Shows
In Bed With The RightEpisode 82 -- Project 1933, Part IV: June 1 to June 30For this episode of In Bed with the Right, Adrian and Moira return to the year 1933. They continue the story of how Hitler seized power, what it did to society, what it felt like to live through it, and -- as always -- what role gender and sexuality played in events. Reminder: We're going month by month for these episodes. This second installment covers June 1 to June 30, 1933 -- above all the role of the stormtroopers, the SA. This one has everything: homosociality, masculinity, red floods, and long knives!Here are the books we refer to in this...2025-06-241h 44
In Bed With The RightEpisode 81: MLM Nation with Bridget ReadJournalist Bridget Read talks with Moira and Adrian about the most American of scams, the multi-level marketing (MLM) scheme. Companies like Amway, Mary Kay and Herbalife have had an outsize impact on American politics, and have been an insidious and at times covert part of the backlash against women's liberation, labor organizing and civil rights. This one has it all: eugenics, scammy Stanford-grads, and alfalfa. So much alfalfa. Bridget's book on the pyramid scheme, Little Bosses Everywhere, is on sale now and is absolutely fantastic!2025-06-1752 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 78 -- Project 1933, Part III: May 1 to May 31For this episode of In Bed with the Right, Adrian and Moira return to the year 1933. They continue the story of how Hitler seized power, what it did to society, what it felt like to live through it, and -- as always -- what role gender and sexuality played in events. Reminder: We're going month by month for these episodes. This second installment covers May 1 to May 31 -- the fate of trade unions, the nascent LGBT movement and the women's movement.Here are the books/texts we refer to in this episode: Timothy Mason, Nazism...2025-05-281h 35
In Bed With The RightEpisode 77: San FranciscoMoira and Adrian tackle the longstanding conservative fixation on the city of San Francisco, its people and its mores. From demographic anxieties, via Joan Didion's hippie-hate, to disaster movies, doom loops, and progressive prosecutors -- the history of SF-hate is a history of US politics. Books and media cited in this episode: Joseph Plaster, Kids on the Street: Queer Kinship and Religion in San Francisco's Tenderloin (2023)Susan Stryker, Victor Silverman (dirs.), Screaming Queens (2005)Thom Andersen, Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003)David Talbot, Season of the Witch: Enchantment, Terror, and Deliverance...2025-05-201h 19
In Bed With The RightEpisode 76: Depp v. Heard with Kat TenbargeIn this episode, Moira and Adrian are joined by journalist Kat Tenbarge for a look back at the media spectacle that was actor Johnny Depp's April/May 2022 defamation suit against his ex-wife, actress Amber Heard. The conversation touches on #MeToo backlash, what counts as evidence in the social media age, content creation and YouTube commenting, and why some women find online misogyny persuasive. 2025-05-131h 06
American Campus PodcastThe Trustees (joint episode with In Bed with the Right podcast)It was my great pleasure to join friends of the pod, Moira Donegan and Adrian Daub (who you'll remember from our Cancel Culture Panic episode), for a deep dive into the history of the trustees. Be sure to check out and subscribe to their excellent podcast, In Bed with the Right.Follow along with IBWTR, Adrian, and Moira:Listen and subscribe to In Bed with the Right on Spotify, Apple, Patreon, or wherever you get your podcasts.Follow IBWTR podcast on Bluesky @inbedwiththeright.bsky.socialFollow Moira: @moiradonegan.bsky.social Follow Adrian: @adriandaub.bsky.socialReferences m...2025-05-0850 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 74: The Trustees (with Lauren Lassabe Shepherd)Have you been enjoying stories about all-powerful student activist groups shutting down vigorous debate on college campuses? Of the insidious cabals of Performance Studies professors thwarting the progress of science? Well, wait till you get a load of the people who actually run the show. In this episode, Moira and Adrian are joined by Lauren Lassabe Shepherd (of the American Campus podcast) to discuss the trustees, their role in university governance, why we tended not to hear much about them ... and why suddenly, in 2025, we very much do!Books, articles and podcasts discussed in this episode: 2025-05-0650 min
Know Your EnemyThe Life & Crimes of Roy Cohn (w/ In Bed with the Right)Recently Matt joined Moira Donegan and Adrian Daub of the excellent In Bed with the Right podcast to record what turned out to be two episodes about Roy Cohn—the "lawyer, closet case and ratfucker extraordinaire," as they describe him. These days Cohn is perhaps most infamous for being Donald Trump's lawyer and mentor, but this first episode focuses on Cohn's childhood and family life, his decisive role in the Rosenberg trial (especially their execution), and his time working with Sen. Joe McCarthy at the height of the Red Scare. After you listen, please head over to In Bed wi...2025-05-0253 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 73 -- Roy Cohn with Matt Sitman (Part 2)The second part of Moira and Adrian's long conversation with Matt Sitman of Know Your Enemy on Roy Cohn -- lawyer to various deplorables, closet case and mentor to a young Donald Trump. This part deals with Cohn's return to New York, his work for the mob, the Church, and the drugs. Here are the books and documentaries we discuss in this first half:-- Nicholas von Hoffman, Citizen Cohn: The Life and Times of Roy Cohn (1988)-- Ivy Meeropol (dir.), Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn (2019)-- Matt...2025-04-2947 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 71 -- Roy Cohn with Matt Sitman (Part 1)Moira and Adrian are joined by Matt Sitman of Know Your Enemy to discuss the life of Roy Cohn -- lawyer, closet case and ratfucker extraordinaire. This first part deals with Cohn's childhood, the Rosenberg trial, and his time with Sen. McCarthy.Here are the books and documentaries we discuss in this first half:-- Nicholas von Hoffman, Citizen Cohn: The Life and Times of Roy Cohn (1988)-- Ivy Meeropol (dir.), Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn (2019)-- Matt Tyrnauer (dir.), Where's My Roy Cohn? (2019)-- Christopher...2025-04-2251 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 70 -- Project 1933, Part II: March 15 to April 15For this episode of In Bed with the Right, Adrian and Moira return to the year 1933. They continue the story of how Hitler seized power, what it did to society, what it felt like to live through it, and -- as always -- what role gender and sexuality played in events. Reminder: We're going month by month for these episodes. This second installment covers March 15 to April 15. 2025-04-171h 17
In Bed With The RightEpisode 68 -- Republican Makeup with Jessica DeFinoWhen it comes to the protagonists of MAGA world, they -- like Roxette circa 1990 -- have THE LOOK. You know the one: hair that rises and crests like a mountain range, lips that are strangely beige and eyes that really show off how dead the person is on the inside. How did this style come to define the modern conservative aesthetic? What are its influences? What are its messages? Jessica DeFino (of The Review of Beauty fame) stops by In Bed with the Right to help Moira and a very lost Adrian make some sense of these and other...2025-04-0839 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 67 -- Project 1933, Part I: January to March 15Germany 1933 is having a bit of a moment. Which made us at In Bed with the Right decide to explore that year in detail. In this series, Adrian and Moira tell the story of how Hitler seized power, what it did to society, what it felt like to live through it, and -- as always -- what role gender and sexuality played in events. We will be going month by month for these episodes, but this first installment cheats a little bit and covers January 1 to March 15. 2025-04-011h 29
In Bed With The RightEpisode 65 -- "So Long, Pamela Paul" with Michael Hobbes and Peter ShamshiriMichael Hobbes and Peter Shamshiri of If Books Could Kill visit In Bed with the Right to talk about the life, times and very, very milquetoast opinions of Pamela Paul, who recently departed from her perch as the New York Times columnist Bluesky loves to hate. Paul emblematizes many aspects of public discourse over the last 5-10 years -- from the emergence of "reactionary centrism" to the renewed freakouts over campus speech, from the panic over trans kids to Gen X's drift to the right. Also this one has an airhorn. 2025-03-251h 07
In Bed With The RightEpisode 64: Whither the Preachers? With Kristin Kobes Du MezMoira and Adrian welcome historian Kristin Kobes Du Mez (Jesus and John Wayne) to talk about what happens to conservative "preacher" masculinity in the age of swaggering, crass and often libertine sexuality. 2025-03-1850 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 62: AI Slop and the New Fascist Aesthetic with Roland MeyerWhy have our new right-wing overlords taken such a shine to chintzy, shiny AI slop? What is persuasive about these phony, artless, slightly desperate images? How do they originate, and how do they circulate? For this episode, Moira and Adrian are joined by Roland Meyer, who is a professor of digital cultures and arts at the University of Zurich and the University of the Arts in Zurich, Switzerland. If you're trying to picture the kinds of image they're discussing, it might be helpful to check out Roland's huge thread on Bluesky. And if you're trying to follow along with...2025-03-111h 14
In Bed With The RightEpisode 60: Emergency Episode: The German Elections Germany voted for a new parliament last Sunday, and if you weren't ready for the words "far right" "Germany" and "20% of the vote" to pop up on your doom bingo, well, then you don't know 2025. Journalist Annika Brockschmidt stops by the pod to talk Adrian and Moira through Germany's political system, how the election results will impact it, and what the results suggest about Germany's future. 2025-02-281h 16
A Bit Fruity with Matt BernsteinThe Incoherent Sexual Politics of the RightElon Musk just (allegedly) had his thirteenth child with a fourth woman — a 26-year-old “conservative” influencer named Ashley St. Clair. In a past version of the “traditional family values” party, this might’ve been a career-ending event. Today, it hardly generates coverage. In this episode, Moira Donegan and Adrian Daub (of In Bed With The Right) help me make sense of the right’s impossibly contradictory code of sexuality: is MAGA the movement of the hot, virile new youth, or is it the movement attempting to ban contraception and abortion? Are women supposed to spit on that thang or dress modestly...2025-02-211h 15
In Bed With The RightEpisode 58: The Pelicot Trial with Manon GarciaTW: This episode is almost entirely about a horrifying case of sustained and organized rape. On December 19, 2024 a court in Avignon, France convicted Dominique Pelicot and 50 other men of rape. It was the conclusion to a spectacular case and trial that galvanized (parts of) France. The victim, Gisèle Pelicot, chose to allow the trial to be public, flipping the script on the way France had thus far metabolized #MeToo: "shame", as Gisèle Pelicot put it, "has changed sides." Philosopher Manon Garcia attended the proceedings in Avignon, and now speaks with Moira and Adrian about what th...2025-02-181h 07
In Bed With The RightEpisode 57: Mark ZuckerbergMoira and Adrian delve into the career and political trajectory of Mark Zuckerberg. From Facemash to The Facebook to the Metaverse to putting on an absurd amount of sunscreen, they trace Mark Zuckerberg's (and Silicon Valley's) complicated relationship to gender. They explore how data, platforms, innovation and disruption, and guiding Silicon Valley figures like the genius and the drop-out are gendered, and how Zuckerberg's trajectory both reflects this gendered hierarchy and its breakdown. [You can find Adrian's book What Tech Calls Thinking here.]2025-02-111h 06
In Bed With The RightEpisode 55: Emergency Episode: Mark Joseph Stern on Executive ActionDonald Trump is issuing executive orders faster than people seem to be able to metabolize what's happening. And many of them have to do with gender, sexuality and wokeness! So Moira and Adrian turn to an expert -- Slate.com's intrepid legal reporter Mark Joseph Stern -- to make sense of at least some of the ones we know about in this special emergency episode. Check out Mark's article on the bizarre (and since possibly rescinded) "spending freeze" at Slate here, Adrian's run-down of the EO on gender affirming care here, and Moira's more hopeful note on the opposition...2025-01-3048 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 53: The Moynihan ReportThe Moynihan Report (1965) written by later New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927-2003) is an important document in the backlash against the Civil Rights era, but it constitutes an important document in gender conservatism as well. In this episode, Adrian and Moira read through the report in some detail, and talk about the many brilliant critiques level at Moynihan and his project pretty much from the start. You can find the report here, and Hortense Spiller's brilliant dissection of it here. [Note: there are a couple of words in this episode that we weren't wild about saying. Just be...2025-01-211h 37
In Bed With The RightEpisode 50: The Second Annual Cursties, Part IIIn what is already being described as a Festivus miracle, we present you -- at long last! -- the second part of the Second Annual Cursties! It's Moira, Adrian and special guest Michael Hobbes doing the annual airing of the grievances (we're deferring the feats of strength until next year). Featuring the most cursed discourses of this particularly cursed-discourse rich year: with walk-on cameos by Octavian George Collins, the Power Gay, Charli XCX and many many more. 2024-12-2454 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 49: The Second Annual Cursties, Part I2024's hottest awards show is THE SECOND ANNUAL CURSTIES. Conjured up by Adrian, Moira and special returning guest Michael Hobbes, this all-gay gabfest has everything. Rapid onset transphobia! How to divorce Matt Walsh! The White Lotus! That thing where a heterosexual is so heterosexual it ... seems kind of gay? Stay tuned for the second half of this episode (and for another Episode Note referencing an SNL skit that's so old it can now legally apply for a learner's permit) next week!2024-12-1747 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 47: Trans KidsMoira walks Adrian through the right wing fixation on trans kids and the way it is reshaping our politics. In early December, the US Supreme Court heard US v. Skrmetti, and is almost certain to uphold a Tennessee law banning most forms of gender-affirming care for minors. In 2016, a trans bathroom ban in North Carolina led to a nationwide outcry and boycotts. Eight years later, laws like Tennessee's SB1 have passed in a majority of US States, and the outcry is comparatively muted. What happened?2024-12-1046 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 46: Live from City Lights Books it's THE CANCEL CULTURE PANICBack in September, Adrian and Moira did an event at San Francisco's legendary City Lights Bookstore for an event launching Adrian's new book The Cancel Culture Panic: How an American Obsession went Global. It was a memorable, energized and often delightfully weird evening that we're thrilled to bring you (slightly edited) as a special episode of In Bed with the Right. 2024-12-031h 17
In Bed With The RightEpisode 44: So You Want to be a Right-Wing Grifter... with Matt BernsteinAs a special holiday treat, podcaster extraordinaire Matt Bernstein (A Bit Fruity) joins Moira and Adrian to talk about the right wing grift machine. It's a tough world out there, so here's your step by step guide to completely selling your soul for some sweet, sweet reactionary billionaire cash! Detours include: Candace Owens, Oli London, Riley Gaines, Chaya Raichik, and various Twinks for Tr**p.Speaking of grifting: If you like the show, consider supporting it via its brand new Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/InBedWiththeRight! It may or may not also a perfect gift for the...2024-11-2652 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 42: 2024 Election Debrief, Part IMoira and Adrian delve reluctantly into the horror, the horror -- aka the results of the 2024 presidential election. We didn't realize it when we recorded it, but this will be first installment in a series. This episode touches on split ticket voting, post-election anti-wokeness debates, the "tech bro" narrative. In the episode, we also mention Kate Manne's Substack essay "Trump's Election is a Triumph of Rape Culture" -- and we point folks to the new IBWTR Patreon! Like and subscribe, as they say!2024-11-1938 min
Ordinary Unhappiness78: Reactionary Fantasies: On “Cancel Culture” and Moral Panic feat. Adrian DaubAbby and Patrick welcome academic, writer, and In Bed With the Right podcast co-host Adrian Daub to discuss his new book, The Cancel Culture Panic: How An American Obsession Went Global. Daub’s book is an exploration of the discourse over “cancel culture” that sets the concept in both historical and global context. In what ways is talk of “cancel culture” merely a return of decades-old complaints about so-called “political correctness,” and in what ways is it different? Why do broad narratives about getting canceled catch on, and what does it mean that anecdotes are so central to their virality? Why...2024-11-161h 33
In Bed With The RightEpisode 41: George Gilder and the Birth of Right-Wing Silicon ValleyStanford researcher Becca Lewis talks Moira and Adrian through the life and influence of George Gilder, who started out as a standard anti-feminist and then reinvented himself as an evangelist for Silicon Valley, supply-side economics ... and also anti-feminism. 2024-11-1257 min
In Bed With The RightA Very Special Announcement from In Bed With the RightIn Bed With the Right has an announcement: the show is coming to Patreon! You can sign up for extra content (2 episodes per month!) here! But our main feed (meaning episodes wherever you have been listening to us) will not be affected -- in fact, there's a new episode coming Tuesday. But if you'd like to hear Moira and Adrian talk their way through some weirder, wilder, more niche topics -- such as conservative fixations on Precious Bodily Fluids --, well, then check out the Patreon!2024-11-1005 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 39: The Meme Wars with Morgan SungJournalist Morgan Sung (who hosts the terrific podcast Close All Tabs ) talks Moira and Adrian through the memes, stan armies, influencers, hatewatchers, bots and trolls of the 2024 election. How has digital campaigning changed since 2016? How do the platforms influence our politics? 2024-11-051h 07
In Bed With The RightEpisode 38: The 2024 ElectionHey, did you know there's an election coming up? And that gender might have something to do with the outcome? In this special emergency episode (recorded on Oct. 30, 2024), Moira and Adrian talk about how gender is influencing the final stages of the campaign, as well as how gender influences how the campaign is being metabolized by the media. They also watch a clip shared by Elon Musk, so you don't have to. 2024-10-3139 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 37: We Need to Talk About UshaMoira and Adrian talk with New York writer and CNN contributor Irin Carmon about Usha Vance and the liberal-coded women in the orbit of the various MAGA men. 2024-10-2945 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 36: Jordan Carroll on Science Fiction and the Alt RightJordan Carroll, author of the new book Speculative Whiteness: Science Fiction and the Alt-Right (which you can buy here) walks Moira and Adrian through the connections between science fiction fandom, gender conservatism and the Alt Right. Space marines, aliens, Bene Gesserit, and insane God Emperors: this one has them all!2024-10-2258 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 35: Talia Lavin on the Christian Right's View of Marriage/ParentingAuthor Talia Lavin (whose Wild Faith is out on 10/15/24) talks Moira and Adrian through the Christian Right's takeover of American life, through objects that are unlikely to appear on your bookshelf, but that nevertheless shape the way many Americans live and what policies they have to live with. From the parenting manuals like James Dobson's Dare to Discipline to Stormy Omartian's marriage guide Power of a Praying Wife, Talia lays out how an image of the family and child-rearing built on subservience, authoritarianism and often enough violence has become part and parcel of our American landscape. (A big trigger...2024-10-1452 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 34: The Secret Lives of Mormon WivesMoira and Adrian grab their Stanley cup and identical hair extensions to follow guest Kate Kelly into the reality show phenomenon "The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives" -- an episode all about the gender politics of the LDS Church, mixed orientation marriages, and, for some reason, "soft swinging". 2024-10-0958 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 33: The VP DebateIt's debate night in America, and you know what that means: MASCULINITY THUNDERDOME! In this special emergency episode, Moira and Adrian discuss the different styles of masculinity on display at the vice presidential debate. You can find Moira's article on this debate here. 2024-10-0336 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 32: In-Vitro FertilizationMoira talks Adrian through the latest fissure in the war on reproductive freedom: in-vitro fertilzation! A fixation of conservative Protestants and the Catholic Church alike, a stand-in for changing family structures, queer families -- but also a serious losing issue for the Republican Party! Come for a discussion of ensoulment, noctural emissions, and stay for St. Brigid, Saint and abortion provider!2024-10-011h 01
In Bed With The RightEpisode 31: Pro-NatalismIn this episode of In Bed With The Right, Moira walks Adrian through the long, creepy history of pro-natalism, and its resurgence amongst conservatives. It is textbook 'weird'!2024-08-271h 17
In Bed With The RightEpisode 30: The Olympic Games (of Gender Panic)In honor of the Olympic Games in Paris and of the way conservatives seem intent to freak out about them almost daily, Adrian walks Moira through the various ginned-up controversies: drag queens recreating paintings! Female boxers boxing! People either conforming or not conforming to their gender! 2024-08-1353 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 29: HarrisIn another emergency episode in a veritable era of emergencies, Adrian and Moira discuss the gender politics of Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign, her potential VP picks, coconut trees, and those darn Dem cat ladies á la JD Vance.2024-07-251h 05In Bed With The RightEpisode 29: HarrisIn another emergency episode in a veritable era of emergencies, Adrian and Moira discuss the gender politics surrounding Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign, her potential VP picks, coconut trees, and those darn Democratic cat ladies á la J.D. Vance.2024-07-251h 05In Bed With The RightEpisode 28: Richard Wagner: Act IIIAlex Ross, music critic for the New Yorker and author of the book ‘Wagnerism’ joins Moira and Adrian to talk about Siegfried, the Wagner clan, and Wagner’s complicated and multifaceted legacy.2024-07-231h 08In Bed With The RightEpisode 27: BidenMoira and Adrian talk about Joe Biden's campaign, about the age question and the fallout from the calamitous presidential debate. NOTE: We recorded this before the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, which is why we don't talk about it here.2024-07-1852 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 26: J.D. Vance with Gabe WinantIn a special emergency episode, Moira and Adrian talk with historian Gabe Winant about J.D. Vance, Donald Trump's pick for vice president. Gender, class and the political ascendancy of creep masculinity.2024-07-1653 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 25: Richard Wagner: Act IIAdrian and Moira return for another episode on the life and works of Richard Wagner, investigating the radical political/philosophical influences that led him to some of the good, the bad, and the downright racist tropes in his operas.2024-06-181h 18In Bed With The RightEpisode 24: LIVE SHOW Anita Bryant with Sarah Marshall of You’re Wrong AboutFor this live show, Moira and Adrian blinking step into the big world and come face to face with other human beings! Specifically Sarah Marshall of the amazing “You’re Wrong About” podcast, and an audience of 60 lovely people on Stanford’s campus. Together they discuss the life and times of Anita Bryant, OG anti-gay crusader—and why we’re still living in an America she helped shape.2024-06-041h 16In Bed With The RightEpisode 23: RFK Jr.Moira walks Adrian through the strange, tragic, enraging life of RFK Jr.—vaccine skeptic, presidential candidate, and literal brain worm survivor. Along the way, your hosts touch on Kennedy masculinity, American aristocracy, and the fine art of styling yourself as an outsider while the whole world can't stop deferring to you.2024-05-281h 08
In Bed With The RightEpisode 22: Richard Wagner: Act IAdrian leads Moira through the life and career of composer Richard Wagner—a not-so-great man with some of world history's worst fans. Aesthetics, politics, revolutionary zeal that curdles into something far more ominous! This one is—as befits its source material—epic!2024-05-141h 07
In Bed With The RightEpisode 21: "The Campus" in the American Imagination with Samuel CatlinSamuel Catlin (University at Buffalo) joins Moira and Adrian to talk about "The Campus" -- about the peculiar mental image Americans seem to have, how little it comports with reality, and the uncanny power of that it nevertheless exercises. You can read Samuel's essay "The Campus Does Not Exist" over at Parapraxis magazine: https://www.parapraxismagazine.com/articles/the-campus-does-not-existYou can read Moira Weigel's article "Hating Theory" (which we refer to in the episode) here: https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/21427And you can pre-order Adrian's book "The Cancel Culture Panic"...2024-05-0547 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 20: Conservatism's Daddy IssuesMoira and Adrian speak to political scientist Jeff Dudas about his 2017 book Raised Right: Fatherhood in Modern American Conservatism. The conversation touches on campus panics, Clarence Thomas's many father figures, and neoconservative failsons. 2024-04-3051 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 19: Judith Butler's Who's Afraid of Gender?In this episode, Moira and Adrian delve into Judith Butler's latest book -- about the worldwide movement against "gender" and the role it plays in right-wing politics. 2024-04-231h 07
Know Your Enemy"Write Like a Man" (w/ Ronnie Grinberg)Historian Ronnie Grinberg's new book Write Like a Man: Jewish Masculinity and the New York Intellectuals couldn't be better "Know Your Enemy" fodder. (Main characters include: Midge Decter and Norman Podhoretz, Diana and Lionel Trilling, Irving Howe, Alfred Kazin, and Mary McCarthy!) These writers, Grinberg shows, built and sustained a novel, secular, Jewish, and masculine concept of the intellectual life, an ideology that would profoundly affected the development of Cold War liberalism, neo-conservativism, Zionism, and right-wing reaction against feminism, gay rights, and black power. As we discovered in this conversation, it's impossible to make sense of the cr...2024-04-171h 16
In Bed With The RightEpisode 18: Trad WivesMoira guides Adrian through the strange, troubling world of tradwifery -- the latest trend in butter-churning, vaguely religious gender conservatism that's taken over your Instagram feed. Come for Adrian's immediate discomfort, stay for Moira's grand unifying theory that links Phyllis Schlafly, the #Girlbosses of the 2010s and unnervingly peppy women currently hand-weaving their childrens' sweaters for social media clout!2024-04-0945 min
In Bed With The RightEpisode 17: Otto Weininger, or Gender and Anti-SemitismAdrian takes Moira into the wild, wildly misogynist and deeply depressing world of Otto Weininger (1880-1903). A posterchild for all manner of fin-de-siècle neuroses, to say nothing for massive quantities of self-hatred, Weininger may be a footnote today -- but he was deeply and weirdly influential in his own time. 2024-04-041h 19In Bed With The RightEpisode 16: Kate Manne on Anti-FatnessPhilosopher Kate Manne (Down Girl, Entitled) joins Moira and Adrian to talk about the politics of anti-fatness – where fatphobia came from historically, how it intersects with racism, sexism and transphobia, and how interpreting bodies according to moralizing principles remains a right-wing idea that succeeds even in the leftiest of spaces.2024-03-041h 11In Bed With The RightEpisode 15: Taylor SwiftFollow Adrian following Moira following various conservative pundits down what is already shaping up to be one of 2024 weirder rabbit holes: the Great Taylor Swift Conspiracy! What it says about electoral politics in 2024, shifting media ecosystems and the long history of masculinity-mysticism. 2024-02-131h 00In Bed With The RightEpisode 14: Prisoner of Sex – Norman Mailer vs. Kate Millett and WomenIn her 1970 book “Sexual Politics” feminist critic Kate Millett devoted 20 pages to a critique of novelist and public intellectual Norman Mailer. In this episode Moira guides Adrian through Mailer’s very cool, very level-headed response: a 250 page screed against Millett in particular and feminism in general.2024-01-0947 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 13: The Cursties with Michael Hobbes2023 was a year rich in truly cursed discourses, In Bed With the Right has already analyzed many of them. In this episode — our first annual CURSTIES — your able hosts (with guest Michael Hobbes) analyze a few that have fallen through the cracks, and vote for the most cursed discourse of the year!2023-12-221h 32In Bed With The RightEpisode 12: The Morehouse Man with Saida GrundyFounded in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, Morehouse College in Atlanta remains one of the most elite HBCUs. As Prof. Saida Grundy argues, the all-male college also sheds light on gender conservatism, Black masculinity and the politics of respectability.2023-12-1659 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 11: HomoconsTogether with their guest, historian Samuel Hueneke, Moira and Adrian delve into the history of the homocons. Gay (and sometimes, very sometimes, lesbian) conservatives. Toggling between the beginnings of the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, the gay marriage fracas of the early aughts and today's anti-trans panics, they ask: is this an invariant of queer public life? Or is there a history and tradition here?2023-12-041h 18In Bed With The RightEpisode 10: Nietzsche and his HeirsMoira and Adrian continue their earlier discussion of the thought and influence of Friedrich Nietzsche — morality and the critique of metaphysics, antisemitism and anti-feminism.2023-11-2745 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 9: Marriage Boosters with Rebecca TraisterEvery few years, it seems, a set of academics and pundits discovers marriage as a panacea for a host of social ills — poverty, unhappiness, social cohesion, research assistants. Moira, Adrian and their guest, New York Magazine writer Rebecca Traister, are less-than-excited to report it’s back and just as threadbare as ever. But this time — since this is the 2020s — with a dollop of “this is something the woke left doesn’t want us to talk about”. A long conversation about feminism, capitalism, anti-feminism, the neocons, data and vibes.2023-11-151h 01In Bed With The RightEpisode 8: NietzscheFriedrich Nietzsche (1844 – 1900) is one of the 19th century's most versatile, counterintuitive and ... well, misogynistic thinkers. Moira and Adrian talk about the legacy of his thought in later movements, both feminist and anti-feminist, and about a specific style of irony and contrarianism that Nietzsche pioneered and that seems to thrive in the internet age -- often enough in league with reactionary gender politics.2023-10-161h 08In Bed With The RightEpisode 7: The “Transsexual Empire” with Susan StrykerOften considered the ur-text of trans-exclusionary feminism, Janice Raymond’s “The Transsexual Empire” came out in 1979, but rehearses a bunch of tropes you could just as well get off JK Rowling’s Twitter feed. In their conversation with historian Susan Stryker, Moira and Adrian explore the very specific milieu from which Raymond and her book emerged — a radical lesbian feminist theology deeply disappointed with the Catholic Church.2023-09-251h 15In Bed With The RightEpisode 6: Perverts, Creeps and Priests!It's Moira and Adrian's version of a classic Cher-song: Perverts, Creeps and Priests! This episode takes deep dives into three texts that illuminate contemporary "crisis-of-masculinity"-debates: those that invoke the Bible, those that invoke science, and those that invoke only their own proudly flaunted neuroses. Where are these right-wing discourses about masculinity in agreement, where are they in conflict? Everyone agrees men are in crisis -- who gets to decide what exactly the crisis is?2023-09-121h 46In Bed With The RightEpisode 5: Crisis of MasculinityMoira leads Adrian through the endless discourse about the "crisis of masculinity" -- where it comes from, what has motivated it in the past, and why we're having it again. Together, the two of them take a long tour de dudes: from Silicon Valley to Mike Pence's bedroom, from the Old West to Jordan Peterson's couch. What is the unique state of emergency that men find themselves in? Is it real? And why is it -- once again -- supposed to be feminism's fault?2023-08-241h 14
The Feminist PresentEpisode 45 - Deadloch with Moira DoneganThis episode is basically a PSA: if you’re not watching the Australian feminist crime show Deadloch, then Laura, Adrian and guest Moira Donegan have one question for you: why not? Depressed industrial towns, toxic masculinity, lesbians, a four-hour movie called ‘Poseidon’s Uterus’: this show has everything, and we’re here for all of it.2023-08-1538 minIn Bed With The RightEpisode 4: Fag Hag with Moira and AdrianEver since the 1960s, the figure of the “fag hag” — a (mostly) straight woman hanging around gay men — has been a mainstay in and around queer spaces. As a woman who refused heterosexuality she aroused the ire of social conservatives, but also critiques from within the community. In this episode, Moira and Adrian investigate: why did conservatives hate the hag? How radical was this figure really? And is she still a thing?2023-08-071h 19
Know Your EnemyMidge Decter: Anti-Feminist Cold Warrior (w/ Moira Donegan & Adrian Daub)In this episode, Matt and Sam join Moira Donegan and Adrian Daub — co-hosts of the new podcast “In Bed With The Right" — for an in-depth look at the life, times, and work of the late Midge Decter, who died in 2022. Decter was inspired by a distinctly conservative, mid-century American reading of Freudian psychology, mobilized in defense of traditional family hierarchies, which made her an important link between neoconservatives and the religious right — unsurprisingly, she helped found or served on the boards of numerous conservative organizations, including the Heritage Foundation, Committee for the Free World, and the Independent Women's Forum, among ot...2023-07-271h 22In Bed With The RightEpisode 3: Susan Sontag with Merve EmreSusan Sontag (1933- 2004) was a writer, critic and activist, one who isn’t thought of (and didn’t think of herself) as conservative. In this episode, your hosts talk with Prof. Merve Emre to think through Sontag’s writing on gender and on the women’s movement. How do Sontag’s leeriness about identity and identification, her ambivalent attitudes to bodies, sex and beauty, and her elitism land in today’s political climate and landscape?2023-07-241h 07In Bed With The RightEpisode 2: Midge Decter with Matt Sitman and Sam Adler-BellMidge Decter (1927-2022) has often been called the "grandmother of neoconservatism" -- hers was in some ways a pretty classic trajectory, from New Deal liberalism to profound unease with the social movements of the 1960s, to the center of the conservative movement and Republican politics. But unlike most of her fellow neocons, Midge Decter always framed her trajectory quite openly in terms of gender: repulsion from a certain kind of women's liberation, and attraction to a certain kind of masculinity. In this episode, Moira and Adrian delve into the weird, cantankerous world of Midge Decter with the co-hosts of Know...2023-07-111h 22In Bed With The RightEpisode 1: Gay Marriage with Moira and AdrianFor their inaugural episode, Moira and Adrian delve into right-wing (ahem) contributions to the gay marriage debate. Ten years ago the Supreme Court decided Windsor v. US and Hollingsworth v. Perry, which together spelled the beginning of the end of the gay marriage debate (gay marriage would be established nationwide in Obergefell v. Hodges two years later). But did the issue really go away? How did the terms of the debate back then on the right influence today's moral panics, how do they motivate a far-right Supreme Court?2023-07-101h 40In Bed With The RightIn Bed With The Right - Trailer!Get a sneak-peek at the all new, upcoming show In Bed With The Right hosted by Adrian Daub and Moira Donegan.2023-07-1002 minThe Feminist PresentIn Bed With The Right - TrailerGet a sneak peek at the upcoming, all-new show In Bed With the Right hosted by Moira Donegan and TFP's very own Adrian Daub.2023-07-0702 minThe Feminist PresentEpisode 5 - Moira DoneganMoira Donegan is an opinion columnist for Guardian US whose work has also appeared in the New Yorker, n+1, the New Republic, and in the viral The Cut essay, “I Started The Media Men List," in which she describes her creation of (and the fallout from) the "Shitty Media Men" list that outed sexual harassers in media and journalism. Laura and Adrian talk to Moira about Jane Fonda's classic workout tapes, exercising at home, about what our new domesticity does to the male gaze, the institution of the gym and why one should mourn it, and whether there is a...2020-07-0848 min