Transcript: The Road to Year Zero #3 - Chait v. The Internet [Extended Edition]

The Spontaneous Origins of the Vertically Integrated Messaging Apparatus

The third episode of the Road to Year Zero looks back at the publication of Jonathan Chait’s February 2015 New York Magazine cover story, NOT A VERY P.C. THING TO SAY, which both registered the recrudescence of political correctness and summoned up a response illustrative of a new balance of forces within media and affiliated institutions. I talk with Chait about that curious inflection point in the culture wars which was at once striking in its blessed innocence and prophetic of the world to come.

Discussed: Nicholas Christakis’s Struggle Session; the bien pensants respond to the Charlie Hebdo Massacre; the rise to ascendancy of Ta-Nehisi Coates

The original episode was released on April 18, 2022 and you can listen to it on Substack or subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts: Apple | Spotify | Google | RSS.

Become a paid subscriber to my Substack to receive transcripts of all audio content across platforms.