This Is Hell!

Mike German, co-author with Beth Zasloff of the new book, "Policing White Supremacy: The Enemy Within," returns to This is Hell! Mike is a former FBI agent who went undercover in the far right whtie supremacsit movement and has appeared on the show a couple of times. "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Mike's book here: https://thenewpress.com/books/policing-white-supremacy Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Disinformation and far-right digital media scholar Becca Lewis, who posted The Guardian article, “‘Headed for technofascism’: the rightwing roots of Silicon Valley." Check out Becca Lewis new Guardian piece at this link: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ng-interactive/2025/jan/29/silicon-valley-rightwing-technofascism?fbclid=IwY2xjawIYf-tleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHc2nPsngc-4BdtZ_VAwm84lbBIMTOkq8WaTAvn1nYmXhUWlgWa_lfeyW2w_aem_L7nLbYIVbWoIlBoxR9OKLw Becca served as an expert witness in the defamation lawsuits brought against Alex Jones by parents of Sandy Hook shooting victims. She is currently writing a book on the rise of reactionary politics in Silicon Valley and online. Keep TiH! free and completely listener supported by subscribing to our weekly bonus Patreon podcast or visiting thisishell.com/pages/support

Journalist and historian Eoin Higgins, author of the new book, "Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Eoin's book here: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/eoin-higgins/owned/9781645030461/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Award-winning journalist Natasha Hakimi Zapata joins us to discuss her new book, “Another World Is Possible: Lessons For America From Around The Globe”, published by The New Press. Her articles can be found be found in In These TImes, The Nation, and The New York Times. Purchase the book at this link: https://thenewpress.com/books/another-world-possible Natasha Hakimi Zapata’s website: https://www.natashahakimizapata.com/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Jeff Bryant joins us to discuss his recent writing on the threats facing community public education and the ways schools and communities are resisting them. Articles to be discussed include "How a Struggling Boston School Found Success in the Roots of its Haitian American Community," and "Voters Across the Political Spectrum Gave Public Education Important Wins in the 2024 Election," both available at The Progressive. Rotten History from Renaldo Migaldi and The Moment of Truth with Jeff Dorchen both follow the interview. Check out Jeff's recent writing at The Progressive here: https://progressive.org/topics/jeff-bryant/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Maya Schenwar returns to This is Hell! Maya will be joined by the co-editor Kim Wilson who are co-editors of the new collection, "We Grow the World Together: Parenting Toward Abolition" from Haymarket Books. Maya is editor in-chief of truthout. Kim is the cofounder, cohost, and producer of Beyond Prisons, a podcast on incarceration and prison abolition. Rotten History from Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out their new edited volume here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2446-we-grow-the-world-together Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Sarah Jaffe, author of “Work Won't Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted, and Alone and Necessary Trouble: Americans in Revolt” joins us to discuss her new book “From the Ashes: Grief and Revolution in a World on Fire”, published by Bold Type Books. Purchase the book at this link: https://bookshop.org/p/books/from-the-ashes-grief-and-revolution-in-a-world-on-fire-sarah-jaffe/21156243?ean=9781541703490 Sarah Jaffe’s website: https://sarahljaffe.com/ Jeffrey Dorchen also brings us his latest "Moment of Truth". Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Liz Pelly joins This Is Hell! to discuss her Harper's cover article titled "The Ghosts in the Machine: Spotify's Plot Against Musicians," excerpted from her new book, Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist (One Signal Publishers). An all-new Moment of Truth with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Liz's article: https://harpers.org/archive/2025/01/the-ghosts-in-the-machine-liz-pelly-spotify-musicians/ And her book: https://lizpelly.info/book Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Sonali Kolhatkar, author of “Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice” joins us to discuss her new book “Talking About Abolition: A Police-Free World Is Possible”, published by Seven Stories Press. Purchase the book at this link: https://sevenstories.com/books/4670-talking-about-abolition?srsltid=AfmBOopfJr7eEoqqTYOKWx9Q_aJhojtOxT5fyipK4DfbqnIfm4q0VBy1 Sonali Kolhatkar’s website: https://www.sonalikolhatkar.com Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Kellie Carter-Jackson returns to discuss her new book, We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance (Seal Press). Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Best of 2024: Gareth Gore on his book, "Opus: The Cult of Dark Money, Human Trafficking, and Right-Wing Conspiracy inside the Catholic Church," published by Simon and Schuster on the day of the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Gabrielle Perry joins us to discuss her recent Scalawag article, "Louisiana is the blueprint for further fascist repression." Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Returning to This is Hell! is listener favorite Sophie Lewis, author of Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family, as well as Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation. Sophie will be on to talk about her new writing at The Drift, "Lipstick on the Pigs: Kamala Harris and the Lineage of the Female Cop." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Cory Doctorow on his Financial Times article, "‘Enshittification’ is coming for absolutely everything: The term describes the slow decay of online platforms such as Facebook. But what if we’ve entered the ‘enshittocene’?" "Rotten History" follows the interview. Cory also has a new novel, The Bezel. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Ajay Singh Chaudhary returns to This Is Hell! to talk about his Baffler Magazine article, "Sick and Tired: Against Resilience," an excerpt from, The Exhausted of the Earth: Politics in a Burning World (Repeater Books). Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Dan Piepenbring on his Baffler article, "K-Pop: Our forefathers did dissociatives." Dan is the New Books columnist for Harper’s and the co-author, with Tom O’Neill, of CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties. He’s currently working on a book about ketamine. "The Moment of Truth" follows the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon.

Tad DeLay returns to This Is Hell! to discuss his new book from Verso, Future of Denial: The Ideologies of Climate Change. "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Matthew D. Taylor joins us to discuss his book, The Violent Take It by Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy, published just yesterday by Broadleaf Books. Jeff Dorchen joins us after the interview to deliver a new segment of "The Moment of Truth." Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Kate Manne returns to talk about her book, Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Past guest Stephen Zunes returns to speak with us about his recent Truthout writing including, "Biden Continues to Provide Israel Billions for War Crimes," "Biden’s Response to Israel’s ICC Prosecution Is an Attack on International Law," and "Don’t Buy the Right-Wing Disinformation Campaign on “From the River to the Sea.” Stephen is a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco, who is currently the Torgny Segerstedt Visiting Research professor at the Gothenburg University in Sweden. "Rotten History" follows the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Historian Gerald Horne returns to the show to discuss his new book, Armed Struggle?: Panthers & Communists; Black Nationalists and Liberals in Southern California through the Sixties and Seventies. "Rotten History" follows the interview. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/thisishell

Economist Rob Larson returns to This Is Hell! to dicsuss Mastering the Universe: The Obscene Wealth of the Ruling Class, What They Do with Their Money, and Why You Should Hate Them Even More (Haymarket Books) on the day it's published. Check out Rob's book here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2215-mastering-the-universe Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon.

We wrap up the week with the return of writer, theorist, and recovering academic Sophie Lewis to talk about her new writing at Salvage Magazine, "Some of my best enemies are feminists: on Zionist feminism." This will be Sophie's fourth appearance on This is Hell! and her interviews have repeatedly been selected by listeners as their favorites of the year each time she has appeared. Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access weekly bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon.

Nevin Kallepalli joins us to discuss his writing at the Baffler, “Hindutva University: Meet the group spreading Hindu supremacist propaganda on college campuses”. “Moment of Truth” from Jeff Dorchen will follow the interview. Check out Nevin’s article here: https://thebaffler.com/latest/university-of-hindutva-kallepalli Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Elaine Scarry joins us to discuss her writing at the Boston Review, “The Extortionist Doctrine : On the persistence of U.S. nuclear deterrence policy.’” "Rotten History" from Renaldo Migaldi follow the interview. Check out Elaine’s article here: https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/the-extortionists-doctrine/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Rebecca John joins us to discuss her writing at DeSmog, "Revealed: Big Oil Told 70 Years Ago That Fossil Fuel Emissions Could Impact ‘Civilization.’" "Rotten History" from Renaldo Migaldi and "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follow the interview. Check out Rebecca's article here: https://www.desmog.com/2024/11/12/revealed-big-oil-told-70-years-ago-that-fossil-fuel-emissions-could-impact-civilization/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Alberto Toscano joins us to discuss his In These TImes piece, "Liberalism Will Cost Us the Earth - Trump’s recoronation is another symptom of centrism’s global bankruptcy.." Check out Alberto's article here: https://inthesetimes.com/article/liberalism-will-cost-us-the-earth?fbclid=IwY2xjawGzEB1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHSSXdh3TbVJILW-Ke60gd7sHll2I-8Y0gu8Hpt8uILxKhva2d1OWrwLeYQ_aem_8ZjUNhGUyyNj4NkRN7PLnA Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Yoav Litvin joins us to discuss his Al Jazeera column, "Project Esther: A Trumpian blueprint to crush anticolonial resistance: The Heritage Foundation strategy named after the biblical Jewish queen offers insights into the persecution those who oppose Zionism and white-supremacy will likely face in Trump’s America." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Yoav's article here: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/11/15/project-esther-a-trumpian-blueprint-to-crush-anticolonial-resistance Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Author and scholar Alex de Waal returns to the show to discuss his recent article at the Boston Review titled "Engineers of Calamity - Famine Denial's Past and Present From Ukraine to Gaza". Check out Alex's article here: https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/engineers-of-calamity/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell Famine Denial's Past and Present/Alex De Waal By This Is Hell! is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Francis Northwood joins us to discuss his new Baffler article titles "Unsafe Bets - Polymarket’s great expectations". Check out Francis' article :https://thebaffler.com/latest/unsafe-bets-northwood Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Legal scholar Karen Greenberg returns to the show to discuss her recent article at TomDispatch titled "It’s Not Just About the President It’s About the Presidency." "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Karen's article here: https://tomdispatch.com/its-not-just-about-the-president/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Returning to This is Hell! is listener favorite Sophie Lewis, author of Full Surrogacy Now: Feminism Against Family, as well as Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation. Sophie will be on to talk about her new writing at The Drift, "Lipstick on the Pigs: Kamala Harris and the Lineage of the Female Cop." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Sophie's article here: https://www.thedriftmag.com/lipstick-on-the-pigs/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Co-founder of the new feminist blog, Flytrap, Nicole Froio joins us to discuss her new piece titled, "The (Feminist) Empire Strikes Back." The Flytrap Media is a worker-owned, intersectional, and expansive feminist media group that thinks beyond clicks and hashtag-engagement. "Rotten History" from Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Nicole's piece here: https://theflytrap.beehiiv.com/p/the-feminist-empire-strikes-back Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Anthropologist Sylvia J. Martin discusses her recent the Monthly Review article, "UARCs: The American Universities that Produce Warfighters." She is the author of numerous articles on globalization and the intersection of narrative and the U. S. national security state. Check out Sylvia's article here: https://monthlyreview.org/2024/09/01/uarcs-the-american-universities-that-produce-warfighters/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Returning to the show for the third time, Jennifer C. Berkshire wrote the American Prospect article, "Breaking the Public Schools: Red states are enacting universal education vouchers, threatening budget calamity and potentially degrading student achievement." Jennifer is the host of the education podcast 'Have You Heard' and the author, with another past guest Jack Schneider, of "The Education Wars: A Citizen’s Guide and Defense Manual." "Rotten History" from Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Jennifer's article here: https://prospect.org/education/2024-10-11-breaking-public-schools/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Tracy Rosenthal returns to discuss her new book, "Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis" from Haymarket Books. Check out Tracy's book here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2443-abolish-rent Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Tracy Rosenthal returns to discuss her new book, "Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis" from Haymarket Books. "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Tracy's book here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2443-abolish-rent Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

National Book Award finalist Arlie Russell Hochschild returns to This is Hell! to speak with us about her new book, "Stolen Pride: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right." "Rotten History" from Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview Check out Arlie's new book: https://thenewpress.com/books/stolen-pride Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Journalist and lawyer Jessica Pishko joins us to discuss her new book, "The Highest Law in the Land: How the Unchecked Power of Sheriffs Threatens Democracy." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Jessica's book here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/707263/the-highest-law-in-the-land-by-jessica-pishko/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Sociologist Musa al-Gharbi returns to discuss his new book, "We Have Never Been Woke: The Cultural Contradictions of a New Elite," published just today by Princeton University Press. "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Musa's book here: https://musaalgharbi.com/we-have-never-been-woke-available-now/ Musa is currently on a book tour. Check out the dates here: https://musaalgharbi.com/book-tour-we-have-never-been-woke/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Matthew D. Taylor joins us to discuss his book, "The Violent Take It by Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy," published just yesterday by Broadleaf Books. Jeff Dorchen joins us after the interview to deliver a new segment of "The Moment of Truth." Check out Matthew's book here: https://www.broadleafbooks.com/store/product/9781506497785/The-Violent-Take-It-by-Force Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Gareth Gore on his book, "Opus: The Cult of Dark Money, Human Trafficking, and Right-Wing Conspiracy inside the Catholic Church," published just today by Simon and Schuster. "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Gareth's book here: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Opus/Gareth-Gore/9781668016145 Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

We have a treat for all you New Yorkers out there. Writer, academic, organizer, and fourth-generation Staten Islander Dennis Hogan joins us to discuss his recent article from The Baffler, "I Got Mine: Staten Island's Politics of Resentment." "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview, as does an all-new "Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen live from another borough of New York. Check out Dennis's article here: https://thebaffler.com/salvos/i-got-mine-hogan Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Center for Economic and Policy Research's Francesca Emanuele on her article, "Gaza Is Causing Diplomatic Rifts in the Western Hemisphere: The Organization of American States’ pro-Israel stance may erode its legitimacy in the region," at Foreign Policy. Check out Francesca's article here: https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/09/12/israel-palestine-gaza-war-oas-latin-america-almagro-us-far-right/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Kellie Carter-Jackson returns to discuss her new book, "We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance" (Seal Press). "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Kellie's book here: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/kellie-carter-jackson/we-refuse/9781541602908/?lens=seal-press Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Heba Gowayed discusses her In These Times article, "Borders and the Exchange of Humans for Debt: Borders and debt are new instruments of violence in a system that has had many names." Heba is an Associate Professor of Sociology at CUNY Hunter College. She is author of, "Refuge: How the State Shapes Human Potential." "The Moment of Truth" with Jeff Dorchen follows the interview. Check out Heba's article here: https://inthesetimes.com/article/borders-exchange-humans-debt-asylum-global-south Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Returning to This is Hell!, On Barak, author of, "Heat, a History Lessons from the Middle East for a Warming Planet." On is a social and cultural historian of science and technology and Professor of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University. After the interview, we hear a new "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi. Check out Barak's book here: https://www.ucpress.edu/books/heat-a-history/paper Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Ben Norton joins us to discuss his recent article at the Geopolitical Economy Report titled, "How US Big Tech monopolies colonized the world: Welcome to neo-feudalism." After the interview, we hear a new "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi. Check out Ben's article here: https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2024/08/19/us-big-tech-monopolies-neo-feudalism/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Gabrielle Perry joins us to discuss her recent Scalawag article, "Louisiana is the blueprint for further fascist repression." Jeff Dorchen delivers a new "The Moment of Truth" after the interview. Check out Gabrielle's article here: https://scalawagmagazine.org/2024/07/louisiana-is-the-blueprint-for-further-fascist-repression/ Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell

Shilpa Jindia discusses her recent Baffler article, "Freedom from Dissent: The Independence of Public Universities Is Under Attack." "Rotten History" by Renaldo Migaldi follows the interview. Check out Shilpa's article here: https://thebaffler.com/latest/freedom-from-dissent-jindia Help keep This Is Hell! completely listener supported and access bonus episodes by subscribing to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/thisishell