In this episode, I discuss the anti-lockdown protests and opposition to ongoing quarantining in the face of COVID-19. Rather than focusing on the extremist gun nuts, anti-vaxxers, and conspiracy loons behind some of this activity, I focus on the more reasonable fears of average, everyday folks, simply worried about the economy and their ability to support their families. But as I explain, however reasonable their fears may be, the assumption that we must choose our money/jobs or our lives/health is false. It is a position into which people have been placed only because right-wing ideology and ..read more

In this episode, I explore the importance of gratitude and humility, in terms of how we think of our own place and the place of others in the economy (especially in this moment of quarantine), and also as political organizing tools. As we enter the home stretch for the 2020 election, activists in both the Biden camp and Sanders camp have been quick to deploy guilt and shame to motivate those in the opposite camp. For Biden supporters, it's shaming those Bernie die-hards who say they will refuse to vote for Biden in November, by insisting they will be responsible if Trump wins a second term. F ..read more

In this episode, I examine the right's new favorite mantra -- "facts don't care about your feelings" -- and what it says about modern conservatism's deeply stunted emotional core. Looking at the political, philosophical and psychological underpinnings of this notion, that "reason and logic" are a) conservative, and b) in opposition to feelings and emotion (which are "liberal") I note the absurdity of such arguments, and also their fundamentally dehumanizing and dangerous logic. Fact is: 1) What the right considers facts often aren't; 2) Conservatives are some of the biggest snowflakes o ..read more

On this episode, taped live at the 2019 National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education, Tim and his guests discuss the need for solidarity between Jews and Muslims in the face of growing white nationalism, fueled by deep-seated anti-Semitism as well as Islamophobia. As synagogues and mosques around the world come under attack from terrorists intent on sowing hatred, the importance of Jews and Muslims seeing themselves as allies to one another becomes ever more important. Islam and Judaism have both been intensely racialized by white supremacists in ways that “other” them both ..read more

In this episode, taped live at the 2019 National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education, Tim and his panelists discuss the way in which Asian Americans have long been viewed by some as a "model minority," and how that framing papers over ongoing racism against all persons of color, incuding Asian folks. Particular attention is given to the way in which this trope has been deployed by reactionary attorneys who brought the recent lawsuit against Harvard for its affirmative action programs. By pointing to higher average test scores for Asian students, the lawsuit claims more qu ..read more

In this episode, taped live at the 2019 National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education (NCORE), Tim and his panel discuss the rise of overt racist and white nationalist organizing in America, and especially on college campuses. With groups like Identity Europa actively recruiting college students, and with young people especially susceptible to right-wing radicalization via internet-based hate forums, it will be important for colleges—as places of learning and as spaces ostensibly committed to pluralism and equity—to devise strategies for responding to the upsurge of racist ..read more

In this episode, Tim speaks with Daryle Lamont Jenkins, founder of One People's Project and a leading figure in the American antifa (anti-fascist) movement. With so much misinformation about antifa in mainstream corporate media, Tim and Daryle take the opportunity to discuss what antifa is and what it isn't; to discuss various tactics of antifa, from releasing the personal information of white supremacists to confronting Nazis in the streets. Do these tactics help or hurt the cause? Are there limits to the tactics? And what is the goal of antifa? Additionally Wise and Jenkins discuss why i ..read more

On this episode, Tim speaks with Bettie Kirkland of Project Return: a Nashville-based non-profit that has been working for forty years to help formerly incarcerated persons find jobs, and most recently housing, despite the oftentimes substantial barriers they face to both. Tim and Bettie discuss Project Return’s efforts over the years, how their work can help break down persistent stereotypes about the formerly incarcerated, and why a model of redemption and restoration is so much more logical than a model of punitiveness and shame—the latter of which, sadly, too often predominates in the c ..read more

In this episode, Tim speaks with Dr. Jonathan Metzl, a professor of sociology and psychiatry at Vanderbilt University, and the author of the new book, Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment is Killing America’s Heartland. In his groundbreaking volume, Metzl sets out to explore and answer the question: why do working class and struggling white Americans so often seem to vote against their own interests? Electing politicians who vote against public health care initiatives (like Obamacare) from which they themselves would benefit? Or politicians who vote for fewer restrictions ..read more

On this episode, Tim discusses CNN’s firing of contributor Marc Lamont Hill (a former guest on the show), for comments he made in favor of full equality and justice for the Palestinian people. Hill’s words, misinterpreted as a call for violence against Israeli Jews, have demonstrated not only the intellectual dishonesty of some of Israel’s most militant defenders, but also the limits of open inquiry and dialogue around the pressing issue of Middle East peace. In this reflection on Hill’s firing, Wise examines the way his own critique of Zionism has resulted in professional pushback and atta ..read more