Manifesto!

Episode 52: True Believers and the Case of the Writer Turned Congressman

Apr 13, 2023

01:51:27

Creator website

Episode guests

Peter Meijer

Highlights

AI Chapters

Episode notes

Interchangeability of Mass Movements: Insights from History

02:47

Self-Education and Self-Invention: The American Story of a Skid Row Philo-Zionist

01:18

Writing as Therapy and the Pressure to Address Trauma

03:28

The Rise of Digital Swarms

01:18

Introduction

5min

The Seagull Standard

3min

The Importance of Not Being a Dogmatic Writer

3min

The Longshoreman Philosopher's Biography

5min

The Inability to Interact With Someone Who Can't Be Convinced

2min

The Interchangeability of Mass Movements

3min

The Importance of Half Truths in the Mass Movement

2min

The Power of Mass Movements

2min

The Strangeness of Hoffer's Writing Style

3min

10.

The Legend of the Longshoreman Philosopher

5min

11.

The Power of Self-Sacrifice

4min

12.

The Importance of Aesthetics in Mass Movements

3min

13.

The Importance of a Hidden Life

3min

14.

The Persistence of the Totalitarian Impulse

4min

15.

The Digital Swarm

2min

16.

The Social Formation of the Digital Swarm

4min

17.

The Power of the Swarm in the Digital World

3min

18.

The Politics of Social Media

4min

19.

The Moderating Effect of the Water Cooler

3min

20.

The Discourse on the Internet Is Not Representative of the Real World

6min

21.

How to Respond to the Current Environment

3min

22.

The Importance of Visceral Hatred

2min

23.

The Diametric Opposition of the National Socialist

4min

24.

The Problem With a Centralized, but Also Aloof Governing Mechanism

4min

25.

The Importance of Conviction in Political Discourse

3min

26.

The Problem With the AUMF

3min

27.

Cashot Payas

3min

28.

Fame Is Not Fastidious About the Lips

2min

29.

The Importance of Respect in Politics

4min

30.

The Difficulty of Poetry

4min

31.

Jeffrey Hill's Art of Mass Popularity

2min

32.

The Relationship of the Poet and Art to a Democracy Public City

1min

33.

The Relationship Between Art and a Poet

3min

34.

Jeffrey Hill on the Common Man

2min

Jake and Phil are joined by former Michigan Congressman Peter Meijer to discuss longshoreman philosopher Eric Hoffer’s 1951 book, The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements, and the poem “On Reading Crowds and Power,” by Geoffrey Hill.

The Manifesto (an edition with some very cool cover art):
The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements
https://archive.org/details/truebelieverthou0000hoff/mode/2up

The Art:
On Reading Crowds and Power
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/49285/on-reading-crowds-and-power