Current Affairs

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Allison Lirish Dean is a journalist and urban planner in North Carolina. She is the author of a recent piece for the Current Affairs print edition (and now available online) critiquing the "Strong Towns" organization. Strong Towns is highly critical of suburban sprawl and many of its suggestions for improving our cities and towns are sensible. But Allison argues that in its disdain for "government" and its rejection of important progressive notions of fairness, Strong Towns ultimately aims up pushing an approach to planning that will maintain existing unjust inequalities. Allison's critique has implications beyond this particular organization, though. It also illuminates the different possible approaches to thinking about how to make better places, and Allison articulates a clear progressive agenda for planning. If, like me, you’re a progressive and distressed about the state of our cities, you will like a lot of what Strong Towns has to say. But its approach is ultimately undergirded by a right-wing ideology that does little to alter the political status quo and further naturalizes austerity and infrastructure inequality: communities get what they deserve based on their ability to build wealth through entrepreneurship, not what they need from a system that prioritizes human rights and the delivery of universal public goods. — Allison Lirish Dean 

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Philip Ewell is a professor of music theory and the author of the new book On Music Theory, and Making Music More Welcoming for Everyone (University of Michigan Press). Ewell is one of the most "controversial" music theorists in the country, having sparked a major controversy in his field by criticizing the "white racial frame" that dominates in music theory. Ewell argued that much of mainstream music theory has been build around unstated assumptions about which kinds of music are sophisticated/interesting/worthy of academic study. Today he joins to explain how the idea of white supremacy translated into normative conceptions about music, why it's a mistake to think he's trying to "cancel Bach," and how music theory can be made, in the words of his title, more welcoming for everyone, meaning that it will break free of its narrow focus on a tiny group of European composers. A great YouTube video by Adam Neely featuring Ewell, discussing the themes of this conversation, is here. A comprehensive Current Affairs article on the controversy around race and music theory is here. Nathan's article on Charles Murray, including Murray's theories about music, is here. The main problem I have noticed as music theory faces its racial past is in how we confront what we see in the mirror as we look at ourselves. Understanding the exclusionist nature of the field is not difficult, and it is also easy to add to the music theory mix a few composers of color and think that this represents a solution to our racial dilemma. However, as Baldwin says in the epigraph to this chapter, all we ever see in that mirror is lies, whether we acknowledge that or not. The lie we are told by music theory, the lie that awaits in the mirror to be seen by the field if it is strong enough to glance, is that the dark secrets of our past are exceptional to our field, and that, by and large, our history has been one of social justice and decency. Of course, this is largely untrue of American music theory, since this is largely untrue of the United States as a country. — Philip Ewell, On Music Theory

Gary Younge spent three decades as a reporter and columnist for The Guardian, where he became one of the publication's most incisive and widely-read contributors. His new book, Dispatches from the Diaspora, collects some of the best of Gary's reporting and commentary. It is a unique collection of snapshots from the African diaspora, from Barbados to London to Ferguson to South Africa. Gary recounts meetings with Maya Angelou, Angela Davis, Desmond Tutu, and other greats, as well as highlighting lesser-known stories like the life of Claudette Colvin. Gary recounts historic moments he witnessed and reported on, such as being in South Africa when Nelson Mandela ascended to the presidency and seeing the reaction to Barack Obama's election on Chicago's South Side. Today Gary joins to discuss some of the events and people he covers in his book, and to expand on some of his unique opinion pieces (such as his "defense of Uncle Tom" and his case for tearing down all statues).“I sign off from this column at a dispiriting time, with racism, cynicism and intolerance on the rise, wages stagnant and faith that progressive change is possible declining even as resistance grows. Things look bleak. The propensity to despair is strong but should not be indulged. Sing yourself up. Imagine a world in which you might thrive, for which there is no evidence. And then fight for it.” — Gary Younge, in his final Guardian column

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Originally aired 9/19/2023Dozens of protesters in Atlanta have recently been hit with serious charges, including domestic terrorism and racketeering, stemming from protest activity over "Cop City," a proposed police training center in the forest outside the city. The Defend the Atlanta Forest movement has been occupying parts of the forest and clashing with police and construction companies, and prosecutors have now come down hard on the protests. In Current Affairs, Nathan recently wrote that the indictment is both preposterous and terrifying. Preposterous because it criminalizes behavior that should obviously not be prosecuted (like buying a tarp, or being an anarchist). And terrifying because it will encourage prosecutors around the country to aggressively pursue dissidents. We are joined today by one of the leading legal experts on the case, Christopher Bruce of the Georgia ACLU. Christopher explains the background, the risks, and shows why all Americans should be deeply troubled by this outrageous prosecutorial overreach.  

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Kristen Ghodsee is Professor of Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of books like Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism and, most recently, Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Life. Today she joins to explain why she believes utopian thinking, and studying the utopian experiments that people have engaged in across history, can help us figure out what life ought to be like and how to change the world for the better. From Charles Fourier to Star Trek, Ghodsee takes us on a fascinating tour of attempts to dream up and build mini-paradises. We discuss where utopias go right and where they go wrong.The Liza Featherstone review of Ghodsee's book in Jacobin is here. The angry Wall Street Journal review is here."Imagination is more important than knowledge,” said Albert Einstein in 1931. “For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.” We stand on the cusp of a new age, with many of us striving toward a more positive vision of the future like the one Roddenberry once provided, where human beings find a way to build a better world for subsequent generations of humanity. Our old ideas about patrilineality and patrilocality are no longer fit for that purpose. We need new ideas, new dreams, and the courage to imagine alternative futures. Now is the moment to “think different.” If we can imagine them first in a galaxy far, far away, it’s only a matter of time before we boldly go and begin figuring out how to translate these inspired visions into our own everyday utopias. — Kristen Ghodsee

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !David Detmer is the author of the book Zinnophobia: The Battle Over History in Education, Politics, and Scholarship. David's book was published five years ago, after former Indiana governor Mitch Daniels became the president of Purdue University and immediately tried to ban Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. Detmer, a Purdue professor and former student of Zinn, set out to understand the remarkable hostility ("Zinnophobia") that Howard Zinn's work has been met with, not just among Republican politicans but also among some of Zinn's historian colleagues. Were they right that People's History is a bad work of history?Today, Detmer joins to discuss Howard Zinn, A People's History of the United States, and the criticisms that have been made of Zinn. We talk about Zinn's life and work and what made it so distinct from previous histories. Detmer explains Zinn's theory of what the role of a historian was. We discuss the backlash and go through some of the criticisms of Zinn. Detmer explains why he finds the criticisms to be so flimsy, and the way in which critics misunderstand what Zinn was doing. The fights over how American history should be taught are still ongoing, as we know, so it's a good moment to take stock of the most famous radical revisionist take on U.S. history. The quote at the beginning is, of course, from Good Will Hunting. Zinn's work lives on at the excellent Zinn Education Project. Highly recommended is Voices of a People's History, a companion volume to the original book that Zinn co-edited with Anthony Arnove. A 21st century sequel to Voices was recently released by Arnove and Haley Pessin. The original People's History has also been adapted into a beautifully-illustrated graphic edition."Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, a perennial bestseller, offers a version of American history that differs substantially from previous accounts. Instead of the standard story, in which the wise and heroic deeds of presidents, Supreme Court justices, military and business leaders, and various other wealthy and powerful elites are celebrated, Zinn makes the case that, whenever progressive change has occurred, it has resulted from the struggles of ordinary people—those who have participated in popular movements agitating for peace, for racial and sexual equality, for improved working conditions, and for environmental protection, among other similar causes. And in opposition to the triumphalist bias of the more orthodox histories, in which the misdeeds of the powerful are either sanitized or erased altogether, Zinn shines a spotlight on official acts of enslaving Africans, slaughtering Indians, lying, breaking promises, violating treaties, trashing the Constitution, exploiting workers, bombing or massacring civilians, assassinating foreign leaders, sabotaging elections, and propping up brutal puppet dictators, among other transgressions.”“As the continuing success of the book testifies (it was first published in 1980 and remains a bestseller 37 years later) many readers warmly welcome Zinn’s work... But the reaction of many other readers (and non-readers who know of Zinn’s book only by reputation) has been one of loathing. Such has been the typical response of political conservatives, the wealthy and powerful, many mainstream historians, and everyone else whose sense of “patriotism” engenders a commitment to the idea that our nation’s leaders, traditions, and institutions are uniquely great and moral.”“What I found, over and over again, is that Zinn’s harsh critics...produce incompetent work—work that, while it occasionally scores an isolated minor point or two against Zinn, nonetheless can be fairly characterized, on the whole, as uncomprehending, larded with errors, and not up to the quality standards one would expect in a term paper submitted for credit by a college freshman for an introductory level course." — David Detmer

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Matthew Desmond's bestselling book Poverty, By America poses a straightforward question: Why is there any poverty at all in such a wealthy country as the United States? Surely we could solve the problem of poverty if we were committed to doing so. Desmond points a finger at those who profit from poverty and argues that there is no justification for our inaction. Desmond, a leading sociologist whose work has won the Pulitzer Prize and the MacArthur Fellowship, tries to understand what makes poverty so persistent and what it would take to "abolish" it forever. Today he joins to give a brief explanation of his ideas.“Lift the floor by rebalancing our social safety net; empower the poor by reining in exploitation; and invest in broad prosperity by turning away from segregation. That’s how we end poverty in America.” — Matthew Desmond“How many artists and poets has poverty denied us? How many diplomats and visionaries? How many political and spiritual leaders? How many nurses and engineers and scientists? Think of how many more of us would be empowered to thrive if we tore down the walls, how much more vibrant and forward-moving our country would be.” — Matthew Desmond“Poverty will be abolished in America only when a mass movement demands it so. And today, such a movement stirs. American labor is once again on the move, growing more boisterous and feistier by the day, organizing workplaces once thought untouchable. A renewed movement for housing justice is gaining steam. In a resurgence of tenant power, renters have formed eviction blockades and chained themselves to the entrances of housing court, meeting the violence of displacement with a force of their own. The Poor People’s Campaign has elevated the voices of low-income Americans around the country, voices challenging “the lie of scarcity in the midst of abundance” and mobilizing for things like educational equity and a reinvestment in public housing.They march under different banners—workers’ unions and tenants’ unions; movements for racial justice and economic justice—but they share a commitment to ending poverty in America.” — Matthew DesmondThe piece by Matthew Yglesias that Desmond is responding to is here. A short version of the argument was published in the New York Times Magazine. Note that Desmond's audio skips briefing in the middle of a sentence toward the end, due to a faulty internet connection. 

"I’m pretty sure that some of my colleagues have signed on to my bill because they wanted me to stop talking about periods on the floor of the House." — Grace MengGrace Meng represents the 6th District of New York in the United States Congress. She recently reintroduced her Menstrual Equity for All Act, which aims to dramatically expand free access to menstrual products across the country. She joins today to discuss the problem of period poverty and what it would take to solve it. A transcript is available here. "When I’m talking about this issue, most people—men or women—do not necessarily prioritize this issue, and many are even surprised to learn about it." — Grace Meng

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Lorne Stockman is the research co-director at Oil Change International, which is dedicated to exposing the harms caused by fossil fuel use and advocating for a green transition. Today Lorne joins us to rebut some common nonsense conservative talking points on climate change, to explain how a transition to 100% renewable energy can happen, and to give a clear assessment of how much progress we've made so far and how much is left to go. It's a crucial conversation for understanding where we're at in the fight against the climate catastrophe, and you may be surprised to hear that there is actually some good news. We discuss such topics as: Why Vivek Ramaswamy is full of crap when he says that continued fossil fuel use is essential for human prosperityWhy Vivek Ramaswamy is also full of crap when he suggests that fossil fuel energy can simply be used to cancel out the damage caused by climate changeWhy many other things said about fossil fuels and climate change are also false or misleadingHow far we've come in improving the cost effectiveness of renewable energy sourcesWhether nuclear power has a necessary role in a green transitionWhether the Inflation Reduction Act is really the boon for climate solutions that it's touted as, and how much it will actually doWhat kinds of fake techno-solutions to climate change we need to be on the lookout forWhat the fossil fuel industry does in the places where its extraction is based, with Lorne discussing his observations in the Permian BasinRead Lorne's writings for Oil Change International here. A recent article Nathan wrote on the latest phase in climate denial is here. This podcast pairs well with our recent conversation with Current Affairs contributor Jag Bhalla. "It is abundantly clear that the production and consumption of fossil gas must decline immediately, even if methane reduction goals are met. No amount of wishful thinking about upstream emissions reduction, carbon capture and storage (CCS), gas-based “blue” hydrogen, or whatever the latest magical techno-fix the industry imagines will save it can change this fact." — Lorne Stockman

Get new episodes early at patreon.com/CurrentAffairs !Jag Bhalla is a contributor to Current Affairs who has also written for Scientific American and Big Think. His pieces for our magazine have frequently focused on debunking popular narratives about climate change and arguing that anything resembling a just future will require a fundamental change in the distribution of global wealth and consumption. Read his articles here:‘Climate Optimism’ Is Dangerous and IrrationalWe Can’t Have Climate Justice Without Ending Computational ColonialismThe 1% Are Many Times Worse Than The Rainforest WreckersWhite-Collar War Crimes and For-Profit Famines Taming the Greedocracy Today Jag joins to explain some of the core ideas underpinning his work in Current Affairs, showing how the assumption that the Global South doesn't matter is buried in U.S. climate discourse and explaining some of the bad math that allows for the rationalization of heinous injustices. Climate change is not just going to be “apocalyptic,” it’s already apocalyptic. It’s just that the apocalypse is not something that happens to the entire world at once. Instead, the apocalyptic events are experienced mostly by the world’s poorest people (who, incidentally, have contributed the least to creating the problem). Who, witnessing the scale of flooding in Pakistan last year, could possibly say that the climate crisis is not “apocalyptic,” unless you regard Pakistanis as unpeople whose well-being simply doesn’t factor into the equation? 33 million people were displaced, and millions of homes destroyed. When white Western elites publish books with titles like It’s Not The End of The World or Apocalypse Never or False Alarm, what they mean is “it’s not the end of the world for people like me,” “apocalyptic conditions will never be experienced by my sector of society,” and “those of us who are among the world’s richest do not need to be alarmed.” Of course, even these are false comforts—the mansions of Malibu are flammable, after all.