Chris Bray is an independent journalist who covers local stories in his native California that illuminate broader trends of elite and institutional failure in the West.
So good to hear you in the podcast, Chris. Your logic regarding boots-on-the-ground journalism is too scary for mainstream to digest. I am hoping the likes of Chris Bray and Nick Shirey will encourage more of it. Call me a cockeyed optimist but I believe that the more this gets out there the more hope we have of bringing sanity back and driving out the woke “warm people” and other insanity. God Bless you!
great interview. i really appreciate chris’ work. his ability to discuss sheer stupidity and make it sarcastic, depressing and thoughtful instead of just depressing is a gift
Good conversation. As a fellow freelancer, I especially appreciated Bray recounting his experience working for various publications. Being "fired" by editors for taking the wrong view, or for being right when everyone else has lost their sense, is beyond infuriating--I think this experience would break most pampered leftist writers. I'm glad to see him finally doing his thing without facing this kind of pettiness. Talented conservative writers do not grow on trees.
I also thought the reaction of his center lib friends lacking the very capacity to respond in any meaningful way to his commentary was also pretty telling. This isn't just a reading comprehension problem, but a total breakdown of empathy and imagination. Their newsfeeds have so utterly warped their reality that they can't even fathom a challenge to their idea that everything's fine, Trump's bad, and that their views on things are all basically correct.
This is how every teacher at my son’s high school operates. They cannot imagine that anyone could possibly come to a different conclusion in a rational way; they must be uneducated and they are being manipulated against their own interests! The most generous feeling they can muster for a RW person is pity.
Most interesting to me: editors who had actively sought him out in the past giving him this treatment.
Out here—outside that world—we wonder, “Did somebody spray these people with something?” because the switch from real journalism to whatever this is was very sudden.
It's religion, not politics - what Thomas Sowell called a 'vision.' As previous commenters have noted, its adherents simply cannot even conceive of anything outside their creed, let alone discuss it rationally. They are The Anointed. Any deviance must be wrong, stupid, and evil! No discussion possible!
Your point regarding juggalos is similar to one I’ve made for years: Where are the goths?
What before was a clique that was self-admittedly weird but ultimately harmless (outside “cutting” and the occasional suicide) morphed into something with horrifying long term effects on society.
Worse, we’ve taken these mentally ill and given some percentage of them a legitimate grievance with “society” if they “grow out of it” (although they also hate society if they don’t grow out of it). The trans ideology is already nihilistic, but then imagine realizing that everyone allowed it to happen and any meaning you might get from family, kids, or just basic sexual function, is gone forever.
And you think incels are scary? This own-goal is going to haunt society for decades. And continue to get support from those in society who can’t look in the mirror, because what they’ve done is truly horrific.
There are hardly any UK politicians I want to see naked. Maybe Starmer for laugh? Reminds me of the Black Adder episode where the protagonist tried to blackmail a bishop by having a painter create two paimtings watching the him fornicating with Percey through the keyhole.
He participated, apologies for the image. I cannot not imagine it. It's not even about his politics, it's more about him looking like a sexual degenerate and behaving like one. Nevertheless he had a point about people no longer trusting experts.
Right. And bringing up Alex Berenson is peak Covid Era look back. Because the credentialed people howled and censored and persisted with lies and Alex lost his mainstream credibility because he was right earlier than most others.
Hey! And no one apologized to Alex or any of the rest of us for how they censored, bullied, tried to get us fired, etc even though we ended up being right about the mRNA shots being both experimental and non-sterilizing. Total LibTard amnesia about ALL of that. And Alex was not let back in their little respectability club either.
Absolutely 100 percent and this time would have been “Gunpersons in dresses”. (Which would make a fantastic name for a ladies rifle club. I just may have to get on that.)
Nice to hear Bray's voice for the first time. Experts: a Tory minister (can't remember him but he looks like the Child Catcher from Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang) said famously about Brexit that "People had enough of experts". Needless to say, the lib reaction was braying and my Facebook feed was full of libs saying 'I HOPE HE WILL HAVE A HEART ATTACK AND WILL NOT BE TREATED BY AN EXPERT AKA A DOCTOR' (does it sound familiar?). But of course he was right, people had enough of the bien-pensants telling them they are racists.
An example: many moons ago The Guardian published an opinion piece about a subject many Guardian readers were concerned about: the yuf playing loud music on their mobiles. The author of the article was a middle-class white academic, an expert who wrote a book about the UK hiphop scene. His conclusion was that young people "are expressing themselves" and if you are concerned about it, you are racist.
The degree that people persist with believing untrue things after being shown they are untrue is such a black pill.
I had this idea to make a little blog around this idea called the Post-Truth-Society Dispatch but I never actually did it.
Matt Taibbi has discussed many time in his pod that journalists used to be antagonistic to power and politicians. Blue collar. Populist background but how it became a prestige job at the same time as the job turned into being regime stenographers instead of journalists.
Ditto. "Lit X" and "Lit 'Stack" are taking off, tho. People have permission now to just, just...SHARE WHAT THEY'RE READING. And maybe why. And what they think of it!
Great interview. You know, Substack is supposed to be social media for writers but these kinds of multimedia content is critical to spreading interest in what people are writing, I think.
Read Chris’s work from time to time, usually when one of my own subs link to him in some way. But hearing what he thinks and what motivates him makes it seem imperative that I follow him.
So good to hear you in the podcast, Chris. Your logic regarding boots-on-the-ground journalism is too scary for mainstream to digest. I am hoping the likes of Chris Bray and Nick Shirey will encourage more of it. Call me a cockeyed optimist but I believe that the more this gets out there the more hope we have of bringing sanity back and driving out the woke “warm people” and other insanity. God Bless you!
great interview. i really appreciate chris’ work. his ability to discuss sheer stupidity and make it sarcastic, depressing and thoughtful instead of just depressing is a gift
Good conversation. As a fellow freelancer, I especially appreciated Bray recounting his experience working for various publications. Being "fired" by editors for taking the wrong view, or for being right when everyone else has lost their sense, is beyond infuriating--I think this experience would break most pampered leftist writers. I'm glad to see him finally doing his thing without facing this kind of pettiness. Talented conservative writers do not grow on trees.
I also thought the reaction of his center lib friends lacking the very capacity to respond in any meaningful way to his commentary was also pretty telling. This isn't just a reading comprehension problem, but a total breakdown of empathy and imagination. Their newsfeeds have so utterly warped their reality that they can't even fathom a challenge to their idea that everything's fine, Trump's bad, and that their views on things are all basically correct.
epistemic collapse
This is how every teacher at my son’s high school operates. They cannot imagine that anyone could possibly come to a different conclusion in a rational way; they must be uneducated and they are being manipulated against their own interests! The most generous feeling they can muster for a RW person is pity.
Most interesting to me: editors who had actively sought him out in the past giving him this treatment.
Out here—outside that world—we wonder, “Did somebody spray these people with something?” because the switch from real journalism to whatever this is was very sudden.
I would have said priestly caste not class. These people are divinely ordained to tell us what to think.
Yeah you’re right it should be caste.
It's religion, not politics - what Thomas Sowell called a 'vision.' As previous commenters have noted, its adherents simply cannot even conceive of anything outside their creed, let alone discuss it rationally. They are The Anointed. Any deviance must be wrong, stupid, and evil! No discussion possible!
NPR to NRP nice
One day we will have NRP totebags too
Your point regarding juggalos is similar to one I’ve made for years: Where are the goths?
What before was a clique that was self-admittedly weird but ultimately harmless (outside “cutting” and the occasional suicide) morphed into something with horrifying long term effects on society.
Worse, we’ve taken these mentally ill and given some percentage of them a legitimate grievance with “society” if they “grow out of it” (although they also hate society if they don’t grow out of it). The trans ideology is already nihilistic, but then imagine realizing that everyone allowed it to happen and any meaning you might get from family, kids, or just basic sexual function, is gone forever.
And you think incels are scary? This own-goal is going to haunt society for decades. And continue to get support from those in society who can’t look in the mirror, because what they’ve done is truly horrific.
The Tory who said that we'd had enough of experts was Michael Gove.
Still slithering around in politics and media to indifference.
In his 20s as a young politician he organized thresomes and orgies if I remember well.The UK elite is degenerate.
I sincerely hope he only organized, not participated. The vision of a naked Michael Gove is enough to put you off sex for life.
Sorry Mike.... https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7125657/A-five-bed-romp-jealous-rage-led-Michael-Gove-fight-dirty-love-rival.html
Barf.
There are hardly any UK politicians I want to see naked. Maybe Starmer for laugh? Reminds me of the Black Adder episode where the protagonist tried to blackmail a bishop by having a painter create two paimtings watching the him fornicating with Percey through the keyhole.
He participated, apologies for the image. I cannot not imagine it. It's not even about his politics, it's more about him looking like a sexual degenerate and behaving like one. Nevertheless he had a point about people no longer trusting experts.
At 19:00 Chris describes the same thing as Trust the Science types in 2020-2022. "Credentials" > reality
Right. And bringing up Alex Berenson is peak Covid Era look back. Because the credentialed people howled and censored and persisted with lies and Alex lost his mainstream credibility because he was right earlier than most others.
Hey! And no one apologized to Alex or any of the rest of us for how they censored, bullied, tried to get us fired, etc even though we ended up being right about the mRNA shots being both experimental and non-sterilizing. Total LibTard amnesia about ALL of that. And Alex was not let back in their little respectability club either.
Ever since the Z Man died, I've been looking for a Sunday morning podcast. I hope you keep this going weekly.
I feel the same way about the loss of Chris, but never thought this podcast could be a replacement…until this very moment. Thanks!
‘Trans’ kids seem to be the latest iteration of school shooters, only more medicated, indoctrinated, and activated.
Someone said this week that if the Columbine shooters were alive today, there’s a good chance they’d be trans.
Absolutely 100 percent and this time would have been “Gunpersons in dresses”. (Which would make a fantastic name for a ladies rifle club. I just may have to get on that.)
Nice to hear Bray's voice for the first time. Experts: a Tory minister (can't remember him but he looks like the Child Catcher from Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang) said famously about Brexit that "People had enough of experts". Needless to say, the lib reaction was braying and my Facebook feed was full of libs saying 'I HOPE HE WILL HAVE A HEART ATTACK AND WILL NOT BE TREATED BY AN EXPERT AKA A DOCTOR' (does it sound familiar?). But of course he was right, people had enough of the bien-pensants telling them they are racists.
An example: many moons ago The Guardian published an opinion piece about a subject many Guardian readers were concerned about: the yuf playing loud music on their mobiles. The author of the article was a middle-class white academic, an expert who wrote a book about the UK hiphop scene. His conclusion was that young people "are expressing themselves" and if you are concerned about it, you are racist.
Yay! New Podcast while I clean!
The degree that people persist with believing untrue things after being shown they are untrue is such a black pill.
I had this idea to make a little blog around this idea called the Post-Truth-Society Dispatch but I never actually did it.
Matt Taibbi has discussed many time in his pod that journalists used to be antagonistic to power and politicians. Blue collar. Populist background but how it became a prestige job at the same time as the job turned into being regime stenographers instead of journalists.
Suggwstion: Make this a regular conversation à la Taibbi and Kirn.
Yes! Someone needs to fill this hole in my heart now that ATW is no more.
I don’t know where I am going to find the literature discussion portion of ATW now 😭😭😭
Ditto. "Lit X" and "Lit 'Stack" are taking off, tho. People have permission now to just, just...SHARE WHAT THEY'RE READING. And maybe why. And what they think of it!
Great convo
Great interview. You know, Substack is supposed to be social media for writers but these kinds of multimedia content is critical to spreading interest in what people are writing, I think.
Read Chris’s work from time to time, usually when one of my own subs link to him in some way. But hearing what he thinks and what motivates him makes it seem imperative that I follow him.
So I will.
DANK!