Bridget sits down with the great Walter Kirn, novelist, essayist, and editor-at-large of the new print-only newspaper County Highway. Walter shares why he and David Samuels decided to start a 19th century style paper centering attention on the middle of the country rather than the edges, the feeling that the country has lost touch with itself - especially during Covid, and the importance of reading something in a media that doesn’t track you or count your clicks or pander to your opinions. They discuss the disembodiment of our era, their shared desire to get beyond addiction, watching people panic during Covid, and seeing the responses to Covid being orchestrated at the highest levels by people with the most privilege while they waged a devastating war against the middle class and poorest people. They cover the roles people got to play during the pandemic and how important it made them feel, why the toilet paper op was a way to divide the genders, the way that irony is deliberately used to keep people at bay and submissive, turning the internet into a weapon for social control, and how every bit of peasant wisdom in Walter's body told him he was being had when it came to the Covid restrictions.

Bridget Phetasy admires grit and authenticity. On Walk-Ins Welcome, she talks about the beautiful failures and frightening successes of her own life and the lives of her guests. She doesn’t conduct interviews—she has conversations. Conversations with real people about the real struggle and will remind you that we can laugh in pain and cry in joy but there’s no greater mistake than hiding from it all. By embracing it all, and celebrating it with the stories she’ll bring listeners, she believes that our lowest moments can be the building blocks for our eventual fulfillment.

Beyond Parody with Bridget Phetasy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.phetasy.com/subscribe