Fire at Will

The overwhelming majority of academic articles come and go with little fanfare. There may be the odd admiring nod from a professor, or a few lively debates in university tutorial rooms. But that’s normally about it.Unless you are Professor Bruce Gilley. In 2017, Bruce authored a watershed paper titled, ‘The Case for Colonialism.’ It sparked a global furore. Far from cowered, Bruce has just released a new book, also titled ‘The Case for Colonialism’, that doubles down on his argument: colonialism was, on balance, good for the colonised, and good for the world.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'The Case for Colonialism' here.

It’s that time of the year when many of us will sit down and write. It could be resolutions. It could be reflections. It could be that book that everyone has inside them. There's just one problem. It's really hard.To crack the code of writing, Will is joined by one of the most successful crime fiction authors of all time, Jeffery Deaver. Jeffery has sold over 50 million novels in 25 languages, won numerous awards and counts Ian Rankin, Harlan Coben and Lee Child among his fans. His latest novel, The Watchmaker’s Hand, has just been released.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'The Watchmaker's  Hand' here.

It's hard not to see America as a country in decline. Foreign policy attention is stretched, political debate is toxic, the national debt is eye-watering, and the institutions have been ideologically captured. However, America has been written off before. It's geographic, demographic, economic and military advantages remain the envy of the world.To discuss American politics as we enter a defining year in the country's history, Will is joined by best-selling author, host of The Gorka Reality Check, and former Deputy Assistant to President Trump, Sebastian Gorka.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Follow Seb here.

As we approach the end of 2023, it’s easy to become despondent about the fate of the West. War rages in Ukraine and the Middle East, as China eyes off Taiwan. The cost of living crisis is becoming unbearable for average families. Illiberal ‘wokeism’ continues to infect our institutions. And the Anglosphere leaders elected to guide us out of this mess appear woefully ill-equipped to do so.To discuss the state of the world, and the small matter of the future of western civilisation, Will is joined by the Executive Director of the Centre for Independent Studies, and former Editor of The Spectator Australia, Tom Switzer.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Learn more about The Centre for Independent Studies here.

Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.For over 30 years, Naomi Wolf was lauded as a feminist icon, a bestselling author and a darling of liberal America. Her investigative journalism during the COVID pandemic led to those labels being replaced overnight with pejoratives like 'conspiracy theorist' and 'anti-vaxxer'. Unbowed and unbroken, Naomi continues to stand against tyranny in the finest tradition of classical liberalism. Her new book is titled 'Facing the Beast: Courage, Faith, and Resistance in a New Dark Age'. Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Facing the Beast' here.

Satire is one of the most important ingredients of a healthy public discourse. But it is under threat across the west. Comedy, once the most subversive of artforms, has caved to the woke mob. Misinformation laws threaten to curtail free speech even further. And perhaps some of us have lost the ability to laugh at the irreverent and the politically incorrect.Joel Berry is not one of those people. Joel is the Managing Editor of the Babylon Bee, one of (if not the) most popular satirical websites on the planet. Millions of people read the Bee’s content every month.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Read The Babylon Bee here.

Who was the most influential person in history? Why do empires fall? What is the biggest misconception about WWI? Napoleon or Alexander the Great? And why are men so obsessed with the Roman Empire?All these questions (and more) are answered by the host of Hardcore History, Dan Carlin. Hardcore History is widely recognised as one of the greatest podcasts of all-time. It reimagined the telling of history for the modern media age.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Visit Dan's website here.

Today, colonialism is viewed by many as the original sin of British history. The truth is far more complex. Theologian, ethicist, and author Nigel Biggar is one of the very few public figures with the courage to take a holistic approach to the study of the British Empire.His latest book is titled ‘Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning.’ It offers a moral inquest into the colonial past, forensically contesting damaging falsehoods and thereby helping to rejuvenate faith in the West’s future.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy ‘Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning’ here.

For the second time in his life, Laurence Fox is engulfed in a cancellation storm. It has taken a heavy toll, but he refuses to be silenced.In this wide-ranging conversation with Will, he discusses cancel culture, GB News, the failure of multiculturalism, the future of conservatism and the sad decline of London.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.

The forensic, long-form political interview remains possibly the best, and certainly the most entertaining, mechanism for political accountability. Can it survive in an age of spin, social media and soundbites?To answer that question, Will is joined by Rob Burley. Rob is one of the most respected and experienced editors in British political television, with a CV that includes stints as editor of the BBC’s live political programs, The Andrew Marr Show, Politics Live and Newswatch. His new book, ‘Why is This Lying Bastard Lying to Me?’, is a history of political television and a love letter to its highest form: the long-form, forensic political interview.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Why is this lying bastard lying to me?' here.

Graham Linehan created some of the most beloved British sitcoms of all-time, including Father Ted, Black Books and The IT Crowd. That counted for little when his life was upended for the ‘crime’ of advocating for sex-based rights.In this conversation with host Will Kingston, Graham talks about his career in television, the craft of sitcom writing and why he continues to rally against the dangers of trans ideology.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Tough Crowd' here.

What if Hitler was killed in 1923? Was Germany's defeat in WWII inevitable? How should we assess Churchill's legacy? And are the events unfolding in Gaza today a by-product of WWII?All these questions, and more, are answered by arguably the pre-eminent living historian on the Second World War, James Holland. Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'The Savage Storm' here.

Jeffrey Archer is one of the most successful authors of all time. He has been published in 115 countries and more than 50 languages, with international sales passing 275 million copies. But his life has been just as remarkable as any of his stories. It’s a tale of political intrigue, wealth, fame, financial calamity, nobility, crime, incarceration, redemption and love.In this wide-ranging conversation with host Will Kingston, Jeffrey reflects on his life, his work and his three loves: politics, storytelling and his wife, Dame Mary.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.

Helen Joyce is a journalist, author and feminist campaigner. Her first book, ‘Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality’, was an immediate bestseller and named by The Times, The Spectator and The Observer as one of their books of 2021. It tells the story of how national laws, company policies, school curricula, medical protocols, academic research and media style guides are being rewritten to privilege self-declared gender identity over biological sex.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality' here.

Has western society ever been more unhappy? Deaths of despair are at historically high levels. Antidepressant use is through the roof. Woke culture is encouraging us to feel guilty about pretty much everything. We are in desperate need of an injection of happiness.Fortunately, this week Will is joined by just the person to provide it. Professor Gad Saad is one of the world’s most important public intellectuals, and surely its most entertaining. His most recent book is titled, ‘The Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life.’Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy ‘The Saad Truth about Happiness’ here.

Capitalism was the driving force behind extraordinary advances in prosperity throughout the 20th century. But isolationist policies, stagnant wages and woke companies have led many to question whether the capitalist system has run its course.To assess the state of capitalism in 2023, Will is joined by self-described 'rabid capitalist', Hannah Cox. Hannah is a prominent American libertarian writer, commentator and activist. She is best known as the co-founder of Based, a hugely popular multimedia platform that uses new media to drive real-world policy outcomes.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Check out Based Politics here.

Who was the greatest-ever military general? What was history's most disastrous party? Is identity politics ruining the study of history? And what on Earth was the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth?All these questions and more are answered by the co-host of the smash-hit 'The Rest is History' podcast, Dominic Sandbrook.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy tickets to see The Rest is History live in Australia here.

It may seem odd to describe a book that was published almost 30 years ago as highly topical. But the 1995 Miles Franklin Award winner, ‘The Hand That Signed The Paper’, is just that.The book's author, Helen Dale, has since established herself as one of Australia's true polymaths. She has continued to produce magnificent novels, such as 'Kingdom of the Wicked', as well as casting a liberal lens over the issues of the day for Law & Liberty (where she is a Senior Writer), The Australian, Quillette and most notably of course, The Spectator Australia.Subscribe to Helen's Substack here.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.

International best-selling author Bjorn Lomborg has spent a career infuriating people by being sensible. He brought much-needed pragmatism to the climate debate, and he's now doing the same for international development.In his latest book, titled 'Best Things First', he presents the 12 most efficient solutions for the world's poorest and our global SDG promises.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Best Things First' here.

John Anderson AC is a sixth-generation farmer and grazier from New South Wales, who spent 19 years from 1989 in the Australian Parliament, including six years as Leader of the National Party and Deputy Prime Minister.In this wide-ranging conversation with host Will Kingston, John discusses the health of public debate today, the upcoming Voice referendum and why politicians have forgotten the importance of 'the case for change.'Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Visit John's website here.

One of the most important academic papers of modern times was published in 2017. It was titled, ‘The Conceptual Penis as a Social Construct’. Thankfully, it wasn’t the content of the paper that started a global discussion, but rather the circumstances that surrounded it and the light that it shone on the current state of academia, woke ideology and notions of truth and freedom of expression.This week, host Will Kingston is joined by one of the pseudonymous authors of the paper, philosopher, writer, and one of the most interesting thinkers of our age, Dr Peter Boghossian.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Visit Peter's website here.

In some respects, the Romans feel strangely familiar. In the great men (and yes, they were almost always men) of the Roman Empire, we can glimpse human motivations, desires and flaws that we share today. At the same time, the Romans inhabited a world replete with some (thankfully) not so familiar features: eunuchs, prophecy, incest and barbarism.What lessons can we draw from a civilisation that is at once familiar to us, and yet so alien? To answer that question, host Will Kingston is joined by the preeminent Roman historian of our generation, Tom Holland. The third book in Tom’s series on Ancient Rome, ‘Pax: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age’, is out now.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy tickets to The Rest is History’s Australia tour here.Buy ‘Pax: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age’ here.

Drugs in the White House... Presidential court cases... Geriatric party leaders… Eight hour hunger strikes… And the odd attempted ‘insurrection.’ It’s fair to say that we’ve become desensitised to just how strange American politics has become. To help make sense of the madness, host Will Kingston is joined by Texas’ #1 radio host, the ‘Czar of Talk’, Michael Berry.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Listen to The Michael Berry Show here.

We live in an age where the lines between entertainment and political activism are so blurred as to be almost non-existent. Barbie is less a movie about a doll than a lecture about the patriarchy. The ‘Welcome to Country’ at most footy games will soon be longer than the game itself. And many stand-up comedians are less interested in telling jokes than they are about making political statements.Monty Franklin is not one of those comedians. Instead he’s become one of Australia’s most successful US-based comedians by poking fun at the things that make Aussies great. In the words of John Cleese, who co-wrote with Monty the upcoming film, ‘The Great Emu War’, ‘silliness always wins’.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Get tickets to see Monty’s show in Australia here.Follow Monty on Instagram here.

Society's approach to mental health is, well, healthier than it was in the past. The stiff upper lip, suck it up, ‘be a man’ mentality has been replaced by a more open and accepting conversation around depression, anxiety and trauma. However, this evolution has also brought with it some troubling consequences: an unhealthy ennoblement of victimhood, difficulty instilling resilience in young people and a fear of uncomfortable truth’s that need to be spoken. It raises the question, has Australia become a fragile nation? To answer the question, Will is joined by psychiatrist, journalist and author of ‘Fragile Nation: Vulnerability, Resilience and Victimhood’, Tanveer Ahmed.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Fragile Nation' here.

It isn't hard to find a right-wing critique of woke ideology. It is much more difficult to find left-leaning thinkers coming out in opposition to the woke dogma that has superseded traditional, social democratic principles in most western centre-left political parties. This is why Susan Neiman’s new book, ‘Left is not Woke’ is such an important contribution to the public debate. Susan is one of the world’s most renowned and respected living philosophers. She currently resides in Germany where she is the Director of the Einstein Forum. She’s also a self-described socialist, and she’s set out to separate 'wokeism' from the historic principles of the left.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Left is not Woke' here.

Adam Creighton is an Australian economist and journalist. He is currently the Washington correspondent for The Australian newspaper. In this interview with host Will Kingston, Adam takes us on a whistle-stop tour of the burning economic issues of the day, including cost-of-living, productivity and innovation. Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.

Brendan O'Neill is the chief political writer for Spiked and a regular contributor to The Spectator. His new book, 'A Heretic's Manifesto', is a rallying cry to stand up against the woke orthodoxy of our age. Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'A Heretic's Manifesto' here.

Sall Grover was a Hollywood screenwriter for a decade before returning to Australia to start 'Giggle' - a social media app for women. After a barely believable series of events (that could only have happened in the strange times in which we live), the app is at the centre of one of the most significant legal cases in modern Australian history. The outcome will have very real repercussions for girls and women across the country.Note: We had some minor sound issues (and a host with a nasty cold). Stick with it. It's worth it.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Support Giggle's crowdfunding campaign here.

Miranda Devine is an Australian journalist and bestselling author. Whilst working in Australia, her opinion pieces for, among others, The Daily Telegraph and The Sydney Morning Herald more often than not made their way to the forefront of the national conversation. She currently resides in New York, where she writes for The New York Post.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Subscribe to Miranda's newsletter here.

Johannes Leak is the Editorial Cartoonist for The Australian. Like his father Bill before him, Johannes’ cartoons represent the soul of the newspaper. In this conversation with host Will Kingston, Johannes delivers a masterclass on the craft of political cartoons, as well as discussing how identity politics and cancel culture are encroaching on modern media and the arts.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Visit Johannes’ website and online shop here.

Winston Marshall was the banjoist and lead guitarist for British folk rock band Mumford and Sons. In 2021, he left the band so that he could be free to use his voice to shine a light on the taboo topics of our age. His podcast for The Spectator, Marshall Matters, is now one of the most popular political and social commentary podcasts in the UK.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Listen to Marshall Matters here.

Senator Alex Antic is a Liberal Senator representing South Australia in the Australian Federal Parliament. In this wide-ranging conversation with host Will Kingston, Alex discusses the Voice referendum, the future of the Liberal Party, the challenges facing the west and the rise of China.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Follow Alex on Instagram here.

Andrew Bogut is Australia’s greatest ever men’s basketballer. His glittering professional career started in 2005 when he became the first Australian to go number #1 in the NBA draft, it reached its crescendo in 2015 with an NBA championship for the Golden State Warriors, and ended back in Australia with the Sydney Kings. Off the court, he has developed a reputation as an intelligent, contrarian thinker on a wide range of issues. In this conversation, Andrew and host Will Kingston discuss the relationship between politics and sport, trans athletes and whether sporting clubs should take a position on the Voice referendum. Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Listen to the Rogue Bogues podcast here.

Mick Ryan is a retired Major-General in the Australian Army. His decorated 35 year military career included deployments to East Timor, Iraq, and southern Afghanistan, as well as a stint as a strategist on the United States Joint Staff in the Pentagon. This experience, in conjunction with an impressive academic resume, has earnt him a reputation as one of Australia’s finest military minds.His new book, ‘White Sun War’, is an engrossing imagining of a future conflict between China and the US over Taiwan. In this conversation with host Will Kingston, Mick discusses what that conflict may look like.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy White Sun War here.

Daisy Cousens is one of the most insightful and entertaining voices in Australian political and social commentary. She’s mastered legacy media via contributions to Sky News, Q&A and The Spectator Australia, but it’s her burgeoning reputation as a YouTuber that has catapulted her to global attention. Over 215 thousand people now subscribe to her channel.In this episode, Daisy and host Will Kingston go on an intrepid adventure into the culture wars and Australian and American politics.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Subscribe to Daisy’s YouTube channel here.

Warren Mundine grew up in a poor Aboriginal family in the 1950’s and rose to become the National President of the Australian Labor Party, an advisor to five Prime Ministers, a successful businessman and a tireless advocate for indigenous Australians.In this conversation with host Will Kingston, he discusses why he is opposing the Voice, and outlines some practical things we can do instead to improve the lives of Indigenous Australians.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Note: We had some minor issues with sound quality on Warren's side. Stick with it. It's worth it.

Cameron Murray is an Australian author and economist, who specialises in property markets, environmental economics and corruption. His latest book is titled ‘Rigged: How Networks of Powerful Mates Rip off Everyday Australians.’It’s an extraordinary and shocking story of how boys clubs and backroom deals have come to dominate business and government in Australia, robbing ordinary Australians of half of their wealth.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'Rigged' here.Subscribe to Cameron's Substack here.Follow Cameron on Twitter here.

Kellie-Jay Keen (AKA Posie Parker) is an activist for sex-based rights. She is the founder of Standing For Women, a global women’s rights campaign group, and the creator of the action Women Stand Up! Her recent tour of Australia and New Zealand made global headlines. She was rushed by Lidia Thorpe in Hobart, accused of being a Nazi sympathiser in Melbourne, and assaulted in Auckland in scenes that shocked the world. In this conversation with host Will Kingston, she's a British mum of four leading a global movement on behalf of women everywhere.Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Check out the STANDING FOR WOMEN website here.Follow Kellie-Jay on Twitter here.

Almost every big company has embraced woke policies and attitudes over the last five years, despite little evidence they improve business performance. Host Will Kingston explores this paradox with American economist and management thought leader, Peter Klein. In 2022, Peter made headlines in business sections the world over for a paper he co-authored, titled ‘Why Do Companies Go Woke?’Follow Australiana on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Read 'Why Do Companies Go Woke?' here.Buy 'Why Managers Matter' here.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.Konstantin Kisin is a Russian-British comedian, podcaster and writer. His speech earlier this year to the Oxford Union on 'whether woke culture has gone too far' (watch) established him as one of the most influential social commentators in the world today. Each week he co-hosts the wildly successful Triggernometry podcast with another friend of Australiana, Francis Foster.In this wide-ranging conversation, host Will Kingston and Konstantin discuss Ukraine, free speech, the decline of western culture and the rise of activist journalism.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy 'An Immigrant's Love Letter to the West' here.Join the Triggernometry community here.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.We now live in an age where words are violence. Where morality is assessed in Silicon Valley boardrooms instead of local communities. Where free speech is encumbered with so many legislative ifs and buts that it’s rapidly losing meaning. The great tragedy is it feels like there are less and less people willing to stand up for a belief that previous generations fought and died for – the right to think and say what we believe. Host Will Kingston is joined by legal theorist Josh Krook to discuss how free speech in Australia is eroding before our eyes.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Subscribe to Josh’s blog here.Note: We had some minor sound quality issues arising from Josh calling from the UK. Stick with it. It's worth it.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.In last week’s episode host Will Kingston chatted to firebrand conservative commentator Sydney Watson, whose funny and fearless culture war observations have made her a Youtube sensation the world over. It turns out both host and guest had an aversion to brevity.This is Part II of Australiana in conversation with Sydney Watson. In this episode Will and Sydney cover modern feminism, race relations and woke celebrities.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Follow Sydney on Twitter, Youtube and Instagram.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.Sydney Watson is not a quiet Australian, although she shares their frustrations. On the contrary she’s a very loud Australian. Her army of over one million social media followers come to her for funny and fearless culture war observations.In this first episode of a two-part series, host Will Kingston and Sydney discuss the body positivity movement, trans conversion therapy and the rise of identity politics within companies.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Follow Sydney on Twitter and Youtube.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.Australia and the UK have adopted a legally-binding commitment to net zero carbon emissions by 2050. In this provocative conversation with host Will Kingston, author and Spectator journalist Ross Clark lays out a searing case for why this commitment is not only environmentally futile, but economically and geopolitically dangerous. Ross’ new book is titled ‘Not Zero: How an Irrational Target Will Impoverish You, Help China (and Won't Even Save the Planet).’Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy ‘Not Zero’ here.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.Why are there almost no right-wing comedians? Why do we take jokes so seriously? Is it possible to be funny in 2023 without being cancelled? Host Will Kingston searches for answers with teacher-turned-comedian-turned-podcasting magnate, Francis Foster. Francis is co-host of the hugely successful Triggernometry podcast. Will and Francis discuss comedy and a buffet of culture wars issues in this wide-ranging conversation.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.The pandemic may be coming to an end, but the virus of groupthink that infected our institutions still runs rampant. Host Will Kingston chats with economist and author Gigi Foster about how Covid exposed an egregious failure of competence and courage in the sciences and academia, where the scientific method and academic debate were shamefully tossed aside. The question is, can they be saved?Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.Buy The Great Covid Panic here.

Update: Australiana is now Fire at Will - your safe space for dangerous conversations.Australia is changing before our eyes but we cannot see it. Or perhaps we don’t want to? Enter Australiana, the new podcast that will look at the big issues facing Australia through the telescope of the news of the day. Every week host Will Kingston will speak to a newsmaker or news-breaker to understand our politics, our culture and the wars that are being waged to change them.Australiana is produced by The Spectator, the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. There’s no publication better placed to help you see the changing face of our nation.Follow Will Kingston and Fire at Will on social media here.Subscribe to The Spectator Australia here.