Lean Out with Tara Henley

This week, in the wake of controversial new legislation, Bill C-18, Meta has announced that it will be ending news sharing on its platforms in Canada. So, for a special bonus episode of the podcast, we reached out to a Canadian academic who’s been following this story closely, to get his reaction to the development — and to hear his analysis on what it might mean for our news sector going forward. (This conversation is part of Lean Out’s summer media series. Please also check out our intervie...

4 Aug 202328min

“Once you question the food, you question everything.” That’s a quote from Rory Feek, a farmer and filmmaker in the growing homesteading movement, which is seeing numbers of Americans turn away from processed foods and rediscover how to grow what’s on their plates, sustaining their communities in the process. Feek made this comment at the inaugural Modern Homesteading Conference in Idaho — and my guest today was there to take it all in. Olivia Reingold is an American journalist, and a staff w...

2 Aug 202322min

In 2019, a white woman in Austin, Texas signed up for a diversity training seminar, in the hopes of better understanding growing polarization in America. But that workshop, in her view, was itself divisive. She went on to publish an essay about it, ending with a call for others to reach out to her with their own experiences — and soon got a letter from a Black man across the country that resulted in a years-long conversation on race. Jennifer Richmond is a China scholar and international re...

26 Juli 202340min

Last week on Lean Out, we heard from Canadian journalist Jen Gerson. The response from listeners was overwhelming. You asked for more coverage of the collapse of our media, including, of course, controversial new legislation. Bill C-18 aims to save journalism in this country — but Tara's guest this week argues that it has instead “accidentally pushed the news industry into the abyss.” Peter Menzies is a former newspaper executive and a former vice chair of the CRTC, the Canadian Radio-televis...

19 Juli 202337min

If you listen to this podcast, you know that the Canadian media is in serious trouble. But in recent weeks, that crisis has intensified, with wave after wave of bad news for the industry. Bell Canada laid off 1300 staff. And, when this was episode was recorded, merger talks between the two biggest newspaper publishers were ongoing — negotiations have since broken down. Add to that, in the wake of controversial new legislation, Bill C-18, Google and Facebook announced they would remove l...

12 Juli 20231h 1min

Earlier this spring, student protesters at the University of Cambridge successfully cancelled an event on campus, a screening of a documentary on fertility. Students accused the film of being misogynistic, despite the fact that, as student event organizer Charlie Bentley-Astor put it in The Critic magazine, this was a film “made primarily by women, with women, for women.” And, as you’ll hear on today’s episode, the film — which screened at the Chelsea Film Festival — features a remarkable deg...

5 Juli 202336min

This week Lean Out is back from our annual summer hiatus, and we are recharged and ready to get back to tackling the big issues of the day. One of the things that Tara did while she was away was attend Plebity’s inaugural virtual conference, Free Speech and the Left, a timely and important gathering that brought together many prominent writers and thinkers on the left. Tara was honoured to moderate a panel for that conference — which she enjoyed so much that we're bringing it to you tod...

28 Juni 202351min

In recent years, we have seen the diversity, equity, and inclusion industry explode in popularity and prevalence. But Tara's guest today says that at its worst, DEI runs from useless to counterproductive. And he thinks companies would be better off giving the lavish DEI consulting fees directly to the poor. Conor Friedersdorf is a staff writer at The Atlantic, and the founding editor of The Best of Journalism, a Substack newsletter that highlights exceptional non-fiction writing. Last week, h...

7 Juni 202326min