From 20f6f841b948579486d59cba57bc63d656616c0d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: David Eisinger Date: Tue, 1 Jul 2025 11:47:21 -0400 Subject: [PATCH] Add links + rearrange --- .../journal/dispatch-29-july-2025/index.md | 123 +- static/archive/defector-com-dykuft.txt | 521 +++++++ static/archive/fly-io-g1y72q.txt | 503 +++++++ static/archive/lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt | 76 + static/archive/tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt | 539 +++++++ static/archive/www-fastcompany-com-qigvi6.txt | 565 +++++++ static/archive/www-nytimes-com-ne64py.txt | 1308 +++++++++++++++++ 7 files changed, 3600 insertions(+), 35 deletions(-) create mode 100644 static/archive/defector-com-dykuft.txt create mode 100644 static/archive/fly-io-g1y72q.txt create mode 100644 static/archive/lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt create mode 100644 static/archive/tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt create mode 100644 static/archive/www-fastcompany-com-qigvi6.txt create mode 100644 static/archive/www-nytimes-com-ne64py.txt diff --git a/content/journal/dispatch-29-july-2025/index.md b/content/journal/dispatch-29-july-2025/index.md index ff87764..ef19cae 100644 --- a/content/journal/dispatch-29-july-2025/index.md +++ b/content/journal/dispatch-29-july-2025/index.md @@ -4,6 +4,31 @@ date: 2025-06-24T14:00:35-04:00 draft: false tags: - dispatch +references: +- title: "Opinion | Sarah McBride on Why the Left Lost on Trans Rights - The New York Times" + url: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-sarah-mcbride.html + date: 2025-07-01T15:45:49Z + file: www-nytimes-com-ne64py.txt +- title: "Generative AI as a magic system – Tracy Durnell's Mind Garden" + url: https://tracydurnell.com/2025/06/24/generative-ai-as-a-magic-system/ + date: 2025-07-01T15:45:54Z + file: tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt +- title: "Toward A Theory Of Kevin Roose | Defector" + url: https://defector.com/toward-a-theory-of-kevin-roose?giftLink=0131f06f11f5f3dfe5152b52f0d2f2dc + date: 2025-07-01T15:46:14Z + file: defector-com-dykuft.txt +- title: "Helix" + url: https://lmno.lol/puddingtime/helix + date: 2025-07-01T15:46:19Z + file: lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt +- title: "fastcompany.com" + url: https://www.fastcompany.com/91352848/field-notes-cult-notebook-started-out-as-a-side-project + date: 2025-07-01T15:46:22Z + file: www-fastcompany-com-qigvi6.txt +- title: "My AI Skeptic Friends Are All Nuts · The Fly Blog" + url: https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/ + date: 2025-07-01T15:46:25Z + file: fly-io-g1y72q.txt --- Some thoughts here... @@ -11,15 +36,18 @@ Some thoughts here... - Nico birthday + - Beach - Beach banger - - Poolsuite -- Ken trip - - Car rental - - Music + - [Poolsuite][1] + + + +[1]: https://poolsuite.net + - Dads birthday - Richmond - - [Children’s Museum][1] + - [Children’s Museum][2] - Buz and Neds {{}} @@ -28,37 +56,39 @@ Some thoughts here... {{}} {{}} -[1]: https://www.childrensmuseumofrichmond.org/ +[2]: https://www.childrensmuseumofrichmond.org/ + +- [Angel Island][3] + - Ball pit photos + +{{}} +{{}} + +[3]: https://www.angelislandusa.com/ + +- Ken trip + - Car rental + - Music + +{{}} +{{}} + + + +[13]: https://turo.com/ +[14]: /journal/dispatch-7-september-2023/ - Firsts - Nico walking - Nev swimming - Nev piano -- [Angel Island][2] - - Ball pit photos - -{{}} -{{}} - -[2]: https://www.angelislandusa.com/ - Next month: * Lake for the fourth * Wide open after that * Running, weight loss, more music (Melodics, Ableton) - - - - -{{}} -{{}} - -[9]: https://turo.com/ -[10]: /journal/dispatch-7-september-2023/ - ### This Month * Adventure: @@ -67,20 +97,43 @@ Next month: ### Reading & Listening -* Fiction: [_Title_][3], Author -* Non-fiction: [_Title_][4], Author -* Music: [_Iteration_][5], Com Truse +* Fiction: [_Title_][4], Author +* Non-fiction: [_Title_][5], Author +* Music: [_Iteration_][6], Com Truse -[3]: https://bookshop.org/ [4]: https://bookshop.org/ -[5]: https://ghostly.com/products/iteration +[5]: https://bookshop.org/ +[6]: https://ghostly.com/products/iteration ### Links -* [Title][6] -* [Title][7] -* [Title][8] +* [Opinion | Sarah McBride on Why the Left Lost on Trans Rights - The New York Times][7] -[6]: https://example.com/ -[7]: https://example.com/ -[8]: https://example.com/ + > Maybe it is hurtful, but you can’t foster social change if you don’t have a conversation. You can’t change people if you exclude them. And I will just say, you can’t have absolutism on the left or the right without authoritarianism. + +* [Generative AI as a magic system – Tracy Durnell's Mind Garden][8] + + > We treat generative AI like magic… and magic systems have rules. When creating fantasy worlds, writers think about who can use magic, how magic is performed, what it’s able to do, what its constraints are, what the source of magic is, and what it costs. I’m applying a bit of reverse worldbuilding to the real world to extrapolate the rules of the AI magic system. + +* [Toward A Theory Of Kevin Roose][9] + + > My suspicion, my awful awful newfound theory, is that there are people with a sincere and even kind of innocent belief that we are all just picking winners, in everything: that ideology, advocacy, analysis, criticism, affinity, even taste and style and association are essentially predictions. That what a person tries to do, the essential task of a person, is to identify who and what is going to come out on top, and align with it. + +* [Helix][10] + + > It's pretty nice! It launches quickly. No plugin system so the futzmonkey sort of has to stay in its cage, but it's very batteries-included. I found a tutorial for setting it up for Markdown that wasn't overwhelming and helped me get a sense of how its config works. + +* [How Field Notes went from side project to cult notebook][11] + + > Two decades after Aaron Draplin and Jim Coudal launched Field Notes, the analog notebook company is crushing it in the digital age. + +* [My AI Skeptic Friends Are All Nuts · The Fly Blog][12] + + > And here I rejoin your company. I read Simon Willison, and that’s all I really need. But all day, every day, a sizable chunk of the front page of HN is allocated to LLMs: incremental model updates, startups doing things with LLMs, LLM tutorials, screeds against LLMs. It’s annoying! But AI is also incredibly — a word I use advisedly — important. It’s getting the same kind of attention that smart phones got in 2008, and not as much as the Internet got. That seems about right. + +[7]: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-sarah-mcbride.html +[8]: https://tracydurnell.com/2025/06/24/generative-ai-as-a-magic-system/ +[9]: https://defector.com/toward-a-theory-of-kevin-roose?giftLink=0131f06f11f5f3dfe5152b52f0d2f2dc +[10]: https://lmno.lol/puddingtime/helix +[11]: https://www.fastcompany.com/91352848/field-notes-cult-notebook-started-out-as-a-side-project +[12]: https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/ diff --git a/static/archive/defector-com-dykuft.txt b/static/archive/defector-com-dykuft.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ebfff41 --- /dev/null +++ b/static/archive/defector-com-dykuft.txt @@ -0,0 +1,521 @@ +[1]Skip to Content +[2]Defector home +[3]Defector home +[4]Subscribe[5]Log In +[6][ ] +Menu +[9][ ]Search +Search + • [11]Crosswords + • [12]NFL + • [13]NBA + • [14]NHL + • [15]WNBA + • [16]Soccer + • [17]Podcasts + • [18]Arts And Culture + • [19]Politics + • [20]Science + + • [21]About Us + • [22]Send Us A Tip (News) + • [23]Send Us A Tip ($) + • [24]Merch Shop + • [25]How To Pitch Defector + • [26]Defector Freelancer Policies + • [27]Crossword Submission Guidelines + • [28]Books By Defectors + • [29]Defector Hall of Fame + • [30]Masthead + +[31]Log In[32]Subscribe + + • [33]Defector Twitch + • [34]Defector Bluesky + +[35]Subscribe to skip adsAdvertisement +AI-Powered Robot interacts with People during the Italian Tech Week 2024 at OGR +Officine Grandi Riparazioni on September 26, 2024 in Turin, Italy.Stefano Guidi +/Getty Images +[36]Capital + +Toward A Theory Of Kevin Roose + +[37][IMG] +By [38]Albert Burneko + +11:15 AM EDT on June 18, 2025 + + • [39]Share on Bluesky + • [40]Share on Reddit + • [41]Share on WhatsApp + • [42]Share on Email + +[43] +250Comments + +"You can't be a serious critic," New York Times technology reporter Kevin Roose +wrote on Tuesday, [44]on Bluesky, about artificial intelligence, "if you're in +denial about how useful it is." Narrowly, in strict terms, this is true: You +can't be a serious critic of anything if you are in denial about any part of +it, where "in denial" describes an irrational and unfounded rejection of +empirical reality. That's hardly even worth saying, but it's also not really +what Roose is saying. + +What Roose wants is to put an entire suite of claims about the technology +presently doing business as "artificial intelligence"—not just that it has more +than zero uses (a thing nobody really denies) but that it truly is artificial +intelligence or anything like it; that it represents a profound leap forward +for technology and human endeavor; that it is the future; that, as such, +adopting it and integrating it into day-to-day work and life processes is the +smart move—beyond dispute. He wants to marginalize the many technology experts, +media knowers, and sharp lay readers who have for years been calling his work +on behalf of those claims appalling boobery. He wants his readers to view all +of those critics as coterminous with whatever minor body of irrelevant +five-follower internet loons might bother trying to argue the literal +uselessness of a predictive text generator or a program that collates search +engine results into layperson's language. He wants his readers to think of all +the critics as united in an essentially pathological relationship with the +observable world. And he wants the juice of dancing this shitty little +passive-aggressive jig on Bluesky, the social-media platform where many of +those critics will encounter his work and, while dunking on it, also share it +around to some number of people who will read it. + +Why do this crap? I think that I would be embarrassed. I think that after I'd +[45]gassed up cryptocurrency and NFTs in the New York Times and told New York +Times readers that the Bing search engine was trying to [46]steal me away from +my wife, I would have asked my editor if maybe I could cover the Broadway beat +for a while instead of continuing to smirk at the world while pouring fire ants +down the front of my shorts for a living. So: Why do it? But also: How? + +I think about these questions a lot, certainly more than I should. (Not just +about Kevin Roose! Sometimes also about Felix Salmon.) Some two decades since +the digital-media attention economy took shape and, sheesh, like 13 years into +my own career working in that economy, the list of the cold incentives that +might drive a journalist toward this type of routine—attention, website +traffic, access to industry honchos otherwise not inclined toward talking to +the press, the possibility of later getting a nice job from one of them—is +depressingly easy to conjure. But that list's plausibility as a Kevin Roose +Explainer is, for me, limited by my fixed standing assumption that other people +have and value dignity. + +Something occurred to me the other day when I was thinking about this—not even +Tuesday! Not even prompted by this particular Kevin Roose Bluesky post!—and has +been sort of following me around since, making me feel squirmy and +uncomfortable and haunted. What occurred to me was the possibility that what +had seemed, to me, like it could only come from a chilling and impossible level +of cynicism might come instead from a perverse and even more chilling variety +of mostly genuine belief. Not in the transformative power of AI! I'm talking +about something wider and deeper and more frightening than that: a genuine and +horribly earnest belief in not believing in anything. + +My suspicion, my awful awful newfound theory, is that there are people with a +sincere and even kind of innocent belief that we are all just picking winners, +in everything: that ideology, advocacy, analysis, criticism, affinity, even +taste and style and association are essentially predictions. That what a person +tries to do, the essential task of a person, is to identify who and what is +going to come out on top, and align with it. The rest—what you say, what you +do—is just enacting your pick and working in service to it. + +I was thinking about a lot of different stuff. I was thinking about the +phenomenon of small-fry sports-bettor bros with no passion for any serious +right-wing politics going big for Donald Trump in 2024 based on a view of their +vote as something like a wager, and of Trump as the bold, ambitious +choice—risky, but with the bigger potential payout. I was thinking about +sophisticated, high-achieving tech-industry types abruptly throwing off all of +their (thin, half-cooked, fundamentally dogshit, but still) liberal-libertarian +politics to get behind an explicitly authoritarian program and help build its +surveillance state. I was thinking about bushy-tailed go-getter types in legacy +media who kept their language carefully bland around policing reform, +anti-racism, and social justice during those topics' brief heightened salience +around the George Floyd protests, and then smoothly pivoted to criticizing the +excesses of woke when the winds changed. I was thinking about randos whom Elon +Musk would not cross a sidewalk to piss on if they were on fire, who, when +Trump invited Musk to gut federal government agencies and programs that benefit +their own lives, rushed to tweet GIFs of Musk, like, dunking on somebody's head +at his critics. I was thinking about [47]bag culture. And I was thinking about +Kevin Roose, serially and with apparent enthusiasm donning each next pair of +gigantic clown shoes handed to him by this or that Silicon Valley titan, and +dancing in them long past the point when everybody else figured out it was all +on behalf of a grift. + +To these people this kind of thing is not cynicism, both because they believe +it's just what everybody is doing and because they do not regard it as ugly or +underhanded or whatever. Making the right pick is simply being smart. And not +necessarily in some kind of edgy-cool or subversive way, but smart the very +same shit-eating way that the dorkus malorkus who gets onto a friendly +first-name basis with the middle-school assistant principal is smart. They just +want to be smart. + +So these people look at, say, socialists, and they see fools—not because of +moral or ethical objections to socialism or whatever, or because of any +authentically held objections or analysis at all, but simply because they can +see that, at present, socialism is not winning. All the most powerful guys are +against it. Can't those fools see it? They have picked a loser. They should +pick the winner instead. + +Likewise, when all the rich guys got behind cryptocurrency, and all the rich +cryptocurrency guys got behind Donald Trump, for these people the thing to do +was very obvious, even if they had previously regarded crypto as a scam: not +just to buy some cryptocurrency—the kind of move any cynic might make—but to +adopt the attitudes and positions of a crypto enthusiast. Neither their +conscience nor their concept of dignity troubles them in this switcheroo, +because they take for granted that this is the precise way everyone forms the +stuff they say and appear to think. In their view, someone like me dumps on +cryptocurrency not because of an analytical conclusion that it sucks and is a +scam, or because of a moral conclusion that as a scam it is reprehensible, but +because I am making a pragmatic prediction that it will fail; my arguments for +it being bad, in this view, are at best just the articulation of the reasons +why I think it will not win. + +Personally, when Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election and threw open +the regulatory gates for crypto, I saw it as a bleak and bitter vindication of +crypto skepticism: Critics had always been right to have identified it as a +tool of predators and scam artists, and now, in its embrace by the most brazen +undisguised crook in American society and the gleeful removal of all safeguards +protecting people from it, everyone could see it for what it is. For the +specimens we are examining here today, they saw almost the exact opposite: not +just a victory for crypto and its boosters, but an actual self-evident +refutation of crypto skeptics' arguments—for the simple reason that these +people understood those arguments to have always been at root a prediction that +crypto would lose, and crypto had won. + +This has not been how I have approached my life—I think that's sort of +painfully obvious—and I think in general it is mostly not how people approach +their lives. I think in general even really flawed and derelict people like me +are trying to figure out what's right or what's best or what's just or what's +fair, or at least some workable compromise between the demands of those pesky +ideas and our desire for near-term comfort and stability. I think in general +people only form associations on the basis of what they think will win in +certain discrete circumstances, like betting on a horse race or making +stock-market trades or whatever; the rest of life is more complicated than +that. You vote for the candidate you think will represent your interests in +government and you hope they will win; you do not try to figure out who is +going to win and then vote for them. You praise the beauty of an artwork +because you think it's beautiful, not because you expect it will smash +auction-price records. You root for the Sacramento Kings because you are a sick +pervert, not because you believe they will ever win the NBA Finals. + +And so, for probably most people, it would be sort of uncomfortable to, for +example, shrug off the social ideas you'd vocally advocated for and throw +yourself behind a political movement in direct opposition to all of them! Not +only on principle—you'd actually believed that stuff, after all—but because of +things like dignity and even vanity: People in general do not want to look like +turncoats, scumbags, or frontrunners. Likewise, for probably most people, the +dissolution of a succession of huge tech-industry hypes having exposed you as a +[48]world-historic stooge and imbecile might temper your eagerness to deliver a +public Funkmaster Flex routine on behalf of AI companies! Not even for +particularly admirable reasons; you might just be tired of looking like a +world-historic stooge and imbecile in the New York Times. + +But now imagine believing that victory, whenever it arrived and on whatever +terms it was accomplished, would automatically redeem all that debasement. If +you believed that Trump winning would mean that everyone who supported him was +right to have done so, because they had picked the winner; that the mega-rich +AI industry buying its way into all corners of American society would mean that +critics of the technology and of using it to displace human labors were not +just defeated but meaningfully wrong in their criticisms; that some celebrity +getting richer from a crypto rug-pull that ripped off hundreds of thousands of +less-rich people would actually vindicate the celebrity's choice to participate +in it, because of how much richer it made them. Imagine holding this as an +authentic understanding of how the world works: that the simple binary outcome +of a contest had the power to reach back through time and adjust the ethical +and moral weight of the contestants' choices along the way. Maybe, in that +case, you would feel differently about what to the rest of us looks like +straight-up shit eating. + +This, I think, is how a guy like Kevin Roose can do what he does without +apparent embarrassment, without ever seeming to have learned anything or to +have been chastened in the least by a series of cigars exploding in his face +right after he told everyone in the world that smoking these +guaranteed-not-to-explode cigars was the way of the future. He is playing the +long game. Non-fungible tokens turned out to be a musical-chairs scam, Web3 +nothing more than a Sony PlayStation in helmet form, crypto at best a +speculative asset class and at worse a wilderness of Ponzi schemes. AI might +turn out to be just the ruinous money-pit Potemkin singularity that critics and +scholars and experts (and I) think it is. + +My theory of Kevin Roose is this: His bet is not on any of these individually, +but on the very rich and very powerful men and institutions backing them. He +thinks they are going to win, and that when they do win, it won't matter that +the rest of us regarded his sucking up to them as a disgrace to journalism and +human dignity. He is, I suppose I must grant, being very smart. + +Recommended + +[49]The Machines +[50] + +Only Kevin Roose’s Editors Despise Him More Than I Do + +[51]213Comments +[52]Albert Burneko +April 25, 2025 +[53]A robot dances onstage +[54]Subscribe to skip adsAdvertisement + +If you liked this blog, please share it! Your referrals help Defector reach new +readers, and those new readers always get a few free blogs before encountering +our paywall. + + • [55]Share on Bluesky + • [56]Share on Reddit + • [57]Share on WhatsApp + • [58]Share on Email + +[59][IMG] +[60]Albert Burneko +[61]@albertburneko.bsky.social + +Assignment Editor + +Read More: + + • [62]ai, + • [63]artificial intelligence, + • [64]bag culture, + • [65]blogs of note, + • [66]crypto, + • [67]kevin roose, + • [68]new york times, + • [69]stooges + +Stay in touch + +Sign up for our free newsletter + +[70][ ]Email +Sign up +More from Defector + +[72]Interviews +[73] + +A Lot Can Go Wrong While Attempting A Speed Record On Mount Everest + +[74][bab] +[75]Owen Lewis +July 1, 2025 +[76]Tyler Andrews runs up the Lhotse south face +[77]MLB +[78] + +It Feels So Good To Be A Robber + +[79]21Comments +[80][AJS] +[81]Kelsey McKinney +July 1, 2025 +[82][GettyImages-2222989821_ee0a99] +[83] + +NYC: Come To Our WNBA Comedy Show On July 15 + +As we approach the WNBA All-Star break, join Defector for a night of stand up, +games, and giveaways. Featuring Devon Walker (Saturday Night Live), Julia +Shiplett (Overcompensating), Grace Johnson (Don’t Tell), and Joey Dardano (Wild +‘n Out)! Use code LETSGOLIBS for 10% off. +Ten Minute Quarters July 15 show +[84]Arts And Culture +[85] + +Just Give Me Some Normal Damn Dinosaurs + +[86]107Comments +[87][hea] +[88]Barry Petchesky +July 1, 2025 +[89]NEW YORK, NY - JUNE 24: A 5-story Titanosaurus towers over Rockefeller +Center to promote the film "Jurassic World: Rebirth" on June 24, 2025 in New +York City. 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View Our Brand Assets +Open main menu + +Articles + [5] Blog [6] Phoenix Files [7] Laravel Bytes [8] Ruby Dispatch [9] Django + Beats [10] JavaScript Journal + +[11] Security [12] Infra Log [13] Docs [14] Community [15] Status [16] Pricing +[17] Sign In [18] Get Started [19] RSS Feed +[20] Blog [21] Phoenix Files [22] Laravel Bytes [23] Ruby Dispatch [24] Django +Beats [25] JavaScript Journal [26] Security [27] Infra Log [28] Docs [29] +Community (opens an external site) [30] Status (opens an external site) [31] +Pricing [32] Sign In [33] Get Started [34] RSS Feed +Reading time • 16 min [35] Share this post on Twitter [36] Share this post on +Hacker News [37] Share this post on Reddit + +My AI Skeptic Friends Are All Nuts + +Author + Thomas Ptacek + + Name + Thomas Ptacek + @tqbf + [38] @tqbf + +A psychedelic landscape. Image by [39] Annie Ruygt + +A heartfelt provocation about AI-assisted programming. + +Tech execs are mandating LLM adoption. That’s bad strategy. But I get where +they’re coming from. + +Some of the smartest people I know share a bone-deep belief that AI is a fad — +the next iteration of NFT mania. I’ve been reluctant to push back on them, +because, well, they’re smarter than me. But their arguments are unserious, and +worth confronting. Extraordinarily talented people are doing work that LLMs +already do better, out of spite. + +All progress on LLMs could halt today, and LLMs would remain the 2nd most +important thing to happen over the course of my career. + +Important caveat: I’m discussing only the implications of LLMs for software +development. For art, music, and writing? I got nothing. I’m inclined to +believe the skeptics in those fields. I just don’t believe them about mine. + +Bona fides: I’ve been shipping software since the mid-1990s. I started out in +boxed, shrink-wrap C code. Survived an ill-advised [40]Alexandrescu C++ phase. +Lots of Ruby and Python tooling. Some kernel work. A whole lot of server-side +C, Go, and Rust. However you define “serious developer”, I qualify. Even if +only on one of your lower tiers. + +[41]level setting + +† (or, God forbid, 2 years ago with Copilot) + +First, we need to get on the same page. If you were trying and failing to use +an LLM for code 6 months ago †, you’re not doing what most serious LLM-assisted +coders are doing. + +People coding with LLMs today use agents. Agents get to poke around your +codebase on their own. They author files directly. They run tools. They compile +code, run tests, and iterate on the results. They also: + + • pull in arbitrary code from the tree, or from other trees online, into + their context windows, + • run standard Unix tools to navigate the tree and extract information, + • interact with Git, + • run existing tooling, like linters, formatters, and model checkers, and + • make essentially arbitrary tool calls (that you set up) through MCP. + +The code in an agent that actually “does stuff” with code is not, itself, AI. +This should reassure you. It’s surprisingly simple systems code, wired to +ground truth about programming in the same way a Makefile is. You could write +an effective coding agent in a weekend. Its strengths would have more to do +with how you think about and structure builds and linting and test harnesses +than with how advanced o3 or Sonnet have become. + +If you’re making requests on a ChatGPT page and then pasting the resulting +(broken) code into your editor, you’re not doing what the AI boosters are +doing. No wonder you’re talking past each other. + +[42]the positive case + +four quadrants of tedium and importance + +LLMs can write a large fraction of all the tedious code you’ll ever need to +write. And most code on most projects is tedious. LLMs drastically reduce the +number of things you’ll ever need to Google. They look things up themselves. +Most importantly, they don’t get tired; they’re immune to inertia. + +Think of anything you wanted to build but didn’t. You tried to home in on some +first steps. If you’d been in the limerent phase of a new programming language, +you’d have started writing. But you weren’t, so you put it off, for a day, a +year, or your whole career. + +I can feel my blood pressure rising thinking of all the bookkeeping and +Googling and dependency drama of a new project. An LLM can be instructed to +just figure all that shit out. Often, it will drop you precisely at that golden +moment where shit almost works, and development means tweaking code and +immediately seeing things work better. That dopamine hit is why I code. + +There’s a downside. Sometimes, gnarly stuff needs doing. But you don’t wanna do +it. So you refactor unit tests, soothing yourself with the lie that you’re +doing real work. But an LLM can be told to go refactor all your unit tests. An +agent can occupy itself for hours putzing with your tests in a VM and come back +later with a PR. If you listen to me, you’ll know that. You’ll feel worse +yak-shaving. You’ll end up doing… real work. + +[43]but you have no idea what the code is + +Are you a vibe coding Youtuber? Can you not read code? If so: astute point. +Otherwise: what the fuck is wrong with you? + +You’ve always been responsible for what you merge to main. You were five years +go. And you are tomorrow, whether or not you use an LLM. + +If you build something with an LLM that people will depend on, read the code. +In fact, you’ll probably do more than that. You’ll spend 5-10 minutes knocking +it back into your own style. LLMs are [44]showing signs of adapting to local +idiom, but we’re not there yet. + +People complain about LLM-generated code being “probabilistic”. No it isn’t. +It’s code. It’s not Yacc output. It’s knowable. The LLM might be stochastic. +But the LLM doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you can make sense of the +result, and whether your guardrails hold. + +Reading other people’s code is part of the job. If you can’t metabolize the +boring, repetitive code an LLM generates: skills issue! How are you handling +the chaos human developers turn out on a deadline? + +† (because it can hold 50-70kloc in its context window) + +For the last month or so, Gemini 2.5 has been my go-to †. Almost nothing it +spits out for me merges without edits. I’m sure there’s a skill to getting a +SOTA model to one-shot a feature-plus-merge! But I don’t care. I like moving +the code around and chuckling to myself while I delete all the stupid comments. +I have to read the code line-by-line anyways. + +[45]but hallucination + +If hallucination matters to you, your programming language has let you down. + +Agents lint. They compile and run tests. If their LLM invents a new function +signature, the agent sees the error. They feed it back to the LLM, which says +“oh, right, I totally made that up” and then tries again. + +You’ll only notice this happening if you watch the chain of thought log your +agent generates. Don’t. This is why I like [46]Zed’s agent mode: it begs you to +tab away and let it work, and pings you with a desktop notification when it’s +done. + +I’m sure there are still environments where hallucination matters. But +“hallucination” is the first thing developers bring up when someone suggests +using LLMs, despite it being (more or less) a solved problem. + +[47]but the code is shitty, like that of a junior developer + +Does an intern cost $20/month? Because that’s what Cursor.ai costs. + +Part of being a senior developer is making less-able coders productive, be they +fleshly or algebraic. Using agents well is both a both a skill and an +engineering project all its own, of prompts, indices, [48]and (especially) +tooling. LLMs only produce shitty code if you let them. + +† (Also: 100% of all the Bash code you should author ever again) + +Maybe the current confusion is about who’s doing what work. Today, LLMs do a +lot of typing, Googling, test cases †, and edit-compile-test-debug cycles. But +even the most Claude-poisoned serious developers in the world still own +curation, judgement, guidance, and direction. + +Also: let’s stop kidding ourselves about how good our human first cuts really +are. + +[49]but it’s bad at rust + +It’s hard to get a good toolchain for Brainfuck, too. Life’s tough in the +aluminum siding business. + +† (and they surely will; the Rust community takes tooling seriously) + +A lot of LLM skepticism probably isn’t really about LLMs. It’s projection. +People say “LLMs can’t code” when what they really mean is “LLMs can’t write +Rust”. Fair enough! But people select languages in part based on how well LLMs +work with them, so Rust people should get on that †. + +I work mostly in Go. I’m confident the designers of the Go programming language +didn’t set out to produce the most LLM-legible language in the industry. They +succeeded nonetheless. Go has just enough type safety, an extensive standard +library, and a culture that prizes (often repetitive) idiom. LLMs kick ass +generating it. + +All this is to say: I write some Rust. I like it fine. If LLMs and Rust aren’t +working for you, I feel you. But if that’s your whole thing, we’re not having +the same argument. + +[50]but the craft + +Do you like fine Japanese woodworking? All hand tools and sashimono joinery? Me +too. Do it on your own time. + +† (I’m a piker compared to my woodworking friends) + +I have a basic wood shop in my basement †. I could get a lot of satisfaction +from building a table. And, if that table is a workbench or a grill table, +sure, I’ll build it. But if I need, like, a table? For people to sit at? In my +office? I buy a fucking table. + +Professional software developers are in the business of solving practical +problems for people with code. We are not, in our day jobs, artisans. Steve +Jobs was wrong: we do not need to carve the unseen feet in the sculpture. +Nobody cares if the logic board traces are pleasingly routed. If anything we +build endures, it won’t be because the codebase was beautiful. + +Besides, that’s not really what happens. If you’re taking time carefully +golfing functions down into graceful, fluent, minimal functional expressions, +alarm bells should ring. You’re yak-shaving. The real work has depleted your +focus. You’re not building: you’re self-soothing. + +Which, wait for it, is something LLMs are good for. They devour schlep, and +clear a path to the important stuff, where your judgement and values really +matter. + +[51]but the mediocrity + +As a mid-late career coder, I’ve come to appreciate mediocrity. You should be +so lucky as to have it flowing almost effortlessly from a tap. + +We all write mediocre code. Mediocre code: often fine. Not all code is equally +important. Some code should be mediocre. Maximum effort on a random unit test? +You’re doing something wrong. Your team lead should correct you. + +Developers all love to preen about code. They worry LLMs lower the “ceiling” +for quality. Maybe. But they also raise the “floor”. + +Gemini’s floor is higher than my own. My code looks nice. But it’s not as +thorough. LLM code is repetitive. But mine includes dumb contortions where I +got too clever trying to DRY things up. + +And LLMs aren’t mediocre on every axis. They almost certainly have a bigger bag +of algorithmic tricks than you do: radix tries, topological sorts, graph +reductions, and LDPC codes. Humans romanticize rsync ([52]Andrew Tridgell wrote +a paper about it!). To an LLM it might not be that much more interesting than a +SQL join. + +But I’m getting ahead of myself. It doesn’t matter. If truly mediocre code is +all we ever get from LLMs, that’s still huge. It’s that much less mediocre code +humans have to write. + +[53]but it’ll never be AGI + +I don’t give a shit. + +Smart practitioners get wound up by the AI/VC hype cycle. I can’t blame them. +But it’s not an argument. Things either work or they don’t, no matter what +Jensen Huang has to say about it. + +[54]but they take-rr jerbs + +[55]So does open source. We used to pay good money for databases. + +We’re a field premised on automating other people’s jobs away. “Productivity +gains,” say the economists. You get what that means, right? Fewer people doing +the same stuff. Talked to a travel agent lately? Or a floor broker? Or a record +store clerk? Or a darkroom tech? + +When this argument comes up, libertarian-leaning VCs start the chant: +lamplighters, creative destruction, new kinds of work. Maybe. But I’m not +hypnotized. I have no fucking clue whether we’re going to be better off after +LLMs. Things could get a lot worse for us. + +LLMs really might displace many software developers. That’s not a high horse we +get to ride. Our jobs are just as much in tech’s line of fire as everybody +else’s have been for the last 3 decades. We’re not [56]East Coast dockworkers; +we won’t stop progress on our own. + +[57]but the plagiarism + +Artificial intelligence is profoundly — and probably unfairly — threatening to +visual artists in ways that might be hard to appreciate if you don’t work in +the arts. + +We imagine artists spending their working hours pushing the limits of +expression. But the median artist isn’t producing gallery pieces. They produce +on brief: turning out competent illustrations and compositions for magazine +covers, museum displays, motion graphics, and game assets. + +LLMs easily — alarmingly — clear industry quality bars. Gallingly, one of the +things they’re best at is churning out just-good-enough facsimiles of human +creative work. I have family in visual arts. I can’t talk to them about LLMs. I +don’t blame them. They’re probably not wrong. + +Meanwhile, software developers spot code fragments [58]seemingly lifted from +public repositories on Github and lose their shit. What about the licensing? If +you’re a lawyer, I defer. But if you’re a software developer playing this card? +Cut me a little slack as I ask you to shove this concern up your ass. No +profession has demonstrated more contempt for intellectual property. + +The median dev thinks Star Wars and Daft Punk are a public commons. The great +cultural project of developers has been opposing any protection that might +inconvenience a monetizable media-sharing site. When they fail at policy, they +route around it with coercion. They stand up global-scale piracy networks and +sneer at anybody who so much as tries to preserve a new-release window for a TV +show. + +Call any of this out if you want to watch a TED talk about how hard it is to +stream The Expanse on LibreWolf. Yeah, we get it. You don’t believe in IPR. +Then shut the fuck up about IPR. Reap the whirlwind. + +It’s all special pleading anyways. LLMs digest code further than you do. If you +don’t believe a typeface designer can stake a moral claim on the terminals and +counters of a letterform, you sure as hell can’t be possessive about a +red-black tree. + +[59]positive case redux + +When I started writing a couple days ago, I wrote a section to “level set” to +the state of the art of LLM-assisted programming. A bluefish filet has a longer +shelf life than an LLM take. In the time it took you to read this, everything +changed. + +Kids today don’t just use agents; they use asynchronous agents. They wake up, +free-associate 13 different things for their LLMs to work on, make coffee, fill +out a TPS report, drive to the Mars Cheese Castle, and then check their +notifications. They’ve got 13 PRs to review. Three get tossed and re-prompted. +Five of them get the same feedback a junior dev gets. And five get merged. + +“I’m sipping rocket fuel right now,” a friend tells me. “The folks on my team +who aren’t embracing AI? It’s like they’re standing still.” He’s not +bullshitting me. He doesn’t work in SFBA. He’s got no reason to lie. + +There’s plenty of things I can’t trust an LLM with. No LLM has any of access to +prod here. But I’ve been first responder on an incident and fed 4o — not +o4-mini, 4o — log transcripts, and watched it in seconds spot LVM metadata +corruption issues on a host we’ve been complaining about for months. Am I +better than an LLM agent at interrogating OpenSearch logs and Honeycomb traces? +No. No, I am not. + +To the consternation of many of my friends, I’m not a radical or a futurist. +I’m a statist. I believe in the haphazard perseverance of complex systems, of +institutions, of reversions to the mean. I write Go and Python code. I’m not a +Kool-aid drinker. + +But something real is happening. My smartest friends are blowing it off. Maybe +I persuade you. Probably I don’t. But we need to be done making space for bad +arguments. + +[60]but i’m tired of hearing about it + +And here I rejoin your company. I read [61]Simon Willison, and that’s all I +really need. But all day, every day, a sizable chunk of the front page of HN is +allocated to LLMs: incremental model updates, startups doing things with LLMs, +LLM tutorials, screeds against LLMs. It’s annoying! + +But AI is also incredibly — a word I use advisedly — important. It’s getting +the same kind of attention that smart phones got in 2008, and not as much as +the Internet got. That seems about right. + +I think this is going to get clearer over the next year. The cool kid +haughtiness about “stochastic parrots” and “vibe coding” can’t survive much +more contact with reality. I’m snarking about these people, but I meant what I +said: they’re smarter than me. And when they get over this affectation, they’re +going to make coding agents profoundly more effective than they are today. + +Last updated • + Jun 2, 2025 + +[62] Share this post on Twitter [63] Share this post on Hacker News [64] Share +this post on Reddit + +Author + Thomas Ptacek + + Name + Thomas Ptacek + @tqbf + [65] @tqbf + +Next post ↑ + [66] What are MCP Servers? +Previous post ↓ + [67] Using Kamal 2.0 in Production + +Next post ↑ + [68] What are MCP Servers? +Previous post ↓ + [69] Using Kamal 2.0 in Production + +[70] App performance optimization + +Company + [71]About [72]Pricing [73]Jobs + +Articles + [74]Blog [75]Phoenix Files [76]Laravel Bytes [77]Ruby Dispatch [78]Django + Beats [79]JavaScript Journal + +Resources + [80]Docs [81]Support [82]Support Metrics [83]Status + +Contact + [84]GitHub [85]Twitter [86]Community + +Legal + [87]Security [88]Privacy policy [89]Terms of service [90]Acceptable Use + Policy + +Copyright © 2025 Fly.io + + +References: + +[1] https://fly.io/ +[2] https://fly.io/blog/ +[3] https://fly.io/docs/about/brand/ +[5] https://fly.io/blog/ +[6] https://fly.io/phoenix-files/ +[7] https://fly.io/laravel-bytes/ +[8] https://fly.io/ruby-dispatch/ +[9] https://fly.io/django-beats/ +[10] https://fly.io/javascript-journal/ +[11] https://fly.io/security/ +[12] https://fly.io/infra-log/ +[13] https://fly.io/docs/ +[14] https://community.fly.io/ +[15] https://status.flyio.net/ +[16] https://fly.io/pricing/ +[17] https://fly.io/app/sign-in +[18] https://fly.io/docs/hands-on/start/ +[19] https://fly.io/blog/feed.xml +[20] https://fly.io/blog/ +[21] https://fly.io/phoenix-files/ +[22] https://fly.io/laravel-bytes/ +[23] https://fly.io/ruby-dispatch/ +[24] https://fly.io/django-beats/ +[25] https://fly.io/javascript-journal/ +[26] https://fly.io/security/ +[27] https://fly.io/infra-log/ +[28] https://fly.io/docs/ +[29] https://community.fly.io/ +[30] https://status.flyio.net/ +[31] https://fly.io/pricing/ +[32] https://fly.io/app/sign-in +[33] https://fly.io/docs/hands-on/start/ +[34] https://fly.io/blog/feed.xml +[35] https://twitter.com/share?text=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts&url=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&via=flydotio +[36] http://news.ycombinator.com/submitlink?u=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&t=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts +[37] http://www.reddit.com/submit?url=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&title=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts +[38] https://twitter.com/tqbf +[39] https://annieruygtillustration.com/ +[40] https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Design-Generic-Programming-Patterns/dp/0201704315 +[41] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#level-setting +[42] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#the-positive-case +[43] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-you-have-no-idea-what-the-code-is +[44] https://github.com/PatrickJS/awesome-cursorrules +[45] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-hallucination +[46] https://zed.dev/agentic +[47] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-the-code-is-shitty-like-that-of-a-junior-developer +[48] https://fly.io/blog/semgrep-but-for-real-now/ +[49] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-its-bad-at-rust +[50] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-the-craft +[51] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-the-mediocrity +[52] https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/course/15-749/READINGS/required/cas/tridgell96.pdf +[53] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-itll-never-be-agi +[54] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-they-take-rr-jerbs +[55] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43776612 +[56] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_port_strike +[57] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-the-plagiarism +[58] https://arxiv.org/abs/2311.17035 +[59] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#positive-case-redux +[60] https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/#but-im-tired-of-hearing-about-it +[61] https://simonwillison.net/ +[62] https://twitter.com/share?text=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts&url=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&via=flydotio +[63] http://news.ycombinator.com/submitlink?u=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&t=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts +[64] http://www.reddit.com/submit?url=https://fly.io/blog/youre-all-nuts/&title=My%20AI%20Skeptic%20Friends%20Are%20All%20Nuts +[65] https://twitter.com/tqbf +[66] https://fly.io/blog/mcps-everywhere/ +[67] https://fly.io/blog/kamal-in-production/ +[68] https://fly.io/blog/mcps-everywhere/ +[69] https://fly.io/blog/kamal-in-production/ +[70] https://fly.io/ +[71] https://fly.io/about/ +[72] https://fly.io/pricing/ +[73] https://fly.io/jobs/ +[74] https://fly.io/blog/ +[75] https://fly.io/phoenix-files/ +[76] https://fly.io/laravel-bytes/ +[77] https://fly.io/ruby-dispatch/ +[78] https://fly.io/django-beats/ +[79] https://fly.io/javascript-journal/ +[80] https://fly.io/docs/ +[81] https://fly.io/docs/support/ +[82] https://fly.io/support/ +[83] https://status.flyio.net/ +[84] https://github.com/superfly/ +[85] https://twitter.com/flydotio +[86] https://community.fly.io/ +[87] https://fly.io/docs/security/ +[88] https://fly.io/legal/privacy-policy +[89] https://fly.io/legal/terms-of-service +[90] https://fly.io/legal/acceptable-use-policy diff --git a/static/archive/lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt b/static/archive/lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e12678b --- /dev/null +++ b/static/archive/lmno-lol-iivfpk.txt @@ -0,0 +1,76 @@ +[1]@puddingtime +[2]sign in · [3]lmno.lol + + _____ _____ _ _____ ______ _ _ ______ ______ _____ _ _ _____ _____ _____ ___ ___ _____ _ + |_ _||_ _|( )/ ___| | ___ \| | | || _ \| _ \|_ _|| \ | || __ \|_ _||_ _|| \/ || ___|| | + | | | | |/ \ `--. | |_/ /| | | || | | || | | | | | | \| || | \/ | | | | | . . || |__ | | + | | | | `--. \ | __/ | | | || | | || | | | | | | . ` || | __ | | | | | |\/| || __| | | + _| |_ | | /\__/ / | | | |_| || |/ / | |/ / _| |_ | |\ || |_\ \ | | _| |_ | | | || |___ |_| + \___/ \_/ \____/ \_| \___/ |___/ |___/ \___/ \_| \_/ \____/ \_/ \___/ \_| |_/\____/ (_) 🔥🤘🏻🔥 + +June 19, 2025 + +[4]Helix + +I had insomnia a few nights ago, so I started fiddling with different things, +including the CLI tasks tool dstask, which is sort of TaskWarrior without the +misanthropy. (I kid.) + +So a kind of nice thing about dstask is that with dstask #{note number} note +you pop open $EDITOR in a Markdown note attached to the task. dstask is aware +of any Markdown checklists inside the task note and blocks completion of the +task if there are open ones. + +That's maybe bad for me because I am a compulsive subtask-maker with a bad +habit of opening a task, loading the subtasks into my buffer, and just doing +them all without looking back. So if I stick with it dstask may shape my habits +that way. + +For some annoying reason, dstask also barfs if $EDITOR has an argument, e.g. +emacsclient -nw, and I found myself once again writing some kind of wrapper for +emacsclient. That is not Emacs' fault, but it raised the perennial question +"when does $EDITOR come into play and do you need a whole-ass Emacs config for +those times?" + +So I think "your go-to for this used to be jed, which acts like Emacs where it +matters." But I've been using evil in Emacs for years now: If I want to keep my +muscle memory between quick CLI edits and my whole-ass Emacs config, what I +really need is something from the vi family. + +It being 3 in the morning, I embark on a tour of modern vi's, looking for some +sweet spot of "nimble" and "feature-packed." I burn through a few neovim +tutorials and starter kits (nooooooope) before stumbling into a feud between +neovim people and Helix people on reddit. + +So around 4 I'm running brew install helix and going through :tutorial. + +It's pretty nice! It launches quickly. No plugin system so the futzmonkey sort +of has to stay in its cage, but it's very batteries-included. I found a [5] +tutorial for setting it up for Markdown that wasn't overwhelming and helped me +get a sense of how its config works. + +It is not "just a batteries included vim." It has its own keybinding grammar +(subject/verb, not verb/subject), so after bonking my head on those changes a +few times I [6]cheated and lifted a few vimisms. + +I guess I also went through a quick consideration of micro, but the CUA-style +default keybindings confused me the way nano often confuses me. + + + +powered by [7]LMNO.lol + +[8]privacy policy · [9]terms of service + + +References: + +[1] https://lmno.lol/puddingtime +[2] https://lmno.lol/signin?goto=/puddingtime/helix +[3] https://lmno.lol/ +[4] https://lmno.lol/puddingtime/helix +[5] https://helix-editor-tutorials.com/tutorials/writing-documentation-and-prose-in-markdown-using-helix/ +[6] https://github.com/LGUG2Z/helix-vim/blob/master/config.toml +[7] https://lmno.lol/ +[8] https://lmno.lol/blog/privacy-policy +[9] https://lmno.lol/blog/terms-of-service diff --git a/static/archive/tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt b/static/archive/tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7fdf671 --- /dev/null +++ b/static/archive/tracydurnell-com-e7ykbg.txt @@ -0,0 +1,539 @@ +[1]Skip to the content +Search +[3]Tracy Durnell's Mind Garden +Thinking and Learning In Public +Menu + + • [5]Blog + □ [6]All posts + □ [7]Featured Posts + □ [8]Articles + □ [9]Post Index + □ [10]Microblog (external) + □ [11]Links to blog about + • [12]Big Q’s + □ [13]Future of the Internet + □ [14]Information Diet + □ [15]Making Culture + □ [16]Transforming Capitalism + □ [17]Resisting Fascism + □ [18]Women’s Equality + □ [19]Thinking Better + □ [20]Creative Processes + □ [21]Writing Fiction + • [22]About + □ [23]About Tracy + □ [24]Start Here + □ [25]Now + □ [26]Weeknotes + □ [27]All Pages + • [28]Books + □ [29]Read in 2025 + □ [30]Past Reading + □ [31]Book Reviews + • [32]Tunes + □ [33]Listened in 2025 + □ [34]Birthday Playlists + □ [35]Best of Year Playlists + □ [36]Favorite Albums + • [37]Eats + □ [38]Recipes I’ve Made + □ [39]Recipes to Try + • [40]Links + □ [41]Blogroll + □ [42]Interesting People + □ [43]Cool Artists + □ [44]Neat Websites + □ [45]Small Businesses + □ [46]Graphic Design Resources + +Menu +Search +Search for: [49][ ] [50][Search] +Close search +Close Menu + + • [53]BlogShow sub menu + □ [55]All posts + □ [56]Featured Posts + □ [57]Articles + □ [58]Post Index + □ [59]Microblog (external) + □ [60]Links to blog about + • [61]Big Q’sShow sub menu + □ [63]Future of the Internet + □ [64]Information Diet + □ [65]Making Culture + □ [66]Transforming Capitalism + □ [67]Resisting Fascism + □ [68]Women’s Equality + □ [69]Thinking Better + □ [70]Creative Processes + □ [71]Writing Fiction + • [72]AboutShow sub menu + □ [74]About Tracy + □ [75]Start Here + □ [76]Now + □ [77]Weeknotes + □ [78]All Pages + • [79]BooksShow sub menu + □ [81]Read in 2025 + □ [82]Past Reading + □ [83]Book Reviews + • [84]TunesShow sub menu + □ [86]Listened in 2025 + □ [87]Birthday Playlists + □ [88]Best of Year Playlists + □ [89]Favorite Albums + • [90]EatsShow sub menu + □ [92]Recipes I’ve Made + □ [93]Recipes to Try + • [94]LinksShow sub menu + □ [96]Blogroll + □ [97]Interesting People + □ [98]Cool Artists + □ [99]Neat Websites + □ [100]Small Businesses + □ [101]Graphic Design Resources + + • [102]BlogShow sub menu + □ [104]All posts + □ [105]Featured Posts + □ [106]Articles + □ [107]Post Index + □ [108]Microblog (external) + □ [109]Links to blog about + • [110]Big Q’sShow sub menu + □ [112]Future of the Internet + □ [113]Information Diet + □ [114]Making Culture + □ [115]Transforming Capitalism + □ [116]Resisting Fascism + □ [117]Women’s Equality + □ [118]Thinking Better + □ [119]Creative Processes + □ [120]Writing Fiction + • [121]AboutShow sub menu + □ [123]About Tracy + □ [124]Start Here + □ [125]Now + □ [126]Weeknotes + □ [127]All Pages + • [128]BooksShow sub menu + □ [130]Read in 2025 + □ [131]Past Reading + □ [132]Book Reviews + • [133]TunesShow sub menu + □ [135]Listened in 2025 + □ [136]Birthday Playlists + □ [137]Best of Year Playlists + □ [138]Favorite Albums + • [139]EatsShow sub menu + □ [141]Recipes I’ve Made + □ [142]Recipes to Try + • [143]LinksShow sub menu + □ [145]Blogroll + □ [146]Interesting People + □ [147]Cool Artists + □ [148]Neat Websites + □ [149]Small Businesses + □ [150]Graphic Design Resources + +Categories +[151]Fantasy [152]Technology + +Generative AI as a magic system + + • Post author By [153]Tracy Durnell + • Post date [154]June 24, 2025 + • [155]3 Comments on Generative AI as a magic system + • ❤️ + +We treat generative AI like magic… and magic systems have rules. When creating +fantasy worlds, writers think about who can use magic, how magic is performed, +what it’s able to do, what its constraints are, what the source of magic is, +and what it costs. I’m applying a bit of reverse worldbuilding to the real +world to extrapolate the rules of the AI magic system. + +[156]Islands in the Sky by Death Valley Girls + +Who can use AI magic: magic users pay to use corporate AI magic systems. Those +who are wealthy and tech savvy enough can host their own local model. Free +magic use is mostly limited to corporate largesse ultimately intended to build +magic dependency. + +How AI magic is cast: AI spells are cast with written text input through a +digital interface. Spells are refined and recast until the outcome satisfies +(spells produce different results every time they are cast). + +What AI magic can do: AI spells can produce combinations of words that are +[157]interpreted as writing, code-like material that sometimes runs as code, +images that resemble art, and video that resembles reality. It can create +imitations of specific human creators’ work, as well as individual’s speech and +appearance. It can also mimic human conversation for a span of time before the +spell dissipates. AI magic is near instantaneous, allowing people without +technical skills to produce text and graphics faster than writers and artisans. + +What AI magic cannot do: AI magic [158]cannot produce the same outcome twice, +nor act upon existing conjurations, instead casting spells anew each time. AI +magic itself cannot reference sources, though may be used in tandem with other +tools that enable citation ([159]though with questionable accuracy). AI magic +cannot reason or write, but its conjurations may create [160]the illusion of +intelligence through their statistical consistency with written language use. + +The source of AI magic: AI magic derives from statistical analysis of +human-created art, [161]writing, speech, music, and video, classified and +sorted by human laborers in low-cost geos. + +The cost of AI magic: Resource costs of AI magic include [162]power, [163]water +, and high-end chips, which themselves require specialized manufacturing and +rare earth minerals. + +Social costs include the [164]reinforcement of racism and sexism, as well as +mental harm to AI trainers assessing inputs to the magic system. + +Societal costs include [165]job elimination and [166]job intensification as +positions able to be reproduced in part by magic are [167]eliminated and that +magic work is shifted to the remaining workers. + +Information costs include the [168]destruction of the [169]online publishing +incentive structure / [170]information commons, leading to more paywalled +content; an [171]increase in low-quality material, which makes finding accurate +information harder; as well as the danger of [172]political propaganda by +poisoned magic systems. + +Individual user costs include critical thinking skills, writing abilities, and +patience for conversing with humans. + + + +Further reading: + +[173]The new magic of AI vs. the old magic of artists by Kening Zhu + +See also: + +[174]Generative AI and the Business Borg aesthetic + + • Tags [175]artificial intelligence, [176]computer generated, [177]cost, + [178]Labor, [179]LLM, [180]magic, [181]metaphor, [182]rules, [183] + worldbuilding + +[70c71f48c24aa2fcf7] + +By Tracy Durnell + +Writer and designer in the Seattle area. Reach me at tracy@tracydurnell.com or +@tracy@notes.tracydurnell.com. She/her. + +[184] View Archive → +━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ +[185] ← Read The Arts and Crafts Movement [186] → Read We Will Not Cancel Us +━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ + +3 replies on “Generative AI as a magic system” + +[cfbec22f5a11e] [187]Colin says: +[188]June 26, 2025 at 5:12 pm + +I very much like the breakdown of costs into those categories, it really spells +(ha) it out well. I’d taken a Genie/ Demonology approach to AI magic, be keen +on your thoughts – [189]https://vonexplaino.com/blog/posts/article/2024/10/ +ai-ai-compthulu-fauxthagn-the-ai-grimoire.html + +[190]Reply +[70c71f48c24aa] [191]Tracy Durnell says: +[192]June 27, 2025 at 7:51 pm + +This is totally delightful Colin! I especially like the Cults framing. This +line — “asking the same thing multiple times gets different answers. It’s just +like magic. Or insanity.” — perfect 😄 + +[193]Reply +[IMG_9150-100x] [194]Joe Crawford says: @ [195]artlung.com +[196]June 27, 2025 at 6:11 pm + +Generative AI as a Magic System + +[197]Reply +━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ + +Leave a Reply [198]Cancel reply + +Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked * + + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] +Comment * [ ] + +Name * [200][ ] + +Email * [201][ ] + +Website [202][ ] + +[203][ ] Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I +comment. + +[204][Post Comment] + + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] + [ ] +Δ[ ] + +To respond on your own website, enter the URL of your response which should +contain a link to this post's permalink URL. Your response will then appear +(possibly after moderation) on this page. Want to update or remove your +response? Update or delete your post and re-enter your post's URL again. ([210] +Find out more about Webmentions.) + +URL/Permalink of your article [211][ ] + +[212][Ping me!] + +Explore + +[215]All Posts | [216]Featured | [217]Categories | [218]Random + +Recent Posts + + • [219]Read Cooking As Though You Might Cook Again June 30, 2025 + • [220]Self-webmention versus self-pingback June 29, 2025 + • [221]Email to my Representative re: tabling impeachment June 28, 2025 + • [222]Weeknotes: June 21-27, 2025 June 27, 2025 + • [223]Read We Will Not Cancel Us June 27, 2025 + +About Tracy + +[224][70c71f48c24aa2] + +Tracy Durnell + + • [225]microblog + • [226]mastodon + +Writer and designer in the Seattle area. Reach me at tracy@tracydurnell.com or +@tracy@notes.tracydurnell.com. 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https://tracydurnell.com/questions/resisting-fascism/ +[18] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/feminism/ +[19] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/thinking-better/ +[20] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/effective-creative-processes/ +[21] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/writing-fiction/ +[22] https://tracydurnell.com/about/ +[23] https://tracydurnell.com/about/ +[24] https://tracydurnell.com/start-here/ +[25] https://tracydurnell.com/now/ +[26] https://tracydurnell.com/category/weeknotes/ +[27] https://tracydurnell.com/pages/ +[28] https://tracydurnell.com/reading/ +[29] https://tracydurnell.com/reading/read-in-2025/ +[30] https://tracydurnell.com/reading/ +[31] https://tracydurnell.com/kind/read/ +[32] https://tracydurnell.com/listening/ +[33] https://tracydurnell.com/listening/listened-in-2025/ +[34] https://tracydurnell.com/listening/birthday-playlists/ +[35] https://tracydurnell.com/listening/best-of-year-playlists/ +[36] https://tracydurnell.com/listening/favorite-albums/ +[37] https://tracydurnell.com/recipes/ +[38] https://tracydurnell.com/recipes/ +[39] https://tracydurnell.com/recipes/recipes-to-try/ +[40] https://tracydurnell.com/resources/roundups/ +[41] https://tracydurnell.com/blogroll/ +[42] https://tracydurnell.com/blogroll/interesting-people/ +[43] https://tracydurnell.com/blogroll/cool-artists/ +[44] https://tracydurnell.com/blogroll/neat-websites/ +[45] https://tracydurnell.com/resources/shopping/ +[46] https://tracydurnell.com/resources/graphic-design-resources/ +[53] https://tracydurnell.com/mind-garden/ +[55] https://tracydurnell.com/mind-garden/ +[56] https://tracydurnell.com/category/featured/ +[57] https://tracydurnell.com/kind/article/ +[58] https://tracydurnell.com/mind-garden/index/ +[59] https://notes.tracydurnell.com/ +[60] https://tracydurnell.com/mind-garden/links-to-blog-about/ +[61] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/ +[63] https://tracydurnell.com/questions/future-of-the-internet/ +[64] 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b/static/archive/www-fastcompany-com-qigvi6.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..82e03b0 --- /dev/null +++ b/static/archive/www-fastcompany-com-qigvi6.txt @@ -0,0 +1,565 @@ +Hamburger menu icon + +LOGIN + +[3]Fast company logo +[4]SUBSCRIBE + + • [6]Premium + • [7]Design + • [8]Tech + • [9]Work Life + • [10]News + • [11]Impact + • [12]Podcasts + • [13]Video + • [14]INNOVATION FESTIVAL + +| +[15]FastCo Works + + • [16]IBM + • [17]Texas A&M University + +[p] +advertisement + +06-17-2025[18]DESIGN + +[19] + +How Field Notes went from side project to cult notebook + +Two decades after Aaron Draplin and Jim Coudal launched Field Notes, the analog +notebook company is crushing it in the digital age. + +SHARE +FacebookLinkedInBlueskyXLink +How Field Notes went from side project to cult notebook + +[Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +BY [26]Zachary Petit + +Listen to this Article[27]More info +0:00 / 0:00 + +Field Notes cofounders Aaron Draplin and Jim Coudal have convened to ostensibly +talk about their cult-fave memo book brand. But Draplin—the gregarious, +hilarious Portland proprietor of Draplin Design Co.—just wrapped up jury duty. +And almost 10 minutes into our conversation, he’s regaling us with courtroom +sketches he made during the trial. (“Of course, I had to figure out some way to +exploit it for creative purposes.”) + +Such freewheeling is just part and parcel of knowing Draplin, but Coudal has a +knack for seamlessly and seemingly effortlessly steering the conversation back +to the subject at hand. It underscores a point: Without Draplin, there would be +no Field Notes. And without Coudal, there would definitely be no Field Notes.  + +“What Jim brought to the table is that he had the light bulb where he saw what +this thing could be,” Draplin says. “Jim’s, like, reputable and stuff. People +always say, well, you’re half of the thing—yeah, but I would have killed it +because I might have gone to the next goofy little thing.” + +[i-1-91352784-field-notes-at-20]Jim Coudal and Aaron Draplin [Photo: courtesy +Field Notes] + +Today, 20 years and more than 10 million sold notebooks later, what began as a +casual side project with no real expectation has yielded a cult product that is +in 2,000 stores worldwide, has a robust direct-to-consumer membership program, +and, Coudal says, just came off its best year for sales and revenue. And 2025 +is on pace, he adds, with hopes to surpass it. + +Design Newsletter logo +Subscribe to the Design newsletter.The latest innovations in design brought to +you every weekday +[30]Privacy Policy + +| + +[31]Fast Company Newsletters + +It all goes back to Coudal’s light bulb—and, of course, Draplin’s before it. He +had been drawing all his life and learned bookmaking at the Minneapolis College +of Art and Design. When Draplin left the Midwest for the West Coast in 1993, he +began collecting [32]memo books that agriculture companies historically gave +out as promos, and was taken with their lineage and practical design. He +decided to make some of his own notebooks in 2005, and the pragmatism and charm +of those promos—the vernacular type treatments, layouts, voice—found their way +into Field Notes’ DNA. He hand-printed 200 notebooks on a desktop[33] Gocco and +later invested $2,000 into a first run of 2,000 notebooks with “FIELD NOTES” +printed on the cover in Futura. His goal? To give them out to friends. And one +of those friends along the way happened to be Coudal, of Coudal Partners, the +measured mind to Draplin’s mad scientist.  + +[01-91352784-field-notes-at-20][Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +“He just said, ‘There’s something here,’” Draplin recalls.  + +Coudal’s team made a website. On the day it went live, they made 13 modest +sales via PayPal. But that was okay—again, he and Draplin both had their own +gigs, and Coudal says Field Notes wasn’t a priority for either of them. + +But, “Before you know it, there’s media attention . . . and we’re seeing real +numbers,” Draplin says.  + +According to Coudal: “One by one we fired all our clients because this Field +Notes thing was getting bigger and taking up more of our time—and it was a lot +more fun than making work we were proud of for people we didn’t particularly +like.” + +[08-91352784-field-notes-at-20]Stanley Donwood, Is a River Alive? [Photo: +courtesy Field Notes] + +THE FIELD NOTES FORMULA + +When the pair formally launched the brand, Coudal says projects at his studio +had three mandates: They had to make money, as the team had mortgages and kids +to put through school; they had to be something the team would be proud of; and +they had to be able to learn something new from it. Field Notes checked the +boxes. + +Draplin’s goals were more straightforward. He says he was making a buck for +every grand the agency he worked for did. The mid-aughts were the dawn of the +modern “maker” movement, and there was an opportunity to craft your own future. +He did just that with a concrete design system for the brand’s signature +notebooks from the get-go. + +“There’s never been a piece of type on any Field Notes material that wasn’t +Futura or Century Schoolbook, two beautiful, hardworking American fonts,” +Coudal says. Other assets like the highly structured copy on the inside covers, +as well as the logo placement on the front, were likewise sacrosanct. “We can +do different printing techniques, and we can do different-size notebooks, and +we do a lot of things. But we don’t mess with what made Field Notes Field +Notes.” + +[i-3-91352784-field-notes-at-20][Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +They sold the 3.5-by-5.5-inch 48-page books in packs of three, and the business +grew slowly—but steadily. And as it grew, Coudal says, it became easier: The +more notebooks you make, the cheaper each one becomes because you’re buying in +bulk. When they began scaling up their print runs, they were able to get the +price down to a couple dollars per book, and sell the three-packs for $13 to +15—which got them into stores. (Today, you can find them everywhere from indies +to Barnes & Noble.)  + +One critical moment came in February 2010, when J. Crew featured Field Notes in +its catalog, alongside the retailer’s other “personal favorites from our design +heroes.” There was a Timex watch, Ray-Bans, Sperry shoes—“and out of fucking +nowhere, Field Notes,” Coudal says. “And when that happened, a lot changed for +us.” + +Coudal says it gave the brand instant credibility—after all, if it was good +enough for J. Crew, it was good enough for your store. In time, friends began +sending him screenshots of Field Notes in TV shows; he and Draplin would see +people jotting notes in them in bars and elsewhere; on the design web, they +became an obsession. By 2014, there was even a[34] subreddit dedicated to them +titled “FieldNuts.”  + +Meanwhile, Draplin dropped into a New York store where the notebooks were +arranged “amongst $600 sweaters and $800 jeans.” And the proprietor told him he +could be selling the notebooks for $29.95 or $40—which is something he would +not do. + +advertisement + +“That’s my favorite part—this stuff is accessible, right?” Draplin notes. + +[06-91352784-field-notes-at-20][Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +SUBSCRIPTION STRATEGY + +In 2009, Field Notes launched a set of color variants, and does a new +installment every quarter, which subscribers can get annually for $120. They +are up to 67 editions. And over the years, the program has grown to include +elaborate series like the brand’s popular[35] National Parks books, +celebrations of[36] spaceflight and [37]letterpress, and dozens more themes.  + +Coudal says the first few print runs were around 1,500 packs each—but they have +grown to the 30,000-to-60,000 range today. He adds that aside from “a couple +very strange years around COVID,” gross revenue and DTC sales (which account +for about 50% of the business) have increased almost every year since 2009. + +[05-91352784-field-notes-at-20]Rocky Mountain National Park by Rory Kurtz, +Great Smoky Mountains National Park by Chris Turnham, Yellowstone National Park +by Brave the Woods [Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +“The thing about the subscription model is, first of all, people are paying us +now for a product we haven’t made yet,” Coudal says. “That’s really good for +cash flow for a small company. But more important than that, having these four +projects every year that people are funding ahead of time gives us a really +great way to make a relationship with our customers and our retailers.” + +Each one also fulfills Coudal’s third tenet for projects—he has an opportunity +to explore an entirely new subject through the work.  + +[09-91352784-field-notes-at-20]Emmy Star Brown, Flora [Photo: courtesy Field +Notes] + +THE DRAPLIN FACTOR  + +Of course, as Field Notes has risen in notoriety over the years, Draplin has +been on a parallel path. He embodies the brand at design conferences like Adobe +MAX and in his merch pop-ups, where he is treated like a rock star. + +I ask about the impact of Draplin’s industry celebrity, and Coudal jumps in.  + +“I can answer that because Aaron’s going to be humble about it. I think it’s +made a lot of difference. I think that Aaron has brought a lot of people to the +brand, and he’s also like our gospel preacher out on the road, telling the +story—the gospel of Field Notes.” + +Before the brand had an advertising budget, Coudal says that was critical. And +for Draplin, those talks aren’t to simply shill. “It’s a reminder: You can go +make your own stuff, too,” he says.  + +With Draplin on the West Coast, Field Notes’ core team of around 10 is anchored +in Chicago. While Draplin says he used to be far more involved in the +day-to-day around seven years ago, these days he regards his role as a bit of a +mercenary. He drops in with ideas; Coudal will, say, assign him to “go make +something weird.” He’s also pissed the team off, on occasion, by going rogue +with an idea.  + +[04-91352784-field-notes-at-20][Photo: courtesy Field Notes] + +Ultimately, “I’m along for the ride at that point, because there’s a den mother +watching over us,” Draplin says. As a result of being removed from the daily +routine, he adds, “I get to experience the buzz of what the customer gets.” +Which is, in all likelihood, a valuable temp check.  + +[i-2-91352784-field-notes-at-20]A sample of Aaron Draplin’s collection of +vintage farmer’s memo books. Explore the digitized collection [38]here. [[39] +Screenshot: courtesy Field Notes, Eric Lovejoy, Leigh McKolay and Joe Dawson +Jr. (site credits)] + +“Aaron’s wisdom and inspiration are a constant good thing for the brand,” +Coudal says. “And while he’s not checking the layouts anymore, he’s certainly a +big part of the general direction that the ship sails.” + +Looking to the future, Coudal says his goals are straightforward enough: +Generate more interest, tell interesting stories, get wider distribution.  + +Draplin, meanwhile, still seems a bit incredulous that the company exists in +the first place. “The biggest, funnest part about this thing—number one, we +didn’t lose any money. Isn’t that cool? I would have been okay if we did,” he +says. But, “This can exist. This happened. [We’ve done] it for almost 20 years. +It’s fucking amazing. I’ll tell you what . . . it exceeded my dreams.” + +The advance-rate deadline for Fast Company’s [40]Innovation Festival is Friday, +July 11, at 11:59 p.m. PT. [41] Claim your pass today! + +━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ + +ABOUT THE AUTHOR + +[42]Zachary Petit is a contributing writer for Fast Company and an independent +journalist who covers design, the arts, and travel. 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+1,1308 @@ +[1]Skip to content[2]Skip to site index +[3] +  +[4]Today’s Paper +[5]Opinion|Sarah McBride on Why the Left Lost on Trans Rights +[6][7] +https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/opinion/ +ezra-klein-podcast-sarah-mcbride.html + + • Share full article + • + • + • 880 + +Advertisement + +[12]SKIP ADVERTISEMENT +You have a preview view of this article while we are checking your access. When +we have confirmed access, the full article content will load. +[13] +Opinion + +Supported by + +[14]SKIP ADVERTISEMENT + +The Ezra Klein Show + +Sarah McBride on Why the Left Lost on Trans Rights + +June 17, 2025 + + • Share full article + • + • + • 880 + +[19]Ezra Klein + +By [20]Ezra Klein + +Video +transcript +Back +0:00/1:33:30 +-0:00 + +transcript + +How to Beat Back Trump on Trans Rights — and Much Else + +Representative Sarah McBride reckons with the trans rights movement’s +shortcomings, and how to win hearts and minds through a politics of grace. + + Donald Trump, in his inauguration speech, was perfectly clear about what he + intended to do. [CLIP] “As of today, it will henceforth be the official + policy of the United States government that there are only two genders: + male and female.“ Starting the day of that speech, Trump launched an all + out effort to roll back trans rights using every power of the federal + government had, and some that it may not have. [CLIP] President Trump has + signed an executive order which declares the US government will no longer + recognize the concept of gender identity. [CLIP] President Trump, directing + the Secretary of Education to create a plan to cut funding for schools that + teach what he calls gender ideology. [CLIP] This afternoon, President Trump + makes a move to ban transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports. + [CLIP] Ban on gender-affirming care for transgender kids. [CLIP] A ban on + gender-affirming care for transgender inmates in federal prisons. [CLIP] A + ban on transgender troops serving in the military. [CLIP] These executive + orders, many of them, have not actually gone into effect yet. But when I + look across the country, we’re already hearing the stories of impact. + [CLIP] It’s a complete dehumanization of transgender people. It’s about + privacy and dignity. For me to be able to change my passport to male, + [CLIP] It’s going to come along with having to out myself to border patrol + agents. [CLIP] We are begging to be allowed to continue our service and + you’re just going to wash us away. A lot of the things Trump is doing in + this term have put him on the wrong side of public opinion, but not this. + In a recent poll where Trump’s approval rating was around 40 percent, 52 + percent of Americans approved of how he’s handling trans issues. And if you + look more deeply into polling on trans rights, the public has swung right + on virtually every policy you can poll. Banning trans medical care for + minors? That’s a majority issue now. A few years ago, it wasn’t. Trump + didn’t just win the election. He — and the movement and ideology behind him + — have been winning the argument. Sarah McBride is a freshman Congresswoman + from Delaware, where she was formerly a state senator. She is the first + openly trans member of Congress, and her view is that the trans rights + movement and the left more broadly, has to grapple with why their strategy + failed. How they lost not only power, but hearts and minds. [CLIP] We have + to grapple with the reality of where people are beyond this room or this + city or my state. Meeting people where they are is not selling out. It’s + what this work is. I was struck, talking to McBride how much, she was + offering a theory that goes far beyond trans rights. What she’s offering is + a counter to the dominant political style that emerged as algorithmic + social media collided with politics, a style that is more about policing + and pushing those who agree with you than it is about persuading those who + don’t. Sarah McBride, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. So I want + to begin with some polling. Pew asked the same set of questions in 2022 and + 2025. And what it found was this collapse in, I would call it persuasion. + So they polled the popularity of protecting trans people from + discrimination in jobs, housing, public spaces that had lost 8 points in + those three years requiring health insurance companies to cover gender + transition, lost 5 points requiring trans people to use bathrooms that + match their biological sex gained 8 points. When you hear those results, + what to you happened there. By every objective metric, support for trans + rights is worse now than it was six or seven years ago. And that’s not + isolated to just trans issues. I think if you look across issues of gender + right now, you have seen a regression. Marriage equality support is + actually lower now than it was a couple of years ago in a recent poll. We + also see a regression on around support for whether women should have the + same opportunities as men compared to 5, 10, 15 years ago. And so there’s a + larger regression from a gender perspective that I think is impacting this + regression on trans rights. But I think it has been more acute, more + significant in the trans rights space. I think just candidly, I think we + lost the art of persuasion. We lost the art of change making over the last + couple of years. We’re not in this position because of trans people. There + was a very clear, well coordinated, well-funded effort to demonize trans + people, to stake out positions on fertile ground for anti-trans politics + and to have those be the battlegrounds rather than some of the areas where + there’s more public support. We’re not in this position because of the + movement or the community, but clearly what we’ve been doing over the last + several years has not been working to stave it off or continue the progress + that we were making 8, 9, 10 years ago. And I think a lot of it can be + traced to a false sense of security that I think the LGBTQ movement and the + progressive movement writ large began to feel in the post-marriage world. I + think there was a sense of cultural momentum that was this unending + cresting wave. I think there is this sense of a cultural victory that led + us into a false sense of security, and I think in many ways shut down, + needed conversations. And I think we the support that we saw for trans + rights in 2016, 2017. It was a mirage of support in some ways, because I + think there was in the post-marriage world, there was a transfer of support + from the LGB to the tea. I think for two reasons. One, I think people said, + well, the tea is part of the acronym, so I support gay people, so I’ll + support trans people. It’s all the same movement. But two, I think in those + early days after marriage, a lot of people regretted having been wrong on + marriage in the 90s and in the 2000. And they went I didn’t understand what + it meant to be gay, and therefore I didn’t support marriage. And I regret + not supporting something because I didn’t understand it. So I’m going to + without understanding, support trans rights because I don’t want to make + that same mistake again. And I think that resulted in a lot of us, a lot of + our movement stopping the conversation and ceasing doing the hard work of + opening hearts and changing minds and telling stories that over 20 years + had shifted and deepened understanding on gay identities that allowed for + marriage equality to be built on solid ground. And I think that allowed for + the misinformation, the disinformation, that well-coordinated, well-funded + campaign to really take advantage of that lack of understanding and the + support on trans rights was a house built on sand. I want to connect to + things you said there, because I hadn’t thought about this exactly before. + So you made this point that there’s been a generalized gender regression, + which is true. And you also made this point that people had this metaphor + in their minds that I was wrong about gay marriage. I didn’t understand + that experience. So maybe I’m wrong here, too. But that one thing maybe + that’s different here is there’s a set of narrow policies here + non-discrimination and then a broader cultural effort. Everybody should put + their pronouns in their bio or say them before they begin speaking out at a + meeting. It was more about destabilizing the gender binary. And there + people had a much stronger view. I do know what it means. I’ve been a man + all my life. I’ve been a woman all my life. How dare you tell me how I have + to talk about myself or refer to myself. And that made the metaphor break. + Because if the gay marriage fight was about what other people do, there was + a dimension of this. It was about what you do and how you should see + yourself or your kids or your society. I think that that’s an accurate + reflection of the overplaying of the hand in some ways that as a coalition, + went to trans 201, trans 301 when people were still at very much trans 101 + stage one and then two, I think there was. There were requests that people + perceived as cultural aggression, which then allowed the right to say we’re + punishing trans people because of their actions rather than we’re going + after innocent bystanders. And I think some of cultural mores and norms + that started to develop around inclusion of trans people were probably + premature for a lot of people. We became absolutists, not just on trans + rights. I think across the progressive movement. We became absolutist and + we forgot that in a democracy we have to one grapple with where the public + authentically is and actually engage with it. And I think we and part of + this is fostered by social media. We decided that we now have to say and + fight for and push for every single perfect policy and cultural norm right + now, regardless of whether the public is ready. And I think it + misunderstands the role that politicians frankly, social movements have in + maintaining proximity to public opinion of walking people to a place. We + should be ahead of public opinion, but we have to be within arm’s reach. If + we get too far out ahead, we lose our grip on public opinion. And we can no + longer bring it with us. And I think a lot of the conversations around + sports, and also some of the cultural changes that we saw in expected + workplace behavior, et cetera, was the byproduct of maybe just getting too + far out ahead and not actually engaging in the art of social change. Making + the position for more maximalist demands is one that you need to be in a + hurry. Trans people are dying now, suffering now and that there isn’t time + for decades of political organizing here. And also that maybe it works. Or + maybe there’s a reason to believe it works. So you’ve been in more of those + spaces in May. How would you describe how this more maximalist approach in + culture evolved and why. Well, first off, I think you’re right. It is + understandable. I mean, this is a scary moment. I’m scared as a trans + person. I am scared and I recognize that when the house is on fire, when + there are attacks that are dangerous, very dangerous, that it can feel like + we need to scream and we need to sound the alarm, and we need everyone to + be doing exactly that. I get that instinct, I understand it, I understand + that people would say, if you give a little bit here, they’ll take a mile. + We’re not negotiating with the other side, though, in this moment we have + to negotiate with public opinion. And, and and we shouldn’t treat the + public like they’re Republican politicians. And when you recognize that + distinction, I think it allows for a pragmatic approach that has the best, + in my mind, the best possible chance of shifting public opinion as quickly + as possible. It would be one thing if screaming about how dangerous this is + right now had the effect of stopping these attacks. But it won’t. You call + it a abandonment of persuasion became true across a variety of issues for + progressives, also for people on the right. And sometimes I wonder how much + that reflected the movement of politics to these very unusually designed + platforms of speech, where what you do really is not talk to people you + disagree with, it’s talk about people you disagree with, two people you + agree with, and then see whether or not they agree with what you said. And + there’s a way in which I think that breeds very different habits in the + people who do it. I think that that’s absolutely right. I mean, again, + we’re not in this place because of our community or our movement, but + clearly we aren’t in this place because we weren’t shaming people enough, + because we weren’t canceling people enough, because we weren’t yelling at + people enough, because we weren’t denouncing anti-trans positions enough. I + think the dynamic with social media is that the most outrageous, the most + extreme, the most condemnatory content is what gets amplified the most. + It’s what gets liked and retweeted the most, and people mistake getting + likes and retweets as a sign of effectiveness. And those are two + fundamentally different things. And I think that whether it’s subconscious + or even conscious, rewarding of unproductive conversations has completely + undermined the capacity for us as individuals or politically, for us to + have conversations that persuade that open people’s hearts and minds that + meet them where they are. And I think the other dynamic that we have with + social media is that there’s two kinds of people on social media. The vast + majority of people are doom scrollers. They just go on and they scroll + their social media 20 percent maybe are doom posters 10 percent on the far + right, 10 percent on the far left, the people who are so, so strident and + angry that they’re compelled to post and that content gets elevated. But + what that has resulted in for the 80 percent who are just doom scrollers is + this false perception of reality. Take a person. Let’s say they’re center + left, and it gives them a false perception of everyone on the left believes + this, and it pulls them that way, and then it gives them a false perception + that everyone on the right believes the most extreme version of the right. + And it creates this false binary extreme perception of availability bias. + Because all of the content we’re seeing is reflective of just the 20 + percent and it’s warped our perception of reality. It’s warped our + perception of who people are and where the public is. One of the best + things about being an elected official is that I have to break out of that + social media echo chamber, that social media extreme world and interact + with everyday people. And you see yeah, there are real disagreements, but + that 80 percent of the doom scrollers or the people who aren’t even on + social media are actually in a place where we can have a conversation with + them. When I ask this question, I don’t just mean on trans issues, but you + represent Delaware, which is a blue state, not Massachusetts blue, but + blue. If you took your sense of what Democrats want or what the country + wants from your experiences on social media versus your sense from + traveling around your state, how would they differ. I think they would + differ in two ways. One, they would differ in the issues that we would + focus on. What you hear on social media is a preoccupation with the most + inflamed culture war issues that you almost never hear when you’re out + talking to voters in any part of the state. What you hear is a + understandable catastrophizing around democracy, which you don’t hear + nearly as much when you’re out talking to voters. What you hear when you’re + talking to voters is you hear about the cost of living. You hear about the + bread and butter issues that are keeping people up at night, people who + aren’t on social media or aren’t posting on social media. And so you hear a + difference in priorities, but then you also hear a difference in approach. + People are hungry for an approach that doesn’t treat our fellow citizens as + enemies, but rather treats our fellow citizens as neighbors, even if we + disagree with them. An approach that’s just an approach that’s filled with + grace. And I think on social media, we have come to this conclusion, + rightfully so, that people’s grace has been abused in our society that the + grace of marginalized people, the patience of marginalized people, has been + abused. And that is true. But on social media, the course correction to + that has been to eliminate all grace from our politics. It’s how dare you + have conversations with people who disagree with you. How dare you be + willing to work with people who disagree with you. How dare you compromise. + How dare you seek to find common ground with Republicans. And I think when + you go out into the real world, Democrats, independents and Republicans, + there is a hunger for some level of grace for us to just not be so angry at + one another and miserable. They want to see and know that we actually do + have more in common, and therefore, it gives you hope that persuasion is + not only necessary, but can actually still be effective. What does grace in + politics mean to you, and when have you either seen it or experienced it. I + think Grace in politics means. One creating room for disagreement. Assuming + assuming good intentions. Assuming that the people who are on the other + side of an issue from you aren’t automatically hateful, horrible people. I + think it means creating some space for disagreement within your own + coalition. I think it’s a kindness that just feels so missing from our body + politic and our national dialogue. And look, I saw it in the Delaware State + Senate on both sides of the aisle, whether it’s in Republicans in Delaware + joining on to be co-sponsors on an LGBTQ panic defense bill that I was the + prime sponsor of whether it was the discourse being much kinder and more + civil on a whole host of even culture war issues. I saw that grace have the + effect of lowering the temperature, removing some of the incentives to go + after vulnerable people in this country, in our state. I saw it with my + colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle who didn’t vote for bills + that were deeply personal to me, and yet we still found ways to work + together. We still found ways to develop friendships. And look, I know that + place is more of a burden on me than it does on them. I know that when + you’re asking a marginalized person to extend grace in a conversation, + you’re asking much more of that marginalized person. But change making + isn’t always easy, and it’s not always fair. And why would we expect that + the extra burdens and barriers of marginalization would ceasefire at the + point of overcoming the marginalization of creating the change necessary to + eliminate prejudice and create equal opportunity in our society. No, that’s + where the barriers are going to be greatest. That’s where the burdens are + going to be greatest. It reminds me of a line that I feel. I hear it less + now, but I used to see it a lot, which is it’s not my job to educate you. + And I always thought about that line because on one level I understood it. + I mean, it’s probably not your job to educate anyone. And then if you’re in + politics, if what you’re trying to do is political change. I always found + that line to be almost anti-political. Yeah right that if what you want to + do is change a law, change a society, change a heart, and you’re the one + who wants to do it. Well, then whose job is it. And who are you expecting + to do it. It’s an understandable frustration, but it’s the only way + forward. And look, I don’t believe that every person from an + underrepresented or unrepresented community needs to always bear the brunt + and burden of public education. I don’t believe that every LGBTQ person has + to be out and sharing their story, and doing all of that hard work. But for + the folks who are willing to do it, we need to let them. And one of the + problems we’ve had is that we’ve gone from it’s not my job as an individual + person who’s just trying to make it through the day to educate everyone to + no one from that community should educate. And frankly, we should just stop + having this conversation, because the fact that we are having this + conversation at all is hurtful and oppressive, and maybe it is hurtful, but + you can’t foster social change if you don’t have a conversation. You can’t + change people if you exclude them. And I will just say you can’t have + absolutism on the left or the right without authoritarianism, right. The + fact that we have real disagreements, the fact that we have difficult + conversations, the fact, the fact that we have painful conversations is not + a bug of democracy. It’s a feature of democracy. And Yes, that is hard and + difficult. But again, how can we expect that the process of overcoming + marginalization is going to be fair. And I think the discourse has taken + this understandable critique of society and the way we operate and the + burdens we place on marginalized people. And we’ve somehow said, well, the + one place that we have control over whether we allow for that + marginalization is in the strategies we use to overcome it. We’re not going + to engage in that because it’s self oppression. And I think that is such a + self-defeating and counterproductive approach. I’ve been thinking in the + past couple of months, because we are in the most illiberal era of my + lifetime in American politics. And I mean liberalism in the sense of + supporting or not supporting universal health care, but in terms of due + process, in terms of tolerance, in terms of the basic practice of politics + and living amidst each other. And it’s also made me think about the need to + clearly define what the practice of liberalism itself is. What do you think + it is. I think it is the recognition that in a free society, we are going + to live and think differently. I think it is the allowance of that + disagreement in the public square, and the tussle of that disagreement in + the public square and that is uncomfortable. That is not easy. And Yes, + there are going to be people in that conversation for whom it’s going to be + more difficult and more uncomfortable. But in the internet world, you can’t + suppress diversity of thought. It will always bubble up. But it will bubble + up if suppressed with an extra bitterness and an extremism fostered in that + echo chamber that it’s been suppressed to. It’ll inevitably bubble up like + a volcano. And I think that’s what we’re seeing right now. I will say, I + think while the left made this mistake of fostering an illiberalism based + on a false sense of cultural victory, I think now the right is making the + exact same mistake. I think they’re overplaying their hand. I think they’re + interpreting the 2024 election to be a cultural mandate that is much + greater than what it actually is. And I think that if they continue to do + that, there will be a backlash to the illiberalism, the cultural + illiberalism, not just the legal illiberalism, the cultural illiberal + liberalism of the right, in the same way that there’s been a backlash to + the cultural liberalism of the left, I couldn’t I think, agree with that + more. We’re going to get to that. I want to talk for a minute about the + 2024 election in the aftermath. So there’s been a lot of rethinking and + self-recrimination among Democrats. One of the comments that got a lot of + attention came right after the election when Seth Moulton, who’s your + colleague, Democratic Congressman from Massachusetts, said, quote, + Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone, rather than + being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face. I have two + little girls. I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a + male or formerly male athlete. But as a Democrat, I’m supposed to be afraid + to say that. What did you think when you heard that. One, that it wasn’t + the language that I would use. But I think it came from a larger belief + that the Democratic Party needed to start to have an open conversation + about our illiberalism, that we needed to recognize that we were talking to + ourselves. We were fighting fights that felt viscerally comforting to our + own base, or fighting fights in a way that felt viscerally comforting to + our own base, rather than maintaining proximity to the public and being + normal people. I think the sports conversation is a good one because I + think there is. There’s a big difference between banning trans young people + from extracurricular programs, consistent with their gender identity, and + recognizing that there’s room for nuance in this conversation. And I think + the notion that we created this all on or all off mentality, that you had + to be perfect on trans rights across the board, use exactly the right + language. And unless you do that, you’re a bigot. You’re an enemy. And when + you create a binary all on or all off option for people, you’re going to + have a lot of imperfect allies who are going to inevitably choose the all + off option. And what ends up happening is the left excommunicates will + excommunicate someone who not only Seth voted against the ban on trans + athletes, but we would excommunicate someone who uses imperfect language. + Yes look again. Not language I would use, but we would excommunicate + someone who’s saying that there’s nuance in this conversation and uses + language that we don’t approve of yet still votes. The quote, the right way + is exactly what’s wrong with our approach. And look, Seth’s not going + anywhere. But for a lot of everyday folks, if they think how Seth thinks or + if they think that there’s room for nuance in this conversation and we tell + them you’re a bigot, you’re not welcomed here, you’re not part of our + coalition, we will not consider you an ally. The right’s done a very good + job of saying, listen, you have violated the illiberalism of the left. You + have been cast aside for your common sense. Welcome into our club. And then + human nature starts to be. Once you then get welcomed into that club, human + nature is well, I was with the Democratic Party on 90 percent of things, + maybe against them on 10 percent of things, or in the middle on 10 percent + once you get welcomed into that other club, human psychology, you start to + adopt those positions. And instead of being with us on 90 percent of things + and against us on 10 percent of things, that person now. Welcomed into the + far right club starts to be against us on 90 percent of things and with us + on only 10 percent of things. And I think that dynamic is part of the + regression that we have seen. And not only the regression we’ve seen, but + the hardening of the opposition that we’ve seen on trans issues. We have + been an exclusionary tent that is shedding in perfect allies, which is + great. We’re going to have a really, really miserable, self-righteous, + morally pure club in the gulag we’ve all been sent off to. I think this + goes to your point in a way. So after he made those comments the times + reported that a local party official and an ally had compared him to a Nazi + collaborator. There were protests outside his office. I was always struck + by which part of his comments got all that attention. It was the part I + just read to you. But he also said this having reasonable restrictions for + safety and competitive fairness in sports seems like, well, it’s very + empirically a majority opinion. He’s right on that. But should we take + civil rights away from trans people so they can just get fired for being + who they are. No he was expressing opposition to what was about to be + Donald Trump’s agenda. Yeah and this space of his divergence from an + already an issue that had already been lost. That was the polling was + terrible on it. That was where people on the left focused. And his + expression of support and allyship, as I saw it, barely ever got reported + or commented on. It struck me as telling. I think it absolutely is telling. + And I think it’s. The best thing for trans people in this moment is for all + of us to wake up to the fact that we have to grapple with the world as it + is, that we have to grapple with where public opinion is right now, and + that we need all of the Allies that we can get. Because if you again, Seth + voted in against the bans, if we are going to defend some of the basic + fundamental rights of trans people, we are going to need those individuals + in our coalition. If you have to be perfect on every trans rights issue, + for us to say you can be an ally and part of our coalition, then we’re + going to have a cap of about 30 percent on our coalition. If we are going + to have percent plus 1, or frankly, more necessarily 60 percent or more in + support of nondiscrimination protections for trans people, in support of + our ability to get the health care that we need. By definition, it will + have to include a portion of the 70 percent who oppose trans people’s + participation in sports. And right now, the message from so many is you + don’t you’re not welcome. You and your support for 90 percent of these + policies is irrelevant. The fact that you diverge on one thing makes you + evil. And it also misunderstands the history of civil rights in this + country. I mean, you can’t compromise on civil rights is a great tweet. But + tell me which civil Rights Act delivered all progress and all civil rights + for people of color in this country. The civil Rights Act of 1957, the + Civil Rights Act of 1960, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights + Act of 1965, the Civil Rights Act of 1968, or any of the Civil Rights Acts + that have been passed since the 1960s. That movement was disciplined. It + was strategic. It picked its battles, it picked its fights, and it + compromised to move the ball forward. And right now, that compromise would + be deemed unprincipled, weak and throwing everyone under the bus. And that + is so counterproductive. It is so harmful. And it completely betrays the + lessons of every single social movement and civil rights movement in our + country’s history. And we have an example of a very successful social + movement in recent history with marriage equality. Where would we have been + in 2007 and 2008, if not only we had not tolerated the fact that Barack + Obama was ostensibly not for marriage equality then, but if we had said to + voters if you’re not comfortable, even if you vote against the marriage + ban, but aren’t quite comfortable with marriage yet, that you’re a bigot + and you don’t belong in our coalition, where would that movement have had + been. The most effective messengers were the people who had evolved + themselves. We had grace personified in that movement, and it worked beyond + even the advocate’s wildest expectations in terms of the speed of both + legal progress and cultural progress, because we created incentives for + people to grow. We created space for people to grow, And we allowed people + into our tent, into that conversation who weren’t already with us. You + mentioned the period in 2008 when Barack Obama was running for president, + and at the very least, his public position. Many of us suspected it was not + his private position, but his public position was that he opposed gay + marriage. That was the mainstream position at that point in the Democratic + Party. And there was a compromise position they all supported, which was + civil unions. Is there an analogy to the Civil unions debate or position + for you now. I think on the sports conversation, it’s local control. It’s + allowing for individual athletic associations to make those individual + determinations. And in some cases, they’ll have policies that strike a + right balance. In some cases, they’ll have policies that are too + restrictive. And I think that is the equivalent to the Civil unions + position in that debate by allowing for Democratic voters, independent + voters, hell, even some elected officials to take that civil unions + position, one that met voters where they were, it gave some of our + politicians who needed it an off ramp, so that they didn’t have to choose + between being all on or all off. And it allowed that conversation to + continue and prevented more harm from being inflicted on to pick up on the + polling. So there’s this YouGov polling from January that looked at all + these different issues, and there are a lot of issues around trans rights + that actually poll great. Yes so protection from trans people against hate + crimes plus 36 net approval banning employers from firing trans people + because of their identity. Plus 33 allowing transgender people to serve in + the military, which Donald Trump is trying to rescind. Plus 22, requiring + all new public buildings to include gender neutral bathrooms. This + surprised me. Plus seven. Then there’s the other side. Everybody knows that + the sports issue is tough in the polling, but banning people under 18 from + attending drag shows, that’s popular. Banning youth from accessing puberty + blockers and hormones. That’s very popular. Banning public schools from + teaching lessons on transgender issues. That’s popular requiring + transgender people to use bathrooms that match their biological sex that is + popular. When you look at these lists of issues, what do you see as + dividing them. What cuts the issues that you could win on now from those + that have heavy disapproval. Well, I think that there’s very clearly a + distinction that the public makes between young people and adults. I think + that there is a distinction that is made in many cases when it comes to + what people feel like is government support of or funding of versus. Just + allowing trans people to live their lives, allowing trans troops who are + qualified to continue to serve, allowing trans people who are doing great + jobs in their workplace to continue to work. It all goes back to this + notion of get government out. Let people live their lives and let families + and individuals make the best decisions for themselves. And I think that + should be through line of our perspective. A libertarian approach to + allowing trans people to live fully and freely, that there are some + complicated questions, but that those questions shouldn’t be answered by + politicians who are trying to exploit those issues for political gain. I + was struck by your use of the word libertarian there, because when I look + at this polling, what I see is something quite similar, which is Americans + by and large aren’t cruel, and their view here is pretty live and let live. + Yes, they have different views which we can talk about in a minute on + minors. But where the question is the government coming in and bothering + you. You being any trans person, they don’t really want that. What they + don’t want to do is change their lives or think something is changing for + them in their society. And maybe those two things are not in all ways + possible. Certainly over the long term. But there are a lot of places where + they are possible. It seems to me that in 2024 and over the last couple of + years, what Republicans did very well, their approach to persuasion was to + pick the right wedge issues. And you would think that the entire debate + over trans policy in America was about NCAA swimmers this was the biggest + problem facing trans people, the biggest problem in some ways facing the + country. When it’s a pretty edge case issue and questions like + nondiscrimination and access to health care are much more widespread. But + what they did was they used their wedge issue and they’re now attacking + those majority positions. Trump is attacking discrimination. He wants + people discriminated against. He doesn’t want trans people to be able to + put the identity they hold and present as on their passports. It’s not a + huge winning issue for him. And so there’s this question of picking the + right wedge issues. Is there a wedge issue for you that you wish Democrats + would pick. Well, listen, I think that we do much better when we keep the + main thing the main thing. Defending Medicaid in this moment is the main + thing for everybody, for everyone, for everyone. And look, I think abortion + to some degree had been a wedge issue that was to the Democrats’ advantage, + not to the Republicans’ advantage. But I think we have to reorient the + public’s perception of what our priorities are as a party. And I think when + we lean into the culture wars and lean into culture war wedge issues, even + if they benefit us, they reinforce a perception that the Democratic Party + is unconcerned with the economic needs of the American people. When you ask + a voter, what are the top five priorities of the Democratic Party. What are + the top five priorities of the Republican Party, and what are the top five + priorities for them as a voter. Three out of the five issues that are the + top issue for that voter appear in what their perception of the top five + issues for the Republican Party, only one of their top five priorities, + appear in their perception of what are the top five priorities for the + Democrats. That’s health. And it was fifth out of five. The top two were + abortion and LGBTQ issues. And I don’t care what your position is on those + two issues, you are not going to win an election. If voters think that + those two issues are your top issues, rather than their ability to get a + good wage and good benefits, get a house and live the American dream. And I + think we have to in this moment, reinforce what is our actual priority as a + party, which is making sure that everyone can pursue the American dream, + which has become increasingly unaffordable and inaccessible, that everyone + should be able to get the health care they need be able to buy a home, be + able to send their child to child care without breaking the bank if they + can even get a spot. That needs to be our focus, and I think when we have + this purity politics approach to LGBTQ issues or abortion, what we + communicate, even if we’re not talking about those issues, is we + communicate. Those are threshold issues. And therefore the voter reads that + as those are priority issues. And the only way to convince the voter that + those are not our priority issues, that’s not what we’re spending our + capital and time on, but rather giving them health care and housing is to + make it abundantly clear to people that our tent can include diversity of + thought on those issues. Something that I notice in the broad coalition of + groups and people and funders who identify as or support Democrats is that + they all want the issue they care most about to be the issue that gets + talked about the most people who fund anything from climate to trans + rights, to all kinds of the hotter issues in American life. You could + actually imagine a strategy where those groups and that money went to + making every election about Medicaid, because Medicaid is just a killer + issue for Democrats. And then the people who get elected are better on + those other issues, too. But it doesn’t that money, those groups that are + organizing what they often want Democrats to do is publicly take unpopular + positions on their issues. I think all the time about the ACLU + questionnaire that asked candidates and in this case, Kamala Harris. + Whether she would support the government paying for gender reassignment + surgery for illegal immigrants in prison. Even if your whole position in + life is, your point is to make that possible. The last thing you would want + is for anybody to claim it out in public. You would want nobody to ever + think about that question ever at all. And it’s something I’ve heard + Democrats talking about more after the election. Just rethinking on some + level, this question of, is the point of all this organizing to get + politicians to commit to the most maximalist version of your issue set. Or + is the point of this organizing to somehow figure out how to win Senate + seats in Missouri and Kansas. So you have very, very, very moderate + Democrats who nevertheless make Chuck Schumer, the Senate Majority Leader + rather than John Thune. I think that there is an incentive from money and + from social media, and those also go hand in hand, sometimes with + grassroots donations that incentivize the groups to want to show their + influence and their effect by having politicians fight the fights that they + want them to fight in ways that feel viscerally comforting to their own + community that they’re representing. And look, I get that, I understand + that. One, we have to be better as elected officials in saying no and + saying public opinion is everything. And if you want us to change, you need + to help foster the change in public opinion before you’re asking these + elected officials to betray the fact that they are, at the end of the day, + representatives that have to represent, in some form or fashion, the views + of the people that they represent. Like at some point you will represent + the people’s positions or they will find someone else who will. And so it + is just an unsustainable dynamic for the groups to continue to ask elected + officials to take these maximalist positions to ignore where their voters + are. They have to do the hard work of persuasion. And there can be there’s + always going to be a tension between the groups and elected officials. + Everyone has to do their own job, but there has to be some degree of + understanding. How do you hold that tension. I always think this is such an + interesting question for politicians to work with, because there is the + internal and the external push to authenticity. Yeah we don’t want these + poll tested politicians. Yeah and it’s also your job to represent. Yes on + know she’s personal to you on issues not as personal to you. How do you + think about balancing. They elected you versus are their servant. Yeah + look, all of these decisions inevitably require a balancing of my own + views, my own principles and the views of the people that I represent. But + I think one thing you always have to do is you have to go, O.K, here’s an + issue that I feel very strongly about. I vote against this. What are the + second, third, and fourth order consequences of voting against or voting in + favor. You might abstractly agree with something as an ideal, but if you + were to pursue that or implement that policy, it would have, in the medium + to long term, a regressive effect, because there’s a backlash to pushing + too hard or taking too maximalist of a position by the mainstream in our + politics. One of the problems we’ve had is that we have said, not only you + have to vote the way we want you to vote, but then you have to speak the + way we want you to speak. And I always have said, even when I was an + advocate, if we can, if we can get the policy vote that we want and the + compromise we are accepting is essentially a rhetorical compromise that is + a pretty darn good deal. And again, I think we have to be willing to have + these conversations out in the open. We have to recognize that there’s + complexity, there’s nuance, and that means not just in the policy space but + in the political space. And that’s authentic to say, these are some really + difficult conversations. And sometimes I’m going to get it right and + sometimes I’m going to get it wrong, and sometimes I’m voting exclusively + with what I think is the right thing to do, even if my voters disagree. But + also sometimes I’m going to have to take a balanced view of this. And + that’s democracy. I want to pick up on speech. It’s true on trans and + gender issues. It’s also true on a bunch of other issues in the past couple + of years that a huge number of the fights that ended up defining the issue + were not about legislation, they were about speech. I’ve always myself + thought this reflects social media, but I mean, the number of people who + have talked to me about the term birthing persons, which I think virtually + nobody has used or Latinx was a big one like this. There is in general, + this extreme weighting of can you push changes of speech onto the people + who agree with you and possibly onto society as a whole, and that the + strategy worked backwards from the speech outcome, not the legislative + outcome. How do you think about that weighting of speech versus votes. I + think look, there is no question in my mind that the vote is much more + important than the rhetoric that they use. We have discoursed our way into, + if you talk about this issue in a way that’s suboptimal from my + perspective, you’re actually laying the foundation for oppression and + persecution. And I just think maybe academically that’s true, but welcome + to the real world. Like, we are prioritizing the wrong thing. It’s an + element of virtue signaling. Like I’m showing. I’m showing that I am the + most radical. I’m the most progressive on this issue, because I’m going to + take this person who does everything right substantively and crucify this + person for not being perfect in language. It’s a way of demonstrating that + you’re in the in-group, that you understand the language, that you + understand the mores and the values of that group. And it’s a way of + building capital and credibility with that in-group. I think that’s what it + is. And I just think it’s inherently exclusionary. And I think that that’s + part of the thing that’s wrong with our politics right now, which is that + all of our politics feels so exclusionary. The coalition that wins the + argument about who is most welcoming will be the coalition that wins our + politics. I think that’s such an interesting point, and I think probably + true. I’d also be curious for your thoughts on this. I think there’s a very + interesting way that speech and its political power confuse people, because + it’s two things at once. It’s extremely low cost and extremely high cost. + So pronouns, for instance, I think are correctly it’s a very, very easy + thing. And basically, if you won’t use somebody’s preferred pronouns, I + think you’re an asshole. That’s my personal view of it. But having trying + to execute a speech change where everybody lists their pronouns in their + bio, where every meeting begins with people going around the circle and + saying their name and their pronouns. That feels very different to people. + It seems small. I mean, you don’t have to pay anything out of pocket. You + don’t have to go anywhere. And yet the language we use is very, very + important to us. Yeah I think you’re absolutely right. There And I think + the thing with pronouns, too, is a prime example of where we’ve lost grace, + though. Me calling people assholes, it’s not graceful. Well, no. No, I + think there is a difference between someone who’s intentionally + misgendering someone. So people who make mistakes. And I think that there + has been, whether warranted or not, the perception that people are going to + be shamed if they make mistakes. But then I think you’re absolutely right, + too, that there is a distinction between treating me the way I want to be + treated and everyone changing their behavior and requiring this, again, + in-group language that exceeds just calling the person in front of you what + they want to be called. And I think it gets to something we were talking + about earlier, which is a way that there are two pieces to the politics of + this. One is fairly popular, at least for now, and the other is a much + tougher lift, which is I think most people have that basic sense of + politeness. If you want to be referred to in a certain way, Yes, I might + slip up. But if I’m being a decent person, I’m going to try. Yeah versus + the move around pronouns to the move for calling, things cisgender. That + was a much bigger effort than in some ways, wasn’t described as such. And I + feel like there’s been a dimension of the politics here, where things that + were very academic arguments became political arguments, and then people + were a little bit unclear on what political what the political win would be + to destabilize the fundamental gender binary that people understand is + operating is touching something very deep in society versus treating other + people with respect and courtesy and decency and grace. Yeah is a much is a + much easier sell. And I think it’s O.K to want to do the former. But I + think people kept mixing up which their actual project was at the end of + the day. The thing that we lost is that we’re just talking about people + trying to live their lives, trying to live the best lives they can. We got + into this rabbit hole of academic intellectual discourse that doesn’t + actually matter in people’s lives. We got into this performative fighting + to show our bona fides to our own in-group, and we lost the fundamental + truth that all of those things are only even possible once you’ve done the + basic legwork of allowing people to see trans people as people, when you + allow trans people to be seen as human beings who have the same hopes and + dreams and fears as everyone else. Once that basic conception of humanity + exists, then all the other things, all the other conversations, fall into + place. Language inevitably changes across society, across cultures, across + time, but it is a byproduct of cultural change. And I just think we started + to have what maybe were conversations that were happening in academic + institutions or conversations that were happening in the community, and we + started having those out in public on social media. And then demand that + everyone else has that conversation with us, and then incorporates what the + dominant position is in that conversation, in the way they live their + lives. And it’s just like, that’s not how this happens. Let’s just talk + about human beings who want you to live by the Golden rule. Let’s just talk + about the fact that trans people are people who can be service members and + doctors and lawyers and educators and elected officials and do a damn good + job in that. That is the gateway to everything else. And it has always been + in every social movement, the place where it is complicated and the place + where not just the politics, but I think the answers are complicated, is + around children. And we talked about the NCAA swimmers and the edge case + nature of that. But schools are broader, and a lot of what the Trump + administration is doing, a lot of what you see Republicans are doing in + states is around schools and minors, and that’s tougher. Parents want to + know what their kids are doing. On the one hand if you’re a kid with gender + dysphoria and taking puberty blockers early matters. On the other hand, + there are a lot of things parents don’t let their kids do young because + they’re not sure what they’re going to want in a couple of years. How do + you think about that set of issues. The leave them alone makes a lot of + sense for adults, but we don’t leave kids alone. Kids exist in a + paternalist system where their parents have power over them, their schools + have power over them. And so the question of policy there becomes very + profound. Yeah, I think first off, in that instance, we acknowledge the and + rightfully acknowledge the important role that parents play in decisions + for their children. Look, you can recognize that there’s nuance here. You + can say that there need to be stronger standards of care, that maybe things + got too lenient. But ultimately, politicians aren’t the people who should + be making these decisions. The family should be making these decisions. The + family, in consultation with a doctor, should be making these decisions. + And I think that is a fair balance in recognizing the need for every child + to get medical care and also the right of parents to make decisions, + including health care decisions for their children. But you do see right + now in some European countries, the government setting tighter standards, + there have definitely been a lot of arguments about whether or not the + research was good, whether or not the research was ideologically + influenced. So there’s some government role here, some role for + professional associations, some context in which families and doctors make + these decisions. What is that role. Well, I think you just hit on that + distinction, which is that in many European countries, the distinction + between the health care system and the government is fuzzier in many cases. + You have government operated hospitals here. You have health care systems. + You have standards of care developed by providers in those medical + associations, and that is where those decisions should be left up to in + terms of establishing the standards of care. And then when applying those + standards of care, allowing those the application, the practical + application of those standards of care to happen between patients, + families, and providers, because it’s fundamentally a different kind of + system. I think the critique that the fear of the right that I hear that + some of these same dynamics towards pushing out people who question the + evidence towards there being things you can say and things you cannot say + took hold, and that the results of that can’t be trusted, that everything + you said is happening in politics is also happening in medicine and + elsewhere. I think that we actually started to see a pretty difficult but + important conversation within WPATH, the World Professional Association for + Transgender Health, about the standards of care for youth care before + government started intervening, where they started having a conversation + about how to adjust the standards of care, recognizing perhaps that they + needed to tighten them. And that’s true across health. I mean, standards of + care across different forms of care are constantly evolving. That + conversation was starting to happen. You cannot tell me that it’s the role + of the government to preempt those conversations. Those conversations + should not be settled in legislative bodies by politicians who aren’t + looking at the data, I don’t understand the data, and certainly aren’t + objectively interpreting the data. And look, I think all of this changes, + though the conversation changes, I should say, when people understand what + it means to be trans, because I think right now we think of it as a choice. + We think of it as an intellectual decision, right. Like, I want to be a + girl. I want to be a boy, and I want to do this because of these rewards, + or I don’t want to do it because of these risks. That’s not what gender + identity is. It is much more innate. It is a visceral feeling. It’s not the + same as whether you get a tattoo or what you have for dinner. It’s not a + decision. It’s a fact about who you are. And I think the challenge in the + conversation around gender identity that differs from sexual orientation is + that most people who are straight can understand what it feels like to love + and to lust, and so they’re able to enter into conversations around sexual + orientation with an analogous experience. And the challenge in the + conversation around gender identity is that people who aren’t trans don’t + know what it feels like to have a gender identity that differs from your + sex assigned at birth. For me, the closest thing that I can compare it to + was a constant feeling of homesickness, just an unwavering ache in the pit + of my stomach that would only go away when I could be seen and affirmed as + myself. And I think that because we stopped having that conversation, + because we stopped creating space for people to ask questions for people’s + understandable, perhaps invasive, but understandable curiosity to be met + with an openness and a grace not by everyone, but just the people who were + willing to do it. We stopped people having an understanding of what it + means to be trans, and it allowed them to start to see it, or it allowed + for their pre-existing perception that this is some intellectual choice to + manifest. And in some cases, the perfect quote discourse started to + reinforce that. See how that we started to get to this place where you + couldn’t be like, I’m born this way that we policed the way even LGBTQ + people or trans people talked about their own identities to be this perfect + academic. Why can’t you say I’m born this way. Because it was. I’m not. No, + no, I’m not saying you’re saying it, but I this is AI think there was been + aware of there was an academic perception of like people have different + people should have agency over their sexual orientation and gender + identity, even if it’s not innate, and that there was this acceptance of a + mainstream perception of sexual orientation and gender identity that was a + one size fits all narrative around LGBTQ people. That didn’t necessarily + include people whose understanding was more fluid, or their understanding + evolved over time, or for whom they feel like they want to transgress + gender norms because of a reason that’s not this innate sense of gender. + And I think when you take that capacity for us to authentically talk about + our experience away from us, because it’s not academically the purest that + creates space and room for every single different lived experience within + that umbrella. You give people justification to say or think this is a + choice, and if it’s a choice, the threshold to allow for discrimination + becomes lower. I’ve known a number of people who’ve transitioned as adults, + and it’s always the degree to which most of us avoid doing anything that + would cause us any social discomfort at all times is so found how much we + live our lives trying to not make anybody look at us for too long that it’s + always struck me as it. It must be such a profound need to make that + decision to come to your family, to your wife or your husband, to your + kids, to your parents. And so this the right wing meme that emerged around + it that people are transitioning because they opportunistically want to be + in another bathroom. Yeah or another locker room or get some kind of + cultural affirmative action. Always struck me as not just absurd, but + deeply unempathic not thinking for a moment what it must mean to want that + much. And so then it’s interesting to hear you say that there was almost + like a pincer movement on that because it hasn’t struck me as a thing, + people. I mean, I’m sure there is agency and people make decisions here, + but the pull from inside of everybody I’ve known is really profound. + Usually they’ve been trying to choose the other way for a long time and + eventually just can’t anymore. That’s exactly what my experience was. I + mean, it’s funny because sometimes there’s discourse that I the only reason + why I’m an elected official is because I’m trans. Like, I see on the right + this notion that I’m a diversity hire. I was like, well, voters, voters + chose me. It’s kind of an insult to voters that they didn’t choose me + because they think that I’m the best qualified or the best candidate or + reflective of what they want, but they just chose me because of my + identity. But it also just undersells such a larger truth, which is that my + life would be so much easier if I wasn’t trans. Now I’m proud of who I am. + I’m proud that this is my life experience for a whole host of reasons. But + this is all a lot harder because I’m trans. Are there moments where I get a + microphone or am I sitting here. If I was a non-trans freshman Democrat, + would I be sitting here. Maybe not. Maybe I would maybe not. We probably + would be having a different conversation. But navigating this world as a + trans person has always been an even more so. Now it’s incredibly hard, and + all any of us are asking, or at least all that most of us are asking, is to + just let us live the best life we can. A life with as few regrets as + possible. A life where we can be constructive, productive, contributing + members of society. You might not understand us. It is hard to step into + the shoes of someone who is trans, and to understand what that might feel + like. But I spent 21 years of my life praying that this would go away, and + the only way that I was finally able to accept it was one realizing this + was never going to go away. Two becoming so consumed by it that it was the + only thing I ever really was able to think about because the pain became + too all encompassing. And 3, the only way I was able to come out was + because I was able to accept that I was losing any future. I had to go + through stages of grief, and the only way I was able to come out was to + finally get to that stage of acceptance over a loss of any future. It’s + really scary and it’s really hard. And right now, it is particularly scary + and hard. And I think to your point earlier, most people are good people + and they just want to treat other people with respect and kindness. But + unfortunately, in this moment, in our politics, we were recently at + something where someone gave us some information. And they said that when a + voter was asked to describe the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, + it was crazy for the Republican Party and preachy for the Democratic Party. + I think that undersells something that’s more true, which is that a voter + will look and say the Republican Party are assholes to other people. I + don’t like that. But the Democratic Party is an asshole to me. And if I + have to choose between the party, that’s an asshole to me because I’m not + perfect or a party that’s an asshole to someone else. Even if I don’t like + it, I’m going to choose the party that’s an asshole to someone else. When + you entered Congress, you were quite directly targeted by some of your + Republican colleagues, led by Nancy Mace, on which bathrooms you could use, + a thing that would not have happened if you were not a trans legislator. + And this is the majority party in the House. You have to work with these + people. You’re on committees with them. What has your experience been like. + Both absorbing that and then trying to work with people who may or may not + have given you much grace in that moment. Well, the first thing I’d say is + that the folks who were or are targeting me because of my gender identity + in Congress, those are folks who at this point are really not really + working with any Democrats and can barely work with their own Republican + colleagues. I’ve introduced several bills. Almost all have been bipartisan. + I’ve been developing relationships with colleagues on the other side of the + aisle. Part of my responsibility in this moment is to show that when + someone likes me me, gets elected to public office, we can do the whole + job. And that means working with people who disagree with me, including on + issues that are deeply personal. The folks who are coming after me. I mean, + look, that’s been hard, but I know that they’re coming after me not because + they are deeply passionate about bathroom policy. They’re coming after me + because they are employing the strategies of reality TV. And the best way + to get attention in a body of 435 people is to throw wine in someone’s + face. That gets you a little attention. But if that person that you’re + throwing wine in their face, if they respond by throwing wine in your face, + it creates a beef which gets you a season long story arc. I knew that they + were trying to bait me into a fight to get attention, and I refused to be + used as a political pawn. I refuse to give them not only the power of + derailing me, but the incentive to continue to come after me. And this is I + think this was a prime example. This was a prime example of how to fight + smart, that is demonized on our own side. Because the grace that I didn’t + get, it wasn’t just on the right. There was a lot of critique on the left. + And I understand when you’re a first, people viscerally feel your highs and + they also viscerally feel your lows. But what would me fighting back in + that moment have done. It wouldn’t have stopped the ban, and it would only + have incentivized further attacks and continued behavior like that. And + sometimes we have to understand that not fighting, not taking the bait, + that’s not a sign of weakness. It’s not unprincipled. Discipline and + strategy are signs of strength. And I think in the social media world, we + have lulled ourselves into thinking the only way to fight is to fight. It’s + to scream, and it’s to yell, and it’s to do it on every instance. And any + time you don’t do it, you’re normalizing the behavior that’s coming your + way, which is both a ridiculously unfair burden to place on every single + human being to have to fight every single indignity. But by that logic, the + young Black students who were walking in to a school that was being + integrated in the late 50s and 60s, who were walking forward calmly and + with dignity and grace into that school as people screamed slurs at them. + By that definition, that student was normalizing those slurs by not + responding. Instead, what that student was doing was providing the public + with a very clear visual, a very clear contrast between unhinged hatred and + basic dignity and grace, which is fundamental to humanity. And I think for + me, one of the things that I struggled with after that was the lack of + grace that I got from some in my own community who said that I was + reinforcing that the behavior of the people who were coming after me, that + I was not responding appropriately to the bullying that I was facing when + the reality is that behavior has diminished significantly because I removed + the incentive for them to continue to do it, because the incentive was so + blatantly about attention, and I wasn’t going to let them get the attention + that they wanted. You remind me of something I heard Barack Obama say many, + many years ago when he was getting criticized for trying to negotiate, + trying to reach out to people who by that point, many, many on the left + thought he was naive for trying to work with. And he said something like + that. He had always felt that the American people could see better if the + other side had clenched their fist, if he opened his hand. I thought there + was a lot of wisdom in that. Yes, absolutely. I early on in those first few + weeks, I had some folks text me as I was responding the way that I was. And + they said, you should watch 42, which is the movie about Jackie Robinson. + And I am not comparing my experience to Jackie Robinson at all. At all. But + there’s a scene in that movie that’s so, I think illustrative of these + dynamics, which is he’s meeting with the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers and + the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Says it’s trying to provoke him into + anger. And when he succeeds, the owner says to him, basically have to + understand that when you are a first, if you respond to a slur with a slur, + they’ll only hear yours. If you respond to a punch with a punch, they’ll + say you’re the aggressor. If we go in and say to these folks, we’re never + going to work with you because you’re never going to work with us, then we + get the blame for never working with them, not them. If we go in and we + respond to their hatred with vitriol and anger, they’re going to blame us. + And that’s the reality of the double standard in our politics. That’s the + reality that a first always has to navigate. Let them. Let them put their + anger, their vitriol on full display. Let us provide that contrast with our + approach. Look, it’s not going to always work out. And it’s not always + going to create the outcome that you desire. But people need us to + demonstrate that contrast to them, for us, for them to truly see it. I’ve + been having a conversation in a very different context than this, but I’m + curious to hear your answer to it. I’ve been having this conversation about + whether or not good politics always requires clear enemies. Do you believe + it does. No I believe that. You can tell a compelling story with an enemy. + There’s no question. It sometimes is an easy out in our politics. But I + think that there’s something to be said about a politics that is rooted in + opposition to an enemy that is fundamentally regressive. That anger is + fundamentally conservative in its political outcome. Barack Obama and Bill + Clinton, for that matter, did a good job of putting forward an aspirational + politics that wasn’t defined by who we are against, but by what we are for + and about who we can be. And I think that is a more successful path for + progressive politics than an enemies based politics, which so often + devolves to anger, which I think more often than not facilitates in the + medium and long term a regressive politics. Look, I’m not saying it can’t + always be effective politics, but that you can have effective politics and + good politics and better outcomes with an aspirational politics, with a + politics that isn’t just about what it’s opposed to but about what it can + build and about who we can be. Because I think everyone has this own + internal struggle between their own better selves and their better angels + and their base instincts. Much earlier in the conversation, I’d asked you + about liberalism, which was a little bit of a weird question to drop in + there, and I don’t really have a question. It’s just something I’m thinking + about. But you actually strike me as one of the most liberal, as a + temperament liberal in the classical sense, politicians I’ve talked to in a + long time, and I’ve been starting to read a lot of older books about + liberalism, because it feels to me that it is a thing, an approach to + politics that even liberals lost. Yeah and one of the reasons I think we + lost it. I very much count myself as a liberal was a feeling that + liberalism’s virtue was its vice, that its openness to critique, its + constant balancing, its movement towards incremental solutions, and its + skepticism of total solutions that those had been these conditions under + which problems never truly got solved, systemic racism and bigotry + festered. And I think as it began to absorb that critique, it lost a lot of + confidence in itself. And in a way, it had had Barack Obama, who was like + the apex of the Liberal leaders, and he hadn’t brought about utopia. And so + it seemed exhausted. And I think alongside that, there’s some way in which + I cannot I still need to figure this out, but I’ll say it because I believe + it’s true. I think there’s something about the social media platforms that + is illiberal as a medium. I think the reason that we now have x and we have + blue sky and we have threads and none of them are good. They all lead to + bad habits of mind. Because simplifying your thoughts down to these little + bumper stickers, then having other people who agree with you, retweet them + or mob you is just. It doesn’t lend itself to the pluralistic balancing + modes of thought that liberalism is built to prize. They’re illiberal in a + fundamental way. And so I don’t think it’s an accident. That is, liberalism + began to lose its own moorings. Illiberalism roared back. And just one + experience I’ve had of this whole period with Donald Trump. The second term + is realizing that the thing that we were trying to keep locked in the + basement was really dangerous. Yeah, really, really profoundly dangerous + the even compared to his first term. I mean, the attacks on due process, + the trying to break institutions that if you let that out, if you let the + disappearance machine get started, that things can go really badly. And + there’s something about liberalism that is so unsatisfying. I mean, the + work you just described having to do, it sounds so unsatisfying and + frustrating and yet something, I guess just that. And yet and yet it is the + approach and the system that, while imperfect, is the most likely and most + proven to actually lead to the progress that I and I know so many others + seek. Look, people have one life, and it is completely understandable that + a person would feel I have one life. And when you ask me to wait, you are + asking me to watch my one life pass by without the respect and fairness + that I deserve. And that is too much to ask of anyone. And that is. It is + our job to demand. Now, in the face of people who say never, but it’s also + our job to then not reject the possibility for a better tomorrow as that + compromise. I truly believe that liberalism, that our ability to have + conversations across disagreement, that our ability to recognize that in a + pluralistic, diverse democracy, there will be inevitably people and + positions that hurt us. But when you’re siloed and when you suppress that + opposition underground in that basement, to use your word, they’re alone in + there. And not only does that sense of community, loneliness, breed + bitterness, but it also breeds radicalization. Liberalism is not only the + best mechanism to move forward, but it is also the best mechanism to rein + in the worst excesses of your opposition. Yes, the compromises. You don’t + get to do everything you want to do, but that is a much better bet than the + alternative, which is what we have developed now, which is an illiberal + democracy in so many ways in our body politic, one where, Yes, we might + have temporary victories, but as we are seeing right now, those victories + can be fleeting and the consequences can be deadly. Was this always your + political temperament or was it forged. I have grown and changed. I think + there are things that I did and said 5, 10, 15 years ago that I look back + and regret because I think that they were too illiberal, because I think I + bought into a culture online that didn’t always bring out the best in me. + But I do think that those were exceptions. And even when I was an advocate, + I was always perceived as one the more mainstream respectability advocates. + I was always considered someone who was too willing to work across + disagreement and engage in conversations that we shouldn’t be having. I was + always considered someone who was too willing to work within the system. I + think I fundamentally always had the same perspective, and fundamentally + have always believed that we cannot eliminate grace from our politics and + our change making. And that’s rooted in watching my parents grow and change + after I came out. Look, I went into that experience knowing my parents were + going to look. They are progressive people. They embraced my older brother, + who’s gay, without skipping a beat, but I knew when I shared that I was + trans with them, it was going to be devastating, to use a word that my + mother uses. And I knew that if I responded by shutting down the + conversation, by refusing to walk with them, by refusing to give them grace + and assume good intentions when they would inevitably say and do things + that might be hurtful to me, I would stunt their capacity to take that walk + with me. And I saw us as a family, move forward with a degree of grace + toward each other that we were all going to inevitably say and do things + that we would come to regret that might hurt a little bit, but that if we + assumed good intentions and intentions and walk forward, that my parents + would go from saying, what are the chances that I have a gay son and a + trans child from a place of pity to a place of awe in the diversity of our + family and the blessings that have come with that diversity. And that only + came from grace. And then I saw it working in Delaware, passing + nondiscrimination protections. I’ve seen it time and time again. And so I + just I have borne witness to change. That once seemed so impossible to me + as a kid that it was almost incomprehensible, not only become possible, but + become a reality in large part because of grace in our politics. And Yes, + because I was willing to extend that grace to others. Grace blessings. + Witness her. Or are these for you. Religious concepts. They tap into my + religion. I’m Presbyterian, I’m an ordained elder in the Presbyterian + Church. But I think they go to something for me that transcends religion + and faith and tap into just my sense of beauty toward the world and my + beauty and my sense of beauty at life and the joy that I get to live this + life, that I get to be myself and that I get to live a life of purpose. And + I know I’m lucky in that respect. And I want everyone to have that same + opportunity. And I have seen that approach and that grace. It’s allowed me + to be a better version of myself, a happier version of myself, which I + think has actually unlocked those opportunities. Is it a practice, when you + say that it’s allowed you to be a better version of yourself. It’s a + podcast, so everything is ultimately self-help. Is that something that + intentionally you cultivate, and if so, how. Yes, I think it’s often an + intentional choice. So many of the problems that we face are rooted in the + fact that hurt people, hurt people. And I think we are in this not to go + down a rabbit hole. I think that we are in this place where we are in this + fierce competition for pain, where the left says to the right, what do you + know about pain. White, straight, cis man. My pain is real as a queer + transgender person. And then the right says to the left, what do you know + about pain. College educated, cosmopolitan elite. My pain is real. In a + post-industrial community ravaged by the opioid crisis. And we are in this + competition for pain. When there is plenty of pain to go around. And every + therapist will tell you that the first step to healing is to have your pain + seen and validated. And while it requires intentionality and effort, + sometimes I think we would all be better off if we recognized that we don’t + have to believe that someone is right for what they’re facing to be wrong. + But I also think that there’s one other aspect of this that I think we have + lost, which is the intentionality of hope. And I think. We have fallen prey + in our online discourse and our politics, to a sense that cynicism is in + vogue, that cynicism shows that we get it. And I think one of the things + that we have to recognize is sometimes hope is a conscious effort, and that + sense of inevitability, that organic sense of hope that we felt in this + post 1960s world. That is the exception in our history. And you have to + step into the shoes of people in the 1950s, people in the 1930s, people in + the 1850s. And to move past the history that we view with the hindsight of + inevitability, and go into those moments and recognize that every previous + generation of Americans had every reason to give up hope. And you cannot + tell me that the reasons for hopelessness now are greater than the reasons + for hopelessness, then. So you’re saying there’s something audacious about + hope. There is something audacity in it. There is. You have to summon it. + You have to summon it. And I think if we allow ourselves to recognize that + hope isn’t about optimism is about circumstance. It’s about evaluating + likelihood. Hope is something that transcends that. And when we allow + ourselves, when we lull ourselves into the sense of cynicism and we give up + on hope, that is when we lose. My editor has this habit of these very + Delphic sayings that I have to then think about for a while afterwards, and + a week ago he said to me that cynicism is always stupidity. And in the + conversation we were having I didn’t ask him about it, but I think, and + he’s not here to tell me I’m wrong, that what he meant is that it always + includes a cynicism is the posture that we both know what is happening. And + we know what is going to happen that we’ve seen through the performance + into the real grimy, pathetic backstage and we know it’s rigged. We know + it’s plotted and planned. And so it’s this posture, this knowing posture of + idiocy. I think it’s also it’s that and it’s just it’s easy. It’s easy. I + think that’s the place to end. Always our final question. What are three + books you would recommend to the audience. So to this conversation, I think + one of the best books on political leadership and understanding how to + foster public opinion change is “Team of Rivals” by Doris Kearns Goodwin. + It’s one of my favorite books. Two, I’ve been reading over time. It’s not + new. “These Truths” by Jill Lepore, a one-volume history of the United + States, which helps to reinforce that so many of the challenges and + dynamics that we face in this moment are actually not unique, even if the + specifics are. How cyclical all our challenges are and our history is. And + then the final one that I’m actually rereading. I read it in the first term + of Trump is “The Final Days,” the sequel to “All the President’s Men.” And + you realize, reading that, how often it felt like Nixon was going to get + away with everything, that he’d stay in office and it’d be fine for him. + And how many instances that it appeared to be done and that he had won + until August 9, 1974 happened and he resigned. And I think for me, it’s a + helpful reminder that it often seems impossible until it’s inevitable. + Congresswoman Sarah McBride, thank you very much. Thank you. + +Video player loading +Representative Sarah McBride reckons with the trans rights movement’s +shortcomings, and how to win hearts and minds through a politics of grace. +CreditCredit...The New York Times + +How to Beat Back Trump on Trans Rights — and Much Else + +Representative Sarah McBride reckons with the trans rights movement’s +shortcomings and how to win hearts and minds through a politics of grace. + +This is an edited transcript of an episode of “The Ezra Klein Show.” You can +listen to the conversation by following or subscribing to the show on the [25] +NYT Audio App, [26]Apple, [27]Spotify, [28]Amazon Music, [29]YouTube, [30] +iHeartRadio or [31]wherever you get your podcasts. + +President Trump, in his inauguration speech, was perfectly clear about what he +intended to do. + + Archived clip of President Trump: As of today, it will henceforth be the + official policy of the United States government that there are only two + genders: male and female. + +Starting the day of that speech, Trump began an all-out effort to roll back +trans rights, using every power the federal government had and some that it may +not have. + + Archived clip: President Trump has signed an executive order which declares + the U.S. government will no longer recognize the concept of gender + identity. + + Archived clip: President Trump directing the secretary of education to + create a plan to cut funding for schools that teach what he calls gender + ideology. + + Archived clip: This afternoon, Trump makes a move to ban transgender + athletes from competing in women’s sports. + + Archived clip: Ban on gender-affirming care for transgender kids. + + Archived clip: Ban on gender-affirming care for transgender inmates in + federal prisons. + + Archived clip: Ban on transgender troops serving in the military. + + Archived clip: These executive orders, many of them have not actually gone + into effect yet, but when I look across the country, we’re already hearing + stories of impact. + + Archived clip: In a time when we are struggling to find people to volunteer + to do this, we are begging to be allowed to continue our service, and + you’re just going to wash us away. So today I’m not OK. + + Archived clip: It’s a complete dehumanization of transgender people. Years + and years and years into who I am, and I’m supposed to out myself? It’s + about privacy and dignity for me to be able to change my passport to male. + +A lot of the things Trump is doing in this term have put him on the wrong side +of public opinion — but not this. + +In a recent poll where Trump’s approval rating was around 40 percent, 52 +percent of Americans approved of how he’s handling trans issues. Another poll +showed that was more than approved of Trump’s handling of immigration. Far more +than approved of his handling of tariffs. And if you look more deeply into +polling on trans rights, the public has swung right on virtually every policy +you can poll. + +Trump didn’t just win the election. He and the movement and ideology behind him +have been winning the argument. + +Sarah McBride is a freshman congresswoman from Delaware, where she was formerly +a state senator. She’s the first openly trans member of Congress, and her view +is that the trans rights movement and the left more broadly have to grapple +with why their strategy failed — how they lost not only power but hearts and +minds, and what needs to be done differently to protect trans people and begin +winning back the public starting right now. + +I was struck, talking to McBride, by how much she was offering a theory that +goes far beyond trans rights. What she’s offering is a counter to the dominant +political style that emerged as algorithmic social media collided with politics +— a style that is more about policing and pushing those who agree with you than +it is about persuading those who don’t. + +We are having trouble retrieving the article content. + +Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings. + +━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ + +Thank you for your patience while we verify access. 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