Dilemma Podcast Jay Shapiro

This podcasts contains the most interesting topics. Jay is super astute and has really shown me how to think critically over the years especially on some of the most complex topics we have to deal with today.

Host is smart and asks good philosophical questions, but is frustratingly centrist at times. Few episodes demonstrate this as clearly as the bromide-filled discussion with Monica Guzman, someone who is herself clearly very intelligent but, at least in this episode, did a terrible job of conveying any rational cause for her Pollyanna-ish view of political polarization. Jay mentioned in that episode that, growing up in a secular liberal Jewish home, he was not accustomed to hearing rational, articulate right-wing arguments until much later in his adult life. Take it from a leftie who actually HAS been exposed to conservative ideas his entire life, engaged with them in their best incarnations, and had in-depth discussions with dozens of conservatives: We may want some of the same things (this claim itself is actually highly suspect once you move beyond the banal universal necessities of food, security, meaning, etc), but the things we are and are not willing to sacrifice to get there make all the difference. Someone who's willing to abide by the killing and imprisonment of peaceful protestors in order to prevent the destruction of fully insured private property, someone who cheers on the state as it violates thousands of women's bodies in order to protect brainless shrimp-sized masses of tissue with no conscious experience, someone who conceives of entire swaths of the population as inherently criminal, diseased, and/or otherwise dangerous, and is willing to grant that state wide berth in purging these segments from the population, whether through deportation, incarceration, or outright terrorization (do not forget the behavior of the police during the George Floyd protests)...these are NOT people that any decent, thoughtful person on the left should ally themselves to or make any common cause with. Yes, we're all experiencing economic anxiety. (In today's news, the Sun rose in the east....) Some people want to solve that by ensuring the maximum opportunity for the most people, knowing full well we have the material capacity to effect this. Some have already decided, long ago, that they are the only rightful heirs to the freedom, security, and prosperity this country has to offer. As someone who has given more intellectual charity and granted the benefit of a doubt to his political enemies (and yes, they are enemies at this point in time, not mere opponents) more than has ever been reciprocated, I have little faith that these gulfs can be mended, when the superstitions of free market capitalism, nationalism, divine mandate theory, racial supremacism, and authority/military worship are so rampant and concentrated in the parts of this country where many people can go their entire lives without actually having a 5-minute political conversation with anyone to the left of, say, a Barack Obama. You have not seen cultural conformity till you have lived in a small rural town in the deep south. Go and actually talk to Trump supporters rather than get your information from other liberal centrists. Go on their Facebook groups and go to their rallies and count how many times you hear or read the word "jobs" vs the word "antifa," or notice how the passion and heat of their rhetoric turns up when the topic of conversation goes from inflation to "critical race theory," the practical apotheosis of every right-wing boogieman, one of a handful of vaporous specters that, in their folly and myopia an ignorance, so many of these people are willing to burn our democracy down to cinders in order to cleanse. Do not kid yourself about what these people want and care about. The psycho-ideological core of American conservatism can be summed up as follows: "There are those who are the heirs to freedom and prosperity (Real Americans) and those who are not (Everyone Else). The state exists primarily to protect the former and punish the latter, and the instruments of the state that effect this dynamic may and should be expanded without bound so long as this distinction is maintained. I will define these two groups as I please and use any justification to maintain these boundaries, both psychologically and structurally." This is what I have gathered from decades of first-hand observation. When they talk about "small government," remind them only that the military, law enforcement, the criminal justice system, corrections, border patrol, ICE, and intelligence agencies are all agents of the state, too. Just ACTUALLY talk to these people, I implore you. It may not be what you want to hear, but you may learn there is actually quite a lot to fear and plenty of reason for distrust, I'm afraid.

Don't let the length scare you away: these podcasts are amazing. Top notch guests and attention to detail make the discussions remarkable.