The Gray Area with Sean Illing16 Touko 2017

Bryan Stevenson on why the opposite of poverty isn’t wealth, but justice

Bryan Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative. He and his staff have won reversals, relief, or release for more than 115 wrongly convicted prisoners on death row. He’s the author of the power book Just Mercy, and a winner of a MacArthur “Genius” grant. There are only a few people I’d say this about, but he’s a genuine American hero.This conversation begins with one of Stevenson’s most provocative arguments. “The opposite of poverty isn’t wealth,” he says. “It’s justice.” In this podcast, he explains what he means.We also talk at length about his argument — an argument I am now fully convinced by — that the question is not whether a criminal deserves to die but whether the state deserves to kill. We talk about America’s history, our justice system, our prejudices. We talk about what it’s like to be a black man in the South, driving down highways named for Robert E. Lee and attending high schools named for Jefferson Davis. We talk about the value of shame, and the way we honor it in the justice system even as we dismiss it in our national dialogue.The nature of writing these podcast descriptions is that they lend themselves to hype. I want you to listen, and I use this space to try to persuade you to listen. But that backfires a bit when it gets to a conversation like this one, which left me more changed than perhaps any of the discussions that came before it. This is worth listening to.Books:“The Brothers Karamazov," by Fyodor Dostoyevsky"Gilead," by Marilynne Robinson“Anna Karenina," by Leo Tolstoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Werner Herzog’s ecstatic truth

Sean Illing speaks with one of his heroes: Werner Herzog. Herzog is a filmmaker, poet, and author of the new memoir Every Man for Himself and God Against All. They discuss "ecstatic truth," a term inv...

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The lessons of Sam Bankman-Fried

Michael Lewis joins Sean Illing to discuss his new book about Sam Bankman-Fried, Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon. They talk about the FTX crash, what Lewis learned while shadowing Ba...

16 Loka 202355min

Is America getting meaner?

Sean Illing and David Brooks talk about Brooks’s recent essay, “How America Got Mean.” They discuss the country's moral history, how politics and culture have shifted our perception of connection and ...

2 Loka 202354min

Naomi Klein on her doppelganger (and yours)

Every generation thinks they’re living through the strangest times, but is our generation right? Sean Illing speaks with writer and activist Naomi Klein about her new book, Doppelganger: A Trip Into t...

25 Syys 202357min

Should we press pause on AI?

How worried should we be about AI? Sean Illing is joined by Stuart J. Russell, a professor at the University of California Berkeley and director of the Center for Human-Compatible AI. Russell was amon...

18 Syys 202357min

Democracy’s existential crisis

Why is democracy worth saving? Sean Illing is joined by Astra Taylor, the author of the new book The Age of Insecurity: Coming Together as Things Fall Apart. They discuss the history and reality of in...

11 Syys 202351min

Conservative socialism?

What will American politics look like after Trump? Sean Illing is joined by Sohrab Ahmari to discuss his new book, Tyranny, Inc. Ahmari is one of the conservative intellectuals trying to map out a pos...

28 Elo 202355min

The benefits of utopian thinking

Why don’t we spend more time imagining a better future? Sean Illing is joined by Kristen R. Ghodsee, the author of Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Lif...

21 Elo 202353min