Bothsidesism Isn't What You Think  ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Bothsidesism Is Not Mere Equivalence** - Bothsidesism is distinct from whataboutism and false equivalence; acknowledging fault on both sides needn't claim equal culpability. - Pointing out wrongdoing across the spectrum preserves nuance and resists moral binary thinking. Transcript: Speaker 3 Probably. Caitlin Schess I feel like that's part of the challenge is like some of the criticisms we have gotten, I think are wrongly defining both sideism. But I hope that we can come to like a, there is a form of this that is worthy of being critiqued that I think we could have a good definition of. Skye Jethani Can we start off with just two, what I think, maybe there's more, two false understandings of both sideism. OK. Sometimes I think people conflate both sidesism. Is it sidesism or sideism? Caitlin Schess Sideism. I think. Skye Jethani Both sidesism. Both sidesism. Yeah. OK. I think some people conflate both sidesism with whataboutism. Yeah. Caitlin Schess Yes. Skye Jethani OK. So sometimes an argument would be a political group, whatever, is doing X, Y, or Z, and people defend it by saying, well, what about? And then they talk about what the other side is doing that's either similar or worse or whatever. We are not talking about both sides. I mean, both sides-ism is not whatabout-ism. Because whatabout-ism is essentially a way of deflating or defending or minimizing whatever your side may be. Yeah, yes. Of. Yeah. OK, that's one, I think, false definition. The other one, and this is going to come up a lot in our conversation. Both sides ism is not the same as equivalence. Yeah. Because you're acknowledging that an error may exist or a violation may exist on both the Democratic left and the Republican right does not mean they are in equal proportion. And I think a lot of the criticism we get are people assuming we're making an equivalency argument when we are not. Speaker 3 I mean, that's the rub right there. I think most people who are aware of both sidesism sees it as a bad thing because it is trying to equivalent things that are not equivalent. But there's a difference in quantity and kind. Let me give you one example. Skye Jethani Right. So during, I looked this up, during President Trump's first term in office, by whoever was recording this, he apparently made 30,573 lies, which averages 21 per day. That's impressive. That's impressive. It is impressive, right? So we could talk all day long about all the lying that President Trump does, right? If we have that conversation and then I say, Biden lied to. Right. Caitlin Schess Yeah. Skye Jethani That's a fact. President Biden did lie. But that doesn't mean he lied as much. But pointing out that he lied. And frankly, some of his lies and that of his administration were were significant, significant, like about his health and ability to to run for office again, all that. He didn't lie nearly as much as President Trump did. It doesn't mean he didn't lie. So just ([Time 0:02:16](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ca79b96a-32b2-469b-beb4-bac3502ed1a9)) - **Clarify Motives When Comparing Faults** - When you point out the other side's faults, clarify your motive so you don't minimize a greater wrongdoing. - Use comparisons to show nuance, not to excuse or downplay severity. Transcript: Caitlin Schess This is where I think part of what's going on is your motivation for saying something about the other side doing this also. If your motivation for saying, well, Biden lied, is to say all politicians lie. Trump's no different from any other politician. They all lie. They all do this. That's unhelpful because you're minimizing that part of what that statistic is showing is like an extraordinary amount of lying and a character flaw, I think. If what you're trying to do is say, well, Biden also lied, it's important to remember he wasn't perfect and that that serves some goal. Or just to say one side or the other is not the only is not where all evil or all goodness lies. That's a really good reason to say, well, Biden also lied. To say the pressures of being in that particular kind of office can lead to these kinds of temptations. And this does often happen because you're trying to get your agenda done or you're trying to cover up something that you had to cut a corner to get accomplished. That can be really useful. But if you're doing it to say, actually, what Trump did isn't that bad or special or important, then I think that can qualify as both sides. Skye Jethani Another example of this beyond the line is the abuse of the pardon power. President Trump, I think, severely abused the pardon power when he pardoned all the January 6th rioters, both those who were guilty of trespassing and those who were guilty of assaulting Police officers. Right. Like they were all pardoned. I think it's important in that conversation to acknowledge that President Biden, I think, severely abused the pardon power when he gave blanket pardons to his own family members. Are they equal? I don't know. We could adjudicate whose abuse is worse. But if you only talk about the way one side abuses power, the assumption can be, well, the other side must be good or the other side must be clean or the other side must be innocent. And in a lot of these issues, it's not that. Yeah, you can say one is worse. It doesn't mean the other is good. It just means it's slightly less bad. ([Time 0:05:13](https://share.snipd.com/snip/63b4a496-91e6-485b-af6a-19f939778cf1)) - **Vacation Shirt Tested On Cape Cod** - Skye tells a personal story about receiving Poncho shirts before a Cape Cod trip and finding them comfortable and versatile. - He used one shirt all day hiking then to a formal dinner, praising fit and breathability. Transcript: Skye Jethani I've got a true story. Amanda and I had a long weekend getaway plan for Cape Cod this summer with some friends. She told me weeks beforehand that I needed to get some new clothes for the trip, but I totally forgot. Then just the day before we left, a new sponsor to this podcast called Poncho sent me three of their shirts to try. So I took them with me to Cape Cod, and I'm not kidding, they are my new favorite shirts i don't know what kind of fabric they use but it just feels great these shirts are seriously comfortable And they stay cool in the heat they breathe and they look fantastic here's the best part they are truly all-day shirts i wore one of my poncho shirts all day while hiking around martha's Vineyard in shorts and then in the evening i just threw on some pants and wore the same shirt out to a very fancy dinner. Poncho shirts can dress up or dress down depending on whatever you're doing, and every one is backed by the Poncho Promise. Free shipping and free returns, free exchanges to make sure you get just the right fit. They have a whole bunch of different styles, the original, the western, denim, and ultralight. You can get them in short or long sleeves, regular or slim fit, and in a ton of colors and patterns. So if you've been looking for the perfect shirt, something breathable that fits great, feels even better, and stands out in a good way, give Poncho a try. ([Time 0:08:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/213e2ed8-6e44-4bf2-a9e7-2189297fb367)) - **Independence Over Audience Flattery** - Holy Post resists placating any political side and structures funding to preserve independent critique. - They intentionally avoid aligning fully with MAGA or progressive camps to maintain theological and political integrity. Transcript: Speaker 3 Can we address, I think, Caitlin, you said it, and I think it's an easy one for us to address. One of the comments was someone critiquing us for doing this, and then they wondered if we both sides things to placate sensitive conservative ears. And part of me wants to be like, I don't know how you could listen to the majority of our stuff and think we care about placating conservative ears. Like we're pretty strong in our critique of that. And so I kind of I see that one come up just enough that I kind of want to put it to bed that obviously we are. John talks about this kind of why we have set up just even our funding model. The way we have set it up is so that we can speak we believe to be true and not worry about losing donors or stepping on toes. Sky, could you speak more about that? Skye Jethani Yeah. I mean, not to go off on a tangent here, but if our primary goal was to make as much revenue as possible, to build as large an audience as possible, to get as much advertising revenue as possible, Then we wouldn't just be worried about offending MAGA people. We would be wholeheartedly going after them and trying to bring them into the fold. There's far more Christian audience on the far right than there is in the middle or on the left. So no, we are not worried about offending people on the right. What I find more interesting, and you guys can tell me if you think I'm right or wrong on this, I think over the past five, well, going back even further prior to 2020, some people found The Holy Post because they were looking for a Christian voice, a Christian outlet that hadn't drunk the MAGA Kool-Aid. And they found me and Phil back then, and then later you came along, Caitlin. They found us and they're like, oh, thank goodness. There's some people who are willing to acknowledge what's really bonkers about Christians going after Trump and MAGA and all that. But then they listened long enough and they were a little weirded out by the fact that we weren't as progressive as they thought we were. And that we weren't throwing our lot in completely with the Democratic Party. And then those people got angry at us for not... President Obama said something about this years ago, I think while he was still in office, he talks about how people go to news networks now not looking for information, but looking For affirmation. And to be fair, I think there's a segment of our audience that comes to us looking for affirmation. And I hope they find that in the things that are consistent with the way of Jesus. But if they're looking for affirmation with a political ideology, they're going to be constantly frustrated with us because we are not here to affirm the MAGA right or the progressive Left, because there are elements of both that we think are really off track. ([Time 0:16:56](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c127a637-a110-4bb0-9a91-4ee9de1460b9)) - **Loyalty Slips Into Idolatry Over Time** - Political idolatry can evolve gradually as parties demand deeper loyalty, producing moral blind spots. - Both left and right can become illiberal when loyalty to ideology outranks fidelity to Jesus. Transcript: Caitlin Schess It's instructive to look at the history of the Republican Party and Christians' relationship to it. We talked a lot closer to 2020 and 2024 about how some of this story is a story in which this idolatry is built over time. The level of loyalty that is demanded of Christians increases over time. And then you get in a position where maybe when you first sort of like tentatively threw your lot in, there were some bad things, there were some good things, but there was a lot of good And you agreed with a lot. And then by the time your loyalty is at this really high level and you're being asked to sacrifice things that shouldn't be sacrificed, the things that you knew were sort of bad at the Beginning, but were not a huge deal, have now become huge deals. And I can't know what will happen politically in the next 25, 50 years. But part of my concern that people not think, oh, I'll just replicate my relationship with the Republican Party on the left is because right now it might be, there's some things I don't Love, but it really is not politically expedient for me to comment on them. And also I'm holding it all loosely and it's a coalition and I agree with them, but I'm not. But over time, if you're not cautious, if you're not like really thinking critically, you can end up in a similar position where you've become very loyal. And those things that were not a big deal in the beginning have now become huge. Skye Jethani Can I give you an example of that in Operation? Yes. I'm sure you remember, it wasn't that long ago, that one of the huge issues on the right was how the left shut down free speech, right? The cancel culture on the left. And you can't go on college campuses and say the things that need to be said. And that Milo, crazy guy, Milo, whatever his name was- Oh, Ventimil- Nope, that's an actor. Caitlin Schess He had some big Greek name. What am I thinking? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Skye Jethani You know, Yiannopoulos or whatever his name was- I was going to say Milo Ventimil- Yeah, the actor.... Was getting shut down on college campus. So the right made it its mission to say, we are for free speech because the left is for cancel culture and not for free speech. And so a lot of people who were against what the left was doing on speech threw their lot in with the right. Well, look at where we are now. Who is shutting down free speech? It's MAGA and the right who are saying, we're going to sick the Justice Department on you if you don't say the right things about the right and everything's now hate speech. And the people defending that are the very people who a couple of years ago were saying, no, we're for free speech. But because their partisan ideology came first, they're excusing the very thing that they demonized on the other side. So I don't want to be responsible for somebody appropriately recognizing abuses on the right, going, all right, then I'm throwing my lot in with the left. And then when the left starts doing those abuses or others, they don't recognize it because they bought into the idea that, well, the godly position is on the left and that's just where I'm going to be. ([Time 0:27:10](https://share.snipd.com/snip/44963916-b1e8-4422-8b9c-26396a82c8c7)) - **Fundamentalism Transcends Left/Right** - Illiberalism and fundamentalism appear across the political spectrum and are defined by how people believe, not what they believe. - Skye prefers describing groups as liberal or illiberal and centered on Jesus versus centered on ideology. Transcript: Skye Jethani Educational pedigree, right? From Liberty to Duke, to Dallas to Duke, like you've seen the spectrum. And a little bit because of my education, I went to a large state university, but more so because of my family background, just the diversity of my family background. I have seen people on the left who are just as fundamentalist as some of the Christians I've met on the right. And if people want to know what gets me animated, it's illiberalism. And I don't care where I see it. And I've seen a lot of it on the left. And that's why I know a lot of people listening are coming out of Christian evangelical environments where they've seen the abuses of fundamentalism and the absolutism and shutting Down people who think differently or question things or who have terribly closed-minded views about this, that, or the other, and they reject it. And they think, well, the other side must be better. And you and I are both kind of saying, you can try it, but you'll find kooks on the other side. And this is my both sides. I think they are there too because human beings are human beings. Yes. And there's a certain personality trait that some people possess that demands fundamentalism. And I am much more comfortable with somebody who's more conservative than me or maybe more progressive than me, who's curious, who's hospitable, who's genuinely trying to follow The way of Jesus imperfectly and improv-ing it when they have to. But there are plenty of people on the other side that don't have those qualities. So rather than painting with these categories of left and right or MAGA versus woke or whatever names you want to use, I want to talk about liberal or illiberal. I want to talk about centered on Jesus versus centered on some other ideology or idolatry. And that's what gets me going. So when I say, well, the other side does this too, what I'm trying to acknowledge is that quality is not non-existent on the other side. So don't pretend that it is. ([Time 0:38:10](https://share.snipd.com/snip/030bee41-b913-4f4f-bae1-b9fe667a10a5)) - **Rhetoric Radicalizes On Both Sides** - Political violence is inflamed by rhetoric and algorithms across camps, even if one side currently shows more incidents. - Bothsides recognition helps spot emerging threats and prevents moral certainty that fuels violence. Transcript: Skye Jethani There's this argument that's happening in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination about which side is more violent or which side is violent at all. And the left is saying, no, no, no, no, no. There's all this evidence that the political violence is much more prevalent on the right. And the Department of Justice deleted evidence that shows it's all on the right, blah, blah, blah. And then you have, of course, the MAGA right going, are you kidding me? Charlie Kirk was assassinated by somebody with leftist ideas. And Donald Trump had two assassination attempts. It's the left that is politically violent. And it's just disgusting to me that they're all arguing about, no, you're the violent one. And what came to mind is Elizabeth Newman, who has been on the show before. We've done some Holy Post events with her. She wrote a book called Kingdom of Rage, former Homeland Security personnel expert in counterterrorism. And I remember having a conversation with her where she said, for many, many, many years, the government was very worried about right-wing extremism and the radicalization that is Happening on the right, neo-Nazi groups, KKK, things like that. And there has been a dramatic rise in all of that, as we've seen, like January 6th and elsewhere. But she said the last time I was with her, I think it was the Denver event. She said what's concerning her is for the first time ever, they're seeing a dramatic increase in violent threats coming from the left. And I think we're seeing that play out. I think there is clear evidence that the rhetoric on all sides is inflaming unstable people and radicalizing them. And yes, some on the right will be moved to violence as we've seen the assassinations in Minnesota that we go on down the list. But we're starting to see violent actions happening on the left. And for either side to say, we are not a problem, only you are. I mean, this is a classic example of why both-side needs to be addressed because the thing that's feeding the problem is not coded red or blue. It's algorithms and rhetoric that gets picked up and spread. And both sides are going to see this increasingly be a problem. It doesn't mean that there's an equal number of radicalized people on one side or the other, but there doesn't need to be for this to be a huge problem for this country. ([Time 0:43:05](https://share.snipd.com/snip/4fde2a6a-ad37-44bf-ab26-4634e1bc3a3e)) - **Prioritize Faithfulness Over Party** - Call people to faithfulness to Jesus rather than to a political party, even if that invites criticism. - Maintain credibility by consistently calling out failures on both sides so you can engage across divides. Transcript: Speaker 3 The issue with it is that, well, sometimes forest fires start from campfires. And so I think like, me if I'm wrong, to some extent of what we're saying is that we think when we call out issues on both sides, even if one is a campfire and one is a forest fire, we are trying To, one, earn some credibility with either side of like, we're not just fan boys and girls of a particular side. And we think that by calling out both sides, hopefully it allows us to engage in better credibility, better discussion with people who might disagree with us, but they're more willing To have a conversation. But two, it's like some of those things that you think are small now, well, eventually the left's going to be in power again. And, and then what happens when that campfire grows and grows and grows? And what do we do then? So can we talk a little bit about, I don't know if you have anything to say about the campfire metaphor, but even just like this idea of credibility and why we think that that's a big reason Why we do this. Skye Jethani To really overextend the metaphor, I think it's a little short-sighted to forget that part of what led to MAGA, the forest fire of MAGA, was the failures and abuses of the left. Would use is, okay, the left was a campfire. Maybe the campfire got a little bit out of control. And MAGA came along, or the right came along at the time and said, in order to stop the spread of that little fire, we need to do a controlled burn. And the controlled burn, unfortunately, has gotten out of control. It's not controlled anymore. But now the left is saying, hey, that forest fire is a huge problem. And we're justified. And we need to pay all attention to that. And you're right. We're ignoring this little one over here, which is going to be the next forest fire. I feel like my calling and responsibility, and I would extend this to the Holy Post media company in general, is not to say you should be in favor of this fire or that fire. We're calling people to faithfulness to Jesus, period. ([Time 0:51:07](https://share.snipd.com/snip/05cbcb8c-de7c-4ae7-806e-58a870256162)) - **Two Slaps: Shifts Between Political Worlds** - Caitlin recounts the 'first slap' and 'second slap' of moving from conservative to progressive contexts and discovering fundamentalism on both sides. - That journey taught her that ideological communities can be just as dogmatic when insulated. Transcript: Caitlin Schess Someone, a kind of loose friend of mine who was posting on Instagram a couple of days ago about how lonely she was because she was like, in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination, she Was like, I don't think he was evil and deserved to I also don't think he was this like Christian saint that stood for everything good and was gunned down for it. And it's really lonely here in this world where I want to say this is a tragedy and it's awful. And also it's not a sign that we need to take up arms against the left. She basically was just like, it was very vulnerable for someone who had kind of a significant platform on Instagram to just be like, I don't have a position really other than like, all Of this is bad and I feel very alone in it. And she posted later that the number of comments she got that were just like, well, you're lonely because you're wrong. Like you should just pick a side. And I told her, I was like, I just think that experience of loneliness is what it means to be a Christian, to be able to say like, I'm going to provisionally agree with you on the right or On the left when I think that's faithful. And then I'm going to face the difficulty of true belonging in our political world requires obedience and just total agreement. And it will be really lonely to not give that to anyone. On the other hand, you and I have talked a lot about my discomfort with talking about us being in exile. And part of my discomfort with that is that there can be this desire to either say we're in exile or to say I'm looking for a third way or that is really a denial of any political responsibility That just sort of says like, I'm critiquing both left and right, and I don't have anything to say. Like, we're in exile and I don't want to get involved. And I think what we're trying to do is say, as different events occur, we want to have a faithful Christian lens on them. And we also want to maintain the ability to say, we will pass different judgments depending on the context, depending on what the particular thing is, and not have those judgments predetermined By whatever side we want to live on. Well said. Skye Jethani We have a couple of minutes left. Can we run through some, because this is going to be short shrift at this point, but can we run through some of the issues on the left that we don't talk much about that we think are problematic? And some people are going to not resonate with these because it's not in their experience. I have college age kids. Lots of my friends have college age kids. Some are Christian schools, some are at state schools or secular schools. I've been on many of these college campuses. I've seen stuff a little bit like what you experienced at Duke in that class, it was like jaw dropping. I know sometimes these stories get told on social media or highlighted in MAGA media world and you think they're crazy. Sometimes they're real. Sometimes they're real. Sometimes they're real. Okay. I already mentioned the free speech cancel culture stuff, which really grew out of the left and the politically correct speech and all that kind of stuff and the suppression of free Speech. I think identity politics has been incredibly damaging and very, very prevalent on the left. The irony is a lot of these things are now being taken up by the right, but they were there. Totally. Totally. The defund the police rhetoric that came out after 2020 and some, I mean, in no way justifying the police shootings that happened or George Floyd or any of those, but the defund the policing, Incredibly politically stupid and not compassionate towards communities. Caitlin Schess And that's a really good example of how we should say on both sides, there's this tendency to give this like overly simplistic, meme-ifiable policy response. And on the right, there's examples we could give that. And the left, that's a good example of like, you took a very complicated thing that needs reform and just slapped a really easy answer on it actually most impoverished many people of Color communities have been like, don't do that. Skye Jethani I have been to communities, very progressive communities that have largely defunded the police. I wouldn't send my children there. It's horrible. So the people who suffer then are the poor and the people most likely to be victims of crime. Open borders, really stupid and not a compassionate immigration policy, even though they think it is. I think the hypocrisy over the COVID shutdowns where schools stayed closed too long and they were preventing churches from gathering for worship, but they were fine with protests During 2020 and some of the other stuff. Caitlin Schess And some things stayed shut down in part because once the other side said we want them open, it became now we dig our heels in and they must stay shut down. Skye Jethani A big one that is a complicated hairball and a mess that we don't have time to get into is I think the gender ideology and the pathology on the left on this stuff, the toxic masculinity talk, The way that so many young people are being forced to question their gender identities in ways that are just psychologically unhelpful, harmful to children, I think is incredibly Dumb and ridiculous. The extremism on abortion mentioned that already. I yeah, we've talked about that a lot of places. I don't even think they're close to being as thoughtful on this issue as progressives in Europe are. Caitlin Schess Yes. Skye Jethani I am very sympathetic to what's happening to the Palestinians. I do believe it is a genocide. I believe Israel's guilty of war crimes at this point. But the tolerance of anti-Semitism on the left right now is completely inexcusable. The valorizing of victimhood, which has definitely been copied by the right sort of horseshoe theory, I think is bad for individuals. It's bad for the country. We go on, but those are some that come to mind. And I didn't get into particular policies like Ezra Klein and what's his name wrote that book on abundance, talking about how broken blue cities are. Derek Thompson. Derek Thompson and blue states because of the over regulation of a lot of things that are actually interfering. And those are two progressive people. Totally progressive people who recognize the shortcomings on their own side. A lot of people will say, well, progressives care more about the poor, care more about immigrants, care more about education. Because in rhetoric, yes. In practice, there's a big nimbyism problem on the left. Totally. Not in my backyard kind of thing. And so there's plenty of hypocrisy on that front too. And that's why we get into other issues like judicial stuff and shopping around for nationwide stays on court shopping. I already mentioned the redistricting stuff that's going. So there's lots of stuff that I don't want to just go, if we can just get rid of MAGA and Donald Trump, then we'll be okay. Because in a way, the abuses on the left led to the overreaction on the right, which has gotten us to where we are. Yeah. Caitlin Schess And I think if you're listening and you're thinking none of those things seem that important compared to stuff on the right, first, not drawing in equivalency. They're not equivalent. But two, I just think it's so easy when you have been consuming one stream of news sources to feel the emotion of some of the problems on one side and to not feel the emotion of problems on The other side. Like I've had conversations with parents of young kids who the question is about gender and sexuality on the left are distressing ([Time 0:54:00](https://share.snipd.com/snip/a62a2f82-fb11-455d-b80d-4541860060e6)) - **Guard What You Owe To God** - Watch for gradual requests to hand God-only loyalty to political causes and resist total allegiance to any party. - Stay vigilant about faults on both sides to avoid being co-opted into harmful ideological demands. Transcript: Skye Jethani Can we run through some, because this is going to be short shrift at this point, but can we run through some of the issues on the left that we don't talk much about that we think are problematic? And some people are going to not resonate with these because it's not in their experience. I have college age kids. Lots of my friends have college age kids. Some are Christian schools, some are at state schools or secular schools. I've been on many of these college campuses. I've seen stuff a little bit like what you experienced at Duke in that class, it was like jaw dropping. I know sometimes these stories get told on social media or highlighted in MAGA media world and you think they're crazy. Sometimes they're real. Sometimes they're real. Sometimes they're real. Okay. I already mentioned the free speech cancel culture stuff, which really grew out of the left and the politically correct speech and all that kind of stuff and the suppression of free Speech. I think identity politics has been incredibly damaging and very, very prevalent on the left. The irony is a lot of these things are now being taken up by the right, but they were there. Totally. Totally. The defund the police rhetoric that came out after 2020 and some, I mean, in no way justifying the police shootings that happened or George Floyd or any of those, but the defund the policing, Incredibly politically stupid and not compassionate towards communities. Caitlin Schess And that's a really good example of how we should say on both sides, there's this tendency to give this like overly simplistic, meme-ifiable policy response. And on the right, there's examples we could give that. And the left, that's a good example of like, you took a very complicated thing that needs reform and just slapped a really easy answer on it actually most impoverished many people of Color communities have been like, don't do that. Skye Jethani I have been to communities, very progressive communities that have largely defunded the police. I wouldn't send my children there. It's horrible. So the people who suffer then are the poor and the people most likely to be victims of crime. Open borders, really stupid and not a compassionate immigration policy, even though they think it is. I think the hypocrisy over the COVID shutdowns where schools stayed closed too long and they were preventing churches from gathering for worship, but they were fine with protests During 2020 and some of the other stuff. Caitlin Schess And some things stayed shut down in part because once the other side said we want them open, it became now we dig our heels in and they must stay shut down. Skye Jethani A big one that is a complicated hairball and a mess that we don't have time to get into is I think the gender ideology and the pathology on the left on this stuff, the toxic masculinity talk, The way that so many young people are being forced to question their gender identities in ways that are just psychologically unhelpful, harmful to children, I think is incredibly Dumb and ridiculous. The extremism on abortion mentioned that already. I yeah, we've talked about that a lot of places. I don't even think they're close to being as thoughtful on this issue as progressives in Europe are. Caitlin Schess Yes. Skye Jethani I am very sympathetic to what's happening to the Palestinians. I do believe it is a genocide. I believe Israel's guilty of war crimes at this point. But the tolerance of anti-Semitism on the left right now is completely inexcusable. The valorizing of victimhood, which has definitely been copied by the right sort of horseshoe theory, I think is bad for individuals. It's bad for the country. We go on, but those are some that come to mind. And I didn't get into particular policies like Ezra Klein and what's his name wrote that book on abundance, talking about how broken blue cities are. Derek Thompson. Derek Thompson and blue states because of the over regulation of a lot of things that are actually interfering. And those are two progressive people. Totally progressive people who recognize the shortcomings on their own side. A lot of people will say, well, progressives care more about the poor, care more about immigrants, care more about education. Because in rhetoric, yes. In practice, there's a big nimbyism problem on the left. Totally. Not in my backyard kind of thing. And so there's plenty of hypocrisy on that front too. And that's why we get into other issues like judicial stuff and shopping around for nationwide stays on court shopping. I already mentioned the redistricting stuff that's going. So there's lots of stuff that I don't want to just go, if we can just get rid of MAGA and Donald Trump, then we'll be okay. Because in a way, the abuses on the left led to the overreaction on the right, which has gotten us to where we are. Yeah. Caitlin Schess And I think if you're listening and you're thinking none of those things seem that important compared to stuff on the right, first, not drawing in equivalency. They're not equivalent. But two, I just think it's so easy when you have been consuming one stream of news sources to feel the emotion of some of the problems on one side and to not feel the emotion of problems on The other side. Like I've had conversations with parents of young kids who the question is about gender and sexuality on the left are distressing to them on a level that I'm like, I don't experience That because I don't have kids. I also don't watch news sources that paint that with great emotion. But if you are watching a lot of news sources that paint that with great emotion, or you're having that experience personally, it will feel so much more existential than if you're not. So I just think there's this weird impulse to just kind of, people might hear that list and just go, none of that is that important. It's all inflated. And it depends what you're experiencing, what news source you're listening to. And it does matter. Just because something else, again, might seem more urgent doesn't mean that doesn't matter. Skye Jethani Last point. I have close friends in blue states, even some who are not Christians, who are very progressive in their politics, and they are turning against the Democratic Party. And it's not because they think the Democrats are too weak against Trump. They are living in environments where things have gotten so over the top progressive that even they're going, this is insane. And so if you don't live in one of those places, you may not realize that there's an extremism and an algorithmic black hole that takes you down weirdness on the left too. And I'm not going to be somebody who says, we just need to solve the problem on the right and everything's okay. And the same thing goes theologically to your point at Duke. I am more conservative in my theology, for sure. I am not extremely conservative in my theology. But there are wackadoodle ideas on the theological left that I think are incredibly damaging to the Christian faith. 100%. So, yeah. Speaker 3 We could go on and on and on about this, but we got to wrap. We do. And I'm afraid our comment section is now on fire. It probably is. I guess like, Caitlin, I'm going to put you on the spot. We can always cut this if you don't have anything. Okay. But basically my takeaway from all of this is we both size things sometimes because Jesus was not on either side. Any political party that says Jesus, if he was around today, would be a blank is wrong. Yeah. You were overseas recently and you described going to a tomb ([Time 0:56:02](https://share.snipd.com/snip/347eb3f8-ce65-4d25-ab53-aaa79bcad1f8)) - **Left-Side Failures Aren't Just Talking Points** - Many problems on the left (cancel culture, identity politics, defunding police, gender ideology) can produce real harms even if they differ in magnitude from right-wing threats. - Recognizing these issues helps prevent reactive overcorrections that birth worse abuses. Transcript: Skye Jethani Sometimes they're real. Sometimes they're real. Okay. I already mentioned the free speech cancel culture stuff, which really grew out of the left and the politically correct speech and all that kind of stuff and the suppression of free Speech. I think identity politics has been incredibly damaging and very, very prevalent on the left. The irony is a lot of these things are now being taken up by the right, but they were there. Totally. Totally. The defund the police rhetoric that came out after 2020 and some, I mean, in no way justifying the police shootings that happened or George Floyd or any of those, but the defund the policing, Incredibly politically stupid and not compassionate towards communities. Caitlin Schess And that's a really good example of how we should say on both sides, there's this tendency to give this like overly simplistic, meme-ifiable policy response. And on the right, there's examples we could give that. And the left, that's a good example of like, you took a very complicated thing that needs reform and just slapped a really easy answer on it actually most impoverished many people of Color communities have been like, don't do that. Skye Jethani I have been to communities, very progressive communities that have largely defunded the police. I wouldn't send my children there. It's horrible. So the people who suffer then are the poor and the people most likely to be victims of crime. Open borders, really stupid and not a compassionate immigration policy, even though they think it is. I think the hypocrisy over the COVID shutdowns where schools stayed closed too long and they were preventing churches from gathering for worship, but they were fine with protests During 2020 and some of the other stuff. Caitlin Schess And some things stayed shut down in part because once the other side said we want them open, it became now we dig our heels in and they must stay shut down. Skye Jethani A big one that is a complicated hairball and a mess that we don't have time to get into is I think the gender ideology and the pathology on the left on this stuff, the toxic masculinity talk, The way that so many young people are being forced to question their gender identities in ways that are just psychologically unhelpful, harmful to children, I think is incredibly Dumb and ridiculous. The extremism on abortion mentioned that already. I yeah, we've talked about that a lot of places. I don't even think they're close to being as thoughtful on this issue as progressives in Europe are. Caitlin Schess Yes. Skye Jethani I am very sympathetic to what's happening to the Palestinians. I do believe it is a genocide. I believe Israel's guilty of war crimes at this point. But the tolerance of anti-Semitism on the left right now is completely inexcusable. The valorizing of victimhood, which has definitely been copied by the right sort of horseshoe theory, I think is bad for individuals. It's bad for the country. We go on, but those are some that come to mind. And I didn't get into particular policies like Ezra Klein and what's his name wrote that book on abundance, talking about how broken blue cities are. Derek Thompson. Derek Thompson and blue states because of the over regulation of a lot of things that are actually interfering. And those are two progressive people. Totally progressive people who recognize the shortcomings on their own side. A lot of people will say, well, progressives care more about the poor, care more about immigrants, care more about education. Because in rhetoric, yes. In practice, there's a big nimbyism problem on the left. Totally. Not in my backyard kind of thing. And so there's plenty of hypocrisy on that front too. And that's why we get into other issues like judicial stuff and shopping around for nationwide stays on court shopping. I already mentioned the redistricting stuff that's going. So there's lots of stuff that I don't want to just go, if we can just get rid of MAGA and Donald Trump, then we'll be okay. Because in a way, the abuses on the left led to the overreaction on the right, which has gotten us to where we are. ([Time 0:56:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/b9be9400-5fcb-4716-bf42-9d579d58a923))