Latest / Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza / Ep.11 - Dr. Brandon Van Dyck of Princeton Discusses Getting Cancelled

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Ep.11 - Dr. Brandon Van Dyck of Princeton Discusses Getting Cancelled · Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza

0:01
Doctor Van Dyke, thanks for joining today.
0:03
It's. Great to be here, Doctor Van
0:06
Dyke. I don't get called that very
0:07
often. Is that right?
0:10
Well, you do look more like a Brandon, so do you mind just
0:15
introducing yourself for us? Sure.
0:18
My name is Brandon Van Dyke. I work for the Witherspoon
0:21
Institute and the Aquinas Institute in Princeton, NJ.
0:25
I used to be a professor of government and law at Lafayette
0:28
College, and I'll leave it there for now.
0:32
But I'm happy to elaborate on any of those things insofar as
0:38
you'd like me to. Yeah.
0:40
Well, there's so much to say. So one thing that's interesting
0:42
is if you feel comfortable just talking a little bit about how
0:46
you move from Lafayette College to your present position.
0:50
Yes, well, I was. So I was a professor, an
0:53
assistant professor at Lafayette College from 2013 to 2021.
0:58
And I think, you know, depending on who you ask, the reasons for
1:04
my leaving. Or, you know, different people
1:08
might give different explanations of why I left.
1:11
But my analysis of what happened is that.
1:14
I became a political pariah at Lafayette College, and I fault
1:19
myself for that in large part. And what I mean by that is,
1:23
while it is true that I had sincere disagreements with my
1:29
colleagues and the administration regarding the
1:31
intellectual climate at Lafayette, I don't think that I
1:34
went about expressing my disagreement in the most
1:37
effective way. I was too combative and
1:40
aggressive and. Dealing with my colleagues and
1:45
even with students who I considered, who I thought were
1:51
contributing to an intellectual climate on campus that was, that
1:57
had negative effects on students.
1:59
So I fault myself for that. But I don't fault myself for
2:04
speaking out against both the orthodoxy itself and the fact
2:09
that it was. Informally enforced through
2:16
ostracism and resulting self censorship.
2:19
But anyway, so more specifically I think around 2017, due to a
2:25
few factors, that's really 2016. 2017 is when I really began to
2:30
become concerned about the intellectual climate on campus,
2:34
and I started a speaker series called The Mill Series and the
2:37
idea was to bring. People to campus or just to host
2:41
conversations where we would put.
2:43
So we would either bring people to campus who articulated some
2:48
viewpoint that ran counter to the campus orthodoxy, which was,
2:52
you know, kind of a cultural leftist progressive orthodoxy,
2:55
or we would just host events and discuss more right wing or
3:00
conservative positions. And I think that.
3:06
There were a few events in particular that we held that
3:09
garnered a lot of negative attention.
3:11
So for example, at some point in 2017, we brought a young lady
3:15
named Lauren Chen, who then violent by, who at that time
3:19
went by the pseudonym Roaming Millennial.
3:21
She was a YouTube host. She she's Canadian, but she
3:27
supported Donald Trump in the 2016 election, and we brought
3:32
her to campus to talk about why she supported Trump.
3:36
For the simple reason that Trump had won the election but almost
3:40
a year had passed and not once had we hosted someone who
3:44
supported the sitting president of the United States to campus.
3:48
So we just thought it would be interesting.
3:49
And you know, we also thought that if she's a young woman, so
3:53
she is, she understands the culture, let's say, of college
4:01
age students. Furthermore, she's a woman, and
4:04
she's a person of color, which. Doesn't matter to me because I
4:08
don't like that trend in left wing circles to focus so much on
4:15
the identity of the speaker rather than the substance of
4:19
what they're saying. Still, we thought it might make
4:21
it a more effective event, that it's a woman and a person of
4:23
color rather than, say, an old white man.
4:26
But it turned out to just be a very controversial event.
4:30
A ton of students came. A lot of students are really
4:32
upset both by the event itself. The very fact that we were
4:36
having the event, but also because of some of the things
4:38
she said and really from that moment on the Mill series became
4:43
a kind of lightning rod rod. And I in particular became a
4:47
kind of lightning rod on campus. And like I said at the top of
4:50
this conversation, you know I was very combative and
4:55
aggressive often and responding to critiques of the Mill series
5:02
that I thought were I'll founded and.
5:06
Often just slanderous, but it just wasn't very prudent on my
5:11
part to respond in the aggressive, hostile manner that
5:15
I did because I ended up making enemies with my colleagues, with
5:18
the administration, and ultimately I was denied tenure.
5:22
And I think, you know, I was naive because I thought that my
5:25
publication record and my teaching evaluations would
5:28
enable me to get tenure even though I was a controversial
5:31
student or controversial. Professor, But what I realized
5:35
is that no, if all your colleagues dislike you, even if
5:39
by objective criteria you you would qualify for tenure,
5:46
they're going to find a way to deny it to you.
5:48
And I do think that's what happened to me.
5:49
So I was denied tenure at Lafayette, and that was really
5:52
crushing because I loved teaching and I loved research, I
5:55
loved academia. But fortunately I landed on my
5:59
own 2 feet by finding. These positions at the
6:03
Witherspoon and Aquinas Institutes in Princeton.
6:06
And yeah, I think I I'm in a position now to say that I am as
6:12
happy in these positions as I was as a professor at Lafayette.
6:16
I'm not saying a lot because I really loved being a professor
6:19
at Lafayette. So I'll stop there.
6:22
What would you exactly have done differently in your approach to
6:25
the persecution that you faced? Well, and I don't want to
6:31
overstate. What I went through, like, I'm
6:34
not even sure. I mean, I it's probably not
6:36
unreasonable to use the term persecution, but certainly the
6:40
criticism that I faced, I think that this is a tough one
6:44
because, you know, I am a sort of warrior by personality.
6:47
I think that, you know, I've said this to people before I was
6:51
born to March into battle. That's kind of my personality.
6:56
I Warrior. A warrior, Yeah.
7:00
Just, you know, and obviously, you know, a lot of human beings
7:06
and a lot of men in particular have that in them, a kind of
7:08
aggressive instinct. You know, I like conflict.
7:12
I'm not at all conflict averse. I actually really enjoy
7:15
conflict. It it makes me come alive.
7:17
And I'm not saying that's really a good or a bad thing.
7:21
It's just true. And I do think that.
7:24
You know, one could make an evolutionary argument about why
7:26
at least some men are like that. And I really leaned into that
7:32
aspect of my personality during this period.
7:35
And I did it in part because it was fun and it was invigorating.
7:39
And I really did feel indignant at the things that people were
7:43
saying about me and about the students I was working with and
7:46
about the MIL Series initiative. But again, it wasn't prudent
7:50
because. I wasn't really looking out for
7:53
my future self because my future because I really wanted to stay
7:56
at Lafayette. I loved academia.
7:58
You know, being a tenured professor in academia, it's a
8:01
rare privilege these days. And I was very much on my way to
8:06
enjoying that privilege. And then I sort of sabotaged it.
8:10
And So what I would have done differently is I think I would
8:14
have like I do not at all regret.
8:18
Expressing my concerns and my critiques of the intellectual
8:22
climate on campus and really the intellectual climate and
8:25
academic scholarship and teaching and just the
8:27
intellectual status quo and academic scholarship and
8:30
teaching. But I think that what I would
8:32
have done differently is really spent a lot of time getting my
8:35
arguments together, putting them in writing, and then trying to
8:39
build coalitions with the more kind of liberal left.
8:45
In order to create organizations, in order to
8:48
create a kind of broader organization.
8:50
So rather than creating a kind of dissident organization that I
8:53
was basically running alone in conjunction with several
8:57
students, I would have tried to get more professors,
9:00
administrators and administrators and a wider range
9:03
of alumni on board and really tried to set up a long lasting
9:07
institution that would have outlived all of us and that
9:10
would have been dedicated to promoting.
9:12
More intellectual diversity at Lafayette.
9:16
But instead, you know, I ran this organization that did make
9:19
a splash for a few years, but ultimately I got booted out.
9:22
And now that organization doesn't exist anymore.
9:24
I'm not there anymore. And Lafayette is, you know, less
9:27
intellectually diverse than it was when I was there because now
9:31
I'm not even there. And I was, I was playing a
9:33
pretty important role in making Lafayette a more intellectually
9:36
diverse place. So I just don't think it served.
9:39
It didn't serve me. In my own professional
9:41
aspirations and professional loves.
9:43
And it didn't serve the students who I think do deserve to be
9:48
exposed to a wider range of viewpoints in the classroom and
9:52
an extracurricular programming. So, and you know, one last thing
9:56
I'll say is that I work at the Witherspoon Institute now and
10:00
the director of the Witherspoon Institute, Luis Teles, who I
10:03
know you know also who actually connected you to me.
10:07
He's been a real model in this regard because he really has the
10:09
long game in mind and he does not make enemies.
10:13
He makes friends and he so he stands on principle.
10:18
He doesn't lie. He expresses his critiques of
10:22
trends in the culture and an intellectual and academic life
10:25
that he does not unnecessarily alienate people because he
10:30
understands that tilting the world in a better direction
10:34
requires forging friendships. With others, including people
10:37
with whom you disagree and really, you know, I think again,
10:42
it's complicated because an interesting question becomes
10:47
what does one do with the instinct for conflict and war?
10:52
Because it is a real aspect of human nature.
10:56
And again, I think it's, you know, a particularly strong
11:00
aspect of male nature and and. You know, a lot of that has to
11:06
do with the fact that tribal conflict is a is a really
11:10
important part of our evolutionary past.
11:16
And you know, I'm kind of thinking out loud here, but I
11:20
think that, you know, maybe my mistake was channeling those
11:23
instincts in the wrong direction.
11:26
So, you know, maybe it's better for me to channel those into
11:30
sports arenas. And and maybe like a debate
11:35
society, instead of sort of treating my ideological
11:42
opponents as real enemies and foes that I want to sort of
11:48
dehumanizing them or turning them into the other.
11:50
I just don't think that, you know, you can't change an
11:53
institution populated by such people by treating them in that
11:57
way. It's just not prudent.
11:58
So I mean, obviously you can. You can just give up on those
12:04
institutions and try to create your own, and that is an
12:06
important aspect of dealing or contending with an orthodoxy or
12:12
a hegemony that you don't like. But if there are institutions
12:15
that you want to change and they're populated by your
12:17
intellectual opponents, you can't just treat them as
12:21
enemies. You have to treat them as
12:24
friends and and try to persuade and really have you know your
12:31
arguments together. And at the same time there is
12:35
merit to channeling that righteous anger towards solving
12:41
an injustice, right? And I think we need to see more
12:44
of that. There's a masculinization of
12:47
society as far as I can tell and people aren't aren't standing up
12:53
in defense of the the true and the good.
12:56
And I find it personally inspiring and encouraging to
13:01
have your perspective. And that's the reason I reached
13:04
out to you is I was, I was facing adversity because of my
13:08
values. And you're you're a very strong
13:11
source of support and prudential counsel, which I greatly
13:15
appreciate. So can you tell us now what,
13:19
what is the nature of your of your work and your current
13:21
position? Yeah, sure.
13:25
So. The main thing I'm doing is I'm
13:29
organizing the conference that will be held a little less than
13:31
a year from now. And so let me back up for a
13:35
second. The purpose of the conference is
13:38
to, I mean it's pretty related to the Mill series in very broad
13:42
terms in the sense that my colleagues at the Witherspoon
13:45
and Aquinas Institutes and I recognize that there is this new
13:50
set of ideas that has become very potent on.
13:55
Not just college campuses, but increasingly in all of our
13:58
mainstream institutions. I mean the so-called Great
14:01
Awoken, and I don't think that's a bad term.
14:03
So when I say so-called, I don't mean to undermine the notion
14:06
that a Great Awoken has occurred, but what is sometimes
14:08
called the Great Awokening. The whole, the whole the essence
14:12
of that phenomenon was that ideas that had been sort of
14:15
gestating and getting articulated in the Academy
14:19
spilled out of the Academy, into the media, into the corporate
14:22
world, into the nonprofit world. In a really big way.
14:26
And I think that, you know, that began in the 2000 tens and then
14:29
it really sort of accelerated after the death of George Floyd.
14:34
But anyway, so this set of ideas that I call cultural leftism,
14:38
some people on the right call it locism, it's been given many
14:41
different names like identity Marxism, cultural Marxism.
14:46
I heard someone call it post Protestant Gnosticism.
14:48
I mean, there's so many different.
14:50
Names for the set of ideas. But I call it cultural leftism
14:53
and I call it cultural leftism because cultural as distinct
15:00
from economic. So economic leftism would be
15:03
more traditional leftism, where you divide the world into the
15:06
haves and the have nots, the rich and the poor, the
15:10
bourgeoisie and the proletariat and you focus on.
15:15
Altering economic arrangements or welfare state arrangements in
15:18
order to increase material equality between the rich and
15:21
the poor. Whereas cultural leftism, you
15:24
know, it's more about dividing the world into identity
15:27
categories, whites and non whites, men and women, straight
15:32
and gays, you know, cisgender, transgender, etcetera and
15:36
focusing on inequality between those groups.
15:39
So. You know inequality between
15:41
cultural groups, not economic groups, although you are
15:44
focusing on economic inequality often between cultural groups
15:49
and the the the the essence of cultural leftism is that
15:56
basically the power, status and material disadvantages of non
16:04
whites, women and sexual minorities should be the.
16:09
Primary focus of our moral attention that these
16:12
disadvantages are primarily or exclusively a product of
16:18
oppression by western societies, either Western countries
16:22
oppressing non Western countries or Western countries oppressing
16:25
their own minorities. Importantly, that this
16:28
oppression is systemic and largely invisible.
16:32
It's inherent in our institutions and even in our
16:35
concepts and categories. So it's not really a matter of
16:39
individual or overt bigotry, but instead this more kind of
16:43
amorphous, systemic, largely invisible oppression.
16:46
And finally, that, you know, it is incumbent on all of us in
16:51
Western societies to remedy those disadvantages in a wide
16:56
variety of ways by allocating resources for these groups, by
17:00
treating them in different ways, by giving them a moral free
17:03
pass. I would argue because one thing
17:06
that. Troubles me is that the groups
17:08
that are coded as victims, whether it's inner city black
17:12
Americans or Palestinians, they're just held to a lower
17:15
moral standard. And that's a it's a kind of,
17:18
it's a kind. It's a form of redistribution
17:21
where you know where. The narrative is that these
17:24
groups have been oppressed and therefore we don't hold them to
17:27
the same moral standard that we might hold others.
17:30
But anyway, so that's the essence of the world view.
17:34
And So what I'm doing with the Witherspoon and the Aquinas
17:36
Institute, and this is mainly with the Aquinas Institute, is
17:43
acknowledging that this world view has become established and
17:47
very powerful. In our society and that it's
17:51
epicenter and origin is really the university.
17:54
And OK, so then the question is what do you do about it?
17:58
And as I was suggesting earlier, you know, one general strategy
18:06
is so if. Let me just say also that my
18:09
colleagues and I at the Witherspoon and Aquinas
18:11
institutes generally are critics rather than supporters of this
18:16
ideology of cultural leftism. So that's where we're coming
18:19
from. We're, we're critics of it.
18:21
And I could get into why, if you'd like, but we're critics of
18:24
it. But we recognize that it's very
18:26
powerful and that there are lots of people who sincerely believe
18:29
in it. And so then the question is, OK,
18:32
what do you do about that Now? You know, one option would be to
18:36
just create parallel institutions, so just to give up
18:39
on the universities and create alternative ones like Hillsdale
18:42
or, you know, New College in Florida or whatever it may be.
18:46
That the Witherspoon and Aquinas Institute approach is not that.
18:49
It's rather the approach of reform, where you say we're not
18:53
going to just cede Princeton, for example, or other
18:56
prestigious colleges and universities in the United
19:00
States to the cultural left. Instead, we're going to
19:03
establish a presence there and try to improve the intellectual
19:07
climate at these universities by entering into good faith
19:11
conversation with adherents of. Cultural leftism.
19:16
And also kind of, as I suggested earlier, trying to build
19:20
relationships with maybe more moderate professors who might
19:26
have some sympathies with cultural leftism but also have
19:28
some concerns about cultural leftism and try to make
19:35
alliances with them and start to change curricula and
19:39
programming. So that the intellectual climate
19:43
on campus changes. And so I know this is a kind of
19:46
roundabout long winded way of answering your question, but the
19:49
main thing I'm doing for the Aquinas Institute is organizing
19:54
a conference that will be held a little under a year from now on
19:58
the Princeton campus. And what we're doing is we're
20:01
taking diversity, equity and inclusion and analyzing those
20:08
concepts and. Cultural leftism broadly through
20:14
the lens of Christian and Jewish theology as well as classical
20:20
Western philosophy. And the idea is, you know, we're
20:25
going to take these concepts seriously.
20:28
We're going to take seriously the notion that diversity is a
20:31
value, that inclusion is a value, that equity and equality
20:36
are values, and ask what like, OK, are they values?
20:50
If so, to what extent? And And again, we're going to be
20:56
using theological and classical philosophical tools to answer
21:00
those questions. And the hope that by doing so
21:02
will enrich and enlarge the conversation about diversity,
21:08
equity and inclusion. Perhaps so that it's not so
21:10
focused on the current concerns of the cultural left, which as I
21:14
said are mainly about white oppression of non whites, male
21:18
oppression of women, you know, sexual majorities, oppression of
21:24
sexual minorities. Try to broaden it.
21:29
So I'll stop there. So that's that's the main thing
21:33
I'm doing with with the Aquinas Institute.
21:34
And then in addition to that, for the Witherspoon Institute,
21:37
I'm giving some seminars and doing some writing on my
21:43
interests, which are in part what I've described.
21:46
And I have some other interests as well.
21:50
So I think maybe a few months ago I wouldn't have been so
21:55
enthusiastic about the approach that you described.
21:59
But what I've what I've come to realize is when it comes to
22:03
people who hold or let's say, who promote these values of
22:06
diversity, equity, inclusion. It seems to me, and I'd like to
22:11
hear your comments, that maybe there's two camps.
22:13
One is those who knowingly use this as a tool to subvert
22:23
Western civilization and morality with the intention of.
22:29
Destroying it and perhaps directly or indirectly
22:33
destroying Christianity and for instance those, I mean we have
22:37
intellectual examples of that explicitly it historically like
22:41
Karl Marx and his successors. And I can only imagine there are
22:46
present day examples of that who we may not be as aware of now as
22:51
as we will be in the future in the history books, but probably
22:55
most of the adherence of. These values are are just
23:00
sincerely wanting to help humanity and doing it in the
23:05
only way they know of, given that we live in an intellectual
23:08
and cultural dark age. They haven't read the classical
23:12
Western tradition and so they're their means.
23:16
Their intellectual means of helping humanity is through
23:21
these culturally Marxist values, which they're unaware of.
23:26
One of the reasons I came to this conclusion is I spoke with
23:29
former professor of mine, the dialogue about my values, which
23:33
she was concerned about on my website, and it became it became
23:39
clear to me that she didn't. She was unaware that the
23:45
diversity, equity, inclusion, values spring from Marxism and
23:50
she was convinced that. This our culture marginalizes
23:57
so-called sexual or racial minorities when to me it seems
24:02
like there's so many indications that it's the reverse.
24:05
And your your career trajectory is a great example of that.
24:10
That's the people who are marginalized are those who hold
24:14
traditional values. Those are the people that are
24:16
excluded and whose diversity is not not respected.
24:22
Do you have any comments on that?
24:24
No. I mean, you put it very well.
24:25
And I do think it's true. And I think increasingly there's
24:28
survey evidence to back this up, that progressives are not
24:30
worried about losing their jobs. Conservatives are worried about
24:33
losing their jobs and like Republicans are worried about
24:36
losing their jobs, not Democrats.
24:39
So in a wide range of workplaces, it's Republicans who
24:42
don't want to speak publicly or even on social media about their
24:45
views because they're worried they'll be canceled, whereas
24:48
Democrats, progressives are not worried about that at all.
24:51
And you know, Republicans are disproportionately white and
24:54
male. So and also just cultural
24:58
leftism itself, which I do think you could argue is our dominant
25:01
ideology, at least the dominant ideology of our broad elite in
25:04
our mainstream institutions. It this is a little crude, but
25:09
basically it characterizes whites and men and straight
25:13
people as a negative, as oppressors.
25:16
Right it. It.
25:16
It, it describes them in negative terms, right.
25:20
So that's a very obvious way and way.
25:23
I mean, I don't know if marginalization is the right
25:25
word, but there's a kind of negative stereotyping of the
25:29
groups that are apparently on that are supposedly on top and
25:33
obviously affirmative action, which goes far beyond college
25:36
admissions. I mean it's it permeates our
25:38
entire labor market. And there are a lot of reasons
25:40
for that, some legal, some cultural.
25:42
But I mean that is discrimination, ethnic, racial,
25:49
gender and even sexual discrimination that
25:53
systematically benefits the groups that are supposedly
25:57
marginalized. So yeah, I mean they're it's,
25:59
you know, a lot of conservatives I think are just like, what is
26:02
going on? Because it's so frustrating Like
26:05
it's it's it's increasingly hard to point to examples of real
26:09
oppression of the supposedly marginalized groups and it's
26:12
quite easy to point to examples of discrimination against the
26:17
supposedly non marginalized group.
26:20
So it's a really good point. And yeah, I mean I think that I
26:27
think what you said is very important.
26:28
You have to kind of distinguish between the the people who are
26:33
very true believers in cultural leftism, because it's, I think,
26:41
you know, you're no more likely to abandon Christianity than
26:46
they are to abandon cultural leftism.
26:49
Like, it's probably a fool's errand to try to get them to to
26:52
to give up that set of beliefs. But there are a lot of people
26:55
who are probably persuadable or who under different cultural
27:02
conditions would would shift. And in part that's because
27:12
people do just go along. And I'm not necessarily accusing
27:14
people of cowardice, but because it's not just that.
27:17
I mean, people have very good reasons not to sabotage their
27:21
own careers. They have families to take care
27:23
of, and so they just keep their head down and don't enter into
27:26
certain kind of controversial discussions.
27:29
So I think, I think there are a lot of people like that who in a
27:32
different cultural environment probably would express some of
27:35
their concerns about cultural leftism, probably do harbor them
27:38
privately. But I do think also, and this is
27:41
kind of to your point about your professor, people have been, I
27:47
would argue, just propaganda. And it's not state propaganda
27:51
necessarily. It's really propaganda on the
27:54
part of our academic institutions and our media.
27:58
You know, I think I would put it slightly different than you
28:02
because you talked about the intellectual origins of DEI and
28:05
how they originate in Marxism. I'm actually not sure I totally
28:09
agree with that. I think that some aspects of
28:10
cultural leftism do have Marxist roots, but other aspects don't.
28:14
I think Yasha Monk actually makes that clear in a pretty
28:20
compelling way in his recent book The Identity Trap that the
28:22
intellectual lineage of cultural leftism or what he calls the
28:26
identity identity synthesis is distinct from Marxism.
28:29
It goes back to Foucault, Marcusa, Derek Bell, Kimberly
28:34
Crenshaw who aren't really Marxists and who some ways are
28:37
explicitly anti Marxist. I mean Foucault was anti Marxist
28:41
but even though he had some things in common with him.
28:44
But anyway, let me get back to the main point which is so.
28:49
But where I agree with you is that I do think that people have
28:53
been propagandized and there are certain really important facts
28:58
and perspectives that they just haven't heard because they get
29:02
their information from the mainstream media, whether it's
29:04
the New York Times or MSNBC or CNN or from their the colleges
29:09
they went to. And all of these institutions
29:12
have a very strong culturally left wing bias, I would argue.
29:17
And so maybe it maybe it'll be better if I give a concrete
29:22
example. You know, George Floyd in 2020
29:25
was killed by a white police officer, Derek Chauvin.
29:28
Derek Chauvin. And I think that, you know, the
29:30
reason people care so much about this, I mean it was a horrible
29:35
event. I watched the video of it and
29:37
it's it was crushing to watch. And you know, I felt so sad for
29:43
George Floyd as I was watching it.
29:45
So I'm not trying to minimize that at all the human aspect of
29:49
this, but it seems that a lot of Americans just accept as fact
29:54
that police officers in the United States racially
30:01
discriminate in the application of lethal force.
30:05
That white police officers and black police officers,
30:09
controlling for relevant situational factors are more
30:13
likely to engage in lethal violence against unarmed black
30:18
men than they are against unarmed white men or other non
30:21
whites. And so in other words Americans
30:25
widely just believe that that is a fact that there is racial
30:29
discrimination by police in the application of lethal force.
30:32
And I've looked into this question somewhat and there
30:35
simply is not evidence that that is the case.
30:37
And yet, if you go to a normal college and read the mainstream
30:44
media, you will emerge with the impression that that is the
30:46
case, right? And so I think that, you know,
30:51
for the people who are more moderate, who aren't deeply
30:54
invested in this narrative, part of part of the way that you can
31:01
bring people or part of the way I guess that you can challenge
31:05
cultural leftism is just to raise some of these important
31:08
facts that they're not aware of because they have been
31:11
propagandized by our mainstream institutions.
31:14
I mean, I think another more important example of this is
31:18
that, you know, I would argue, and I'm certainly not the first
31:21
to argue this, that in our history of the 20th century we
31:26
have focused too much actually on Nazism in the Holocaust,
31:32
which obviously was an unbelievably catastrophic,
31:35
morally horrible event, not denying that at all.
31:41
But when I say that we've focused too much on it, what I
31:45
mean is that Hitler has become a kind of Satan figure, and he's
31:48
really the only form of evil that Westerners feel deep in
31:54
their bones. But there were so many other
31:57
forms of evil, including left wing forms of evil in the 20th
32:01
century, that people have far less information about.
32:04
I mean, just the horrors of the famines and the Soviet Union and
32:10
China and the political purges carried out by Stalin.
32:13
And some of the famines, by the way, were intentional and they
32:16
were genocidal, like the whole load of more of the Ukrainians
32:19
carried out by Stalin and and just the unbelievable political
32:24
repression, the gulag, the gulag system in the Soviet Union that
32:30
led so many innocent people to their deaths.
32:34
And I mean they're, they're examples abound.
32:39
I mean, the way the Japanese treated the Chinese in the first
32:43
half of the 20th century just, you know, makes your blood
32:46
curdle and and yet if you, you know, go to normal schools and
32:55
normal universities in the United States, you sort of only
32:58
hear about Nazism. And the only thing you worry
33:02
about is ethno nationalism and right wing totalitarianism, you
33:06
know, but there's left wing totalitarianism too, and we
33:09
should be worried about that too.
33:11
And you know, I think one problem in Western countries,
33:14
including the United States, is that we're so worried about
33:17
right wing totalitarianism and not sufficiently worried about
33:20
left wing totalitarianism. And I would argue that cultural
33:23
leftism is a kind of proto left wing totalitarianism.
33:28
A lot of the people who are adherents of cultural leftism
33:34
have unmistakable totalitarian tendencies.
33:37
They want to subordinate everything to cultural left wing
33:40
ideology. They want it to affect how
33:43
therapy is practiced, right? They want it.
33:45
They want it to constrain comedians, right?
33:49
They want it to to to be implicit in the movies people
33:53
watch. You know, that's what
33:54
totalitarianism is. When there's an ideology that
33:59
like insinuates itself into every aspect of culture and
34:03
where people are afraid to question it because they will
34:07
be, you know, canceled or ex community.
34:09
That's what totalitarianism is. And there's much more
34:13
totalitarianism in the United States coming from the cultural
34:16
left than there is from the right.
34:19
But again, because we've been propagandized to believe that
34:22
the great political threat is right wing ethno nationalism, we
34:28
don't really have much of an immune response to left wing
34:31
totalitarianism. And so, yeah, I mean that this
34:36
is all in response to what you said about your professor
34:38
because what you said just reminded me that people have
34:42
been propagandized. And part of the way you combat
34:45
cultural leftism is to tell people about facts, whether it's
34:48
police violence today or facts about history, like the role of
34:54
left wing totalitarianism in Eastern Europe.
34:57
Just just to tell people about those facts, so that they
34:59
recognize that that cultural leftism sort of succeeds because
35:07
people are unaware of or ignorant of those facts.
35:10
Yeah, great points. First of all, thanks for
35:13
correcting me on the distinction between Marx and other
35:17
contemporary philosophers. Well, I mean, and it's just my
35:21
opinion. You could be right.
35:22
I mean there are like, for example, I think James Lindsay
35:24
would largely agree with you. Like he wrote a book called Race
35:28
Marxism where he thinks that cultural leftism has definitely
35:32
has a Marxist roots. So I just wanted to there's sort
35:35
of a debate, I think, among critics of locism about what the
35:39
best way to think about the ideology is.
35:42
To what extent is it a mutation of Marxism and to what extent
35:45
does it have an independent lineage?
35:49
And I think I prop, I'm somewhere in the middle there,
35:53
but I'm not you know, you could be right.
35:56
So. So I'm not trying to tell you
35:57
that I'm right and you're wrong or.
35:59
Anything like that? Well, let's put it this way,
36:00
Whether I, whether I happen to be right or wrong, you are much
36:03
more informed on the issue than than I am.
36:06
Although I wonder if what we could all agree on is that
36:10
regardless of which particular strain of philosophy it comes
36:14
from, it's under the genre of secular humanism which comes
36:19
from like Protagoras has a great definition of it.
36:23
Man is the measure of all things, the things that are that
36:26
they are the things that are not, that that they are not.
36:29
So man is sufficient for himself.
36:31
He has total autonomy. He decides what reality is.
36:35
And I think that's basically the religion of the New World Order,
36:38
which which we're all beholden to without even realizing it
36:43
because it's not articulated explicitly.
36:45
Because people are not even educated enough to recognize it.
36:49
Yeah, I mean, what you just said, it really kind of sets my
36:52
mind ablaze because it sort of raises the question of where all
36:58
of this comes from. And I, you know, one way of
37:02
restating what you just said is that we're living in a kind of
37:07
post Christian secular age and these ideologies that have taken
37:14
over have sort of filled the vacuum created by the absence of
37:20
a of a real religious structure like Christianity.
37:24
And I do think there's a lot of truth to that.
37:26
I mean, you know, a very important question is like where
37:29
did this ideology come from? And you know, we've talked a
37:31
little bit about the intellectual lineage, but and a
37:34
lot of the books that have come out are about the intellectual
37:37
lineage, whether it's Christopher Ruffo's book or
37:39
Yasha Monk's book. And some other books are about
37:43
like the roots of the ideology and civil rights law, like
37:45
Richard Hanani's book. But I think that the deeper
37:49
explanation of where this ideology come from comes from it
37:54
has to do with history, like the fact that we had Nazism in the
37:57
Western world, but we didn't have communism, but also major
38:02
sociological, demographic and structural shifts that have
38:05
unfolded over generations, including very importantly de
38:09
Christianization. I mean Western Europe is I, I
38:15
don't have the numbers in front of me, but the, but the
38:18
percentage of the population in Western European countries like
38:21
France and Germany and Spain and Italy that go to church on a
38:24
regular basis is very low. the United States for a while was
38:28
kind of an outlier, but now the United States is rapidly
38:31
secularizing. Like the change in the last 15
38:34
years is really quite remarkable.
38:37
We're basically Europeanizing with regard to religion very
38:40
quickly. And you know, it's kind of a,
38:45
it's kind of become a cliche at this point.
38:47
But what's important is whether it's true or not, the cliche
38:50
being that people are inherently religious and if there isn't a
38:54
kind of traditional religion on offer, then they will create a
38:56
new one. I do think there's a lot of
38:58
truth to that because religion satisfies the deepest longings
39:04
of the human soul. We need to kind of lose
39:07
ourselves and a vision of the future and then a meaningful set
39:10
of goals and values and we're going to find a way to do that
39:15
unless we're unless some people can be just hedonistic and
39:18
nihilistic. But I think most people and
39:20
cultures as a whole can't be. And so yeah, I think that
39:27
cultural leftism serves as a kind of religious structure for
39:33
a significant percentage of, especially the college educated
39:37
population in the United States and in the Western world.
39:41
And it's interesting because the people like the true believers
39:45
in cultural leftism. They do tend to be college
39:47
educated. And they also tend to be
39:50
secular, right? Like working class Americans,
39:53
working class black Americans, Latinos and whites are, I think,
39:57
more likely to go to church or to be Christian.
39:59
College educated Americans are less likely to be Christian,
40:02
less likely to go to church. I could be wrong about that, but
40:04
I'm pretty sure that's true. And so even from that point of
40:08
view, it kind of makes sense. Those who no longer go to church
40:11
and adhere to Christianity have latched onto this new ideology.
40:16
So yeah. So let me just offer another
40:22
perspective on the George Floyd case.
40:25
So if you if you look at the video that's taken, I believe in
40:28
front of Jerry Chauvin who looks like his knees on his neck.
40:32
But if you look at the video, it's taken behind him.
40:34
It's clear that his knees on his shoulder, his left shoulder and
40:40
furthermore it was it was found in the autopsy that his blood
40:44
contained George Floyd's blood contained legal dosage of
40:48
fentanyl, like far, far beyond the the the lethal threshold.
40:55
He had fentanyl pills in his car.
40:58
There's no history or evidence of any other have any racism on
41:03
the part of Derrick Chauvin and his split in his career as a
41:07
police officer. Anyways it's so it's just to see
41:10
the extent of the propaganda that I'm I'm taking this.
41:14
If you want more detail, there's a great documentary by Candace
41:17
Owens called Follow the Money Greatest Lie Ever Sold.
41:22
Yes, I've heard about this. I've not seen it.
41:24
But yeah, that's. So is your view that Derek
41:28
Chovin was wrongly convicted of murder?
41:33
As far as I can see from all the evidence points towards that,
41:36
yeah. So that that's interesting is
41:38
I'm I'm ignorant of this issue. I would need to learn more about
41:42
it, but if that's the case, that's horrible and.
41:46
Regardless of the situation with Derek Chauvin, I do think that
41:50
many people have been sacrificed on the altar of this new
41:52
ideology. I mean, I feel that in a very
41:55
small way, I was like my career was just kind of put into the
41:59
meat grinder. And I worry about you too,
42:01
Johan. Like just being a based on what
42:03
you shared with me about the pressure that is being put on
42:06
you for making your values explicit on your website and the
42:11
fact that you know. Some people are raising
42:14
questions about whether it's consistent with the American
42:17
Psychological Association's values and best practices.
42:23
You know, I I think that I mean, I I hope that nothing ultimately
42:29
comes of it. But, you know, just in the
42:30
extreme case that it did, I mean, I think there are lots of
42:33
stories like this in the United States and Western world where
42:36
people are being unjustly again, sacrificed on the altar,
42:39
scapegoated. The altar of this new ideology.
42:44
Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. Civilization is so fragile.
42:48
CS Liz said civilization. Their islands on a sea of
42:52
barbarism, basically. Yeah, I'm really inspired by it.
42:58
What you said about like being a warrior, I The more I read
43:03
history, the more convinced I am that for civilization to exist,
43:10
there need to be people who are willing and able to sacrifice
43:15
their own personal material well-being, physical well-being,
43:20
for the sake of society. Oh yeah, without without a
43:23
doubt. And I mean, I think men in
43:28
particular, that's what we're born to do, like that's what
43:32
we're designed for. And I think I mean again, I.
43:37
I I I think what's important is to find the the correct the the
43:40
right ways to allocate that very noble primal energy.
43:45
You know, because sometimes it can be misplaced, can be
43:48
misdirected, but but but it shouldn't be repressed, you
43:53
know, and it certainly shouldn't be demonized.
43:55
And I do worry about that that you know, I think that we're
43:58
talking about how de christianization is an important
44:00
structural contributor to cultural leftism.
44:02
Another another one is the fact that.
44:06
You said, I think you referred to the emasculation of society.
44:09
And yeah, I mean it's, I don't know what the best way to put
44:12
this is, but basically, you know, the Academy and the
44:15
workforce and our political system has become much less male
44:20
dominated. Women are playing a much larger
44:22
role in higher education, in the corporate world, in the
44:28
political system and. I'm not, you know, I'm not
44:31
making an argument about whether that's good or bad.
44:33
But I do think that cultural leftism and this focus on the
44:37
victim and this kind of maternal compassion for weak,
44:44
defenseless, downtrodden people and this kind of almost maternal
44:52
rage, did anyone who is insensitive to or perceived as
44:57
threatening to these? You know, downtrodden victims.
45:00
I do think that that that whole set of urges is more feminine
45:06
than masculine. And certainly the the
45:11
willingness to enforce conformity at the expense of
45:18
truth, to prioritize consensus over honest truth seeking.
45:29
And the disagreement that results from that, I do think
45:31
that that shift in values, and I think there's a lot of evidence
45:35
to support this, is a function of women playing a more
45:40
prominent role in our institutions.
45:42
And again, you know, I'm not saying that's a bad thing
45:46
because there I'm sure there are many reasons why that's a good
45:50
thing. But I think one negative effect
45:53
of that is that it's leading to a lot of repression of.
45:58
Primal and potentially noble male instance.
46:03
And yeah, I used to joke that The Academy Is now populated by
46:07
women and the kind of men who nod along to everything that
46:10
women say, which sounds maybe a little a bit misogynistic, and I
46:14
don't mean it that way at all. But, you know, you don't get
46:17
that rough kind of raw masculine energy in the Academy at all.
46:23
Or maybe you do, but it's in only.
46:25
It's in, kind of. Secondary like marginal parts of
46:28
the Academy. I wonder if in addition to that
46:31
factor that men themselves are more feminine, you know,
46:34
concrete testosterone levels increase in estrogen due to just
46:38
this ubiquity of artificial contraceptions.
46:43
Mycoplastics have been cited also the pandemic of pornography
46:49
addiction that we're experiencing.
46:52
So I think all these things are taking away the edge of
46:55
masculinity. Yeah, that's interesting because
46:57
I've heard about this drop in testosterone, but I haven't
47:00
looked into what's causing it. So you said.
47:04
So I've heard, I've, I've heard about the microplastics
47:06
explanation. I'm very concerned about
47:08
pornography, but I didn't realize that that was leading to
47:10
a potential reduction in testosterone.
47:12
What's the mechanism there? It it's a good question.
47:16
I haven't studied it directly, but to use like a historical
47:20
example, Men in battle, they would be separate from their
47:25
wives before on the eve of battle, right?
47:28
Yes, because that they'd have this greater ferocity, greater,
47:32
higher testosterone. I've heard that soccer, some
47:35
soccer coaches do the same. They say abstain from sex for
47:39
two days before the game. I see what you're saying.
47:42
So people are just, frankly, they're masturbating all the
47:45
time. And.
47:47
Right, Right. It's kind of draining them of
47:48
that vital masculine energy. Yeah, yeah, I can see that.
47:52
Yeah. Or yeah.
47:53
Or like cohabitation versus having the need to.
47:57
Well, I really need to form as a man for my wife by getting by
48:03
being able to support myself professionally, to to seek her
48:08
out through adversity and win her over through my personal
48:13
charm and virtues, rather than make it a scary decision of
48:18
making a commitment in order to win her over rather than just
48:24
having the like easy, easy decision or just sliding into
48:29
it. You mentioned there's this
48:32
overemphasis on Nazism under an emphasis on the dangers of
48:37
socialism. And my observation is in part
48:42
that's due to this successful effort from the Jewish people of
48:49
advertising the evil of the Holocaust, you know, through
48:53
informing people through Holocaust museums.
48:57
And the more people are aware of history and the makes mistakes
49:01
that have been made, the better. And there maybe there isn't as
49:06
much of an organization to show the evils of of socialism.
49:12
We know more people died as a result of Stalin's regime than
49:15
Hitler's and more people died as a result of Mao's regime than
49:19
Stalin's right And then Jordan Peterson also points out that
49:23
it's more difficult to identify when socialism goes too far like
49:30
whereas with although I guess Nazism is considered National
49:36
Socialism, but right wing they the dividing line.
49:42
There is discrimination on the basis of race.
49:44
That's like a clear sign of going too far.
49:47
And Peterson's point is, well, yeah, it's difficult to to pick
49:51
that line when it comes to socialism.
49:55
But he believes it's when compelled, when speech is
50:00
compelled, which is why he took such a fervent stand against
50:04
compelled speech. And I think that's what we're
50:06
facing now here. Yeah, yeah.
50:09
I think, I mean, I mean, I do think it's true that, right?
50:14
Because there's a very large Ashkenazi Jewish population in
50:17
the United States especially. And Ashkenazi Jews, because the
50:22
Holocaust targeted Ashkenazi Jews, like because they're also
50:25
Sephardic Jews and Mizrahi Jews. But the Holocaust targeted
50:28
Ashkenazi Jews, which are the Eastern European Jews.
50:32
And there's a very large Ashkenazi Jewish population in
50:35
the United States. Basically, almost all this is
50:39
actually true of Jews in German. I think almost all of the Jews
50:41
in the world are either in Israel or in the United States.
50:44
I mean, there's some elsewhere, but the vast majority are in
50:46
those two places. But yes, I mean Ashkenazi Jews
50:50
in particular, they're an incredibly successful group.
50:52
They have like a really high IQ on average, and they're heavily
51:00
over represented. And I don't mean that in a
51:02
negative way. They're just like statistically
51:05
over represented in media, entertainment, all kinds of
51:09
areas, academia. And it's not because of any
51:11
conspiracy, it's just because they're a very successful group.
51:14
But one thing that that leads to is like they shape the
51:17
narrative. More than other groups might.
51:20
And yes, that could be part of the reason why the Holocaust
51:23
figures so prominently in the American and Western historical
51:29
understanding. I do think it's also important
51:32
though that Ethno nationalist totalitarianism, violent
51:37
anti-Semitic totalitarianism did occur in the Western world.
51:41
It occurred in Germany and. No left wing totalitarian regime
51:50
ever took power in Western Europe or in any of its settler
51:54
colonies, whereas in Eastern Europe you had a really heavy
51:57
dose of left wing totalitarianism.
51:59
And as a result, Eastern Europeans have a much stronger
52:02
immune response to left wing totalitarianism to this day.
52:06
Like they're much less susceptible to cultural leftism,
52:08
to immigration, all of this stuff.
52:11
They're much less susceptible than than Western Europeans and
52:14
N Americans are. So I think that that's another
52:17
factor. Just the fact that we never
52:19
experienced left wing totalitarianism in the way that
52:22
Eastern Europe and Russia did. There was something else you
52:25
said that I wanted to respond to that.
52:27
Oh yeah, about, you know, how you, how you draw the line like
52:30
when, when has the left gone too far to.
52:32
To restate Jordan Peterson's question.
52:35
Yeah, I I also, I mean I think that there are a couple of
52:39
things I would say about that. I mean.
52:42
I think that one problem with what we've learned about Nazism
52:49
and World War 2 and then the Holocaust is that it's a it's
52:53
made us afraid of ethnic nationalism.
52:58
And I don't think that my personal view is that we
53:01
shouldn't be afraid of ethnic nationalism.
53:03
I mean, obviously we should be afraid.
53:05
I I I think when people start talking about other ethnic
53:07
groups as cockroaches and vermin.
53:11
And, you know, speaking about other ethnic groups in really
53:14
negative terms and talking about wanting to, you know, cleanse
53:19
your Society of them or something like that's all very
53:21
concerning. But the notion that your polity
53:25
should have ethnic coherence or ethno cultural coherence, I
53:29
don't think that's a crazy idea. In fact, I think there are a lot
53:32
of reasons why that makes sense. And I think one thing that's
53:34
hurting Western countries is that they've lost their ethno
53:37
cultural coherence. And so increasingly, they're
53:40
really not nations. They're just like, you know,
53:44
agglomerations of people who don't really have that much in
53:47
common with each other. And that's a real problem for a
53:49
variety of reasons. So I think one negative
53:51
consequence of this historical focus on the Nazis is that it's
53:57
made us immune to healthier forms of ethnic nationalism and
54:00
anyone who even raises the. Possibility that maybe the
54:05
country would function better if it had an ethnic supermajority
54:08
is considered like a dangerous right wing lunatic.
54:12
And I don't think that's AI, don't really think that's a
54:14
crazy idea. I mean most countries in the
54:17
world are ethnic nations effectively like China, South
54:21
Korea, Japan, Mexico, like these are all Eastern European
54:27
countries. Like, you know, they have ethnic
54:30
cultural coherence and that's not a bad thing because the
54:31
nation is a kind of extended family.
54:34
But, but I think, I do think there are forms of ethno
54:37
nationalist discourse that should raise our, that should
54:41
set off alarm bells. Yeah, but on the left, I mean, I
54:44
think that for me, the key like the left, the left goes too far
54:48
when it starts saying that outcome inequality is unjust.
54:54
Like that's that's what you know, Marxism is one form of
54:57
that where really any economic outcome, inequality is unjust,
55:01
is unjust. Cultural leftism, The idea is
55:04
that outcome inequality between groups within a capitalist
55:07
system is unjust. And I think that's really
55:11
dangerous because I think groups left to their own devices do not
55:15
perform equally. And so in order to achieve
55:18
outcome parity, you have to require, you have to basically,
55:23
you know, redistribute a lot of wealth and not allow meritocracy
55:28
to. Operate.
55:30
And that's that's bad because meritocracy is the foundation of
55:34
high functioning systems. And I do think we're witnessing
55:37
a pretty serious assault on meritocracy in in the United
55:43
States, especially and also Western Europe.
55:45
Because there's this. It's really like fixation on
55:49
getting equal representation of ethnic groups, racial groups,
55:53
men and women across our economy and polity.
55:58
Even though. There are differences in ability
56:00
and interest that lead to disparate outcomes between these
56:05
groups. So I think that that's so the
56:09
equity part of diversity, equity and inclusion, I think is that's
56:14
I think where the alarm bells should be going off regarding
56:18
when the left has gone too far. And I agree also that compelled
56:21
speech really. Any form of a liberalism.
56:24
Well, actually. I'm not sure any form of a
56:26
liberalism is bad. I mean, there's some very
56:28
interesting debate it's happening right now within
56:31
especially the conservative intelligentsia about liberalism
56:34
itself and whether it's flawed. So set that aside.
56:37
But like compelled speech, I I would.
56:40
I'm not disagreeing that that's also a potential.
56:44
Yeah. I I, I would agree that that is
56:46
also a a sign that a political movement has gone too far when
56:50
it starts compelling speech. Yeah, all said.
56:55
Well, I wish we could continue this conversation.
56:58
I wanted to hear more about how much hope you have in the
57:03
success of your endeavors. Maybe if you could just end with
57:06
a word there. Yeah, well, I'm, I'm excited
57:10
about this conference we're going to be holding in less than
57:12
a year. And it's really been a great
57:15
learning experience for me because we've been doing some
57:18
working groups in the lead up to it.
57:19
And we brought together a group of theologians, and they're.
57:24
Theological examinations of concepts like diversity, equity,
57:28
equality, dignity, inclusion, recognition, belonging,
57:32
friendship and enmity, lamentation, grace.
57:37
I've really learned so much because those weren't areas that
57:39
I was particularly well versed in before taking these positions
57:44
that. The Aquinas and Witherspoon
57:46
Institute. So it's been a really great
57:48
learning experience for me and it's turned me on to a bunch of
57:51
authors I hadn't read before like I'm reading Alastair
57:54
McIntyre now for the first time and really enjoying his book
57:57
After Virtue which is quite profound.
58:01
So, but, but but anyway I'm hopeful that the conference will
58:05
go well. I'm doing everything I can to
58:07
ensure that it will, and I hope that coming out of that will
58:12
develop a framework for talking about.
58:14
Diversity, equity and inclusion that we can then share with
58:18
others both in conversation and just share through materials
58:23
with other universities so that they can start to talk about
58:26
these concepts that are entrenched in a different and
58:29
better way. So we'll see where it goes.
58:32
We're doing our best. Yeah.
58:34
Look forward to hearing, hearing what you come up.
58:36
Yeah. Well, thanks for joining and
58:39
thanks for all the work you do, Brandon.
58:40
Johann, it was great great to join you and.
58:44
Yeah, I would. I hope we can talk again soon.
58:47
Thank you so much for having me and I wish you the best of luck
58:52
with everything that you're doing, this podcast, your
58:54
practice, etc. Thanks so much man.