
New Discourses
Pursuing the light of objective truth in subjective darkness.
Latest episodes

Mar 1, 2023 • 19min
The SEL Cycle
New Discourses Bullets, Ep. 39
Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) is a dangerous scam being forced into our education system at every level and in every possible way. How are they doing it, though? Among the techniques they're using to ram SEL deeper and deeper into school districts against all sense and without real evidence is what might be called the "SEL Cycle." What happens in this fraudulent circular approach is that SEL is used as a justification to gather survey data from students in their schools. That survey data is then massaged and interpreted through equity, inclusion, and sustainability lenses to identify shortcomings in what's happening in the schools according to those ideological interpretations. Those "shortcomings" are then leveraged to demand more SEL, more DEI training, and more Woke Marxism. In this episode of New Discourses Bullets, host James Lindsay breaks down the way this fraudulent scam operates so that we can put a stop to it.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #SEL

5 snips
Feb 27, 2023 • 2h 30min
Ideological Totalism in the Woke Cult
The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 111
Woke is a cult. In fact, Woke is a cult in exactly the same way Maoism was and is a cult. There's only a little daylight between them, as we recently explored here on the New Discourses Podcast. Ideological cults like Woke and Maoism operate in an environment Robert Jay Lifton labeled "ideological totalism," which he described in depth in his book 'Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China' (https://amzn.to/3k3jdEa). In one of the later chapters of that book, Lifton details eight characteristics of ideological totalism, and in this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay reads through the relevant chapter in full and connects it both to the Maoist context Lifton is describing from the outside and to the Woke Marxist revolution we're currently suffering from the inside. Join James for an unprecedentedly close and detailed look at the cultic nature of Woke.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #woke

Feb 22, 2023 • 26min
Lysenkoism
New Discourses Bullets, Ep. 38
One of the most notorious names almost nobody in the West remembers is Trofim Lysenko. His horrific ideas about agriculture and biology, derived mostly from crackpot Marxist Socialist and Soviet Theory, led to the starvation and deaths of tens of millions of people in the Soviet Union and Communist China. Opposing or challenging his ideas was a one-way ticket to cancellation, reeducation, or destruction. Lysenkoism, therefore, is the enforced application of an ideological lens that distorts science, and thanks to Woke Marxism and the "Sustainability" agenda, we're facing our own looming (and unfolding) Lysenkoist catastrophe right now throughout Western nations. Host James Lindsay breaks it down for you in this episode of New Discourses Bullets. Join him to understand an important facet of what's happening around you and the history behind it. It's not the first time in human history we've made this technocratic, scientistic mistake.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #lysenkoism

6 snips
Feb 20, 2023 • 2h 58min
Woke, Mao, and the American Cultural Revolution
The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 110
It's time to be plain. Actually, it's long past time. What's happening in America today and throughout the West is a Maoist cultural revolution, just like happened in China under the CCP from 1966 to 1976. This is plain to see for those who know what to look for, from the struggle sessions, to the ideological totalism, to the separation of families, to the brainwashing in schools, to the destruction of statues, curriculum, and culture. If we are to have any hope of stopping this Maoist Cultural Revolution with American Characteristics, we have to begin by being honest about it. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay walks the listener through a speech given by Mao Zedong (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-5/mswv5_58.htm) in February 1957 to make very clear and palpable that what's happening here, now, is what was happening there, then. Mao gave this speech on the eve of the Great Leap Forward (into catastrophe), just as we're living through our present tumult on the eve of the Great Reset. Join James for this must-listen podcast so you can understand clearly where we are and thus what we might do about it.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #mao

16 snips
Feb 16, 2023 • 24min
Demoralization
New Discourses Bullets, Ep. 37
Demoralization is the destruction of one's morale, in every possible sense. It's also a Communist tactic being used not only on our society but on our children. At the end of the demoralization road, people can't tell true from false, right from wrong, real from fake, or who to trust, and they completely lack hope outside of the vague hope that the state, institution, or cult will deliver them from their increasing misery and confusion. We must understand demoralization in order to resist and counter demoralization or else we risk losing our country, our children, and ourselves. In this episode of New Discourses Bullets, host James Lindsay sits down and discusses the various elements of demoralization and how they're affecting your life. Join him to avoid the "black pill."
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #demoralization

Feb 15, 2023 • 22min
Is Michael O'Fallon a Christian Nationalist? | OnlySubs with James Lindsay, Ep. 118
This episode of the OnlySubs Podcast with James Lindsay is available for FREE! To get access to all past and future episodes, consider becoming a contributor. Learn more: https://newdiscourses.com/2020/12/new-subscribers-only-podcast/
According to my (fairly hilarious) Wikipedia entry, my friend and business associate Michael O'Fallon is a "Christian Nationalist." Of course, that's not true! Just look at how he's one of the leading voices challenging the new idiotic push for a "Christian Nationalist" movement in America right now. In this episode of my subscribers-only podcast, James Lindsay OnlySubs, I discuss this issue and take you back behind the shadowy curtains and tell you a bit about how Michael and I came to do so much work together. There's an important implication in this story regarding the misguided, so-called "Christian Nationalism" movement. I hope you'll join me and hear it out.
-James Lindsay
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #michaelofallon

Feb 13, 2023 • 1h 42min
Stakeholder Capitalism and the End of History
The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 109
In 1844, Karl Marx explained that Communism, "as the positive transcendence of private property as human self-estrangement" is "the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution. In 2016, 172 years later, Klaus Schwab's World Economic Forum put forth a bold future-casting video proclaiming that by the year 2030 "you will own nothing, and you will be happy." These, of course, are the same assertion. Flashing back, in 1964, in the book 'One-dimensional Man' (https://amzn.to/3HekQ9w), Herbert Marcuse explained that to move forward with the Marxist project, socialism had to figure out how to become productive without abandoning its core values and capitalism had to be reined in to curb its inherent unsustainability. That is, Marcuse reframed the riddle of history and pointed in the direction of a way to solve it. This year, in 2023, just weeks ago in an interview resulting from the Davos meeting (https://bit.ly/3RNDF8m), Klaus Schwab articulated his vision for this solution: state capitalism on the one hand and shareholder capitalism on the other have to be reconsidered into a new model he calls "stakeholder capitalism" that incorporates certain aspects of "social responsibility." Yet again, these are the same assertion. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay explains these ideas in unprecedented depth, reading through and building off an essay he wrote for New Discourses on this very subject last October: "The Riddle of History, Solved" (https://newdiscourses.com/2022/10/riddle-of-history-solved). Join him to understand what "stakeholder capitalism" really is in terms of "productive socialism" and capitalism reframed in terms of the "sustainability" agenda.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #stakeholders

Feb 9, 2023 • 12min
Woke "All" Means Some
New Discourses Bullets, Ep. 36
In Woke Marxism, "all" means "some." Not just any some, but a very specific some: the some that the Woke holds out as suffering from systemic oppression. You see, Woke Marxism maintains that society is contoured entirely by systemic power, and that creates an "unlevel playing field" that they have to "level" through redistribution schemes like equity and inclusion. When they say they want to devise an education system that benefits "all students," then, for example, what they're telling you is that because of systemic power dynamics, some kids don't benefit under the current system, and that needs to be remedied. Thus, the system will favor those students and disfavor others who are deemed relatively privileged. In this episode of New Discourses Bullets, host James Lindsay explains why you need to be on the lookout for specialized Woke uses of the word "all" and why it ultimately harms everyone.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #woke

Feb 3, 2023 • 2h 24min
Gnosticism in the Modern West
The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 108
Marxism is not a philosophy. Neither are its derivatives, like "Wokeness" (Woke Marxism). These are a strain within a broader category of cult religious movements that pose as economics, sociology, and politics. The broad name for these Esoteric cult religions is "Gnosticism," but that's a confusing label for a number of reasons. The first of these reasons is that "gnosticism" as a term, either as a descriptive or proper noun, means several things at once, which requires clarification. Another is that as economic, social, and political movements, they don't look at all like the pre-modern spiritualist and mystical movements that go by those names. In this groundbreaking episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay clarifies the term "gnosticism" and unmasks what amounts to a huge "New Age" movement in the Middle Ages as the source of a thread of Gnostic cult belief that has shaped every facet of the West for at least the last three hundred years. He also explains how the shift from the Middle Ages to the Modern period included a shift in the Gnostic project, out of overt spiritualism and into exactly those society-building realms of economics, sociology, and politics. Join him to gain a completely new understanding of these dangerous movements and how they're relevant to our lives today.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #gnosticism

Feb 2, 2023 • 14min
Action, Reaction, and Beautiful Trouble
New Discourses Bullets, Ep. 35
What if I told you the Woke have a manual for their direct action and you could read it online for free today and learn how to spot their operations and call them out in real time? Well, they do. It's called Beautiful Trouble (https://beautifultrouble.org), and you need to know about it. It's the twenty-first century update to Rules for Radicals (Saul Alinksy), as they shamelessly report for themselves, and fighting the Woke when they engage in direct action (a Marxist tactical term, by the way) is almost impossible without understanding these tactics. In this episode of New Discourses Bullets, host James Lindsay introduces Beautiful Trouble by sharing one of its "principles": "The real action is your target's reaction" (https://beautifultrouble.org/toolbox/tool/the-real-action-is-your-targets-reaction/ ). Join him to learn about this so we can all stop falling for Woke tricks.
Order James Lindsay's new book, The Marxification of Education: https://amzn.to/3RYZ0tY
Support New Discourses: https://newdiscourses.com/support
Follow New Discourses on other platforms: https://newdiscourses.com/subscribe
Follow James Lindsay: https://linktr.ee/conceptualjames
© 2023 New Discourses. All rights reserved. #newdiscourses #jameslindsay #beautifultrouble