Not An Expert: A Teen's Take On Life, Identity, and Politics

This episode has a long intro so skip to 3:46 to jump straight to the interview.

Lev Moscow, affectionately known to many as Mr. Moscow, talks to me about everything from ChatGPT to media in a broken democracy, how the more you know the less you know, a new fascist age, BookTok, and more.

Moscow's Podcast: https://www.acorrectionpodcast.com/

Mentioned:

Ones and Tooze

How to Watch TV News by Neil Postman

The Chickenshit Club by Jesse Eisinger

Elite Capture by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò

Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman

The Century Trilogy - Ken Follett

Kingsbridge Series - Ken Follett

Timothy Snyder

Understanding Power - Noam Chomsky

Tyler Cowen

Ezra Klein

Doug Henwood

Marginal Revolution

Developing Economics

Jacobin

Open Democracy

Hammer and Hope

The Black Agenda Report

Vox

ZNetwork

In this episode, I talk to Jamieson Webster, psychoanalyst and author of several books on Freud and psychoanalysis as well as essays on mental health and American life. We discuss dreams, psychoanalysis, freud, teen suicide, mass media, the 2008 crisis and how it all interacts. This is the last episode of my series on teen trends and mental health!

In this episode Malcolm Harris, author of Kids These Days and Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, among others, talks with us about what a generation means, how Gen-Z and millennials differ, generational trends, mental health and more.

In Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life, author William Deresciewicz talks about elite college admissions and the effect it has on students before and after starting college, how society tries to trap us in a rat race and what we can do to get out. I talk with him about everything from affirmative action, social media, and NFTs to what it means to be a meritocracy, how students cope with mental health issues and what causes them.

Matthew Continetti, author of The Right: The Hundred Year War writes about the history of The Right, how it has shifted, populist strands throughout The Right, and how Trump fits into that. We talk about history, current events, and what that tells us about the shape of the Republican Party, Sarah Palin, and more.

Michael Kazin, author of What It Took to Win: A History of the Democratic Party and American historian at Georgetown University writes about populism throughout history and how the Democratic party has dealt with Democracy. I wanted to talk with him about how history illustrates current events and he provides invaluable historical insight for framing todays political climate!

This episode features John Perkins, New York Times bestselling author, shaman, father, ex-economic hitman, and more. We talk about what's changed since the last confessions of an economic hitman: COVID, Trump, China, and Afghanistan among other things. Also, we briefly discuss Russia and Ukraine. We filmed this episode on February 21st so the information is slightly outdated but I think it's important to reflect on what our thoughts were before the invasion and how they (and the world) have changed. Enjoy!

Cam Grey, UPenn professor of Classics and Rome, spoke with me about how Roman society is entwined in American society, what it means to be an empire, how we can be more empathetic, the capitol riots and more. 

Listening to this episode, half a year after I recorded it, editing it on January 6th of 2022 and hearing how my thoughts, my own thoughts on these issues have changed and evolved, has been for me, one of the best parts of this experience thus far. I can also appreciate, as opposed to be embarrassed by, Dr. Grey’s ability to leave me grasping for words (not something many people can do). And I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I enjoyed making it.

Facing a mayoral election last year and an upcoming gubernatorial election, not to mention California's recall, I wanted to talk to someone well-versed in local politics and who better than Errol Louis. Errol Louis is a journalist, teacher, and a television host on NY1 among other things! We talked about many things including the media's influence on polarization, local and federal politics, and how journalism relates to all of that as well as (fittingly) what makes a good interview!

Mentioned:

Ken Burns

Cindy Adams 

Josh Fox is a documentary film maker primarily focused on the Climate Crisis, I watched his film, How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can't Change, on a school trip. it has been over 6 years later and I still think about this film. The film scared me, but it scared me into trying to learn more and trying to take action. But I still have some questions, what is the price of climate education? Who is to blame for climate change and what should individuals do about it? And what role does art play in all this? I try to answer all these questions and more with Josh Fox in this episode.

Find Fox here:

https://twitter.com/joshfoxfilm?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Watch all his films: https://www.joshfoxfilm.com/

http://www.howtoletgomovie.com/

https://www.instagram.com/joshfoxfilm/?hl=en

Find me @margotluftig on instagram

Hi, my name is Margot and I am a 16-year-old living in New York City. Over the pandemic I had the opportunity to be left alone with my thoughts and what I discovered is that I have questions, lots of them. So I decided to start this podcast, where I'll be talking to everyone and everyone I want to (who responds to my emails of course) about anything and everything on my mind!