My guest this week is Michael Shellenberger, author of several books—including San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities—CBR Chair of Politics, Censorship, and Free Speech at the University of Austin, and proprietor of the Substack Public. Michael’s concerns as a journalist run the gamut from the decay of cities under progressive administrations, environmental extremism, social media’s collusion with censorious government agencies, free speech, and the dangers of totalitarianism.
Michael worries that the panoply of social, political, and environmental problems we’re now facing threaten the very fabric of civilization. He lists an increasing acceptance of censorship among Democrats as one of those threats. Yet the rise of social media has blurred the line between “speech” and “action” in ways that challenge our traditional ways of thinking about the 1st Amendment. Michael worries about what he calls the “Censorship-Industrial Complex”—the collusion between government agencies and tech companies—in suppressing online speech. His concerns aren’t merely technological. He worries that movements like Black Lives Matter have ginned up a kind of nihilism that’s eating away at the basic interpersonal civility that holds society together. What’s needed, he says, is a broad-based coalition that will push back against these forces and safeguard the tenets of American liberal democracy.
Michael’s got a panoramic analysis of the state of the world as we see it. For obvious reasons, it’s not one that gets a lot of airtime on mainstream media. But that’s what The Glenn Show is for.
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0:00 Michael’s new role at the University of Austin
5:41 Michael’s “civilization” trilogy
9:40 The rise of pro-censorship opinion among Democrats
17:05 Do new communication technologies require revising our ideas about free speech?
21:53 The Censorship-Industrial Complex
28:10 The anti-censorship benefits of the Streisand Effect
35:37 The government’s role in censorship at Facebook
42:04 What you can’t say about war
45:19 The dehumanizing effects of Black Lives Matters protests
55:25 Forming an anti-nihilist coalition
1:00:36 Embracing American liberal democracy
Recorded March 21, 2024
Links and Readings
Michael’s book, Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All
Michael’s book, San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities
Andrew Lobaczewski’s book, Political Ponerology: The Science of Evil, Psychopathy, and the Origins of Totalitarianism
Martin Gurri’s book, The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium
John McWhorter’s book, Woke Racism: How a New Religion Has Betrayed Black America
Ernest Becker’s book, The Denial of Death
Glenn’s City Journal essay, “The Case for Black Patriotism”
John Burn-Murdoch’s Financial Times piece, “America is undergoing a racial realignment”
Abigail Schrier’s book, Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren’t Growing Up
Jonathan Haidt’s book, The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness
Rob Henderson’s book, Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Glenn’s conversation with Rob Henderson
Michael Shellenberger – The Censorship-Industrial Complex