#207 — Can We Pull Back From The Brink？
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 53 minutes
Words per Minute
138.72832
Summary
Sam Harris talks about the current social unrest and its possible political implications, and suggests what it might take to pull back from the brink here, and suggest what might be the best thing we can do in the short term to pull ourselves back from this low point in our understanding of what is happening in the world. He also discusses the impact of social media and the problem of racism in the current protests, and offers some suggestions on how to deal with them. Sam Harris is the host of the podcast Making Sense, and is a frequent contributor to the New York Times, CNN, NPR, and other media outlets. He is also a regular contributor to The Huffington Post, and has a regular column for the Los Angeles Times, and a column in the Wall Street Journal. He is the author of several books, including The Dark Side Of: How We All Get Lost in the Storm, and Other Words For Smoke. His work has been published in The New Yorker, The Guardian, and The Guardian. His new book Other Words for Smoke is out now, and he is available for pre-order on Amazon Prime, Blu-ray on Amazon, Vimeo, and Audible. If you're interested in becoming a supporter of The Making Sense Podcast, you can do so by clicking the link below, and I'll send you a $5 discount code: MAKINGMESENSE. at makingsense. to get 20% off your first purchase of a copy of the Making Sense podcast. and a free copy of his new book, "Making Sense: A Guide to the podcast, "The Making Sense: How to Understand the World in the 21st Century Times" and much more! by clicking linktr.ee on amazon.co/makingensepodcasts/makingsensepodcasts and other ways to support the podcast on the making sense in the future of our culture and more. in the coming months, including the book "making sense and more in future episodes, coming soon, coming in paperback and books, coming out in paperback, coming soon coming in hardcover, and more on the paperback edition of Making Sense and epsiode, to be published in paperback a paperback edition and paperback, coming at $99 and hardcover in & on The New York Review of the book, The Other Words by John Grady, paperback
Transcript
00:00:24.340
Okay, well, I have been trying to gather my thoughts for this podcast for more than a
00:00:33.700
week, and I've actually been unsure about whether to record it at all, frankly.
00:00:42.280
I mean, conversation is the only tool we have for making progress.
00:00:48.560
But many of the things we most need to talk about seem impossible to talk about.
00:00:57.000
And I think social media is a huge part of the problem.
00:01:01.180
I've been saying for years now that with social media, we've all been enrolled in a psychological
00:01:14.760
And it's still not clear how it will turn out, but it's not looking good.
00:01:31.340
And on the most important topics, it now seems to be fury and sanctimony and bad faith almost
00:01:51.640
As in incapable of coming into contact with reality.
00:01:59.320
And then becoming totally destabilized by our own powers of imagination and confirmation
00:02:09.960
And then lashing out at one another on that basis.
00:02:14.760
So, I'd like to talk about the current moment and the current social unrest and its possible
00:02:23.960
political implications and other cultural developments.
00:02:27.760
And suggest what it might take to pull back from the brink here.
00:02:35.200
And I'm going to circle in on the topics of police violence and the problem of racism.
00:02:39.580
Because, you know, that really is at the center of this.
00:02:53.280
And yet, most people are behaving as though every important question was answered a long
00:02:59.640
So, I've been watching our country seem to tear itself apart for weeks now.
00:03:08.640
And perhaps lay the ground for something worse to come.
00:03:13.320
And I've been resisting the temptation to say anything of substance.
00:03:17.420
Not because I haven't had anything to say, but because of my perception of the danger,
00:03:25.740
And if I feel that way, given the pains I've taken to insulate myself against those kinds
00:03:31.700
of concerns, I know that almost anyone with a public platform must be terrified.
00:03:38.180
Journalists and editors and executives, celebrities.
00:03:44.200
Everyone has to be terrified that they might take a wrong step here and never recover.
00:03:50.800
And this is really unhealthy, not just for individuals, but for society.
00:03:57.820
Because again, all we have between us and the total breakdown of civilization is a series
00:04:07.800
And if we can't reason with one another, there is no path forward other than violence.
00:04:17.280
So, I'd like to talk about some of the things that concern me about our current state of
00:04:27.120
And unfortunately, many things are compounding our problems at the moment.
00:04:32.280
We have a global pandemic, which is still very much with us.
00:04:36.460
And it remains to be seen how much our half-hearted lockdown and our ineptitude in testing and our
00:04:46.340
And now our plunge into social protest and civil unrest will cause the COVID-19 caseload to spike.
00:04:57.580
As many have pointed out, the virus doesn't care about economics or politics.
00:05:02.400
It only cares that we keep breathing down each other's necks.
00:05:11.380
Of course, almost no one can think about COVID-19 now.
00:05:16.320
But I'd just like to point out that many of the costs of this pandemic and the knock-on
00:05:23.180
effects in the economy, and now this protest movement, many of these costs are hidden from
00:05:32.000
us, in addition to killing more than 100,000 people in the U.S., the pandemic has been a
00:05:41.380
And the ongoing implosion of the economy is imposing tangible effects, of course, but it
00:05:50.340
And now this civil unrest and other recent events is compounding these problems.
00:05:57.400
Whatever the merits of the protest may be, or will be, the opportunity costs of this moment
00:06:06.540
In addition to all the tangible effects of what's happening, the injury and death, the
00:06:12.420
lost businesses, the burned buildings, the neighborhoods that won't recover for years
00:06:22.040
And the breakdown in public trust of almost every institution, just think about all the
00:06:32.440
good and important things we cannot do, cannot even think of doing now, and perhaps won't
00:06:39.960
contemplate doing for many years to come, because we'll be struggling to get back to that distant
00:06:48.780
Now, of course, normal life for many millions of Americans was nothing like a paradise.
00:06:56.340
And the disparities in wealth and health and opportunity we've gotten used to in this
00:07:02.140
country, and that so much of our politics and ways of doing business seem to take for
00:07:10.700
There is no excuse for this kind of inequality in the richest country on earth.
00:07:15.020
And what we're seeing now is clearly a response to that.
00:07:25.740
And worse, it's a response that is systematically silencing honest conversation.
00:07:35.180
This isn't just politics and human suffering on display.
00:07:40.120
It's philosophy, it's ideas about truth, and about what it means to say that something
00:07:48.700
What we're witnessing in our streets, and online, and in the impossible conversations
00:07:56.100
we're attempting to have with one another in our private lives, is a breakdown in epistemology.
00:08:02.820
How does anyone figure out what's going on in the world?
00:08:10.180
If we can't agree about what is real, or likely to be real, we will never agree about how we
00:08:19.580
And the problem is, we're stuck with one another.
00:08:31.880
What is happening when a police officer or a mayor takes a knee in front of a crowd of
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young people who have been berating him as a cog in the machinery of systemic racism?
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Is this a profound moment of human bonding that transcends politics?
00:08:52.680
Or is it the precursor to the breakdown of society?
00:09:02.880
In the most concrete terms, what we're experiencing is widespread social unrest in response to what
00:09:10.640
is widely believed to be an epidemic of lethal police violence directed to the black community
00:09:20.820
And this unrest has drawn a counter-response from law enforcement, much of which ironically
00:09:28.720
is guaranteed to exacerbate the problem of police violence, both real and perceived.
00:09:34.460
And many of the videos we've seen of the police cracking down on peaceful protesters are hideous.
00:09:46.180
And this is one of the many vicious circles we have to find a way to interrupt.
00:09:50.860
Again, there's so much to be confused about here.
00:09:56.340
We've seen endless video of police inflicting senseless violence on truly peaceful protesters.
00:10:04.560
And yet we've also seen video of police standing idly by while looters completely destroy businesses.
00:10:13.240
Is there a policy that led to this bizarre inversion of priorities?
00:10:18.720
Are the police angry at the protesters for vilifying them and simultaneously trying to teach a lesson to the rest of society
00:10:26.240
by letting crime and mayhem just spread elsewhere in the city?
00:10:31.880
Or is it just less risky to collide with peaceful protesters?
00:10:40.240
I mean, how representative are these videos of what is actually going on?
00:10:45.400
Is there much less chaos actually occurring than it's being advertised to us?
00:10:54.900
What's easy to know is that civil discourse has broken down.
00:11:01.760
And it seems to me we've long been in a situation where the craziest voices on both ends of the political spectrum
00:11:08.800
have been amplifying one another and threatening to produce something truly dangerous.
00:11:21.720
the degree to which even serious people seem to be ruled by false assumptions and non-sequiturs,
00:11:31.480
And it's important to keep in mind that with the presidential election coming in November,
00:11:40.700
As most of you know, I consider four more years of Trump to be an existential threat to our democracy.
00:11:46.360
And I believe the last two weeks have been very good for him politically,
00:11:52.480
even when everything else has seemed to go very badly for him.
00:11:58.920
A large majority of people seem to disapprove of his handling of the crisis so far.
00:12:05.420
But I think we all know now to take polls with a grain of salt.
00:12:09.840
There's a very real problem of preference falsification,
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especially in an environment of intense social pressure.
00:12:18.460
People will often say what they think is politically acceptable,
00:12:21.480
and then think or say or do something very different in private,
00:12:31.340
Trump has presided over the complete dismantling of American influence in the world
00:12:44.660
but the stock market has become totally uncoupled from the economy.
00:12:52.700
the future is just as bright now as it was in January of this year,
00:12:58.760
before most of us had even heard of a novel coronavirus.
00:13:06.940
And a lot can happen in the next few months, right?
00:13:14.800
And my concern is that if Trump now gets to be the law and order president,
00:13:27.840
Now, of course, this crisis has revealed, yet again,
00:13:34.540
I mean, the man could not strike a credible note of reconciliation
00:13:41.640
And the fate of the country has depended on it.
00:13:44.800
And I also think it's possible that these protests wouldn't even be happening
00:13:53.720
Whether or not the problem of racism has actually gotten worse in our society,
00:14:03.460
It has been such a repudiation of the Obama presidency
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So, all the more reason to get rid of Trump in November.
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And now he's been given a very different battle to fight.