Initial disclaimer: I’m very much a progressive person.
Recently listening to podcasts like Heavyweight, Reply All, Invisibilia, Underunderstood etc, I noticed that while the episode - or podcast overall - is investigative journalism lite, something incidental but progressive might happen (using the correct pronouns for a trans person, for example.) I also recently rewatched the Some More News episode on why conservative comedy is so awful, which sparked my pondering.
So… while I’m not interested in veering to the right, this did get me wondering what content might be out there that I’ve not been exposed to at all. Are there (relatively) apolitical podcasts out there that mirror those lite journalism examples above?
In my experience–and I’m definitely on the far left–they are.
Right wing people are often more than happy to sit down and explain–with charts and (bullshit) references why their beliefs are the only morally and ethically correct ones. People on the left tend to say things like, “I don’t have to do your emotional labor”, or “you need to educate yourself”, or reply with image macros of pigs shitting on their own balls. Yes, I know that these are broad generalizations, but this is how I’ve more often than not observed things. People on the right tend to be evangelical about their beliefs. People on the left tend to treat socially/fiscally conservative ideas as though they are contagions that need to be quarantined or removed.
This isn’t always the case; I’ve definitely seen circular firing squads in alt-right circles (see also: Moms For Liberty melting down over their leaders’ sex lives and sex harassment), but I’ve seen it far more often in leftist spaces, and far more purity tests with leftist groups.