Episode 211: Bari Weiss, The 'University' of Austin, and the Silicon Valley-Funded Faux-Iconoclast Media Industry
Added 2024-10-30 14:51:04 +0000 UTCBefore we get to today's episode, here's a little reminder that we'll be doing an Election Night livestream here on Patreon next Tuesday evening, Nov. 5, at 10:30 PM ET.
This is for Patreon subscribers only (and thanks again for your support!).
Join us and some special guests for some of that good ol' buzzkilling banter on the buzzkilliest night of them all.
Ok, now onto the show.
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The PC Police Outlaw Make-Believe." "Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web." "The Roots of Campus Hatred." "End DEI."
These articles all have something in common: they were written by Bari Weiss. Weiss, the New York Times opinion editor and columnist turned horseshoe theorist media proprietor, has made a name for herself as a victim, and enemy, of that perennial right-wing bogeyman: so-called wokeness. For over a decade now, Weiss has taken to the pages of major news media to complain, vilified — and sometimes target — college kids and protesters who won’t let her and the fascistic company she keeps, Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, and the like, speak their minds as loudly and publicly as possible.
There is, of course, a comical level of irony here. Amid her claims of being silenced and repressed by a hostile left, Weiss has been paid to voice her opinions in legacy paper after legacy paper and been given millions by venture capital firms to start her own media company, The Free Press, and her so-called "university," the University of Austin. And despite her insistence that mainstream institutions are too intolerant of heterodox views like hers, she's warmly embraced on CNN broadcasts, in the pages of her former employer, The New York Times, and has been given glowing profiles in Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Magazine, Ha'aretz, The Information, and the Financial Times.
On this episode, we discuss the rise of Bari Weiss Silicon Valley-funded media empire, the trope of the Iconoclast rebel, truth-telling media lightening rod with banal conservative political positions, and the broader, seemingly uniquely American psychological need, and branding convention, for people with 95% boilerplate rightwing positions to see themselves as persecuted outsiders who don’t fit into any labels.
Our guest is Discourse Blog's Katherine Krueger.
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Guest
Katherine Krueger (@kath_krueger) is a writer, editor and co-owner of Discourse Blog.
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Show Notes
Bari Weiss and the $100 Million Boondoggle
Rafi Schwartz | October 1, 2024 | Discourse Blog
Bari Weiss Knows Exactly What She’s Doing
Matt Flegenheimer | August 11, 2024 | The New York Times
Is Bari Weiss Embarrassed by the Intellectual Dark Web?
Matt Johnson | May 4, 2024 | The Daily Beast
An American Education: Notes from UATX
Noah Rawlings | February 19, 2024 | The New Enquiry
A Trans Teen Is Debunking an Article That Attacked Their Gender Clinic
Samantha Riedel | April 6, 2023 | Them
The Intellectual Dark Web’s Descent Into Paranoia and Trumpism
Anthony L. Fisher | January 19, 2023 | The Daily Beast
Everything's Going Great at Bari Weiss's Fake University
Rafi Schwartz | November 16, 2021 | Discourse Blog
I’ve Heard You Have Some Questions About the New University My Friends and I Are Starting
Alex Pareene | November 15, 2021 | The AP Newsletter
The not-so-hidden purpose of the University of Austin
Daniel W. Drezner | November 15, 2021 | The Washington Post
Statement from Chancellor Robert J. Zimmer on his role for the University of Austin
Robert J. Zimmer | November 15, 2021 | UChicago News
Will the University of Austin Succeed?
Adam Laats | November 11, 2021 | Slate
Bari Weiss resignation: Palestine advocates decry 'hypocrisy' of NYT columnist
Ali Harb | July 15, 2020 | Middle East Eye
The intellectual fraud of Bari Weiss
John Stoehr | July 15, 2020 | The Editorial Board
The Intellectual Dark Web’s “Maverick Free Thinkers” Are Just Defenders of the Status Quo
Luke Savage | July 13, 2020 | Jacobin
The Hard Bigotry of Soft Racism: The New Threat to Social Change
Roderick Graham | July 10, 2020 | An Injustice!
Why Racists (and Liberals!) Keep Writing for ‘Quillette’
Donna Minkowitz | December 5, 2019 | The Nation
Study Shows How the ‘Intellectual Dark Web’ Is a Gateway to the Far Right
E.J. Dickson | August 28, 2019 | Rolling Stone
A Philosopher’s Hoax Embarrassed Several Academic Journals. Was It Satire or Fraud?
James McWilliams | January 25, 2019 | Pacific Standard
The Intellectual Dark Web, Brought to You by Your Snowflake Tweets
Inkoo Kang | May 15, 2018 | Slate
Conservatives Cheer the Latest Right-Wing Supergroup, the Intellectual Dark Web
Roy Edroso | May 14, 2018 | The Village Voice
Shaming the Deplorable Dark Web
David Atkins | May 12, 2018 | Washington Monthly
The “Intellectual Dark Web,” explained: what Jordan Peterson has in common with the alt-right
Henry Farrell | May 10, 2018 | Vox
The only thing to do with the "intellectual dark web" is laugh at it
Reid McCarter | May 9, 2018 | AV Club
Atlantic Bravely Confronts Twitter Insults, Ignores Threat of Decades in Prison
Adam Johnson | February 27, 2018 | FAIR
Q&A Transcript: James Bennet Talks About His Editorial Page With New York Times Staffers
Ashley Feinberg | February 27, 2018 | The Huffington Post
Leah Finnegan | February 14, 2018 | The Outline
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Transcript
For a full transcript of this episode, go here. You can also find transcripts of past episodes, live shows, Beg-a-Thons, Interviews and News Briefs here.
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Credits
Senior Producer: Florence Barrau-Adams
Producer: Julianne Tveten
Production Assistant: Trendel Lightburn
Newsletter: Marco Cartolano
Transcription: Mahnoor Imran
Music: Grandaddy
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Comments
Ugh revisiting this one after her appointment to run CBS news. So very silenced into being hand picked by the richest man on earth to run one of the biggest media companies news divisions. Hoping for a news brief on this one
Steve Ducey
2025-10-07 19:56:24 +0000 UTCJust getting around to this one, sadly even more relevant post-election. Love these episodes, e.g. the Leonhardt one, that zoom in on a particular creep to explore broader tropes. This one reminds me of a tweet by Jason Wilson of SPLC that said, "What’s interesting about reactionaries’ otherwise-tedious habit of blaming others for their politics is the implicit admission that their politics are blameworthy." Y'all should have Eoin Higgins on to talk about his new book on the Silicon Valley-backed contrarian "left" / "heterodox" griftosphere, feat. Greenwald and Taibbi as well as Bari et al.
Isadore Nabi
2025-01-26 02:51:33 +0000 UTCAlways happy to hear from Katherine!
Laura
2024-11-02 14:23:49 +0000 UTC"Freedom of the Press" is great for those who can afford to own a press
Cree Merr
2024-11-01 18:09:53 +0000 UTCAll these grifters want free speech for their shitty ideas and anyone who pushes back to STFU. BTW, Claremont College $60,000 a year.
Stephen Meany
2024-10-31 15:16:27 +0000 UTCWonderful episode. 'Intellectual Dark Web' does violence to the word 'Intellectual'. Bari Weiss, Bill Maher and their ilk are ultimately motivated by their base hatred of backchat.
Ciaran Colley
2024-10-30 20:30:45 +0000 UTCCurious why you “skipped over” the pro-rape book? Please consider, in the future, more airtime for the discussion of the ideological right’s point of view that lacks enthusiastic consent as a core value between sexual partners. I have a hypothesis that not teaching enthusiastic consent, especially between men & women, is precisely the objection. Even “consent of the governed” isn’t actually taught in US institutions of all kinds. I addition to subjugation to “Authority”, which comes from schools and churches before it comes from families.
dddebz
2024-10-30 18:12:10 +0000 UTC
