0:00

Part of my argument for how we get out

0:02

of some of the messes we're in and change

0:04

things so that we have more of that sort

0:06

of material political security that we're talking about is

0:08

that we actually have to face our vulnerability. And

0:10

we have to say, okay, we're all insecure. Therefore

0:13

we need each other and let's band together to

0:15

fight for a world that meets our basic needs.

0:19

Hello and

0:21

welcome to Tech Won't

0:24

Save Us. I'm

0:36

your host, Paris Marks. And before we get to

0:38

this week's guest, I just wanted to let

0:40

you know about a little holiday giveaway that we're

0:42

doing here on the show. So as you

0:44

know, the show relies on the support of listeners

0:47

like you to keep making it, to keep having

0:49

these fantastic conversations like the one that you're

0:51

going to hear in just a minute. But

0:54

if you have been on the fence for

0:56

a while or considering becoming a Patreon supporter,

0:58

now might be the time to do it.

1:00

Because if you support the show before the

1:02

end of the year, by December

1:05

31st, you will be entered into a

1:07

draw for one of five signed copies

1:09

of Joanne McNeil's new book, Wrong Way.

1:12

Remember she was on the show just

1:14

recently. Or five copies of

1:16

my book, Road to Nowhere. So that is

1:18

10 books that you have

1:20

the chance to win. And in

1:23

order to enter, you need to sign up to

1:25

become a Patreon supporter. And of course, if you're

1:27

already a Patreon supporter, you will have the option

1:29

to enter into that draw as well. But

1:31

what better thing to do at the end of

1:33

the year than to support a show that hopefully

1:35

you enjoy very much and also get a chance

1:38

to get a new signed book in the process.

1:41

So give it a thought. If you want, you can

1:43

pause the show right here, go

1:45

over to patreon.com/tech won't save us and

1:47

become a supporter, or just keep

1:49

it in mind as you're listening. And so

1:51

with that said, this week's guest is Astra

1:53

Taylor. Astra is a writer, filmmaker and political

1:55

organizer. She's the author of The Age of

1:58

Insecurity and a co-founder of The Dead. I've

2:00

been meaning to have Astra on the show for

2:02

a while. We talked about it about a year

2:04

or so ago and just had some scheduling issues.

2:08

And I was so happy that we reconnected and could

2:10

finally have her on the show to talk about her

2:12

new book and some of the

2:14

other work that she's been doing over the years

2:16

that relates to technology, the tech industry, some of

2:19

the subjects that we talk about quite often. And

2:22

I think that this was an important conversation to

2:24

have because it relates to a lot

2:26

of the topics that we've been talking about over

2:28

the past year and even longer, especially

2:31

when you consider the difficulties that a

2:33

lot of people, that workers face, and

2:35

how the tech industry can make those

2:37

things worse. As the title of Astra's

2:39

new book suggests, it is about insecurity,

2:41

something that more and more people, I

2:43

think it's fair to say, are feeling

2:45

in their lives and something that we

2:47

see the tech industry and their new

2:49

kind of innovative, quote unquote, business models

2:52

making even worse. So I was thrilled to

2:54

have Astra on the show to dig into

2:56

the book, to dig into her perspectives on

2:58

these issues. You know, we talk a bit

3:01

about some Canadian political stuff because Astra is

3:03

also a Canadian and this book deals with

3:05

some Canadian issues. But I'm sure you won't

3:07

mind that. You know, you love hearing a

3:09

little bit about Canada. So

3:12

I don't want to make this intro too long, but I'll

3:14

also just say, you know, obviously the holidays are upon us.

3:17

So whatever it is that you celebrate, I hope you have

3:19

a really great time or able to spend some time with

3:21

friends or family. And thanks so much

3:23

for the fantastic year. Tech won't save

3:26

us, wouldn't be possible with all of your listens

3:28

and support. And I think that 2023 has been

3:30

really fantastic for the podcast. And of course, you

3:32

know, you're a big part of that. So thank

3:34

you so much. With that said, if

3:36

you enjoy this week's conversation, make sure to leave a

3:38

five star review on the podcast platform of your choice.

3:40

You can also share the show on social media or

3:42

with any friends or colleagues who you think would learn

3:44

from it. And if you want a

3:46

chance at winning one of five signed copies of

3:48

Joanne McNeil's Wrong Way, or one of

3:50

five signed copies of my book Road to Nowhere,

3:53

while supporting all the work that goes into making

3:55

the show possible, you can join

3:58

supporters like Yuto in Tokyo, Keith in Tokyo. expanded

6:00

and the opportunity presented itself when I

6:02

was invited to give this year's 2023

6:05

Massey Lectures in Canada. The challenge was

6:07

essentially, you know, write a short-ish book

6:11

in a matter of months so that they could

6:13

have copies on hand. And then I got to deliver

6:15

the five chapters or five lectures in

6:17

five Canadian cities. And I did that in

6:19

September. And so it was one of these

6:21

concepts that kind of emerged out of, you know,

6:23

sort of two prompts or invitations. You know,

6:25

what I'm trying to show in the

6:27

book is that insecurity is really central

6:29

to the way that capitalism operates,

6:32

and that we need to be rendered

6:34

insecure in order to be

6:37

exploitable. And so I sort

6:39

of use that as a lens to explore

6:41

various social dilemmas. And

6:43

it's one of those concepts for me, it spans

6:46

the personal and the political, the

6:48

economic, and the emotional. And so, you know,

6:50

it just kind of was able to sort

6:52

of take it in all these different directions that

6:54

I found pretty fun as a writer.

6:57

Yeah, and the book is fantastic. Like, as

6:59

you say, it's not a totally kind of

7:01

tech focused book, but there's so much to

7:03

delve into there. And, you know, I found

7:05

it really great as well, obviously being Canadian,

7:07

but also knowing a whole lot about the

7:09

states and writing about the states often, the

7:11

kind of interplay that happens in the book

7:14

and in that work between concepts in Canada

7:16

and things happening in Canada and relating them

7:18

to the United States as well. Like, I

7:20

feel like I don't see so much of

7:22

that. And, you know, I'm sure because, you

7:24

know, you needed to relate it to a

7:26

Canadian audience, because you were up here.

7:28

But I'm also hoping that, you know, maybe Americans

7:31

pick it up and learn a bit more about

7:33

things happening up this side of the world as

7:35

well. Yeah, it

7:37

was my most Canadian book for

7:39

sure. And that was, you know,

7:41

really, actually part of the pleasure

7:43

of writing it was knowing

7:45

that I'd have these lecture stops where

7:47

I'd literally be speaking to people in

7:49

Whitehorse, you know, in the Yukon territory,

7:52

or I'd speak to people in Halifax,

7:54

and wanting to make it sort of resonant

7:56

and relatable for those specific audiences, but also

7:59

universal. And so a big

8:01

chunk of it was excerpted in the New York Times

8:03

when it came out. And my editor, after he read

8:05

the book, was like, oh, it's really interesting. Let's have

8:07

an excerpt. It does have a lot of Canada in

8:09

it. But I think

8:11

it's really important actually for Americans to learn

8:14

more about Canada and not just invoke it

8:16

as this idealized place. Right. So

8:18

there's a rather long disquisition about

8:20

the crisis of the public health

8:22

care system. I think that that's

8:25

important. But also, I did try to also

8:27

pierce that veil of Canadian smugness throughout the

8:29

book, and say, crisis of indebtedness in the

8:31

United States that I, Asher Taylor, have been

8:33

organizing around. But guess what? It's really bad

8:35

in Canada, too. So hopefully the

8:38

lessons sort of flow both ways. And

8:40

then in terms of the tech stuff, I mean,

8:42

I used to write a lot more explicitly about

8:44

technology ever since my first book is

8:47

The People's Platform and Taking Back

8:49

Culture and Power in a Digital Age. It came out in 2014. And

8:51

what I've done since then is try to just

8:54

not silo tech as its own thing, to

8:56

just write explicitly about tech, but to show

8:58

that it's a facet of every

9:01

aspect of our lives, right? Because

9:03

it's part of our work experience, it's part

9:05

of our education experience, it's part of health care, it's

9:07

part of our social lives, it's part of our romantic lives.

9:10

And to just sort of put it in

9:12

there without cutting it off

9:14

or reifying it or pretending that

9:16

it's somehow separated from these other

9:19

social fields. Yeah, well,

9:21

you know, you talk about tech, you

9:23

know, and how you've been writing

9:25

about tech for a long time, which I don't

9:27

know, might surprise some listeners, maybe not. Maybe they're

9:29

familiar with The People's Platform, maybe not. You know,

9:32

I read the book, I think a little bit

9:34

after it was released, but I found it a

9:36

really great one. But that year as well, you

9:38

know, you were also writing with a friend of

9:40

the show, Joanne McNeil, you know, a piece in

9:42

the bathroom called The Dads of Tech, I believe

9:44

it was, you know, and I feel like that

9:46

was a time when Silicon Valley

9:48

itself was still very kind of idealized.

9:51

You know, a lot of the reporting was

9:53

still very positive on it. So

9:55

I wonder kind of what you were seeing in

9:57

that moment that was making you kind of look

9:59

at. this industry or these technologies in

10:01

a different way than I think

10:03

the public was still largely

10:05

seeing them at that time. Yeah,

10:07

it's interesting to think back to that

10:10

moment. I mean, it's almost hard, I

10:12

think, sitting here today in 2023 to

10:14

remember just how over

10:16

the top and utopian some of the

10:18

rhetoric about the internet was

10:20

specifically about social media and

10:23

about the potential of these

10:26

new tech companies to disrupt the

10:29

old media monoliths and sort of

10:31

get rid of middlemen. So there's

10:33

this whole idea of disintermediation that

10:35

we as citizens or

10:38

as cultural producers or

10:40

just as amateurs and whatever field would suddenly

10:42

have this direct connection to

10:44

one another, to our

10:46

audiences or to potential sources of income.

10:49

And then it was going to be

10:51

radically democratizing and all of that.

10:54

So I started going to a lot of these conferences and

10:56

reading a lot of the textbooks. And the

10:58

basic analogy at the time was sort of napster,

11:01

we're going to napsterize everything,

11:03

napsterize democracy, napsterize these

11:06

other industries. And so the

11:08

analogies came from the cultural field

11:10

and they were being extrapolated to the sort of political

11:12

and the social and the economic. And

11:15

as somebody who is a cultural producer and knows a lot

11:17

of artists and a lot of musicians, I was like, hold

11:19

on, this isn't happening. We've got the

11:22

old guard of Hollywood

11:25

and the cable industry and

11:27

we've got this new corporate guard

11:30

of Google and Facebook. And they're

11:32

not disintermediating anything, they're just new

11:34

mediators. So we have double the

11:37

gatekeepers and they're collaborating in lots of

11:39

ways and they're engaging in vertical integration.

11:41

Like what are you people talking about?

11:43

But it didn't make me then wonder,

11:45

okay, well, what is salvageable here? And

11:48

is the problem tech itself or is it

11:50

the underlying business model? And so what I tried

11:52

to inject into the debate back then was just

11:54

a bit more political economy. The

11:57

problem is not technology, it's economic incentives and

11:59

the business. model structuring it and the fact

12:01

that so much of our technical

12:04

experience is actually funded

12:06

fundamentally by advertising. Now we talk

12:08

about surveillance capitalism. That's one way

12:10

of describing that. But

12:12

just the conversation was just so full of

12:14

shit, man. And these people would get on

12:17

stage and write these books. And they write

12:19

the same book over and over about how

12:21

everything was changing for the better because

12:23

there were these new companies. And I was like,

12:25

no, no, there's a lot of continuity here. A

12:27

lot of these debates are debates we've had before

12:30

around other media. And ultimately, I

12:32

was making a socialist case

12:34

for state investment in culture, communications infrastructure,

12:36

the public good, all the things that

12:39

listeners of your show know really

12:41

well and conversations that have advanced in

12:43

really interesting ways. But

12:45

yeah, it was a lot of debunking. And

12:47

so the piece that you mentioned, the Dads

12:49

of Tech that I wrote with Joanne is

12:51

definitely one of the more fun things I've

12:54

ever written, because it was just us sort

12:56

of lampooning the misogyny of the

12:58

tech world. And I just have to say,

13:00

every single guy we criticize that

13:02

piece got in touch with us. And

13:04

no way wrong, like Silicon

13:07

Valley, like billionaire investors,

13:09

you know, they were like read this article

13:11

in the Baffler and got their feelings hurt

13:13

over it and had to reach out. I

13:17

love that. Because when you think of like,

13:20

you know, what so many of

13:22

these powerful figures in Silicon Valley are

13:24

like into today, where they've been like

13:26

very radicalized, they, you know, are increasingly

13:28

embracing these like right wing politics. And

13:31

the question is, like, was this always

13:33

there? Or, you know, is this something

13:35

new? And it's like, they've always been

13:37

these people. I will say about two weeks

13:39

ago, I was at a coffee shop in New York, and

13:41

I looked up and I realized it

13:43

was like, another table was one of the guys we

13:45

were most vicious about. No. Anyway,

13:48

I think it's a good piece. People should read

13:50

it. It's fun. Yeah, absolutely. I will include it

13:52

in the show notes for people to go check

13:54

out. I guess kind of related to that, I

13:56

think when we talk about tech, there are a

13:58

lot of people who There has been a big

14:01

recognition, especially in the past few years, even if

14:03

it wasn't so much kind of on

14:05

the radar or not as many people were recognizing it in

14:07

2014, that in the past few

14:10

years there's been a real kind of, I don't

14:12

know, wake up in the impact of the

14:14

tech industry on the world

14:16

that we're inhabiting. And I feel like the

14:18

recognition of how it propels insecurity has been

14:21

a really kind of important part of that.

14:23

And that, of course, comes out in the

14:25

logic piece that you wrote, but also the

14:27

lectures that you prepared. What

14:30

do you see in the way that these technologies

14:32

are connected to these business models that allows them

14:34

to be used in this way? Right.

14:37

So I think actually, you know, I can

14:39

actually channel a bit of the people's platform here because what

14:42

I was part of what I said at the

14:44

introduction to that book is we need

14:46

to emphasize continuity as much as change.

14:48

So in that book, I talk about how the old

14:50

forces of consolidation, centralization,

14:53

commercialism are still present. Those

14:55

problems from the old media model are still present

14:58

in the

15:01

digital landscape. And that continuity is really

15:03

essential. You know, so in this book,

15:06

The Age of Insecurity, it also

15:08

takes that view of like, okay, what

15:10

actually within the kind of capitalist paradigm

15:12

has been consistent. And

15:15

one of the analogies I make is between the

15:17

sort of digital revolution and the enclosure movement.

15:20

So the enclosure movement, of course, again, your listeners

15:22

will be familiar with sort of the dawn of

15:24

market society, the dawn of capitalism as

15:26

we know it. And for the

15:28

period of many centuries through thousands and

15:31

thousands of acts of parliament, millions

15:33

of acres in England were enclosed,

15:35

literally turned from once common

15:38

fields of vore and to

15:40

privately owned property enriching the

15:43

landlord class. And this

15:45

pushed people off of their

15:48

homes, changed the mode of production

15:50

because people could no longer sort

15:52

of provide for themselves and their

15:54

families through subsistence agriculture. So people

15:56

were made insecure. And as

15:58

a result of insecurity, you know, how nothing but to sell

16:00

but their labor. And this is really conscious. I mean,

16:03

when you read the commentary from

16:05

enclosures, they say this, this is their

16:07

goal explicitly. And you know, I, my

16:09

favorite, one of my favorite quotes in the book is a

16:12

landlord saying, you know, when you're doing this enclosure

16:14

business, and you're putting up your fences

16:17

and your hedges, don't plant trees that

16:19

bear fruit, because the idol will be

16:21

tempted to eat for free. And so

16:23

capitalism begins with what I call

16:25

the manufacture of insecurity. So that

16:28

manufactured insecurity is there at the

16:30

genesis, because you don't have people

16:33

who have nothing to sell with their

16:35

labor, unless you have insecurity first, right.

16:37

And so that displacement. And so what

16:39

I say explicitly in the book is

16:42

the enclosure movement, right, that privatization has

16:44

been rebranded, it was rebranded as

16:46

creative destruction in the 50s. And

16:48

then it was rebranded as disruption,

16:50

right, this intermediation, this sort of

16:53

these tech buzzwords that are really

16:55

about keeping that engine of manufacturing

16:57

insecurity going. And so

16:59

now what enclosures have is just

17:01

more digital tools in their arsenal.

17:04

So workers can be tracked delivery

17:06

workers, it's getting to be the holidays

17:08

thinking about all these people racing around

17:10

delivering packages, but it's radiologists. It's

17:13

white collar workers being tracked on their

17:15

computers. I mean, these are the kinds

17:17

of tools that these enclosures, you know,

17:19

could only they couldn't even dreamed of

17:21

them, right. But it is the continuity

17:23

is essential. And I

17:25

think this is part of the project

17:27

of, you know, not fetishizing tech, it's

17:29

like, okay, what's really new here? Like,

17:31

yeah, it's old wine in a microchip

17:33

bottle. But like, let's get real, the goals,

17:36

the same and the power dynamics are actually,

17:38

you know, really familiar. And

17:40

that helps us resist the kind of self

17:43

mythologizing the guys do the guys that Joanne

17:45

and I attacked in our article, the dads

17:47

of tech. I

17:51

feel like what you're describing there, like

17:53

really speaks to how this industry and

17:55

you know, I'm sure capitalism more generally

17:57

benefits from us not understanding those histories.

18:00

right, and not understanding the connection between

18:02

what's happening now and what's happening then

18:04

and the real through lines that exist

18:06

that show how these are not novel

18:08

things, right? When we talk about how

18:10

surveillance is being rolled out in the

18:12

workplace or, you know, how employers

18:15

are using technologies against workers to disempower

18:17

them and devalue their labor, these things

18:19

happen again and again. It's just like

18:21

a new fresh coat of paint, a

18:23

new fresh set of technologies that they're

18:25

deploying, right? Yeah, and a lot

18:27

of work is then to obscure that history. You

18:30

know, I think part of the reframing I'm doing

18:32

in these lectures is to say insecurity really is

18:34

at the center of this, because when some of

18:36

us who rail upon about

18:39

the economy day and night, you know, we

18:41

tend to emphasize some of its pathological consequences,

18:43

the concentration of wealth and power, you just

18:45

the obscenity that poverty exists in a world

18:47

where there could be abundance. But I think

18:49

this, this aspect of

18:51

insecurity is really useful

18:53

because it helps us understand, you know, that

18:55

it's not just the disparities. It's not just

18:58

the fact that there are a couple of

19:00

these billionaires, many of them tech billionaires,

19:02

and people who are struggling to

19:04

stay housed or stay fed. But the

19:06

fact that, you know, even people who

19:08

are kind of managing to get ahead

19:10

a bit, or quite a lot,

19:12

you know, feel like they can never rest,

19:14

they feel perpetually insecure. And that is not

19:17

an accident. You know, again, to go back

19:19

to those enclosures, why did they not want

19:21

those hedges to bear fruit? Because they had

19:23

a theory of human motivation, which is like

19:25

you have to keep people insecure, to keep

19:28

them, you know, struggling to keep them

19:30

striving to make them more controllable to

19:32

make them more efficient and pliable

19:34

and docile workers. And

19:36

that is also language that reverberates through

19:39

the centuries into the present. Absolutely.

19:42

I feel you know, you can look at

19:44

what Elon Musk says about, you know, workers

19:46

in the United States being lazy and how

19:48

Chinese workers are work harder than them and

19:51

how you know, people doing remote work aren't

19:53

really doing work. These things stick around time

19:55

and again, right? They just take a different

19:57

form. Sometimes they're much more explicit and sound.

20:00

quite similar to what we were hearing long

20:02

ago. You know, obviously the

20:04

concept of insecurity is one that people

20:07

will have heard about, but if they

20:09

think about narratives that we've been hearing

20:11

from the political left or just in

20:13

political discourse in recent years, what

20:16

they've probably heard people talk about much more

20:18

is inequality, right? And the growing gulf that

20:20

exists between the rich and the poor. How

20:23

does talking about insecurity kind of reframe or

20:25

change some of those debates and how does

20:27

it make us think about the problems that

20:29

we face in a different way? I

20:32

think talking about inequality is really essential and

20:34

it's been such a core theme of

20:36

my political work as an organizer

20:38

with the debt collective, which is

20:40

a union for debtors that I helped found

20:42

in the wake of Occupy Wall

20:45

Street. And in my writing,

20:47

my writing about technology, I mean, it's

20:49

a big part of the people's platform

20:51

is that we are seeing that these

20:53

technologies that people are cheering as democratizing

20:55

are actually accelerating the concentration of attention

20:57

and money in the hands of the

20:59

people who own the platforms that we

21:02

use every day. Inequality

21:04

is really key. It's also essential to my

21:06

work on democracy. And inequality

21:08

undermines the democratic project,

21:10

the small d democratic project in big

21:13

ways. But I think it

21:15

needs to be supplemented with attention to

21:17

insecurity. And that's because inequality gives us

21:19

a snapshot in time. Inequality says,

21:21

here are the gains captured by the 1%. You

21:25

know how everybody else is suffering. Look

21:27

at the various income differentials. Here's

21:30

how deeply unequal this

21:33

moment is. Insecurity

21:35

I argue in the book actually has two

21:38

things that kind of supplement that. The

21:40

first is insecurity actually always looks forward.

21:42

It anticipates what's coming. And

21:44

that's really important because as human beings, we live

21:46

in time. And so

21:48

I might be okay right now and go, gosh, I've got

21:50

a fridge full of food. That's cool. And

21:52

I actually have a place to live. But

21:55

if I'm afraid I might lose my job, and so I won't

21:57

have that for just full of food, and I might not be

21:59

able to renew my life. least, then I'm

22:01

going to be insecure. And that is an

22:03

incredibly valid perspective for millions and millions of

22:06

people right now. This is essential to the

22:08

political debate that's playing out in the United

22:10

States right now, where there are all these sort of economists

22:13

who are like, but by these metrics, the

22:15

economy is doing great. And it's like, yeah,

22:17

but in reality, people are like,

22:19

my rent keeps going up, like, I don't

22:21

know if I'll be able to live in

22:24

a year if I'm, you know, take a look up

22:26

from this spreadsheet. Yeah, right. Like, and so

22:28

I, you know, I say even that any insecurity is

22:30

how the points on the spreadsheet feel.

22:32

And that's really important. Because one thing I've

22:35

learned as an organizer is that economic issues

22:37

are always emotional issues, right?

22:39

Financial issues are always about your feelings.

22:42

They try to tell us that these

22:44

are separate realms and they're not, you

22:46

know, I think, you know, there needs

22:48

to be a revolution of economic thought

22:50

and your behavioral economics does not cut it.

22:52

This is not about nudges. This is really

22:54

about affects with an A and fear

22:57

and the right knows this the right

22:59

taps into people's fears taps into people's

23:01

insecurity taps into people's fear about losing

23:03

status down the road, right losing position

23:05

about what Barbara Aaron right to is one

23:07

of my favorite writers, you know, the recently

23:10

passed away author called the fear of

23:12

falling, which is something she said, you

23:14

know, really plagued the American professional middle

23:17

class. And so insecurity, I think is

23:19

is a really useful supplement.

23:21

And again, you know, it is

23:24

a heuristic that can help us understand people

23:26

at different gradients of that inequality

23:30

graph. Because, you

23:33

know, in the United States today, you

23:35

know, a simple medical emergency can

23:38

push a middle class family into

23:40

homelessness, right medical debt is the leading

23:42

cause of foreclosure. But even

23:44

in a place like Canada, where there

23:46

is a more robust social safety net,

23:49

but it's tattered one, you know, people

23:51

are increasingly anxious, especially because of the

23:53

cost of housing, or the cost of

23:55

groceries, or the fact that they

23:57

don't necessarily trust what remains of the welfare state will be

23:59

the there, you know, when they're older and

24:02

in need of more support. So

24:04

I just, I think it's something that can

24:07

help us understand the world and people's emotions

24:09

better, and that that

24:11

can help us be better organizers, because ultimately

24:13

that is what I'm about. You know, it's

24:16

like, how do we not just diagnose the

24:18

problem, but organize people to solve it? And

24:21

inequality encourages us to look up and down. So

24:23

we look at Elon Musk and we look at

24:25

the unhoused people. And that's really important.

24:27

And it's sick that we live in a world where not

24:31

golf exists. But I think insecurity can help us

24:33

look sideways too and be like, okay, we're not

24:35

exactly the same, but you're afraid about what's coming down

24:37

the pike. And so am I. And maybe

24:39

we can build some solidarity together. You

24:41

talk about how it causes you to look

24:43

forward, right, to what is coming. But

24:46

I guess part of the book as well

24:48

is, you know, looking back to how we

24:50

got to the point we are today. And,

24:52

you know, you talked about how manufacturing insecurity

24:54

is really key to the capitalist project, but

24:56

it feels like we used to be largely

24:58

in a period where there was a bit

25:00

more security, you know, the welfare state was

25:02

more secure and there were kind of more

25:04

protections for people when they did fall down. And

25:07

that had to be really destroyed in

25:10

order for us to get to this point

25:12

where we do feel such great insecurity in

25:14

the present, I guess. Hmm.

25:17

Yeah, it's true. I mean, the one thing I

25:19

am trying to do with this book is also

25:22

rethink what security is. And

25:25

security is a word that I don't necessarily

25:27

love. It's a little tainted. And

25:29

I think that's very much for me related to the

25:31

fact that I sort of came of age politically under

25:34

the shadow of 9-11, where

25:36

there was suddenly a lot of talk

25:38

of national security and homeland security.

25:41

And you know, it's not a word that the left

25:43

really talks about that much these days. You

25:45

know, it's a word more often invoked

25:48

by the right. And to

25:50

me, it conjures a lot of negative things,

25:52

you know, policing, militarization,

25:54

and, you know, border

25:56

patrols and all of that. Nevertheless, I think

25:59

material security. is the security of the welfare

26:01

state, that kind of security is really important.

26:03

And it's important for left-wing

26:06

people to talk about security in that

26:08

register and to acknowledge how important it is

26:10

to people. And so, yeah, I mean, the

26:12

way we structure our economy under capitalism can

26:14

make us more secure or less so. And

26:17

obviously, there's lots of problems with the

26:19

mid-20th century welfare state, but it was

26:21

a really important intervention. I

26:23

mean, a really critical one. And one thing I learned

26:25

that I wasn't aware of that sort of

26:28

is something I sprinkle in there is that

26:30

during the construction of that welfare state, and

26:32

this is true in Canada and in the

26:34

US, talking about insecurity and

26:36

security was really, really key. That's

26:40

how the architects of

26:42

the welfare state and how the

26:44

movements, the labor movements demanding the

26:47

construction of that welfare state framed

26:49

their intervention. They said, insecurity

26:51

is a plague on

26:53

people in this world where

26:56

we could live better. FDR

26:58

went on and on about

27:00

security. Obviously, we call the

27:02

most famous welfare program that

27:05

we know of, it's social security. And it's

27:07

a product of that history. It's

27:09

more sort of evidence that actually it's

27:12

something that speaks to people, right? That

27:14

folks were less mobilized by invocations

27:17

of inequality in the moment than insecurity,

27:19

because they had just lost everything in

27:21

the Great Depression. They had just experienced

27:23

a devastating world war. They felt this

27:25

uncertainty that events beyond their control could

27:27

bring and that the havoc that could be

27:29

wrought on their families. And so they wanted

27:31

security, they wanted stability, they wanted that ability

27:33

to look forward. So I think

27:36

material security is really

27:38

essential. And what I try to explore in

27:40

the lectures a bit too is then, but

27:42

what does that do for us on

27:44

that emotional level? And I

27:46

look at a lot of empirical

27:49

data and studies have shown that

27:51

when people have that baseline of

27:53

material security, it increases tolerance, open

27:55

mindedness, that it is

27:57

positive again for small d democracies in

27:59

that it. it makes people sort

28:01

of less prone to

28:03

anti-immigrant sentiment, sort of

28:06

authoritarian appeals. And so there's all these

28:08

sort of personal and

28:10

political benefits that come from the

28:13

public provision of security.

28:15

And I think that's really important for us

28:17

to emphasize in this moment, you know, when

28:19

authoritarian is on the rise again. Absolutely.

28:22

And it also kind of makes

28:25

it very clear or really

28:28

draws my attention to how the tech industry

28:30

and, you know, the people in charge of

28:32

it have used that insecurity against people, right?

28:35

If you think about in the aftermath of,

28:37

you know, 2008, 2009, kind of, you know,

28:41

the really difficult period that people experienced then,

28:43

you know, how many people lost their homes,

28:46

lost their jobs. And then of course, you

28:48

had the tech industry coming in and saying,

28:50

we're empowering you, we're giving you freedom by

28:52

carving your work out of employment protections and

28:55

all this kind of stuff through the gay

28:57

economy, right? And how they have

28:59

been able to do that time and

29:01

again, by using this, this supposed possibility

29:03

of technology for empowerment to actually disempower

29:06

and, you know, make people more insecure,

29:08

I guess. Yeah. I mean,

29:10

one of the big ironies of corporate America,

29:12

right, is that they go on and on

29:14

about entrepreneurial risk taking, but they're always voicing

29:16

that on the workers, whether that is by,

29:19

you know, actively undermining the welfare

29:21

state or through creating gay

29:23

economy conditions, you know, or, you

29:25

know, whatever, a few decades before

29:27

it was just moving towards using,

29:29

you know, contractors and things like

29:31

offshoring, right? But meanwhile, the sort

29:33

of corporate bottom line is insulated

29:35

from risk, you know,

29:37

and, you know, we saw that in 2020,

29:40

at the start of the COVID pandemic, when there's

29:43

just massive intervention, the economy, much of

29:45

it going to subsidize corporate America. So

29:48

yeah, that is definitely one

29:50

of the dynamics that I'm pointing to here. The

29:52

other thing is that their argument, maybe

29:54

we can call it their ideology, again, goes back to

29:56

that question of motivation, right?

29:58

So they actually, say that

30:02

by repealing that

30:05

social safety net, by

30:07

creating a dynamic, disrupted

30:10

economy where we're

30:12

all entrepreneurs of the self, we're

30:15

all little LLCs on our

30:17

own competing with each other that we're being

30:19

the best we can be. Because

30:21

if we were to invest in

30:23

public provision in a robust welfare

30:26

state in material security, they

30:28

say, then people get lazy, right?

30:30

Then people will shirk. And

30:33

so there's been this rhetoric, again, going back to enclosure

30:35

movement, that this is actually

30:37

a sort of project of public morality,

30:40

in addition to sort of market efficiency, right?

30:43

Like that this makes us good and productive. And

30:46

it's just bullshit, right? Because there's all sorts

30:49

of evidence that people are motivated by all

30:51

kinds of other things. The

30:53

desire to cooperate, the desire to create, the desire

30:55

to learn, the desire to take care of each

30:58

other. And but actually,

31:00

kind of desperation is inefficient

31:02

for lots of reasons. But I think

31:04

that part is there too, like in the rhetoric, they're not just

31:06

like, oh, we want to make a lot of money, they're like,

31:08

and it's good. And you'll be

31:10

better people as a result of us destroying

31:13

your financial lives, because you'll be

31:15

scrambling and virtuous. Yeah.

31:18

And you know, it makes me think of like

31:20

the general narrative of Silicon Valley around work, right? That

31:23

you need to work long hours, and you need to be

31:25

willing to like give yourself to the job

31:28

and not have much of

31:30

a personal life, because otherwise, you're not

31:32

going to get ahead in the kind

31:34

of the meritocratic narratives that they have.

31:37

But as you wrote about, many

31:40

years ago, the people who tend to succeed in

31:42

this industry are the people who

31:44

already have kind of a leg up, right? Yeah.

31:48

I mean, or they succeed because

31:50

they've done something that doesn't

31:54

necessarily benefit humanity, but

31:56

it's like a hack, or they managed to

31:58

get sort of sold, you know, and absorbed a

32:00

bigger company at the right moment, right? Or

32:03

because they privatize the commons, they

32:05

engage in some act of taking

32:07

something that was collectively built. I mean,

32:09

the internet itself, obviously, is the creature

32:12

of men's public investment, and they privatize

32:14

some corner of it. This

32:17

is, I think, just one of these old stories

32:19

that we're just gonna have to be constantly debunking.

32:21

And for me, as an organizer, as a writer,

32:23

and as a writer, I'm very much about cultivating

32:25

a sense of entitlement among ordinary people.

32:28

And it's like, no, you're actually just entitled

32:31

to public care, to food, clothing, shelter, the

32:35

basic necessities of life, and society

32:37

will not crumble. To go back to the example

32:40

of billionaires, I mean, what do billionaires often

32:42

live off? It's called an unearned income. You

32:44

know, it's just like the fruits of their

32:46

investment. You know, I mean, they're not out

32:48

there living from the sweat of their brows.

32:50

So it's always, you know, what works

32:52

for me doesn't work for the, and that

32:55

incredible, a hypocrisy. But,

32:57

you know, security is, you know, I think there'd just

32:59

be lots of salutatory effects. And what I also try

33:01

to go into in the lectures

33:03

too, is the fact that according to international

33:06

human rights, well, we actually have a right

33:08

to, we have a robust right to material

33:10

security. And security is written into many domestic

33:12

constitutions. And I found that really interesting as

33:14

an organizer, that it's not a right that

33:17

we often invoke on the left. Again, you

33:19

know, I think the left doesn't talk about

33:21

security very much, but it's there on some

33:24

pages, and it's something that we could

33:26

lay claim to. And I think there's some

33:28

potential, you know, power in that, and

33:31

that we should, you know, be more vocal about the

33:33

fact that this kind of material security is something we're

33:35

entitled to. And then it would actually, you know,

33:38

and to go further than just saying, well, hold on,

33:40

it's not gonna be a bad thing for society, but

33:42

to say, no, it's gonna be a good thing. Because

33:45

again, it's going to make

33:47

us healthier. It's going to give

33:49

us time to participate politically. And

33:51

because again, empirical research shows it

33:53

makes people more tolerant, more open-minded, less

33:55

authoritarian, and less afraid. And those are

33:57

consequences that we should be very. to

34:00

see manifest as reality. Absolutely.

34:03

And I feel like this is probably

34:05

a bit more in like the Canadian

34:07

wheelhouse sort of a thing, but you

34:09

know, obviously it's a book that deals

34:11

a lot with Canada. And I found

34:13

that fascinating. But when you wrote about

34:15

how, how the judges kind of interpreting

34:17

the Canadian constitution tend to focus on

34:19

kind of the negative freedoms that Canadians

34:22

have, but often not, you know, enforcing

34:24

kind of the positive freedoms or not

34:26

wanting to kind of bring that into,

34:28

I don't know, the legal framework or

34:30

ruling on it, I guess, I found

34:32

that really fascinating and hadn't kind

34:34

of realized that necessarily. Yeah,

34:36

I mean, this is I really, again, I

34:38

got really into Canadian constitutional law.

34:41

And one of the cool

34:43

things about right, I mean, it's the cool thing

34:45

about podcasting to write is you have this

34:47

excuse to like contact people and be like,

34:49

Hey, do you want to chat for an

34:51

hour and I'll pick the brain and learn

34:53

from you. But again, you know, this, this

34:55

right to security is found in many domestic

34:57

constitutions, very explicit in the Canadian Charter of

34:59

Rights and Freedoms. And it is directly inspired

35:01

by the UN Declaration of Human Rights, which

35:03

is the lead author of which was actually

35:05

a socialist Canadian, Sky John

35:07

Humphrey, who is a character I'm very

35:10

fond of. So he was

35:12

an instrumental player in helping to

35:14

insert the left wing social movements to

35:16

help construct the Canadian welfare state. Then

35:18

he goes and he's a very

35:20

progressive influence on the United Declaration of

35:23

Human Rights, very inspired by Latin American

35:25

socialist countries, and

35:27

by the Canadian example. And he

35:29

makes sure that woven into the Universal Declaration

35:32

are positive and negative rights, meaning, so

35:34

the right to be protected from a tyrannical

35:36

state, but also the right to the

35:39

things we need to survive. So you know,

35:41

the right to have a

35:44

speedy trial, right to not be illegally detained, those

35:46

are these kind of negative rights to even to

35:49

free speech, right to not have your speech be

35:51

censored, what we might think of as civil

35:53

liberties, but then the right to housing and

35:55

health care, you know, labor union, right? Well,

35:57

remunerated work, security in old age and in

35:59

disability. Those are the positive rights.

36:01

And those are positive rights to security,

36:04

specifically. Fast forward to

36:06

the early 80s, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom.

36:09

And there's section seven of the charter.

36:11

And it says that Canadians have right

36:13

to security of the person. That's the

36:15

way it's phrased. And there's an ongoing,

36:18

really interesting legal debate over what the

36:20

hell that means. Because it's not like

36:22

laws are ever just self-evident. There are

36:24

also terrain of political struggle, right? There

36:27

have been justices and

36:29

lots of lawyers and lots of activists saying,

36:31

this means that robust positive rights to security,

36:33

like right to housing, right to welfare benefits,

36:36

right to health care. And because

36:38

those are actually rights Canadians do not

36:40

have. Americans like to think of Canada

36:43

as the land of the welfare state,

36:45

very romanticized. And it does have a

36:47

more robust welfare state and tradition of welfareism.

36:49

But Canadians as people have the

36:52

right to remarkably little, in that

36:54

positive sense, unless we can manage

36:56

to rest the section seven

36:58

right and then view it with a deeper meaning. And

37:01

again, this isn't a

37:03

pie in the sky or ridiculous interpretations. This

37:06

is an interpretation a lot of legal scholars

37:08

and justices agree with. But it just goes

37:10

against the market grain of our society at

37:12

the moment. And so I wanted to

37:15

take some time in the talks and talk

37:17

about some of the litigation that has tried

37:19

to push the envelope and say,

37:22

the right to security should mean a right

37:24

to health care. It should mean a

37:26

right to housing. So over the years, for example,

37:29

activists, literally like activist lawyers have managed to get

37:31

the right to security to mean the right to

37:33

be in a tent if there are no shelter

37:35

beds available, right? So they've pushed it to mean

37:37

that, but they haven't quite pushed it to the

37:40

point where it means the right to housing. Youth

37:43

climate lit against, right? So these kids who

37:45

are suing governments around the world have

37:48

been engaging in some interesting legal

37:50

arguments saying that a section seven right to

37:52

security should mean the right to a habitable

37:55

environment. What is security if the climate is

37:57

on fire? And they're making really interesting

37:59

inroads. I mean, they

38:01

haven't won, but in one recent

38:04

decision, a judge said like, hey, they're making some

38:06

credible points here, right? Just enough, they give them

38:08

kind of grounds for an appeal. You know, I

38:10

think it's really important to kind

38:13

of always have your eye on, well, what are the struggles

38:15

trying to make real these ideas you're

38:17

promoting? And when

38:19

you look, there's actually quite a lot of inspiring

38:21

stuff happening. But I think this is, you know,

38:23

I just think it's like, yeah, we should be

38:25

like, we have a frickin' right to security. And

38:29

that means the welfare state, but also

38:31

this larger context, I think, of

38:33

the environment is also really important.

38:36

But it's something that a lot of Canadians don't

38:38

know about, don't think about. And certainly you don't,

38:41

you know, a lot of us aren't thinking about

38:43

the Declaration of Human Rights. But that's

38:45

the thing with rights, like, they're on the page, but we have

38:47

to fight to make them real. That's just how it

38:49

always goes. Absolutely. Yeah, I feel

38:51

like one of the reasons that it really stood out to me

38:53

is because, you know, I feel like

38:56

in Canada, if you're kind of aware of

38:58

it, people look to the Canadian Charter of

39:00

Rights and Freedoms and say, like, this has

39:02

had a really positive impact in getting kind

39:04

of our courts and our Supreme Courts to

39:06

make decisions that have been positive, that have

39:08

maybe pushed the actual political system in our

39:10

governments to do things that they otherwise wouldn't

39:13

have. In contrast to,

39:15

I think, how many people often see

39:17

the US Supreme Court as this kind

39:19

of conservative kind of backward influence, especially

39:21

under the current judges that are there. So

39:23

I felt like it kind of added some

39:25

nuance to that discussion, I guess. Yeah,

39:28

I mean, it's, you know, again, it's said the US

39:30

is like a low bar. I feel like, you know,

39:32

if I could just say one thing about Canadians, but

39:35

never compare yourself to the US, like, but it's true

39:37

that the US Supreme Court has become this bulwark of

39:39

reaction, you know, captured by these six ultra

39:41

conservative judges, but it's also just the

39:43

American political system is full of these

39:45

veto points that make progressive

39:48

reform really, really, really hard. Whereas

39:50

the Canadian jurisprudence is, you know, has

39:52

more openings. And this is why I

39:54

think this is an interesting frontier to

39:56

push even further. which

40:00

is bullshit in the US, right? I mean, it's not an

40:02

originalist interpretation, but this idea, this

40:04

fantasy that we should cue

40:06

to what the wise

40:08

founding fathers thought about everything. In

40:11

Canada, there's this doctrine called the Living Tree

40:13

Doctrine, which is that the Constitution should

40:15

branch and grow and change. And

40:18

that's a beautiful image and something people shouldn't

40:20

take for granted. As someone who straddles both

40:23

worlds, I'm like, it can get

40:25

so bad, like grow that tree, you

40:27

know? Yeah, absolutely. I feel like

40:29

somewhat related to this is a discussion that

40:32

you have in the book around insurance, right?

40:34

And I feel like when we think about

40:36

insurance today, it's often like, ah, this thing

40:38

that I had to spend money on that

40:41

costs way too much and doesn't deliver

40:43

nearly the benefits that I think I

40:46

should receive from it. But that how,

40:48

you know, when the idea of insurance

40:50

was really kind of new, it was

40:52

quite a radical thing provided by the

40:54

state to give you this degree of

40:56

the type of security that we're talking about. Can

40:59

you talk to us a bit about kind of, I

41:01

don't know, the origins of that and how it's been

41:03

transformed and whether it can be taken back? Yeah,

41:06

so, you know, you have to write five chapters for

41:08

this because there's five lectures. And

41:11

when I got to the fifth lecture, I was like, okay,

41:13

well, what am I gonna write about? And I had one

41:16

idea that the one I had to write

41:18

for so long about insurance. It's really fascinating,

41:20

I think. But I just feel

41:23

like even saying that sounds so boring. Like I

41:25

felt like this is risky, you

41:27

know, gonna get up and give

41:29

a lecture to a thousand people and be

41:31

like, hello, people, I'm talking about insurance today.

41:34

Precisely because it has such a bad connotation,

41:38

right? I mean, I was just picking out what's the

41:40

horrible online marketplace insurance plan

41:42

I want for 2024. And

41:44

like, I don't want it, it's terrible. The deductible is like

41:47

$9,000, like it's a

41:49

nightmare. But the

41:51

word insurance once had a really radical ring,

41:54

in the early 1900s and late 1800s, as

41:57

people started to fight for... workers

42:00

compensation and programs and

42:02

other schemes. The idea

42:05

of social insurance was

42:07

transformative. It's the idea of pooling

42:09

risk as a society. Really,

42:12

at the heart of the question of insurance is, what

42:14

is risk and how do we share it?

42:18

Who is culpable or is nobody

42:20

culpable? Before social insurance

42:23

did really begin with these worker compensation

42:25

schemes, then it was always the workers'

42:27

fault. Because the bosses had all the

42:29

power, right? So if something went wrong,

42:31

it was on the employee. And there

42:33

were these societies where workers attempted to

42:35

pool risk and take care of each

42:37

other, take care of widows, take care

42:39

of families that it's on on a

42:41

hard time. But ultimately saying,

42:43

what you have to do before

42:45

this can become a public program

42:48

is actually re-conceptualize risk, re-conceptualize accidents

42:50

as something that just happens, that

42:52

is sort of statistically unavoidable. It's

42:54

not really on the shoulders of

42:57

one individual person. And

42:59

then only when you kind of have that

43:01

paradigm shift saying, actually, this isn't really

43:04

one person and their punishment. This

43:06

is just inevitable when you have

43:09

industrial production, bad stuff

43:11

is going to happen. We should try

43:13

to mitigate against it, but also we should

43:15

protect those who fall or

43:17

loom themselves or something like that. Only

43:20

then can you start implementing these programs. And

43:22

so this idea of pooling risk is

43:25

really powerful. And it relates to insecurity because

43:27

at the heart of it, it's like, yeah, we're

43:29

all insecure. We could all be the person

43:31

who falls, who cuts

43:34

themselves, who is in a car accident,

43:36

who gets an illness. And so let's

43:38

take care of each other. Let's create

43:40

these insurance programs. And so I think

43:43

there's just something really sort of poignant

43:45

in that image. And we forget, we're

43:47

so acclimated to conceiving of risk in

43:49

that way, as something

43:52

kind of impersonal, That I

43:54

don't think we appreciate necessarily what a

43:56

leap it was and how much work went

43:58

into starting those programs. But. Then

44:00

of course the as. Prevention. Is

44:02

a better. Approach and they're all sorts of

44:04

ways. To. Prevent workplace accidents by

44:07

the or safety measures by not

44:09

overworking people by not rushing them.

44:12

Maybe. By using like digital trackers or

44:14

whatever it is that like causing people

44:16

to feel harried. You know we can

44:18

prevent a whole lot of climate disasters

44:20

by a raining in fossil fuels. That's

44:22

something I read about a at Linked

44:24

in that chapter two is just the.

44:26

Paradoxical role of the

44:29

modern insurance industry in.

44:31

Climate change so I'm in l to get

44:33

in. The insurance sector is enormous. They are

44:35

sitting on trillions of dollars of assets is

44:38

your assets? They pulled us sensibly to pay

44:40

out claim biggest were a lot of it

44:42

is invested. In fossil fuel infrastructure to

44:44

they are paradox. Of the literally invested

44:46

in the things that they're gonna be paying

44:48

more claims on, down the read that

44:50

right there is a parable about the

44:52

pathology treating insurance as a private good instead.

44:55

Of as a comment or the public good

44:57

wishes mean I'm one of. The. Core

44:59

things at the heart of that chapter is

45:01

like is risk Something that we should that

45:03

is privatized or that something that we oppose

45:05

community. Yeah, I thought it was just

45:07

another one of those really good illustrations of

45:09

kind of how much things have been eroded

45:11

over such a long period of time. Rights

45:13

That We see Insurance, which is this thing

45:16

that should be about providing a security as

45:18

just another way to kind of rip us

45:20

off and take money out of our pockets.

45:22

And and stuff like that, right? Yeah,

45:24

well we see it that way because that's when it

45:26

is a lot of the Cia and elderly. Guess is

45:28

that I think that perceptions. Not. Wrong.

45:30

But if we are stuck in and

45:32

with it insurance, I fucking hate my

45:35

insurers member actually not thinking about what

45:37

it would need to pull risk in

45:39

a socially productive and caring less. In

45:41

that chapter, minutes, try to bring it

45:43

to life by telling the story of

45:45

Kafka, the novelist, who we all know

45:48

as a brilliant writer and artist. And

45:50

he was, but during his lifetime he

45:52

was mostly known as an industrial reformer.

45:54

And. I mean, he was really appreciated

45:57

as such, because he. You

45:59

know, basically we're. worked as a kind of

46:01

cog in the machine of the Workman's

46:03

Comp's Office of Bohemia, or some, you

46:05

know, is like one of

46:07

the early workers' compensation programs. And his

46:10

mission at the job was to

46:12

stand up for workers as much as

46:14

he could. And he wrote

46:16

all of these very, very dull

46:18

but detailed papers about the mistreatment

46:20

of workers and how the working

46:22

conditions precipitated the accidents.

46:25

He even designed machinery that

46:27

would protect workers' hands

46:30

more than the machines that were being

46:32

used. So he actually did some

46:35

work that scholars actually, you know, saved lives

46:37

during his day. And as much

46:39

as, you know, he's sort of famous for having hated his job,

46:41

right, when we think of Kafka, we're like, oh, yeah, he hated

46:43

his job and he just wanted to be able to write. But

46:46

he actually was really fascinated

46:48

by insurance because he saw the social implications

46:50

and cared about them. And he was just

46:52

like, you know, he was just up against

46:54

the monolith. He was up against bosses that

46:57

were basically determined to blame the

47:00

worker at all costs. And by

47:02

a state that, you

47:04

know, was deeply resistant to the

47:06

idea of standing up for poor

47:08

people. So Kafka

47:10

is a fascinating guy, for

47:13

sure. But his interest

47:15

in an investment in social insurance, like,

47:17

just endears me to him a little

47:19

more. Yeah, it was one of

47:21

those stories that really fascinated me when

47:23

I was reading the book, you know, one of

47:25

many. I want to pivot back to something that

47:27

we were talking about earlier. You know, obviously, you

47:29

brought up the People's Platform and, you know, we

47:32

were talking about technology.

47:34

You know, I think there's a lot

47:36

of discussion today around the role that

47:38

kind of social platform, social media plays

47:41

in making people feel more insecure in

47:43

their lives. I wonder how you

47:45

reflect on kind of the impact that that

47:47

has had on people. It's

47:49

a big question. I'm curious what you think, because I feel like you're

47:52

more in the discussions and probably in the data

47:54

than I am right now. I mean, I,

47:56

you know, I quote some studies in passing

47:58

In the Book. About. A

48:00

detrimental effects as as a social

48:02

media particular and and young people

48:04

in an old people on younger

48:07

people suffer seem to tell quick

48:09

these platforms artist so them you

48:11

know harmful content mean literally content

48:13

that is I'm encouraging in a

48:15

self survey san and self harm

48:17

and even suicide and then older

48:19

folks who are often push down

48:22

these sort of conspiratorial wormholes who

48:24

would seem to lack the skills.

48:26

To. Decipher The units are once. But.

48:29

Credible Information. From what's a

48:31

scam, I mean there's no doubt that

48:34

this is. a male platform seat. on the

48:36

part of the business most it was something or

48:38

self esteem. But again, that's a new that's

48:40

what. Advertising has been

48:42

doing. For. Decades since. I think

48:45

here in this lens of continuity is really

48:47

helpful in this is why going back to

48:49

Two Thousand and Eleven Twelve Thirteen when I

48:51

was raised the people's by far my A

48:54

with like really. Think they're gonna have a

48:56

revolution here when it. The. Business

48:58

model of these platforms as

49:00

advertising. You know, because like

49:03

by Design. And. Add

49:05

assaults. Your. Self esteem or

49:07

makes you feel like you lack something right?

49:09

A noise say in the opening lecture of

49:11

this but node advertisement effort Tell you that

49:13

you're okay and that is the world that

49:15

needs changing. Know it's always gonna tell you

49:18

that you know you're not enough or does

49:20

it to stay cool. You than a by

49:22

this or to stay on yep it's take

49:24

this pill or whatever I mean this is

49:26

it's but now the sad but also the

49:28

wouldn't spend literally. Trillions of dollars a year.

49:31

On. This shit if it didn't kind of

49:33

work, it doesn't work, is not a science,

49:35

right? And. We can all laugh at

49:37

the bad as we get and how inappropriate they

49:39

are. But bring me a person who has and

49:42

bought something that they were targeted by like so

49:44

be sentenced. Oh,

49:46

totally I. I'm sort of knowledge I'm writing.

49:48

this is where I think am. I'm not

49:50

ahead of the curb with a conversation On

49:52

this thread I just think it's I think

49:54

it's worrying and I. you know I see

49:56

it myself. I see you my own attention

49:58

span in a panic. Many sayings,

50:01

my addiction to my

50:03

devices increasing despite. My

50:06

awareness of it. You know and again this is

50:08

an is. This is what. Progress.

50:10

It's I predict seven same time as. I get

50:12

these are addictive by side and like we

50:15

shouldn't be soon be just as the us

50:17

to impose our habits. Of self control

50:19

and our digital sebastien and things like

50:21

that in the sexual my I'm talking

50:23

about. A social media and

50:26

it's effects on people's psychology and

50:28

self esteem? Part of what's. Maddening

50:30

about these dynamics is like the

50:32

more. Damage. People

50:34

are by these devices and

50:36

these platforms are just by

50:38

consumer culture in general. Is

50:40

a more a market opens up

50:43

to us sensibly Lakes some of

50:45

these problems right and said this

50:47

is your into this. Gaping.

50:49

Hole. Despair. In a flows

50:51

the wellness industry or as a

50:53

self care of self help which

50:55

is like promises people some. Solace

50:57

and the in said that.

51:00

He has us when have been ten years.

51:02

Things about capitalism right Farms create new markets.

51:05

And so as I know I never read. Self.

51:07

Help books by. read a few. Writing. This

51:09

book the this is like I'm segment

51:11

security and psychology in trouble filling annum.

51:14

Enormous. Safe and to me is quite a few

51:16

Potter authors, even. Talk about people's

51:18

sense if locker of never having

51:20

a nurse or their desire to

51:22

do things like be creative, right

51:25

to not live to work, but

51:27

to work to live the beaches

51:29

never take that political step right.

51:31

A problem is always. You when

51:33

it's like know the problem is

51:35

capitalism and you. Difference is not.

51:37

Yeah, you just can't self care or

51:39

meditate or scully a breather way. or

51:41

the crisis but of course he does

51:43

these books never take that extra step

51:46

because that would be you know that

51:48

sort of like undermine the conditions of

51:50

their own success yeah and i think

51:52

the connections to you again the fact

51:54

that be sort of stuff has been

51:56

going on for a long time as

51:58

is now happening in like a different

52:00

way through the tools

52:02

that are available to these companies

52:04

and to the system in order

52:06

to continue pushing us in

52:09

this direction, continue to making us feel terrible

52:11

so that we buy things and all that.

52:14

It's not much of a surprise, I guess. In

52:17

the book, one of the things that you talk

52:19

about, I think when you start to get more

52:21

toward how we address these

52:23

sorts of issues is the concept

52:26

of decentralization. Obviously,

52:28

this is discussed in a much broader remit

52:30

than just technology in the way that

52:33

we would understand it. Obviously,

52:35

this is a concept that is very

52:37

much of interest to people in the

52:39

technology space and I feel like there

52:41

are divided opinions on as well where

52:44

in some circles, there's a view

52:46

that if we just have more

52:48

decentralized technology, everything will be better.

52:51

There's also the way that companies

52:53

have taken advantage of decentralization to

52:55

kind of recenter their power structures

52:57

and stuff. I wonder how you

53:00

see decentralization helping in this way

53:02

and if you also have concerns

53:04

about how it can be co-opted by powerful

53:07

institutions that exist out there already. I mean,

53:09

I think this is a tricky thing. I

53:11

don't think that there's a one-size-fits-all answer

53:14

because you can have

53:16

sort of anti-democratic versions of decentralization

53:18

and disempowering versions and you can

53:20

have democratic and empowering versions of

53:22

centralization. And

53:24

so again, I think we have to look

53:27

to the context and have to look

53:29

to sort of the political agenda and

53:31

the economic paradigms. And I also think

53:33

they're not necessarily opposed. You

53:36

could have a situation where

53:38

there's centralized funding going

53:40

into communities where communities have democratic

53:43

determination over what kind of cooperative businesses they

53:45

want to start or something like that. I'm just

53:47

pulling an example out of the ether. I mean,

53:49

you know, but it's like whether it's

53:51

centralized funding streams and a mechanism for

53:53

ensuring equality in conditions on

53:56

where the funding goes, but there's

53:58

still community determination. the room

54:01

for experimentation, room

54:03

for democratic deliberation. So it's

54:05

a bit of a false binary, but

54:07

I do think we have to be

54:09

really alert, especially in the United States

54:11

with this weird Federalist system and its

54:13

fetishization for state power, state's rights, local

54:16

control, local school boards,

54:20

hijacked by moms for liberty, that

54:23

the right has used a project

54:25

of devolving power to the states

54:27

and to the local level to

54:29

pursue a right-wing agenda, because it was

54:31

the federal government that was often trying

54:33

to pursue things like the

54:35

correct application of civil rights law. I

54:37

just think it's really, it's tricky and

54:40

that we actually have to be sort of

54:42

more precise about what it is we're talking about. I

54:45

am someone who also thinks, again, I

54:47

obviously like the word democracy, I like

54:49

experimentation. I wish, I'm

54:51

not sure I'm ready to reclaim the word innovation,

54:53

but I don't, in theory, maybe we should, but

54:57

we have to do it within a framework that

55:00

pursues equity and security

55:02

and justice. I

55:05

don't think one category alone, like

55:07

centralization or decentralization gets us

55:10

there. I think it kind of has to be more nuanced

55:12

than that. I guess I'm inclined to think there are sort

55:14

of basic things that we need

55:16

as human beings that should be

55:18

sort of guaranteed by a central authority,

55:20

meaning, in this case, the federal government, right?

55:23

We have a right to healthcare. Now,

55:27

but I don't think that's irreconcilable with

55:29

some level of community

55:32

control, right? Or for example, you

55:34

have public healthcare and

55:37

you obviously have healthcare workers, like shouldn't

55:39

doctors in the community have some

55:41

say in how a local hospital is run? So

55:44

again, an element of decentralization mixed with

55:46

central funding where, funding

55:48

is equitably distributed based on need

55:51

and not just the ability to pay. So yeah, I think

55:53

it's interesting. This kind of gets a little bit into the

55:55

terrain of a book I have coming out in

55:58

March that's on solidarity where there's a challenge. after

56:00

where we talk about what a solidarity

56:02

state might look like. So sort of

56:04

something beyond the welfare state. And

56:07

a solidarity state would create feedback loops

56:09

that encourage solidarity. And I think some

56:11

element of decentralization or democratization is key

56:14

to this because we want citizens to

56:16

feel invested in public

56:19

goods. Right? So the

56:21

welfare state sort of dispenses

56:23

with services from on

56:25

high on a charitable model like the state

56:28

giveth, right? So then the state can take

56:30

it away. A solidarity state would be like,

56:32

this is actually like public isn't it belongs

56:34

to you, the public be invested in it,

56:37

right? And thus help protect it. I

56:39

think breaking that binary would be essential

56:41

to that project. Yeah, I

56:43

love that. And I love your recognition

56:45

of decentralization as well and kind of, you

56:48

know, the nuance that is inherent in it

56:50

and looking at where power is and how

56:52

decentralization doesn't necessarily mean that, you know, you're

56:55

taking power away from, I guess, the forces

56:57

that we wouldn't want to have it. Right.

57:00

But there is also resilience in decentralization.

57:02

There can be experimented in decentralization. It's

57:05

just like not to make a fetish

57:07

of anything. I mean, decentralization under really

57:09

unequal circumstances is bad. Like you could

57:12

argue, for example, that American K through

57:14

12 public schools are decentralized, right?

57:16

The funding is based on local property tax. Then

57:18

there are these local school boards. And that

57:21

is, you know, and nobody, I think,

57:24

who's got an objective analysis

57:26

would call American public education

57:28

democratic. And

57:30

to me, it could use a lot more centralization. We

57:32

should equalize funding for students. Yeah, I'd like to see

57:34

some controls implemented there. I don't know.

57:37

So I just I think it's one

57:39

of those debates that I think it

57:41

just needs to be a much more complex dependent and example

57:43

dependent. Like what are we talking about? Totally.

57:46

No, I think it makes perfect sense. And,

57:48

you know, to wrap up our conversation, we've

57:50

been talking a lot about the insecurities, you

57:52

know, the way that this works in favor

57:54

of capitalism and the system and how it

57:56

really harms a lot of people out into

57:58

the world. You know, after doing all

58:00

of this research, putting these lectures in this

58:03

book together, what have you

58:05

learned about the best ways that you think that we

58:07

kind of combat this and increase

58:09

the kind of good kind of security that we

58:11

want for people? Yeah, maybe

58:14

I'll end by actually going back to

58:16

the beginning of the book where I

58:18

contrast what I call manufactured insecurity, which

58:20

is the insecurity we've talked about in

58:22

this interview with what I call existential

58:24

insecurity. So I

58:26

think that there's a case to

58:28

be made that we are just inherently insecure

58:30

and by product of being mortal,

58:32

vulnerable creatures who are dependent on care

58:34

throughout our lives, right? We are born

58:37

as tiny, helpless infants.

58:39

And if we are lucky to live long enough,

58:42

we're pretty helpless at the

58:44

end of our lives as well. And the fact

58:46

is we need care throughout our lives. We're all

58:48

dependent on infrastructure and communities and supply

58:50

chains that are so far beyond our own,

58:52

not just control, but our game

58:55

and conceptualize them. They're so massive and

58:57

integrated at this moment. So

58:59

that existential insecurity is there. It's something I

59:01

think we will never escape. And

59:04

the manufactured insecurity is kind of layered on top

59:06

of it. That I think we can mitigate

59:10

and reduce to a dramatic degree.

59:12

So part of my exit, I guess, part of

59:14

my argument for how we get out of some

59:16

of the messes we're in and change things so

59:18

that we have more of that sort of material

59:21

political security that we're talking about

59:23

is that we actually have to face our vulnerability

59:25

and we have to say, okay, we're all insecure.

59:27

Therefore we need each other. And let's band

59:30

together to fight for a world that meets our basic

59:32

needs. And at the heart of

59:34

the word insecurity, and also the word

59:36

security, etymologically, if

59:38

you go back to the Latin is the word

59:40

cura, which actually means care. And

59:43

so I think that recognizing we're all insecure,

59:45

we all need care, can be the kind

59:47

of basis for politics, a

59:50

kind of politics of solidarity,

59:52

right? A recognition that we're

59:54

interdependent, that we again

59:56

are mutually vulnerable. And it kind

59:58

of basis for this reimagining. of what security

1:00:01

can be. Security as not just

1:00:03

something that is defensive, militaristic, market

1:00:06

driven, but that is collaborative

1:00:08

and caring and sustainable.

1:00:10

Ultimately, those are just nice words, but

1:00:12

we need to fucking organize to do

1:00:16

it, which is, you know,

1:00:18

another big theme of the book. I learned a lot

1:00:20

writing the book, right? I learned about Canadian legal systems,

1:00:22

and I learned about the enclosure movement, and I learned

1:00:24

about Kafka, and I learned about all this stuff. But

1:00:27

when I was actually out on the road giving the

1:00:29

lectures, and then there would be like

1:00:31

a 45 minute Q&A, and

1:00:33

every Q&A was just like, what do

1:00:35

we do? And what

1:00:38

I felt was people know that

1:00:40

we're facing a bunch of shit right

1:00:42

now that they're intersecting crises.

1:00:44

You know, they don't need

1:00:47

to be convinced of that. But

1:00:49

what they don't really know is what to do about it,

1:00:51

because it's not like they learn

1:00:53

organizing one on one in high school or

1:00:55

college, right? You know, unless they're lucky enough

1:00:57

to be in a labor union at

1:00:59

the job, in a good labor union at that, or

1:01:01

maybe someone who's just like hyper politically engaged,

1:01:04

or maybe one of the tiny percentile of people who's

1:01:06

like in attendance union, like they

1:01:08

don't have much firsthand experience of

1:01:10

organizing. And so when I

1:01:12

came away from this lecture, you know, each

1:01:14

Q&A almost became like a symposium on like

1:01:17

organizing. Yeah, and I felt like just a

1:01:19

lot of appetite for actually trying to do

1:01:21

something to improve things. So that was actually,

1:01:23

it was like a really heartening experience.

1:01:26

Because by the end,

1:01:28

I was like, I'm not really convincing you people have

1:01:30

anything, we're actually on to the really hard question, which

1:01:32

is like, okay, what are the next steps that we

1:01:34

take together, so that we can

1:01:37

build the world that we all deserve and are entitled

1:01:39

to. Exactly. And that world requires

1:01:41

organizing, not just new technologies delivered to us

1:01:43

by some tech companies, as they would want

1:01:45

us to believe. Asra, it's been great to

1:01:47

speak with you, you know, we'll I'll be

1:01:49

looking forward to your new book coming in

1:01:51

March, I'm sure. But thanks so much for

1:01:53

taking the time. It's been great. It's been

1:01:55

really, really, really fun. Thanks so much for

1:01:57

having me. As

1:02:00

retailer is the author of the Age of

1:02:02

Insecurity and a cofounder of The Tackling. I

1:02:04

could say was his house Why Me Marks

1:02:06

production is by Eric with them and transcripts

1:02:08

or I bridge of Hulu Fry Tackled was

1:02:10

relies on the support of listeners like you

1:02:12

to keep providing critical perspectives on the tech

1:02:14

industries you can join. Hundreds of other supporters

1:02:16

are going to Patron of Com/stuck on Save

1:02:18

Us and a pledge of your own thanks

1:02:20

for listening to make sure to come as

1:02:22

between.