Parallax Views w/ J.G. Michael
Society & Culture
On this edition of Parallax Views, last month I spoke to journalist Jeffrey Sharlet, known for his books on the Christian Nationalist movement (The Family and C Street; the former has been made into hit Netflix documentary miniseries), to discuss his latest work The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War. The book is a series of essays exploring the chaotic moment that Sharlet calls the "Trumpocene" and delves into everything from the January 6th insurrection and death of Ashli Babbitt to the Men's Rights Movement. Given he New Hampshire primary on January 23rd, I felt that now was the perfect time to release this prescient conversation.
In this conversation we cover a number of topics including:
- The "F Word"; or fascism
- The rise of the far-right in the U.S. and its global ascendancy
- Trump and Gnosticism; Jeff's citing of the Gnostic poem "Thunder Perfect Mind" in relation to the Trump/MAGA movement phenomena
- Jan 6th and the death of Ashli Babbit; what drove Ashli Babbit into Trumpism and the MAGA movement?
- QAnon and the power of narratives in mobilizing the American right-wing
- Revisiting Jeff's groundbreaking journalism on The Family, C Street, the Council for National Policy (CNP), and Christian Nationalism
- Christian Nationalism and Trumpism as radical reinterpretations of Christianity; the Church itself as not being the be-all-end-all of Christian Nationalism (it's much bigger than that)
- Jeff's experiences reporting on the MRA movement and the ways in which they start with some true observations (men have high suicide rates, custody issues, etc.) that are chucked away in favor of misogny and all-out attacks on feminism (even though some of their initial observations can also be found amongst feminist works such as Susan Faludi's Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man)
- And more!
Sympathy for the Raging Boll: Re-Evaluating Filmmaker Uwe Boll, from the German QAnon Shooter Docudrama HANAU to the Columbine-Inspired HEART OF AMERICA w/ Uwe Boll
Your Waking Nightmare: Exploring the UFO Through the Lens of Horror and Techno-Realism w/ David Metcalfe
Atomic Days: The Untold Story of the Most Toxic Place in America w/ Joshua Frank/U.S. Foreign Policy & Nuclear Weapons Delivery Systems w/ Yint Hmu
Lula Goes to Washington: What Lies Ahead for U.S.-Brazil Relations, Lula’s Foreign Policy, & the Recent Lula/Biden Meeting w/ Andre Pagliarini
The Chinese Spy Balloon Incident & U.S.-China Relations w/ Mel Gurtov
The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power, Paranoia, and the Coming Crisis w/ Jared Yates Sexton
The American Surviellance State: How the U.S. Spies on Dissent w/ David H. Price
Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World’s Most Notorious Diaries w/ Rick Emerson
The Anti-Oligarchy Constitution: Reconstructing the Economic Foundations of American Democracy w/ Joseph Fishkin
Violence Erupts in Israel/Palestine (Jenin Massacre & E. Jerusalem Shooting) w/ Richard Silverstein/Did Thomas Friedman Run Cover for an Israeli Nuclear Smuggling Operation? w/ Grant F. Smith
Pro-Social Deep Fakes? w/ Stephanie Lepp
Hannah Arendt, Adolf Eichmann, & the Problems With the Banality of Evil Hypothesis w/ Ramon Glazov
The Empty Wagon: Zionism’s Journey from Identity Crisis to Identity Theft w/ Rabbi Yaakov Shapiro
Permanent Distortion: How the Financial Markets Abandoned the Real Economy Forever w/ Nomi Prins
Behind the Scenes of the Class Warfare, Body-Horor Cult Classic SOCIETY (+ BRIDE OF RE-ANIMATOR, SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT 4, & GIRL NEXT) w/ Screenwriter Zeph E. Daniel
The Emirati Lobby and Foreign Influence Operations in the U.S. w/ Ben Freeman
Chatting w/ Casper Kelly of Adult Swim Yule Log, Too Many Cooks, & Your Pretty Face is Going to Hell Fame
The Strange Story of Nazi Satanists, the Feds, & Montenegro’s Orthodox Church w/ Boris & Rey of The Empire Never Ended Podcast
Muppets in Moscow: The Unexpected Crazy True Story of Making Sesame Street in Russia w/ Natasha Lance Rogoff
UNLOCKED: Absurdist Humor and Horror Collide in Butt Boy and Tiny Cinema w/ Tyler Cornack and Ryan Koch
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