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 policymakers resist the kinds of government support for families and workers that other nations provide as a matter of course. We could be doing the same things as nations like Denmark, for instance -- paying their people significant sums to stay home until the danger passes -- but our cultish devotion to the so-called free market and limited safety nets makes that unthinkable. And yet, using two thought experiments, I show that we WOULD do those larger state interventions IF the victims of COVID-19 were disproportionately white, affluent, healthy, and in the prime of their lives. Similarly, we would take that route if the virus had a much greater ability to spread or was as deadly as say, a chemical weapons attack. The fact that we could go the direction of a huge government support effort, but aren't doing that currently, proves that we value some lives more than others and that we value our ideology far more than the lives we're sure to lose if social distancing measures are lifted.

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 policymakers resist the kinds of government support for families and workers that other nations provide as a matter of course. We could be doing the same things as nations like Denmark, for instance -- paying their people significant sums to stay home until the danger passes -- but our cultish devotion to the so-called free market and limited safety nets makes that unthinkable. And yet, using two thought experiments, I show that we WOULD do those larger state interventions IF the victims of COVID-19 were disproportionately white, affluent, healthy, and in the prime of their lives. Similarly, we would take that route if the virus had a much greater ability to spread or was as deadly as say, a chemical weapons attack. The fact that we could go the direction of a huge government support effort, but aren't doing that currently, proves that we value some lives more than others and that we value our ideology far more than the lives we're sure to lose if social distancing measures are lifted.

Episode 61 - Your Money or Your Life: COVID-19 and the False Choice of the Far-Right

On this episode — the last before returning to the regular interview format of the program — please enjoy Tim's presentation to the teachers, staff and administrators of the Cahokia Illinois School district on August 31 of this year. In this presentation, he discusses the ways that racial and ecnomic inequities in education, far from indicating failures in the system, actually suggest that inequality is a desired and deliberate outcome of schooling, and has been for many years. Herein, Wise explores the role techers can play in challenging that system of inequity, the importance of adopting a paradigm of schooling that focuses on collective liberation rather than individual accomplishment, and discuss the problems with colorblindness as a method for eduating children of color.

On this episode — the last before returning to the regular interview format of the program — please enjoy Tim's presentation to the teachers, staff and administrators of the Cahokia Illinois School district on August 31 of this year. In this presentation, he discusses the ways that racial and ecnomic inequities in education, far from indicating failures in the system, actually suggest that inequality is a desired and deliberate outcome of schooling, and has been for many years. Herein, Wise explores the role techers can play in challenging that system of inequity, the importance of adopting a paradigm of schooling that focuses on collective liberation rather than individual accomplishment, and discuss the problems with colorblindness as a method for eduating children of color.

Episode 48: Educational Inequity is a Feature not a Glitch: Racism and Schooling in America

How does it feel to be a problem? It’s a question sociologist W.E.B DuBois asked over a century ago in The Souls of Black Folks, and which my guest this week also addresses, regarding both blackness and his identity as a Muslim in post 9-11 America. On this episode, I chat with writer/director Qasim Basir about his award-winning films Mooz-lum and Destined. We discuss the beauty (and the horror) of faith, the power of personal choices in the face of systemic injustice, and the importance of unapologetically black art in dangerous times.

Episode 1 : Filmmaker Qasim Basir

Speak Out with Tim Wise is an informative and entertaining podcast aimed at promoting multiracial democracy and justice in dangerous times. The show features the biting, factual, and humorous commentary of its host, alongside dialogue with some of the nation's leading scholars, artists and activists, as well as grassroots community leaders whose voices are often ignored in the dominant media.

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Speak Out with Tim Wise

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