Dialogues with Richard Reeves

"Every body is wrong; no body feels right". So says philosopher Clare Chambers, who defends the idea of the unmodified body, both as a political and an ethical concept. It's not that bodies don't change of course - they do all the time, and should, by what we do and eat and so on. But we dig into the three reasons we modify our body: appearance, health and hygiene, or identity (using my decision to brush my teeth as an example). Clare explains why the idea of being "trapped in the wrong body", a popular description among many trans people, has some problems as well as potential, in part because to some extent we are all not in the right body, or our "own" true body. That's why new mothers are urged to "get their body back".

We talk about how far gender differences are the result of nature or culture; why there is no clear distinction between cosmetic surgery and cultural surgery; how shaming doesn't really work as a public health approach; the changed nature of bodybuilding (and not for the better). We discuss the striking differences in rates of male circumcision between the U.S. (80% of boys) and the UK (6%), where it is described as a procedure of last resort, what this tells about the role of culture and especially how what counts as a "medical procedure". In her new book Intact, Clare has produced an excellent and thoughtful treatment of some very important and sensitive subjects right now, and it was a real pleasure to have this dialogue with her.

Read Intact: A Defence of the Unmodified Body (Penguin, 2022)

Clare Chambers

Professor of Political Philosophy and a Fellow of Jesus College, University of Cambridge. She is the author of Against Marriage: An Egalitarian Defence of the Marriage-Free State (Oxford University Press, 2017); Sex, Culture, and Justice: The Limits of Choice (Penn State University Press, 2008); Teach Yourself Political Philosophy: A Complete Introduction (with Phil Parvin, Hodder, 2012); and numerous articles and chapters on feminist and liberal political philosophy. She is also a member of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics,

Website: http://www.clarechambers.com/

Twitter: @DrClareChambers

The Dialogues Team

Creator: Richard Reeves

Artwork: George Vaughan Thomas

Tech Support: Cameron Hauver-Reeves

Music: "Remember" by Bencoolen (thanks for the permission, guys!)

Who broke America? Quite likely, you did. David Brooks, my guest today, describes how the new elite, the "bobos" as he once labelled them (bourgeois bohemians) have created a hereditary meritocracy, failed the leadership test, condescended to the less successful, and actively contributed to inequality and segregation. We talk about what class means today, why David now thinks economics is more important than he did, his advice for both the Democrats and the Republicans, the culture wars, and much more. We end with a discussion of his work on a new book on the importance of social recognition, of being seen.

David Brooks

David Brooks is a prominent social and cultural commentator writing regularly for the New York Times and the Atlantic, and previously for the Wall Street Journal. He also appears on “PBS NewsHour,” NPR’s “All Things Considered” and NBC’s “Meet the Press” to discuss politics and culture. Brooks teaches at Yale University and belongs to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

More Brooks

• Read his Atlantic piece, How the Bobos Broke America, building off his 2001 book, Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There
• His previous books include The Social Animal, The Road to Character, and The Second Mountain.
• For more, check out his column at the New York Times and his column at the Atlantic
• You can follow more of his work on twitter: @nytdavidbrooks

Also Mentioned

• We chatted about my book, Dream Hoarders.
• We mentioned several scholars who work on social and/or economic inequality, including:
  • Robert Putnam, specifically referring to his work on extracurricular activities.
  • Raj Chetty and how geography plays a role in mobility.
  • Sean Reardon, specifically his point that racial diversity is more common than class diversity.
  • Richard Fording and his work on occupational segregation.
• We also mentioned Jonathan Rauch and his work on the cognitive regime - which you can learn more about in this episode of my podcast.
• Brooks mentioned the book “Privilege: The Making of an Adolescent Elite at St. Paul's School” written by Shamus Rahman Khan.
• We discussed Brooks’ infamous deli meat anecdote in his 2017 piece “How We Are Ruining America”
• Brooks referred to the work of Pierre Bourdieu, a French sociologist who studied power dynamics and the importance of cultural capital, linguistic capital, symbolic capital, and more.
• I mentioned Michelle Margolis’ research on religion and politics, which you can learn more about in her book “From Politics to the Pews.”
• I also referred to the book “The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class”, written by Elizabeth Currid-Halkett.
• Brooks mentioned Ibram Kendi.
• Brooks...

What made America into a tinderbox, ready for Donald Trump's spark? That's the question Evan Osnos, staff writer for the New Yorker, set out to answer in his book Wildland: The Making of America's Fury. Having lived overseas for many years, mostly in China, Evan returned to the U.S. in 2013 and felt something of a stranger in his own land. The events of the next few years added to this sense. So he set out to find out what had happened to make his home country feel so foreign, by returning to the places he knew best: Greenwich CT, where he grew up, Clarksburg WV where he started his reporting career, and Chicago where he covered city politics for the Tribune. The book is already a bestseller and being heaped with critical acclaim. The story is of a country that was ever more divided by class and geography and politics, but ever more connected by the ties of the modern economy. Evan and I talk about the financialization of the economy, and the transformation of the culture of his home town of Greenwich into the hedge fund capital of the country; the battles over the coal industry; the rise of Trump; the potential for Joe Biden to bring the nation back together; the cleavages of race and wealth in cities like Chicago. Although he is worried about what he calls the "seclusion of mind" of many of America's tribes, Evan ends on an optimistic note: that the pandemic has shown that whether we like it or not, we're all in together.

Evan Osnos

Evan Osnos is a staff writer for the New Yorker, contributor to CNN, and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution covering politics and foreign affairs. A graduate of Harvard, Osnos started his journalism career in West Virginia and Chicago, before being stationed in the Middle East to report on the Iraq War. He then moved to Beijing for eight years and wrote, “Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China” which won the National Book Award. He now lives in Washington, D.C. with his wife and two children.

More Osnos

• Read his "novelistically gripping" book, Wildland: The Making of America's Fury
• Find more of his writing at The New Yorker
• Follow him on twitter: @eosnos

Also mentioned

• We briefly discussed the book “The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class”, written by Elizabeth Currid-Halkett.
• Osnos referred to Michael Sandel’s work, specifically what he calls "The Skyboxification of American Life"
• We discussed the saga of Varsity Blues, and the very notable quote from Gordon Caplan: “To be honest I'm not worried about the moral issue here.”
• Osnos referred to the documentary-style photography of Walker Evans
• Osnos spoke in depth about Patriot Coal
• I highlighted the racial disparity in wealth pre- and post-recession, which you can learn more about here.
• Osnos mentions a political movement in West Virginia, called WV Can’t Wait

The Dialogues Team

Creator: Richard Reeves

Research: Ashleigh Maciolek

Artwork: George Vaughan Thomas

Tech Support: Cameron Hauver-Reeves

Music: "Remember" by Bencoolen (thanks for the permission, guys!)

“To be free is to be white, and to be white is to be free. In this reading, therefore, freedom and race are not just enemies but also allies”. That’s my guest today, the historian Tyler Stovall on the idea that animates his new book White Freedom: The Racial History of an Idea. It was an idea, Tyler says, that “kept him awake at night”. We talk about whether the most important racial line is between white and others, or between Black and others; the startling true history of the Statue of Liberty (“the world’s most prominent example of the racialization of modern ideas of freedom”, Tyler says); the controversy surrounding the 1619 Project and specifically the extent to which retaining slavery motivated some of the colonies in the War; the fight over school integration; the use of reason and rationality as gatekeepers to enlightenment ideas of liberalism; the decolonization movement; and the fights over both voting rights and Critical Race Theory; and much more besides. It’s a topical conversation but also one that reaches across history. I found this a stimulating and challenging conversation.

Tyler Stovall

Dr. Tyler Stovall is a lauded historian of modern and twentieth-century France, with a specialization in transnational history, labor, colonialism, and race. His work has covered topics ranging from the suburbs of Paris to Black American expatriates in France and the French Caribbean. He has written numerous books, including the widely-popular “Paris Noir: African Americans in the City of Light.” This summer, Stovall was appointed as the Dean of Fordham’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Previously, he was the Dean of Humanities at UC-Santa Cruz and served as the President of the American Historical Association from 2017 to 2018. Stovall currently lives in Berkeley, California with his wife Dr. Denise Herd.

More Stovall

• In this episode, we discussed Stovall’s new and thought-provoking book “White Freedom: The Racial History of an Idea”
• He recently wrote an article in The Nation titled “Liberty’s Discontents”
• While serving as President of American Historical Association, Stovall gave an address on “White Freedom and the Lady of Liberty”. You can watch it here.

Also mentioned

• Stovall mentioned the book “Men on Horseback”, written by David Bell
• We discussed the iconography of the broken chain on the Statue of Liberty
• The hat that was given to former slaves in Ancient Rome is known as a ‘Pileus’
• Stovall referred to the famous painting by Delacroix, “Liberty Leading the People”
• We discussed the New York Times 1619 project which you can learn more about here.
• Stovall mentioned Crispus Attucks, an African American man killed during the Boston Massacre and believed to be the first casualty of the American Revolution.
• Here’s a clip of The Allman Brothers Band performing their song ‘Whipping Post’
• We discussed Phyllis Schlafly and her role in opposing the Equal Rights Amendment
• In On Liberty, J.S. Mill wrote that “Despotism is a legitimate mode of government in dealing with barbarians, provided the end be their improvement, and the means justified by actually effecting that end.” (p. 19)
• After WWI ended, Black American soldiers returned home to a violently racist society and were threatened with increasing riots, lynchings, and additional brutality.
• Stovall mentioned Julius Nyerere, the former President of Tanzania.
• A man in Texas, after waiting in line for hours, now faces a 40-year sentence for voting while on parole.
• I referenced Amartya Sen on the concept of meritocracy and its central conflict of ...

How should we approach decisions about children, especially our own? That's the question that motivates my guest today, Emily Oster. She is a Professor of Economics at Brown University and currently a visiting Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Through her books and newsletter, Emily has become something of a data guru to many parents confused by the torrent of conflicting advice and "studies show" headlines; she describes her work as "part memoir, part meta-analysis"

We talk about Emily's new book, “The Family Firm: A Data-Driven Guide to Better Decision Making in the Early School Years”; how to go about decisions such as bedtimes, extracurricular activities, and of course, when to buy your child a phone. We spend some time on how to evaluate risks, opportunity costs and counterfactuals in the parenting enterprise, and in particular the trade-offs between risk and independence. We also discuss her recent work on the impact of COVID on children and education; Emily has assembled a unique dataset on this question, and became a strong advocate on the need to return quickly to in-person learning, not just for or even mainly for education reasons, but for mental health ones.

I found this a thoroughly stimulating and enjoyable conversation - my only regret is that I wasn't able to read Oster's work when my own kids were younger! One of the things I like is the way she explodes lots of myths about the impact of various decisions on your children; which has the effect of lowering the stakes, and hopefully giving parents the chance to relax just a bit.

Emily Oster

Emily Oster is a Professor of Economics at Brown University and currently a visiting Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Previously, she held a position at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. Her expertise is wide ranging, but is best known for her work on the economics of family and parenting. Oster’s newest book, along with her book Cribsheet, are New York Times bestsellers, not least because of her expert ability to translate economic data to the public.

More Oster:

• Her new book, “The Family Firm: A Data-Driven Guide to Better Decision Making in the Early School Years”, is out now!
• Previously she wrote, “Cribsheet: A Data-Driven Guide to Better, More Relaxed Parenting, from Birth to Preschool” and “Expecting Better: Why the Conventional Pregnancy Wisdom Is Wrong-and What You Really Need to Know”
• For more of her writing, Oster is often featured in the New York Times, the Atlantic, and Slate.
• Additionally, she has a weekly newsletter, ParentData, which offers really interesting and informative discussions of parenting.
• You can also follow Emily on twitter, @ProfEmilyOster, or on her website.

Also mentioned

• I referred to the book “How Not to be a Hypocrite: School Choice for the Morally Perplexed Parent,” authored by Adam Swift.
• Although I don’t suggest watching it, I referred to this video which captured the angry response of parents in Franklin Tennessee, following a decision to require masks in schools.
• We also discussed Oster’s dashboard which started collecting data on schools and childcare early on in the pandemic.

The Dialogues Team

Creator & host: Richard Reeves

Research: Ashleigh Maciolek

Artwork: George Vaughan Thomas

Tech Support: Cameron Hauver-Reeves

Music: "Remember" by Bencoolen (thanks for the permission, guys!)