What if the entire “marketplace of ideas” story about how people change their minds is mostly wrong? In this episode, I talk with political theorist and organizer Dr. Sarah Stein Lubrano about why debate, podcasts, and “critical thinking” rarely shift anyone’s core political commitments.

Sarah and I dig into her book Don’t Talk About Politics: Changing 21st Century Minds, the limits of political education, the classed nature of “critical thinking,” cognitive dissonance and cult dynamics, and why good politics begins with friendships, cooperative projects, and building a different world together.

Dr. Sarah Stein Lubrano is a political theorist and organizer with a background in feminist mutual aid, local grassroots work, and teaching in prisons. She holds a PhD from Oxford and a master’s degree from Cambridge. Sarah works with the Sense and Solidarity Initiative and the Future Narratives Lab. Her first book is Don’t Talk About Politics: Changing 21st Century Minds (Bloomsbury).

• Website: https://www.sarahsteinlubrano.com

• Substack https://sarahsteinlubrano.substack.com

• X (Twitter): https://x.com/SSteinLubrano

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahsteinlubrano/

• Sense and Solidarity Initiative: https://senseandsolidarity.org

• Sense & Solidarity podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2dcKkTCJNZM2j2CLKJZS3W

Don’t Talk About Politics: How to Change 21st-Century Minds: https://www.bloomsbury.com/ca/dont-talk-about-politics-9781399413923/ (Bloomsbury Publishing)

Mentioned in this episode
– Olivia Nuzzi, American Canto
– Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (audio excerpt)
– Leon Festinger, When Prophecy Fails and the origins of cognitive dissonance theory
– Thomas Kelly’s archival critique of Festinger’s study (discussed further on Conspirituality)
– System justification theory
– Aristotle on friendship and the “friend of virtue”
– The Dig podcast (as a political education project)
– The School of Life

– Please leave a rating and review so more people can find the show!
– Preorder my book Antifascist Dad: Urgent Conversations with Young People in Chaotic Times (out April 26, 2026)
– Become a supporter on Patreon.
– If you have an antifascism story to share – especially about relationships, generations, or parenting – leave me a voice message on Signal at username: antifascistdad71.

• (00:00:38) - Don't Talk About Politics With Sarah Stein Lubrano
• (00:02:50) - Olivia Nuzzi's American Canto
• (00:07:14) - "Don't Talk About Politics"
• (00:12:50) - How Do People Change Their Minds?
• (00:17:42) - What's Hard in the World?
• (00:26:44) - Cognitive dissonance and the conversion
• (00:38:54) - Fascist Dad of the Week

Donald Trump casually embraces the word “fascist” in front of Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, and doesn't bat an eye when Mamdani accuses him of funding genocide. This smug absorption of rhetorical confrontation is something we need to think about.

On the same day Mamdani brought socialism discourse to the Oval Office, the Democratic leadership voted in favour of House Resolution 58, “Denouncing the Horrors of Socialism,” which features Jordan Peterson’s favorite “100 million deaths” talking point from the dodgy stats of 1997's Black Book of Communism.

But guess what? this same week, the province of Kerala, which has be led by democratically-elected communist parties since 1957, declared that it had eradicated extreme poverty for 64K households through an intensive micro-plan program involving helping folks making like than $3/day get good documents, ration cards, travel allowances, health care, house repairs, and palliative nursing.

And: I'm joined today by trans philosopher and performer Sara Rose Caplan. We explore why trans people drive fascists bananas; fascism as a fear response to freedom and uncertainty; C.T. Nguyen’s idea of “games as existential balm”; the Cassandra feeling of warning about fascism while no one listens; philosophy as “thinking in slow motion”; and why you can’t win arguments with bad-faith actors like Matt Walsh. Part 2 is available now on Patreon.

Sara Rose Caplan is a trans woman, performer, and educator originally from Houston, Texas. She studied philosophy in undergrad before spending a decade in LA as an improv comedian. This fall, she started working on a MA in philosophy at Cal State LA under the mentorship of trans philosopher Talia Mae Bettcher, though she has sadly had to put her studies on hold as she and her wife, also trans, have decided to leave the United States for safer, hopefully less christofascist shores up North.

Sources:

Text - H.Con.Res.58 - 119th Congress (2025-2026): Denouncing the horrors of socialism.

The Right Can’t Figure Out What to Do With Zohran Mamdani

Jordan Peterson: The right to be politically incorrect | National Post

The Black Book of Communism Is a Shoddy Work of History

How Kerala eliminated extreme poverty | Brookings

Kerala becomes the first state to eradicate extreme poverty | Peoples Democracy

Links from Sara:
https://equalitytexas.org/give/501c3/
https://hcb.hackclub.com/donations/start/lastreetcare
https://www.instagram.com/sararosecaplan

Bluesky: @matthewremski.bsky.social
Instagram: @matthew_remski
YouTube: Antifascist Dad on YouTube
TikTok: @antifascistdad

Support the project/instant access to Pt 2.
Patreon: patreon.com/AntifascistDadPodcast

...

• (00:02:58) - Trump Is Making the F word Okay
• (00:06:33) - House Resolution 58 Denouncing the Horrors of Socialism
• (00:17:54) - Intro: Sara Rose Caplan
• (00:18:39) - Why Do Trans People Drive Fascists bananas?
• (00:27:26) - What Does It Mean to Be Trans in America?
• (00:34:08) - Why I Studied Philosophy
• (00:39:19) - Matt Walsh on Philosophy

In Part 2, David and I go deeper into the contradictions, tensions, and possibilities of the Catholic Church at this political moment. We discuss ideological purity, coalition building, critiques of capitalism, the role of synodality, and how leftists and religious radicals can meet each other in common struggle.

What are the spiritual and emotional dimensions of direct action? What gives people courage to resist? The effort to bring communion to detainees is not a stunt but a deeply rooted pastoral act grounded in human rights, sacramental practice, and a public demonstration of both humility and defiance.

What happens when people of very different beliefs show up at the same protest? What does collaboration look like when disagreements run deep? What happens if coalitions fracture? The right is always ready to fill the vacuum when the left stumbles backwards.

Finally: a diary entry on post (?) religious antifascist parenting.

David's excellent podcast on Liberation Theology

• (00:00:08) - Anti-Fascist Father
• (00:04:02) - The Mass Against ICE Detention
• (00:13:25) - Lazarus and Violence in the Catholic Church
• (00:26:12) - The issues of labor and social justice
• (00:27:01) - A More Joyful Side to Political Action
• (00:31:53) - Pope Francis on Fighting for Christ
• (00:32:39) - The Value of Religion for Our Kids

I posted a short reflection to TikTok last week, and it landed harder than I expected. It’s about the emotional double-life I believe many of us are living: one foot in the adult world of political vigilance and despair, and one foot in the child-world of curiosity, play, and care.

Today I’m expanding that theme and pairing it with another challenge: how suspicion-driven Left analysis shapes our emotional availability, our social trust, and our parenting. How do we balance vigilance with openness? How do we keep our melancholy from becoming our children’s inheritance? And how do we stop feeling like orphans in a world where radical elders have been scattered, suppressed, or lost?

I’d love to hear your experience with this:

• Best way: send me a voice memo on Signal @antifascistdad.71. Try to keep messages under 2 minutes!
• You can also DM me on Bluesky and Instagram, or join me on Patreon @antifascistdadpodcast where my DMs are open.
• I’m also on TikTok and YouTube @antifascistdad.

Preorder link for Antifascist Dad (North Atlantic Books, April 2026)

Just a coupla antifascist Canadian dads having a chat about stuff.

In this special crossover episode, I join Cory Johnston of the Skeptical Leftist podcast for a conversation about cult dynamics, fascism, antifascist parenting, masculinity, and how to support kids with empathy in a collapsing world.

We talk about parenting in a political emergency, how to avoid overwhelming kids with adult anxieties, and how to build trust-based conversations about power, policing, misinformation, and existential fear. We get into masculinity, emotional repression, the unpaid labor of women, the politics of care, and how becoming a co-parent radicalized me more deeply than any book ever could.

We also spend time on atheist/religious alliances, liberation theology, body-image capitalism, surviving neoliberal time-pressure, and how to nurture political imagination without drowning in guilt or fatalism.

Our interview on YouTube.

Cory's Linktree.

My book to preorder.

• (00:00:07) - The Skeptical Leftist Podcast
• (00:01:07) - Matthew's Short Bio Rant
• (00:05:03) - On Parenting and the Left
• (00:10:13) - What is Anti-Fascism?
• (00:24:37) - Anti-Fascism & Conspirituality
• (00:29:59) - Democracy on Liberation theology
• (00:41:39) - On Becoming a Parent
• (00:49:04) - What Is Healthy Masculinity?
• (00:59:59) - How Do You Raise Your Kids With Empathetic Awareness?
• (01:08:51) - Emotional maturity and the police
• (01:19:45) - White Privilege and the Problem of Personal Responsibility
• (01:25:32) - Time Management
• (01:33:17) - Where Can People Find Antifascist Dad?

In Part 2 of my conversation with Cy Canterel, we keep digging into how people form identity, belief, and belonging inside the swirl of irony, nihilism, and digital performance that defines so much of contemporary life.

We explore the psychology of online radicalization—what actually pulls people toward fascist aesthetics, what ambivalence can teach us about resistance, and how the very same infrastructures that feed alienation can also host creativity, solidarity, and care.

Also: more on the Graham Platner story as a living case study in fluid online identity: how meaning shifts, how people change, and how communities can choose to interrupt cycles of rage instead of reproducing them.

And an epilogue on taking the 13 year-old to the Toronto Anticapitalist Book Fair in the old Tranzac Club, where I used to hang out more than 30 years ago.

Cy's Website

Cy's Substack: Abstract Machines

• (00:00:07) - A Dare Wrapped In a Joke Wrapped in a Void
• (00:02:49) - The Psychology of Extremist Identity
• (00:05:30) - Noxious Views in the Online Culture
• (00:08:30) - Can You Change Your Own Mind?
• (00:09:57) - The Narrative of Who Is Graham Platner
• (00:12:53) - Do Narratives Promote or Decrease Ambiguity?
• (00:22:40) - The Problem With The Revolutionary Imagination
• (00:25:16) - Cy Cantarel on Being Nihilistic at 14
• (00:29:43) - Anti-capitalist book fair at the Tranzac Club

I sit down with Jesuit priest and liberation theologian Father David Inczauskis, S.J., who has been helping lead faith-based protests at Chicago’s Broadview ICE Detention Center. We get into the lived meaning of community life, the risks and necessities of nonviolent resistance, and why liberation theology is suddenly back at the center of the global Catholic conversation.

Before we talk, I take about ten minutes to get clear — personally and ideologically — about my own evolving relationship to Catholicism, anticapitalism, and antifascist organizing. If you’ve ever struggled with the contradictions of religious institutions while still feeling pulled toward their radical roots, this may resonate.

We also close with Fascist Dad of the Week, featuring the tragic anti-heroism of White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, whose devotion to a decrepit sex criminal seems to grow deeper with every press conference.

David's excellent podcast on Liberation Theology

Liberation Theology Primer on Conspirituality

YouTube: https://youtube.com/@antifascistdad
TikTok: @antifascistdad
Instagram: @matthew_remski
Bluesky: @matthewremski.bsky.social

Join the community and get all Part 2 episodes + extras on Patreon:
https://patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast

Antifascist Dad: Urgent Conversations with Young People in Chaotic Times
North Atlantic Books · Coming April 26, 2026

just say the word.

• (00:00:45) - Intro
• (00:11:48) - Inczauskis on Faith and the Left
• (00:13:47) - Mass and the Future of Nonviolence
• (00:15:29) - Jesuits Bring Communion to Immigrant Detainees
• (00:18:12) - Liberation Theology
• (00:23:26) - Jesuits live a community life
• (00:28:56) - An Objective Assessment of the Catholic Church
• (00:40:09) - Catholic Church Attempt to Bring Communion to Detainees
• (00:47:29) - Karoline Leavitt Lying About Trump's Relationship With Jeffrey

I sit down with feral scholar and TikTok analyst Cy Canterel to explore one of the strangest and most opaque zones of contemporary politics: the swirling online subcultures where memes, irony, nihilism, and fragmented identity collide with rising fascism.

Cy brings a rare combination of systemic thinking, psychological insight, and lived experience as an autistic researcher who understands outsider culture from the inside. Together we trace how today’s meme-driven environments blur the lines between subculture and politics, and why attempts to “decode” online radicalization so often miss the mark. What looks like political ideology is often a shared subcultural language. What looks like a manifesto might actually be a dare, a joke, or an attempt to create meaning in the void.

We talk about the very ambiguous case of Tyler Robinson, alleged killer of Charlie Kirk, and why the bullet-casing engravings left behind point less toward a stable ideology and more toward the chaotic, dare-based dynamics of online subcultures. We also begin unpacking the emerging story of Graham Platner, and why he has become a Rorschach test for liberal and left anxieties.

Cy argues that online extremism is not distortion of human nature, but a predictable outcome of alienation, platform incentives, and a society that doesn’t give people — especially young men — stable roles, narratives, or futures. But she also insists the internet itself isn’t broken. The tools could be used for creativity, care, and community; they’ve simply been captured by the wrong incentives.

If you’re a parent, educator, caregiver, or anyone trying to understand what’s happening to young people online — and what can actually intervene in these dynamics — Cy’s insights are super helpful.

Cy's Website

Cy's Substack: Abstract Machines

• Subscribe on Patreon for Part 2 and full archive access:
https://www.patreon.com/antifascistadpodcast

• Preorder Antifascist Dad: Urgent Conversations with Young People in Chaotic Times (April 26, 2026)

• Follow me on Bluesky: @matthewremski.bsky.social
• Follow me on Instagram: @matthew_remski
• Follow on YouTube & TikTok: @antifascistdad

• Rate & Review — it helps this project reach more people!

• Share this episode with educators, caregivers, or anyone trying to understand online radicalization.

• (00:00:00) - A Dare Wrapped in a Joke: The Memosphere
• (00:02:50) - Zoran Mandani Wins
• (00:11:17) - Cy Canterel on the Internet and Political Radicalization
• (00:18:35) - Autism and Internet Studies
• (00:24:14) - What Looks Like Politics Is Often a Subculture
• (00:35:29) - The Confused Politics of Far-Right Groups
• (00:40:37) - What do men become vulnerable to in isolation, particularly on the Internet
• (00:45:50) - Fascist Dad of the Week