Eminent Americans Justin Smith-Ruiu Is Not Who You Think He Is
This is the first episode of Eminent Americans where I’ve had the pleasure of talking to both the subject of a published profile and the profile writer at the same time.
Kevin LaTorre, a return guest on the show, recently wrote “The 6,069 Fictions of Justin Smith-Ruiu,” a long piece about philosopher and metafictionist Justin Smith-Ruiu. Or maybe Justin wrote it himself, appropriating Kevin’s name and likeness as another one of his authorial alter-egos. Maybe “Kevin” doesn’t even exist. I mean, I think he does, since I’ve talked to him before on zoom, and perused his digital profile, but what if he’s just a gifted improviser who was hired by Justin to play Kevin on my podcast? What if the plan all along was to create a real-seeming “Kevin LaTorre” persona, with a fully fleshed out online profile, in order to add yet another layer of semi-unreality to the many layers of the Hinternet, Justin’s vast and sprawling endeavor.
This seems unlikely, given that “Kevin” and I don’t even talk about Justin in our first podcast interview, but who knows? If you’re going to create a plausible “Kevin LaTorre” in the world, then you need to have him doing plausibly Kevin LaTorre-esque things, like coming on my podcast to discuss his “faith,” the essayist “Jia Tolentino,” and “climate change.”
Anyhoo — such are the questions one begins to ask oneself after one has spent more than a certain amount of time in Justin’s world.
The conversation, which I really enjoyed, is primarily about Justin and his Hinternet project. We also talk about the challenges that Kevin faced in profiling Justin, Justin’s disillusionment with academia, and Justin's scooter accident of a few years ago, which marked a profound break in his life and career. And much, much more.
Hinternet posts we discuss include (descriptors and parentheticals from Kevin)
* His past audio-mixing history
* This metafiction: "The Storyteller"
* His case against euthanasia (by far, the most technoskeptic take I've read from him)
* His case for pacifism (by far the most dissident-left stance he has, I think -- antiwar in a pro-war Democratic party)
* His reflection on his post-2020 developments (where he uses the "old-time religion" of love which sums up plenty about him lately)
The show notes, according to ChatGPT:
🕰️ Episode Show Notes: Justin Smith-Ruiu & Kevin Latorre on Metafiction, Belief, and Intellectual Rupture
[00:00] — Introduction: Dan sets the tone, welcomes listeners, and introduces Justin and Kevin. Also explains the wounded ignoramus moniker.
[01:00] — The premise: A first for Eminent Americans—bringing together the subject of a profile and its author. Kevin describes how the episode came to be.
[03:00] — Who is Justin Smith-Ruiu? Justin gives his intellectual and personal background—from Sacramento to Paris, academic to substacker.
[05:30] — The Lime Scooter incident: Real or not real? Justin discusses the tall tale and his metafictional approach to truth and storytelling.
[10:00] — What is The Hinternet? Justin outlines his sprawling, layered Substack project, blending essay, fiction, and pseudonymous experimentation.
[13:00] — On writing after rupture: Justin reflects on how his philosophical and creative instincts changed after 2020 and his break with academic norms.
[17:00] — Kevin on profiling Justin: The challenges of writing about a slippery, self-multiplying metafictional presence.
[21:00] — Metafiction, Nabokov, and Timothy Pnin: Literary precedents for Justin’s work, and why The Hinternet feels more like a fictional universe than a newsletter.
[24:00] — A ghost among us: Justin discusses how COVID-era disillusionment led to a sense of living as a “ghost,” and how that figures into his work.
[28:00] — Academia and its discontents: Justin explains the psychological and professional struggle of leaving the norms of philosophy behind.
[32:00] — Class background stories: Dan, Kevin, and Justin reflect on their families, social mobility, and the strange fluidity of class in America.
[38:00] — Fiction vs. performance art: Kevin and Justin discuss how The Hinternet functions like a long-form installation piece as much as a writing project.
[42:00] — Future plans for The Hinternet: Justin teases the upcoming Ort Cloud Review, and ambitions to grow The Hinternet into a nonprofit media institution.
[47:00] — On returning to Catholicism: Justin shares his path back to the church, the limits of secular humanism, and the desire for a faith tradition “for the dumbest people you can find.”
[52:00] — Kevin on faith and refinement through suffering: The personal and emotional stakes of belief.
[56:00] — Theology vs. intellectual pride: Justin discusses the difference between elite theology and his desire for something simpler, more grounded.
[01:00:00] — Writing as a spiritual and psychological response: Dan reflects on faith, fiction, and the psycho-spiritual stakes of writing and thinking in the 2020s.
[01:04:00] — Will The Hinternet become a book? Maybe not. Justin sees it as an evolving structure with other aims.
[01:07:00] — On the pleasure of the work: Why The Hinternet is fun to read, and why that joy is essential to its value.
[01:11:00] — Wrap-up: Dan reflects on the episode’s tone and richness, and plugs Kevin’s profile and Justin’s best pieces.
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