Factually! with Adam Conover End Times Fascism with Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor
34 snips
Sep 16, 2026 
Naomi Klein, author and activist on corporate power and climate, and Astra Taylor, filmmaker and Debt Collective co-founder, examine “apocalyptic fascism.” They explore Silicon Valley’s embrace of authoritarianism, AI, climate anxiety, Christian Zionism, media fragmentation, and elite escape fantasies. The conversation turns toward unions, local movements, debt campaigns, and collective action rooted in care for the living world.
AI Snips
Chapters
Books
Transcript
Episode notes
The Billionaires Building The Flood
- Powerful apocalyptic actors are building private arks while helping create the flood they claim they can escape.
- Their imagined refuges include bunkers, rocket ships, cloud-based immortality, and borders that exclude everyone else.
AI Turned Fossil Fuels Into A Lifeline
- Elon Musk’s racism, space ventures, data centers, and fossil-fuel expansion form one escape-oriented political project rather than separate stories.
- Naomi Klein argues that AI’s enormous energy demand turned Trump into Silicon Valley’s preferred ally and a lifeline for fossil fuels.
Fascism Turns Climate Fear Into Scapegoating
- Left environmental pessimism recognizes real material danger, while fascist apocalypticism welcomes catastrophe as proof that chosen groups will triumph.
- The right redirects legitimate fear about climate change, inequality, and AI toward immigrants, trans people, and other vulnerable targets.
