#142 - Nathan Pinkoski - France Sacrificed Free Speech To Keep The Peace, Britain Did The Same And Now Neither Has Either

Aug 27, 2026

Nathan Pinkoski, Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute and translator of The Suicide of France, offers a brisk tour of cultural and legal shifts since 1968. He discusses why Zemmour resonated in France, how free speech was traded for peace amid migration, Britain’s faster path to statutory change, Vichy’s weaponization, and a call for Christian revival to renew Western identity.

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INSIGHT

Hate Speech Law And The 10% Threshold

The Plaven hate‑speech law made third‑party NGOs able to bring charges and financially benefit from fines, shifting speech constraints into civil enforcement.
Pinkoski notes lawmakers justified it as preventive once foreign‑born population approached a ~10% threshold to keep the peace.

INSIGHT

Judges Versus Parliamentary Reversal

Judicial supremacy blocks major policy reversals in France because judges exert elevated review powers, unlike Britain where statute can reverse judicial gains.
Pinkoski argues British Parliament retains mechanisms to unpick human‑rights architecture if a bold government chooses to act.

INSIGHT

Trudeau's Constitutional Coup

Pierre Trudeau used patriation to attach the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to the constitution, shifting powers from Parliament to the Supreme Court.
Nathan highlights Tony Benn and Enoch Powell as rare voices who warned Britain about this constitutional transfer of authority.

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Nathan Pinkoski is a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute, the translator of Eric Zemmour’s The Suicide of France, and author of the forthcoming Silent Revolution: The End of the Liberal West. He writes for First Things and Compact and publishes the Substack Lament for the Nations.

In this conversation, we think out loud about:

— Why Zemmour’s Suicide of France sold half a million copies and what it tells the English-speaking world
— How the 1968 revolution conquered society rather than the state — and nobody noticed the difference
— The 10% threshold: when the foreign-born population reaches a certain level, free speech is the price of keeping the peace
— How Britain could dismantle its entire progressive legal architecture in a single statute — and why France, Canada, and America cannot — Pierre Trudeau’s constitutional coup: how Canada became the end game of perverted Westminster, and why only Tony Benn and Enoch Powell saw it coming
— The three deaths of the father: de Gaulle, paternal authority, and the gold standard — and why the West no longer produces leaders
— How Vichy was weaponised to impose collective guilt on the French people and delegitimise national sovereignty
— Why the smartphone killed assimilation and the Ellis Island myth is dead
— Why the only way to save the West is Christian revival

Find Nathan Pinkoski:

Substack: lamentforthenations.substack.com
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The Suicide of France by Eric Zemmour

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Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical and civilisational forces shaping England, Britain, the Anglosphere and the wider West. Hosted by John Gillam.

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