How to Think About Power and Morality

As subscribers of Wisdom of Crowds will know, the war in Gaza has preoccupied Shadi Hamid for over a year now, and has taken a central place in his political thinking. Damir Marusic begins this episode by challenging Shadi on this point. Is he giving too much importance to one political and moral cause over all others? And is he giving too much importance to morality as such in geopolitics?

The conversation eventually shifts when Damir tells Shadi that he is an “activist” when he writes in favor of a cause, and Shadi disagrees. Writers want to change the world, too, and that does not make them activists. Even Damir (Shadi argues) wants to change the world in some way with his writing. Even Damir has a preferred outcome. But Damir denies this: “My preferred outcome is that people recognize the world is fallen and irredeemable.” Instead, Damir says that it is precisely Trump’s “superpower” of being morally indifferent to norms and human rights that has, paradoxically, brought a few positive developments in the Middle East.

This is a tense episode, one that digs deep into the psyches of both Shadi and Damir. “Then what?” Shadi retorts. “What’s the point of persuading people that the world is irredeemable?” Writing is just playing with words and power, Damir says. It’s “a slug trail I leave behind myself.”

This episode cuts to the core of Shadi’s and Damir’s convictions, so we have made it free for all subscribers. You will not want to miss their conversation about Dresden, Hiroshima, Bucha, Trump and the Middle East, and more!

Required Reading

* Shadi’s essay, “I’m Not As Open-Minded As I Used To Be” (WoC).

* Shadi’s new column, “A genocide is happening in Gaza. We should say so.” (Washington Post).

* “Counting the dead in Gaza: difficult but essential” (The Lancet).

* “Gaza will be entirely destroyed, Israeli minister says” (The Guardian).

* Pankaj Mishra, “Unholy Alliances” (New Yorker).

* Yglesias and Shadi exchange about Trump and the Middle East (X).

* Damir’s Bucha essay (WoC).

* “Trump announces US will stop bombing Houthis” (Politico)

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