On this week’s episode I’m joined by Ross Benes, the author of the forthcoming book 1999: The Year Low Culture Conquered America and Kickstarted Our Bizarre Times. It comes out in a few weeks and I hope you take a gander at it; we spent most of our time discussing the ways in which professional wrestling and the Insane Clown Posse help explain the phenomenon that is Donald J. Trump and his ascent through the political landscape, but there’s more to the book than that. And if you enjoyed this episode, I hope you share it with a friend!
Interesting convo, but to the last question I doubt that in the future people will look back & say the concerns about social media were overblown like they were with video games lol. I can't remember video game characters bullying people into suicidal thoughts, nor can I remember video games resulting in an explosion of eating disorders in young girls. I also don't remember seeing anywhere that video games were scamming people, causing a huge jump in mental health issues in youth, or that Command & Conquer resulted in players storming the United States Capitol. That is of course until the rise of modern multiplayer games where bullying could occur just as easily as social media, because games like WoW, Fortnite, etc are pretty much social media with your own action avatar.
Maybe I'm just old though and none of those issues linked to social media are actually important enough anymore, at least in America. Actually that's probably it considering America's Autocrat in Chief did really well with the young demographic of American voters in the election. That raises a chicken and egg question - are today's young people more open to harming others & social media just amps up the volume, or did the social media addiction of young people turn them that way.
I think it might be the second answer considering that the billionaires that own social media won't let their kids touch it & severly limit screen time lol. Yet they want YOUR kids clicking on things every waking hour and develop the algorithms for apps/sites accordingly. Knowing that the owners of a product aimed at the youth won't let their kids go near it should tell you everything. Perhaps it is their understaning of mob mentality that is both their key to untold profits through social media, and also the reason why they won't allow their kids to use what they create.
It's worth examining the processes by which Republicans assembled "the base" and how different that is from the assembly of the Democratic base.
The first step was with the Moral Majority, whose entire thing was identity: "We're the good guys, they're the bad guys."
Meanwhile Democrats have actual interest groups, civil rights, social justice, DEI...all based on policy.
So a base goes from "We're the good guys, they're the bad guys" to "Whatever we do is beyond question better than whatever they do."
Adultery? God forgives us! Self-dealing? They do worse! Child molesters are in our leadership? A few bad apples (but a single child molester among t hem is proof they are worse!)
So a base whose entire motivation is how superior they are to everyone they dislike is a wildly different thing from a base that is attempting to enact policies to address their problems.
And when you're necessarily better, transgressing with impunity is proof that they're worse....because we get away with, or get pardoned, for what they need to be harshly punished for.
Trumpers define themselves by how progressives judge them. They embrace that and that's how they own the libs. Don't give them the ammunition.
The entire Trump cabinet is a super villain comic book cast. They are characters. With their own costumes and persona. Governing is not entertainment. When you're so busy putting on a show, you're not doing what you should. Plus, while you're flooding the zone with bullshit to distract people, you're probably pulling some horrible shit.
Great analysis! Except you left out "Duck Dynasty." 😀
I'll read this later, but the funny thing is that I've been calling Mango's fans Trumpalos for *years*.
Ok, I finally got to minute 10 in the transcript. First of all, PLEASE The Bulwark, allow us to open the transcript in a NEW WINDOW. For now, this page gets replaced with the transcript, so I need to go back to my email inbox, click on your email again, then click on "read the full story", and then I'm finally back to this place. Not helpful.
Secondly and much more importantly, at the tenth minute already Ross claims not to know how to fight against THE characteristic of all FASCIST PROPAGANDA. My guess: he doesn't know because he studied wrestling, not the history of fascism.
There's absolutely nothing new about the "alternative facts" universe that the GOP installed. Read the WSJ 1976 op-ed by Irving Kristol, "The Stupid Party" (Irving is one of the founders of neoconservatism, and yes, Bill's father). "The Stupid Party" is how liberal John Stuart Mill called conservative political parties. Kristol decided to wear it as a medal, arguing that in a "healthy society", intellectuals always stay "at the margins", because as soon as they enter the public debate, conservatives cannot but lose the debate and therefore the elections. To win elections, he argued, conservatives need to play on people's "gut feeling". Obviously, that has always been behind the "circenses" part in the Romans' "pane et circenses" (give the people bread and a circus and they'll stay calm).
How to do that, as 20th century conservatives? First, take over the GOP (done in 2000), then, create a massive fake news machine: Fox (which in court admitted it was pure entertainment, not real news).
That empowered a clown like Trump, who grew up with his father's slogan "In this world you're either a killer or a loser; make sure you're a killer" AND his father's abuse (so who grew up to become a needy man vitally needing to entertain others to have their constant attention and adulation), to use the Fox "circus" and turn it against neocons. All he needed was ONE blatant lie (the Iraq war), and from then on, the GOP base no longer trusted anyone BUT a buffoon who constantly tells him that it's all fake. And yes, that means that Trump thrives on cynicism, electorally. As did and does Fox.
Today, however, something totally different is going on. Trump is ALWAYS manipulated by others. This time, it's by those who took Kristol's idea so seriously that they gave up on democracy altogether and became convinced neofascists. THAT is why what Trump says today is SERIOUS. In his first term, he was manipulated by all kinds of people, with no clear, uniform direction. This time, the guys truly pulling the strings behind the scenes of the Oval Office are NEOFASCISTS (the tech "Network State" ones on the one hand, and the theocratic (Heritage Foundation) on the other - with neofascist populists such as Bannon still hanging around, since he successfully helped Orban to turn Hungary into a fascist state).
Each time, it's the same old story: LIE! Lie and entertain. That's it. Nil novi sub sole.
How do we fight against the cynicism that fuels fascism and the massive lies that its voters (who still support democracy and think that Democrats are fascists...) are plunged into 24/7?
Also in the same way as always: (1) expose the objectively proven truth and (2) teach people how to fact-check. Then have real, respectful conversations with them (do not treat them as "evil" or "stupid", but treat them as the decent, often hard-working people that they are, and who became the victim of a by now very well-oiled propaganda machine).
Finally, what scares me most is the cynicism of Ross himself. "Of course" Democrats will never install free healthcare??!! Obamacare alone by now saved an additional HALF A MILLION American lives, and the fact that so many other lives are saved too, thanks to Medicare and Medicaid, is ONLY thanks to the very hard work of Democrats, while the GOP tries to block and repeal it all again and again!
The day Ross studies the history of fascism (not studying history IS part of a "low culture"), he'll see that its fuel IS cynicism - HIS type of cynicism. And unfortunately, he's not the only Never Trumper who finds this utterly cynical (and frankly immoral) attitude self-evident. It has infected part of this country's progressives too. THAT is why change is so slow, in the US. Each time a president makes huge legislative progress, a whole bunch of people stand at the sidelines yelling "not enough!" and then letting corrupt politicians take over DC again.
CONCLUSION: the way to fight fascism has always been known. It consists of STUDYING THE FACTS, both today's facts and history, combined with learning how the democratic process works, so that no citizens still indulges in the type of cynicism that Ross himself displays. And yes, that means that we've got a lot of work to do...
When you open the transcript, isn't there a little x in the top right that you can click to close the transcript and return to this page?
I just checked: correct! Thank you so much for the tip!
Still, to have a real debate it's best to be able to quote the arguments we disagree with (so that any reader can show us where we misunderstood those quotes, whenever we did), so I'd love to have the transcript open in a new tab, which would make it easy to switch from the text to the comment section.
Anyhow, thanks again!
If you right-click on the "transcript" button and choose "Open in Reading Mode" it opens in a different, smaller window beside the video. Does that help?
Thank you. I truly appreciate your response and how thorough and thoughtful it is. I agree that it is Ross’ type of cynicism which is prevalent in privileged folks (i.e. mostly white people middle and upper middle class who can afford the luxury of cynicism) that is an obstacle to more change more quickly. I am unsubscribing from The Bulwark primarily due to podcasts like this where these folks like to talk and hear their own voices but dont offer anything new and dont offer ways to get out of the deep hole of shit we’re in. They just want to sell their own books while it all burns down.
Make sure not to buy into the fascist anthropology that assumes that certain people just ARE somehow "inferior" by nature... . Because as soon as we indulge in imagining that those who disagree with us must somehow be morally inferior to us, we ARE adopting a fascist, hierarchical view of human nature. There are no scientific studies backing up those claims...
As to unsubscribing from The Bulwark: how will that help us move forward? Imho, there is only one way forward, namely actively go toward people who disagree with us and engage in real, respectful debates with them. That is and has always been the only way to obtain a thriving democracy. And with fascism being installed, cultivating a real debate culture is imho more urgent than ever before.
YES WE CAN! ;-)
Thank you
The problem is that given the facts (average IQ under 100; 80% of us overweight; overpopulation, etc.) I doubt our version of humankind is capable of studying "today's facts and history." A democracy is fueled by participation, and we are not up to participating. Hence, a grim outlook. Lie and entertain. Little buyer's remorse to be seen as Rome burns.
Not at all a helpful suggestion and I question where your stats are coming from.....a better suggestion is anyone is capable of learning; the subject matter needs to be presented in a coherent manner with reasonable arguments backed up by FACTS. This is the reason why we have to fight against the efforts to dismantle the education system in US and return to teaching as it was before this crusade to turn America fascist began. Also we must watch carefully to stem the tide to ban books...it happened under Hitler, it can happen under Trump if we let ourselves be afraid of their bullying.
I'd counter-argue that... we cannot afford such a cynical outlook on the American people, the present and future. So let's unpack your arguments for a moment.
First of all, by definition the average IQ is set at 100, so what do you mean by "average IQ under 100"?
Secondly, studying is a SKILL that anyone can develop, not some kind of innate personality trait. All that is needed is that we help others develop it (and taste the joy of develop it), that's all. Why would we miraculously no longer be able to do that... ?
Third, it's precisely when social media and unhealthy diets lower our political literacy and knowledge of the most relevant facts that we need to step up and invest in (formal and informal) methods of education again. And here, AS a progressive (defined as someone espousing most of the ideals that the vast majority of the American people today want to see Congress put into law, and who believes in the democratic process as the best way to get there), I have to admit that "the left" is in part to blame. For decades now, universities (which are mostly left-wing, if only BECAUSE conservatives turned away from believing in basic fact-checking and critical thinking for a long time already) mistakenly saw their first job (when it comes to pedagogy) as VALIDATING a student's "personal opinions" (as if these would by definition be valuable), with the explicit goal of making him/her feel valuable AS an individual, rather than prioritizing debunking false ideas and TRANSMITTING the many wonderful things people in the past (who mostly happen to be "dead old white men", for past political/cultural reasons) have invented, discovered, and created.
That's imho how today so many journalists (including most people working for The Bulwark) have such a superficial take on what is going on.
Add to that the tendency of the English-speaking world to have an aversion for "ideas" (which even made The Bulwark reduce MAGA 2.0 mostly to Trump's clownish behavior without truly refuting the neofascist ideology that was behind it and made it SO dangerous in the first place), ever since Hume saw ideas/thinking as something less real/important than the sensory level of experience... and it becomes more understandable why we got where we are at today.
Still, for all these important problems, there is only one solution: tackle them head-on. Imagining that somehow we could skip that stage and just "jump" to a well-educated society, and if not should give up altogether, is again, imho, a stance that is not only demonstrably false, we just cannot afford to indulge in those types of idealism/pessimism...
My Trumpy friends always tell me… ‘don’t worry. He’s not going to do 10% of this (tariffs, take over Canada, Panama and Greenland, pull out of NATO, etc.’. This may work but n campaigning, but it doesn’t work in governing. If Trump was just joking around, the Canadians didn’t get the joke. The stock market does not get the tariff joke. Maga fans are not going to appreciate the cut Medicaid joke.
Your "trumpy" friends need to study more and talk less...have them research the Nazi /Hitler belief in LEBENSRAUM. It was a key concept to the success of Hitler's plan to expand his empire and beliefs. Trump is not joking...he is not delusional...he has a plan and it is LEBENSRAUM. Google it and educate yourselves so you will be able to fight back before it is too late.
It hasn't "flipped 180." The Republicans were anti-woman then and they're anti-woman now. The difference is that more women have been prominently calling out the misogyny of some of these "fun, zany" entertainers, leaving the latter without a home among the Democrats. (I'm not saying anything about Al Franken here -- I don't think what happened to him was fair, but the point still stands.)
It seems like you’re saying that Democrats need cartoonish, lying clowns to compete with the Republicans. And it’s their fault that they haven’t come up with them. You may be correct, but there is no reason for hope here
It's an idea that has been proven to be false. Just ask yourself: which fascist regime was EVER defeated by a clown, offering the people only cynicism and entertainment rather than all the objective facts needed to make the bubble of fascist propaganda explode?
“ rather than all the objective facts needed to make the bubble of fascist propaganda explode?”
Not snark: Can you please cite when objective facts made fascist propaganda explode?
History seems to prove that objective facts have little to zero ability to squash fascism, ie, the Democratic Party mantra.
Study the history of South Africa's Apartheid fascism, for instance. Or notice how Germany deals with the truth today.
As to your counterargument: what do you mean by "the Democratic Party mantra"?
Agree that Germany has done a solid job of tamping down fascism since WW2, albeit utilizing near draconian laws. That stated, and in spite of it, Fascism is rising precipitously there - as you may acknowledge.
South Africa was disgustingly racist, & codified as such - but that literally resembled the USA’s codified racism until the 60’s. (Not fascism, per se.
The Democratic Party mantra has for decades been stuck in the false belief that “objective facts” will protect their place in American political society.
To that, allow me to cite, “Res ipsa loquitur”.
Any example of those "near draconian laws", and why would you call them "draconian"?
And yes, fascism is rising... in EAST Germany. As we know, for decades former dictatorships risk falling back into fascism. That's because its population (1) is still not very politically literate yet, when it comes to how a democracy functions, (2) doesn't immediately see the benefits of democracy yet (corruption tends to persist long after a dictatorship is formally ended, as Greece and Italy also prove, so local politicians tend to not prioritize the well-being of their constituents but their own careers instead, not necessarily because they "are evil" but simply because their personal history has proven that if you don't, you may well end up at the bottom of the pecking order), and (3) has vague memories of certain things that "were better" in the past, so under a fascist regime.
In West Germany (a democracy for almost a century now, except for the Nazi decade) the AfD's poll numbers are in the single digits.
And indeed, there is a difference between codified racism and fascism. The US Constitution is 100% democratic (separation of the three branches of government), whereas South Africa's Apartheid Constitution was not, as far as I remember (it was fascist; to be verified though). Apart from that, both indeed had a form of codified racism.
The difference matters, because today, the GOP is ending "codified democracy" and replacing it with "codified fascism". That is why passing the CR bill was SO vitally important (exceptionally), because it seriously slows down that codification, and the more fascism is codified, the more we reach a point of no return.
As to the Democratic Party: I disagree. They've always been lucid about how fragile a democracy is, and how much the survival of democracy depends on a critical number of citizens having access to the objectively proven truth. These are just basic facts, in and of themselves, regardless of which party believes them or not.
Finally, your last lines seem to fall into the same, cynical trap: if fascist propaganda can take over DC, then somehow we should abandon them altogether? Or somehow, Democrats rigorously avoiding creating their own fake news propaganda machine and coming up with their own clown in chief would have been a BAD idea? Is that what you're saying?
Accepting the gist of your arguments, with some reservations regarding the human nature paradox.
As for the Democratic Party, I was deeply immersed in it for years during the “aughts”.
A delegate to state and national nominating conventions, board member of a large Democratic club, a publicly elected Precinct Committeeman, a hard working, ground pounding campaign canvasser of locations near home and occasionally other states, a licensed security provider (“bodyguard”) for Democratic candidates for local, state and in one case - presidential Primary campaigns (before they qualified for S/S protection).
So I know what Democratic Party “mantra” is, which is exactly why I eventually chose to resign from all of that when it became obvious that the Party could not see the forest for the trees.
And stubbornly refused to consider change.
Oh, I continued to donate to certain Democrats & Liberal pols, and am a so called “Super Voter”.
But that’s where it stopped, until 2024.
As a former military person, whose Oath to the Constitution continues - I’m newly Re-dedicated against the authoritarian cabal known as the “Republican Party”.
Gotta be productive now. Have a good weekend!
That sounds like a subjective argument, no? You imagine that there is a Democratic mantra because that is how you interpret your personal experience inside the Democratic Party.
Even if we'd assume for a moment that we could extrapolate it and show that it's the objective truth about the Democratic Party, my question remains: why would it be false?
You merely repeat that you believe that it's false here, but don't tell us why that would be true. Any idea?
In the meantime: a democracy vitally needs people like you and me (and everyone else) to have real, respectful debates (as we're having here), in which we both assume that we may be wrong and therefore accept to fact-check both our own beliefs and those of others, coming up with objective evidence and arguments. So that IS what "being productive" as a citizen inside a democracy means. We cannot possibly skip that fact. And if there is a democratic (Democratic or not) "mantra", this IS it... . There are no shortcuts. You need a lively debate culture, on the level of society, before a democracy can thrive and can quite easily defeat the constantly looming threat of falling into fascism. To the extent that we ARE today falling into fascism, restoring that culture IS what should be our first priority, and, I'd argue, is tremendously "productive" - productive of the civil society needed to restore democracy asap.
And with that... thank you so much for your service!
Have a good weekend.
Post Script: And that may be so, for I am predominantly a soldier in this high stake’s political battle. Not a philosopher. 😉
I agree, and I hope I hope Franken comes back
I only listened to the beginning and got stuck very quickly. If you want to discard the fact that today, we still don't have free healthcare even though most Democrats have always argued that that's exactly what we need and what they will work on as "of course they never did it" because "they never meant it" in the first place, and you take THAT as an excuse for the current pervasive cynicism that led people to either not vote or vote for Trump... you ARE the perfect example of "low culture", especially when it comes to political literacy.
The democratic process means that ANY politician will always have to compromise with 400 other representatives in Congress, and with the Senate, and with the president. That is what DEMOCRACY means.
There are no silver bullets in a democracy. So look at what Democrats achieved over the last few decades, and you cannot but see that they did EXACTLY what they promised: using the democratic process to get us closer and closer to universal, free healthcare.
Reject that as "not enough" and YOU are the cynical, low-political-literacy guy who are part of the problem, not the solution!
👏👏👏👏👏👏yes
I haven't thought this through, but maybe "1999" started with the 1998 Clinton sex scandal. A lot of norms fell that year.
It's wishful thinking to assume that Trump doesn't mean what he says.
He's been talking for years as when the US has trade deficit with a country, that country is CHEATING us out of that amount of money, and that's why he has to invade Canada and impose tariffs.
Hey WAKE THE FUCK UP, HE IMPOSED TARIFFS. He DID side with Russian in Ukraine.
He may, in fact, invade Canada.
He's probably going to invade Greenland and Panama.
You're comfortable upper class people who pretend that nothing bad happens in the world.
This is what Germany was like before Hitler actually started invading countries, sure the government is weird, but we're all fine, right?
I'm gonna paste this here too from down a bit:
This is a terrible podcast. These cringy laughing joking numbnuts are like, ha ha ha, we're so smart, we're in on the joke, there's no real Fascism, it's all a joke.
No it's not a joke. It's sold as a joke, but Trump isn't an actor, Donald Trump is a deeply mentally damaged man with neurological problems like ADHD and psychological problems like the PERSONALITY DISORDER called malignant narcissism.
His worship of Putin isn't Kayfabe, it's how a man with a personality disorder of narcissism attempts to soothe his emotions. And what he worships is the abuse of power which involves hurting actual populations.
He literally has the same kind of personality as an actual monster like Stalin or Mussolini. That's not pretend.
They'll be laughing up until the day they get put against a wall and shot!
This is definitely a plan on Trump's part to follow in Putin's footsteps. Has anyone ever heard or studied the concept of "Lebensraum"? If you have or had you would know that Trump's threats about Canada, Greenland, and Panama are nothing to laugh about...stop calling him names that soften what would be a terrible blow to
our country and really put out there what he and whomever is feeding him the
concepts to be able to delude the "low-culture". Instead of insulting the population of the US...how about educating them (which neither party ever did)..knowledge is power and they did not want the everyday citizen to have the power to vote intelligently...don't blame the people...they have been groomed for this moment for many years...low education standards for the public schools; overextended work hours to make ends meet with little time to keep current on civic issues; pushing of consumerism to fill the empty voids in their lives (big business plays a big part here).
Americans have been duped but it is not too late to turn things around....educate, educate, educate. Analyze each facet of Trump's so called dementia and compare it to
Hitler and the events leading up to WWII....then teach it to the persons willing to listen and pass it on.
I’m done pretending. We’re either thoroughly deluded or unbelievably brainwashed. Wise up and stop dragging the rest of us down.
Great podcast! Another example of Dems not getting the "new picture"- Senator Franken. They sure kicked him out. He could've been a phenomenal weapon against all this crap. Nothing like humor, sarcasm and satire to get people to see logic! Dems are just ..... I don't know a good word to describe their ineptness - well maybe that's it. Dems are inept. Profoundly inept. Thanks for a great podcast.
Agree about Franken. That was the moment for me when I realized we (Dems) were hopeless. I had recently finished his book, Giant of the Senate, when the accusations came out. An undercurrent in the book was how much the GOP/Fox had always been out for him, and how they tracked him closely throughout his senate campaign. I was sure, given it was known he was particularly despised by the right, his fellow Dems would pause and investigate the claims. Instead they just fell right into useful idiot roles.
Yes! I too had the moment of "You're kidding, right??" I was pissed. Dems need a whole revamp or we need a new party. Franken was/is awesome. What a loss.
No, terrible podcast. These cringy laughing joking numbnuts are like, ha ha ha, we're so smart, we're in on the joke, there's no real Fascism, it's all a joke.
No it's not a joke. It's sold as a joke, but Trump isn't an actor, Donald Trump is a deeply mentally damaged man with neurological problems like ADHD and psychological problems like the PERSONALITY DISORDER called malignant narcissism.
His worship of Putin isn't Kayfabe, it's how a man with a personality disorder of narcissism attempts to soothe his emotions. And what he worships is the abuse of power which involves hurting actual populations.
He literally has the same kind of personality as an actual monster like Stalin or Mussolini. That's not pretend.
They'll be laughing up until the day they get put against a wall and shot!
Yes, that's part of their point.
Ok, good to know, because I got so disgusted with the high number of falsehoods myself, when reading the transcript, that I too just gave up, expecting nothing more from it. I'll give it (reluctantly) another try...
I admit that I've only gotten 9 minutes in so far, and I'm puking with disgust at these giggling privileged idiots.
Well at least you’re listening!
Sorry Sonny, but we have got to stop laughing and joking and looking to blame ourselves for what is happening...I am sick and tired about the attacks on "Dems" (not one myself but do believe in the Democratic process). How about putting out real information to help people see what is happening and how it is happening so they can fight back? I'm looking for input on the situations happening around me so I can do something constructive to help turn the tides...snarky, self-important jibes at Democrats or anyone else trying to help stop this wave of autocracy is not helpful. I'm sure you have heard the saying ..."united we succeed, divided we fall". Your contributing to the fall in my opinion by your constant search and writing on subject matter that has no constructive purpose. I am going to share a quote by Wm Vogt from his1948 book "Road to Survival".
"It is no accident that authoritarian groups of all stripes consistently oppose freedom of education, and advocate unchecked reproduction." Just a snippet of what can be shared and pondered in order to educatate.
My take on the podcast was about how we got here! For me, the podcast tracks back into the 90s and shows how our culture believed these ridiculous things that have led to voting in ridiculous people and a propensity to believe ridiculous things. Yes, I think we all agree with how horrible it all is and how Trump is etc. - but it's time we started looking at how we got here! To me, this *might* help us understand how to get out of it (though I have less and less hope about that). It's a fascinating cultural shift and impact and can also be horrific right now - AT THE SAME TIME.
The guy who went to University of Nebraska and lives in NY, is all 'I don't know what college educated people like'🙃. I love the part where he's saying Democrats not having Hulk Hogan characters is a big problem for them. No mention of how deluded people have become when they apply their fandom to real world politics just might be an effing problem. This is the first Bulwark podcast episode where I was constantly WTFing.
Well, I could lower my standards, or hoi polloi could raise theirs. Who can say?
Of all the characters in politics and culture, there was no mention of trolls in your podcast. The aim and measure of a troll’s success is disruption. Trump and Musk are, at their core, trolls.
This was quite an informative episode. I plan to get the book. And thank you for your extended discussion of Insane Clown Posse - I had only had a limited awareness of them.
It’s insulting to Canadians!