Sacred Tension: Making Monsters | David Livingstone Smith

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In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by philosopher David Livingston Smith to discuss his work on the history of dehumanization. We explore why “monstering” language is dangerous, how dehumanization leads to violence, and how trans people are currently being dehumanized.

In the second half of our conversation, we discuss racism and David’s commitment to race abolitionism. We discuss “racecraft”, and why reifying race as a category reinforces racism.

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The Talk Back: What Kind of Community Do We Want?

NOTE: I am moving to Substack! Please subscribe to my work there.

Last week, I published an episode of Sacred Tension with Lucien Greaves responding to the recent controversy in The Satanic Temple. See that post to get caught up.

I’m glad I released the episode. I felt I needed to as a matter of conscience, and that I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t. I feel like I’ve lanced a boil on my conscience that was going septic. At the same time, conscience errs. I know that the episode probably wasn’t perfect, and I’m willing to hear people out if they think I fucked up. I can live with both my imperfection and the requirements of my conscience. Whether other people can too is between them and Satan.

Unless something new happens that requires my commentary, I believe I’m done publicly discussing this controversy. That does not mean I’m closed to dialogue behind the scenes. By all means, my DMs are open. I’m just ready to move on to the stuff that I enjoy writing about.

Since publishing the episode, I’ve received an outpouring of responses, both privately and publicly. Some of the responses were filled with rage, disappointment, and hurt. Others were filled with relief, hope, and gratitude. I don’t think I’ve ever received such a diversity of feedback.

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Losing Faith, the Darkness, and the Uninhabitable Earth

Welcome to Sunday Curiosities, the series where I bring you the strange and fascinating tidbits I’ve collected over the week.

This week, we explore climate change apocalypse, the nuances of humor within oppression, and losing faith.

Content warning: this post contains some upsetting material, including discussions of extreme climate change and transphobia.

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Jordan Peterson, Satanic Factions, and Anti-trans Memes

Welcome to Sunday Curiosities: the blog series where I bring you the interesting, bizarre, and insightful tidbits I’ve collected over the week.

Jordan Peterson is Incomprehensible

A hilarious video of edited footage from the Joe Rogan show has Jordan Peterson arguing with himself. I was once enamored of Peterson, but I now understand him to be at best boring and at worst incomprehensible and an accessory to sexism, transphobia, and patriarchy. What amuses me about this video is how it is just slightly more indecipherable than his regular videos.

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The 4 Steps of Standing in Solidarity with LGBT People

I regularly find myself in conversation with people who feel deeply conflicted about how to love and respond to LGBT people: conservative minsters whose hearts have softened towards LGBT people, but whose theology has not; college chaplains who are suddenly finding themselves flummoxed by trans, queer, and gay students sitting in their office, struggling with faith and sexuality; parents, friends, siblings of gay people who see the damage done by the church and don’t know how to stop perpetuating that damage.

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