Studying Conservatism on a Liberal Campus with Eitan Hersh

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • Teaching Conservative Policy at Tufts with Eitan Hersh

  • Outside of Politics: The Met Gala

CORRECTION: The Pell Grant does not run out. There are lifetime limits per student on the Pell Grant and basically every other grant that exists is first-come, first-served, but not Pell. Pell is always available. We are in the process of omitting this statement from the episode and will also correct it on Friday's episode.

Thank you for being a part of our community! We couldn't do it without you. To support the show, please subscribe to our Premium content on our Patreon page or Apple Podcasts Subscriptions, or share the word about our work in your circles. Sign up for our newsletter or follow us on Instagram to keep up with everything happening in the world of Pantsuit Politics. You can find information and links for all our sponsors on our website.

EPISODE RESOURCES

Our free Newsletter has moved Excuse the boxes!

This podcast and every episode of it are wholly owned by Pantsuit Politics LLC and are protected by US and international copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws. We hope you'll listen to it, love it, and share it with other people, but not with large language models or machines and not for commercial purposes. Thanks for keeping it nuanced with us.

TRANSCRIPT

Sarah [00:00:07] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.  

Beth [00:00:09] This is Beth Silvers.  

Sarah [00:00:10] You're listening to Pantsuit Politics.  

Beth [00:00:12] Where we take a different approach to the news.  

[00:00:14] Music Interlude.   

Sarah [00:00:30] Hello. Thank you so much for joining me today. Beth is feeling under the weather, but I am delighted to be welcoming Eitan Hersh, a professor of political science at Tufts University. I read Professor Hersh's book Politics is for Power several years ago. And if you're a long time listener of the show, you probably remember that I could not stop talking about that book. I still think about his central thesis all the time, that most of us are engaged in political hobbyism-- not political action. Then back in March, I read this amazing article in Boston Magazine by Rachel Slade [sp] about a professor teaching American conservative thought at Tufts University and all the interesting results among the students. And then I realized that this professor was Professor Hersh, the same one that wrote Politics for Power. So we immediately invited him on the show to talk about the class and all the interesting fall out among the students. And then the campus protests began sweeping the country, including at Tufts. And our conversations even more important and timely-- because hearing from people on the ground, on campuses brings such an important perspective to the discussion. Now, speaking of our discussion about colleges and college admissions, on Tuesday, we had a long, expansive conversation about admissions and financial aid and FASFA with consultant Sara Bittner.  

[00:01:48] We wanted to issue a small correction. Sara said that the Pell Grant runs out of money. That's not true. There are lifetime limits per student on the Pell Grant, but it is always available. However, every other grant does exist on a first come, first served basis. And that race for grant money was and continues to be dramatically affected by the FASFA delays. But we wanted to make sure we clarify that it is not true of the Pell Grant. Now, as always, we're going to take an exhale at the end of the episode and talk about what's on our mind Outside Politics. Alise will be joining me to talk about the Oscars of the East Coast, the Met Gala, and all the fabulous fashion taking place in the Garden of Time, which was this year's theme. Before we get started, we wanted to remind you that our newsletter now lives on Substack. If you are already subscribed, there is no change for you. Just double check your spam folder to make sure we didn't land there in the transition. But there is no change and no charge for our newsletter that arrives every Friday. But we moved to Substack because we wanted more of a community element, and we wanted to make it much easier for you to get to old editions of the newsletter.  

[00:02:54] Our most recent newsletters, like I said, will always be available for free, but you can't upgrade to paid at Substack and support our work. You can get access to additional community features, including we invited everybody to our Spicy Live last night where we talked about Stormy Daniel's blockbuster testimony at the Trump trial. Because, guys, we just can't fit it all in even in two shows a week. So the Spicy Lives and our premium content and the Substack, those newsletters and all that audio content often hold the stuff we just cannot fit it here on the show. So you can go subscribe there if additional audio content is not for you. Or you can subscribe at our premium channels. Up next, my conversation with Professor Hersh. And if you hear some sounds in the background, those are just street noises from his recording. Don't worry, there's nothing happening outside your own car. Just going to give you a heads up to that. And I hope you enjoyed the conversation.  

[00:03:43] Music Interlude.  

Eitan Hersh [00:03:53] Eitan Hersh, welcome to Pantsuit Politics. I'm so excited to have you here.  

[00:03:56] I'm excited to be here. Thanks for having me.  

Sarah [00:03:58] I've been a fan of your work since I read Politics for Power several years ago. And so when I read about this class, I was like, oh, we got to do it.  We got to get him on the show. Because I think your work intersects with our work in so many ways. So welcome. Thank you so much for coming.  

Eitan Hersh [00:04:13] My pleasure. Yeah, this class has been the most delightful teaching thing I've ever done actually.  

Sarah [00:04:19] I know. I just read the article. I mean, it was mostly positive emotions, but a lot of it was like, oh, I wish I'd been in the class. Can I audit the class next time? I don't live in Boston, I don't even know how that works.  

Eitan Hersh [00:04:27] You should definitely come visit. The class is going to be packed this coming year, and I'm excited about it. It's a very special environment- at least it feels that way to me. Yeah.  

Sarah [00:04:38] So you've taught it how many times now?  

Eitan Hersh [00:04:39] Twice.  

[00:04:40] Okay. And you kick it off with I'm going to read the statistic because I think it's so great. Thirty percent of Americans call themselves liberal, 35% call themselves moderate, 36% call themselves conservative. No, this is not reflective of college students and professors. No, this is not the breakdown at your university or other places.  

Eitan Hersh [00:04:59]  No. Increasingly, our university I think like many others has many private universities  have become really kind of homogeneous places. So there are few conservatives, most of them in secret I think. There's an assumption, I think, that the students make when they come into most political science classes, that everyone's going to basically agree amongst the core things. If you went to a big public university with 30,000 people, you might think, okay, I'm in a political science class. Maybe half the people here are pro-life and half are pro-choice, and half are anti-gay rights. But you come to a place like Tufts and you wouldn't make an assumption like that. You would assume that everyone's kind of the same as you on a lot of these issues.  

Sarah [00:05:39] So is that where the idea from the class came from?  

Eitan Hersh [00:05:42] Yeah, in a way. We're supposed to be teaching students about politics. And I thought increasingly that our students were not exposed to what politics is like. From not just how a bill becomes a law, how to contend with people on the other side, but where do people who have different views, get those views? What do they think? One of the range of views that are associated with conservative identity or liberal identity. And so you get a taste of this in other class like my other big class on elections. You'll teach something like Citizens United, money in politics. And we read the court case and it's always great to read Supreme Court cases because you get the dissenting opinions as well as the majority opinion. So you see this debate in every Supreme Court case written by really smart people who are great writers. So the students come in to this elections class learning about Citizens United. And most of them have a sense that they know what Citizens United is, and they know they're against it. And then they read the case and we talk about these examples. So we talk about what about a company that has a big gay workforce and wants to oppose candidates who are pushing an agenda that they think is fast to their company because maybe it's hostile to LGBT people. And they think it's bad for the community. And then the students, like in one example, are like, I forgot that sometimes companies are on my side. But it's sort of like they had this knee jerk reaction to begin with. Like, I'm against money in politics. Companies aren't people. And then you just read the main court case on this, and you're like, oh yeah, it's actually kind of complicated. And I wanted them to have that feeling of, oh, it's actually kind of complicated with more topics than just the ones I teach on election. So that's sort of how this came to be.  

Sarah [00:07:37] Well, and as you were organizing the course, you kind of had to organize it yourself. I thought one of the best parts of the article was when your other professors were like, yeah, you can teach it, but there's no curriculum for this. You going to have to make it up yourself because there's no standard curriculum for American conservative thought, which considering the statistic that 36% of Americans call themselves conservative is a little bananas to me.  

Eitan Hersh [00:07:59] Yeah. To put some color on that, there are plenty of people mostly in the humanities like historians who teach classes on conservative thought, mostly like going back in time. And even in political philosophy, students can learn about like challenges to liberalism. They can go back in time and read old philosopher types. What's new or what was new, as far as I could tell, was contemporary public policy from the perspective of a conservative. In other words, if you were a conservative, how would you organize a class on contemporary public policy? I have three weeks on the class (and I might add a fourth) on family and religion. There's no public policy class that's from a liberal perspective that would spend that much time on family and religion. But obviously there are classes that are about social and family policy that is mostly coming from a liberal perspective. But I think what was new for me was thinking about how do you hit on all these topics that you know the students care about? Family, religion, guns, affirmative action, crime. And then you also have to give them the ones that they don't think they're that interesting, like, regulation and capitalism and a whole bunch of other stuff. But you basically want to build a class that's contemporary and on on policy matters, but like coming from how a conservative intellectual might think about it.  

Sarah [00:09:23] Yeah. And it reminded me the way you structured it is, honestly, like a march through my own experience because I grew up in a very conservative evangelical community. And so I sort of formed these ideas, thought I was righteous and right, went to a liberal arts university, took political science classes that told me there was another way. And I thought, oh no, now I'm righteous and right.  I'm motivated by fairness instead of authority, basically. And it wasn't until I moved back to Kentucky and we started this podcast-- and I don't know if you've ever read The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt, but that book blew my mind. I was like, oh my gosh. Okay, so other people are motivated by things. It is not unethical to be motivated by authority or to be motivated to protect the group and to see it through the lens, especially because I was in a community surrounded by people that felt that way. And it was going to be emotionally and psychologically and spiritually exhausting to see them as the enemy every day as I was moving about my life in Kentucky. And I think it feels like it should be easy to shift, but it does. You have to walk through these things that you have knee jerk reaction (to use a religious example) to watch the scales fall from your eyes and realize like, oh, it's not that-- I always think about that editorial during the Donald Trump presidency, "I don't know how to teach you how to care." I'm like, no, that's not helpful. Like, that's not what's going on. We're not living with 36% of the country that just are psychopaths. Maybe it's a little more complicated than that.  

Eitan Hersh [00:10:59] Yeah. And even on, I think, the mostly progressive students own terms, they can see that there's a problem. So we talk about marriage and why is it the case that most of these students who are fairly well-to-do were raised by two parents? And you look at the statistics of kids who did go to college, and why is it all of a sudden in the last bunch of years somehow not possible for people without college degrees to stay in marriages? There's something almost like a sense of embarrassment that comes over liberals, like what has happened here? Same thing with technology-- this Jonathan Haidt newest thing. The kids from well-to-do parents have been much better equipped to manage social media, so they're on it way less than poor kids. And actually all of the non-judgmental attitudes of our public institutions that say, well, who are we to say how much your kid should be on their phone in school? And you can go to a bunch of schools that are in lower income neighborhoods, and all the kids are just on their phones all day long. Well, who are we to judge? But you know that the parents of the kids in these classes who come from privileged families, it's not how they're raised. And so there's something like, really, even if you don't have your bubble burst about, okay, well, some people are motivated by loyalty and religion as opposed to by fairness, even on the progressive own terms, when you just look at the world differently, you're like, oh, like there are whole problems that I'm not attuned to because I'm in a kind of a progressive bubble that's led me not to pay attention to some of the problems that are generating the political conflicts we have right now.  

Sarah [00:12:44] Yeah. And I think you get this sense of like, you don't want critique, you think you're right, but you're hungry for it. You're actually hungry for a little critique. You're going to be surprised when I tell you another moment I had was not led by a book or a public intellectual, but by Dax Shepard on his podcast. I remember him one time saying, "I live in Hollywood, and progressives and liberals think that they don't care about impurity (like they're not obsessed with purity in the same way conservatives are about sex) but they are. It's just directed at food." And I thought, oh my gosh. I remember like it was yesterday, like, oh my gosh. Yeah, right. Of course. That there's like this purity and disgust and toxic chemicals and all this language around stuff that we think on the progressive left we're above. And I think you talk about how just introducing conservative ideology and around these issues just allowed that critique, allowed that debate just a little space to say we can debate this. Because I think so many Americans-- not just young people-- are hungry for more real debate instead of just an exchange of shame, which feels like that's all that American debate is right now. I'm going to tell you, you don't care about kids. You're going to tell me, I don't care about kids and we all want the kids to die. And that's like the entirety of American. That's what I was saying. I am like, that's the only thing. That's why we get there so quick, because that's all that's left. If it's all morality and shame, then the hardest thing you can throw at somebody is you don't care about kids. And that's where every debate ends up. Gun control, abortion, foreign policy. You don't care that kids die. That's all that's left on the table.  

Eitan Hersh [00:14:18] Yeah.  

Sarah [00:14:20] And I think what's so interesting-- we just had these filmmakers from girls state on. You know what girls state is? Girls and Boys State. And they were talking about how they wanted to debate it and they wanted to talk it. But the language policing is so strong in the sense that you could get canceled or you could get shut down is so prevalent. So how did you get past that? How did you get past in the classroom, that sense of if I say the wrong thing, it's over for me.  

Eitan Hersh [00:14:49] Yeah. So I would say I'm not totally past it because students definitely feel that, but I'm trying to set them up for success in a couple of ways. One is the class I think can fairly advertise itself as like, the most ideologically diverse space on campus that's talking about politics. I kind of joke that probably like the engineering classes are more ideologically diverse, but they don't talk about politics. But in this classroom you can expect that some of the kids are conservative. The other thing you can expect is that there's a lot of self-selection. I mean, there are kids in my class who kind of get made fun of by their peers, like it's so lame or not cool of you to take this class because why would you need to learn about those evil people, basically. So the ones who are in the class are the smart ones. I mean, this is like the brilliant thing about teaching. I figured out a way to get a roomful of the smartest kids on campus. So they are looking for that. They are, though, very careful about how their peers react to them. And I think it comes across most clearly when a student who is on the progressive side themselves, but  sees some element of connection to one of the more conservative ideas or a piece of empirical data, whatever. And they're like, oh, if I make a comment that makes it sound like I'm endorsing this, does that mean I'm no longer perceived as liberal? And by the way, not to move this conversation off topic, but so much of what's going on on campus this year with the Israel-Palestine stuff, is there are so many kids who are either apolitical or they are political but they're not like invested in the Israel-Palestine issue. And you ask them, well, why? When the student groups on October eighth and nine were celebrating the terrorist attack on October 7th.  

[00:16:48] Guess what happened? The students for Justice Palestine group sent a message out to the school saying, "Yeah, we're excited about the creative strategies used by Hamas. These are our freedom fighters." But no students ostracized this group. In fact, they welcomed them in. And I think a lot of that is they do not want to criticize someone on the left. So even if they're very quiet about it, it's not cool for them to to do that. And the version of that in the class is for the most part-- yeah, I think some of them are worried. But, again, because it's a class on conservatism that they're deliberately taking. There are a good number of students who that's why they're there. They're there to try out these ideas and learn about it. And they have me presenting the conservative perspective from writers that were reading. They have their TAs who have so far been able to get these great TAs who are steeped in conservative identity and knowledge from the Harvard Law School, and they kind of just are in a different space on campus. So like in a bubble within a bubble where you can have an open conversation.  

Sarah [00:17:51] But I think that that's not off topic because the events on October 7th and the fallout since has burst that bubble and it raised the emotional tenor of several of the discussions. But I think it also prepared the students in such a way to really address it. When I was reading this article, there was a moment where one of the students says, "Or have we gotten to the point where endorsing terrorism against colonizers is something that is acceptable?" And I thought, well, this is the one place and all my readings since October 7th that cracked that wide open. So clearly you were pushing them and getting them to a place where they could do what debate is supposed to do, which is supposed to crack it open, it's supposed to push us into new territory, it's supposed to help us see things more clearly instead of just doubling down, shutting down, pushing each other away.  

Eitan Hersh [00:18:49] As you read the article, this was sort of a follow on conversation to a conversation that happened before the events of October 7th. In September it happened where the small group of conservative students on campus hosted a debate between a pro-life and a pro-choice law professor. These are two law professors and it's got abortion. And a group of pro-choice students shut down the debate. They scream. They had these dog barking apps that they put on their phones, and it went on for an hour and [inaudible]. And they held the view that basically no pro-life positions should be articulated on campus as a form of hate. And so we had a discussion about that. And a bunch of students in the class openly endorsed the idea that there should be no debate or that it's okay to shut down the debate. And so there is definitely even in this class-- which I think is selecting on students who are much more open today than other kids--  a common view that you should debate people who are haters or something like that. So you should have that. And I would say like a good share of the students on campus think of Israel, the country, as essentially like an expression of hatred. And so any kind of engagements with Zionists, with people who are supporting Israel, is basically like participating in hatred and the groups that are opposed to Israel, even violent terrorist groups, are counteracting said hatred. And so, again, everything is sort of just hate, hate, hate, hate-- this is sort of echoing what you're saying about how people treat kids policy. It's not a great debate.  

Sarah [00:20:51] So what have you seen in the spring since having this-- you taught the class in the fall, right?  

Eitan Hersh [00:20:55] Yes.  

Sarah [00:20:56]  And you mentioned before we start recording that you're surveying students. So how are you seeing this debate around the encampments play out among the students? I really want to know if the students that took the class in the fall have spoken with you, if you've carried on the conversation with them, and if after being in the class that changes their perspective on the campus protests?  

Eitan Hersh [00:21:16] Yeah. So I don't know exactly if I can classify them by whether they were in the class or they were in another class of mine or they're in class this semester. A couple of things have happened on campus. For one thing, there's a big bifurcation between the Jewish students and the non-Jewish students, where the Jewish students just feel totally isolated. And in some ways they are like leaning more into their Jewish identity. You can see greater expressions of Jewish identity and feelings of internal connection, but also external division. And it's a feeling of us versus them. Everyone hates us. We don't have a place here. And there's a lot of that sentiment on across campuses where there are Jewish populations, which is interesting conceptually. Because those students are like in some ways like leaning into this identity, but also it's because of a feeling of disconnect or rejection. I think that [inaudible] there's a complicated set of things happening. Right. So one complicated thing is that at the center of a lot of the anti-Israel activism is really pro-war movements. That is, they endorsed October 7th. They're chanting Intifada. They want a revolution. They also what a revolution against America. They think we're all settler colonialists, and none of us belong in the United States except the Native Americans. The United States is evil country. Israel is a super evil country. Even though it's not even obvious where the Jewish refugees who populate Israel, [inaudible] obviously they're all refugees or descendants of refugees from all these countries that they were kicked out of. But what a core group of the students want is sort of a revolution against these countries, including Israel. And so I take it to be a pro-war endeavor, given their rhetoric and how they view October 7th. But then the periphery of the movement, which is much bigger, it's a bunch of students who don't like war. And I would say they are not deeply knowledgeable about the conflict, don't have a great sense of what the history is, what the alternatives are, what kind of coexistence can exist. It's just sort of like, I don't like war. Israel's obviously the bad guy. Netanyahu is a bad guy. They're using the war machine that's coming in part from the United States and it's hurting a lot of people, so make it stop.  

[00:23:43] And there is obviously a big tension between those two elements of a movement. But there is also, I think, underlying this whole sense is that we-- that is I'm putting myself in their position--  the anti-Israel, we don't know much necessarily about what's going on or what the alternative is. But you are opponents have to educate yourself until you learn our position because you basically are supporting hate. And so these groups, at least on our campus, they reject any kind of dialog. They don't want to be in any kind of setting where they have to debate or converse with Zionists, because they think that's basically endorsing, even just in conversation, some form of hatred and that's it. But if you ask them, what do you think should happen? And it's not just students. If you just ask the typical far left or very progressive person, what do you think should happen in this region? You get a lot of non-answers like I don't know. And if this is sort of like that of politics, is for power connection, if you have a goal, maybe the goal is peaceful coexistence, whatever the goal is, like, what are the actual activities you're doing to advance that goal? And it seems to me like we can get into the details, where the path that the activists have taken since October 7th has been pretty much a place to achieving the goals that they, I think, will.  

Sarah [00:25:21] Yeah, you beat me to it because I was going to pick up all these threads, definitely that the politics is for power angle. Because I think what the connection to me between the class and the book and all of this is that it has become politics isn't for power, it's for identity. It's for purpose. That was my absolute favorite moment from this article about your class, is when you're talking about what do you want for your kids, right? That's why we get the kids so quick, because we're not talking about government. We're talking about life. And some of the students say, oh, my parents want me to be happy. They just want me to be happy. And you'd say, I don't want that for my kids. So I don't want them to be unhappy, but I want them to serve their family and their community. I want them to follow the precepts of religion like I have different goals. I want them to live a purpose driven life, not a lie filled with happiness and no discomfort. And I read that and I thought, yes, that's it. That's the whole kit and caboodle, because we're asking politics (which is supposed to be about governance and policy) to hold identity and purpose.  

[00:26:26] And so when we're telling people that actually your political partisanship is reflective of who you are as a person, it's about right and wrong and what you believe about what lives a good life, we're asking it to do way too much. And because it's this fertile ground for that type, that's what people are thinking about anyway, right? I think so often because a lot of these other institutions have struggled and suffer from distrust and have fallen away, that we ask politics to become the center point of who we are. Are you a good person or not? And so we can't debate because what's on the line here is kids, life and death and whether or not I'm a good person or not. So, of course, there's no debate around that. It just feels like particularly post October 7th, that's just become the flash point. I thought we were getting better. I thought we were breaking through a little bit that, okay, maybe you're Partisan identity does not reflect whether you're a good person or not. And then it just all kind of fell apart and it just became this burning, raging fire about you're an oppressor, you don't care about people, you certainly don't care about kids and I do. And so, of course, we can't debate that because that's what's on the line here, is whether or not I'm a good person. And the entirety of my identity is wrapped up in this political identification.  

Eitan Hersh [00:27:46] Yeah, 100%. And I think it's interesting that some people are, for the first time, having this realization that it's not an identity. So like when I think of so many of the Jewish students who have come to my office hours and they're processing like, oh, I thought I was a progressive, but that around here kind of means like Hamas curious. And that's not okay for me. So I don't know what I am. Maybe it's more complicated. Maybe like on some issues I'm this way and some issues I'm that way. And welcome to the club. The world is complicated and you don't have to agree with everyone on everything. And I think taking a class on conservatism or learning about it, you start to see connections to other other people and other communities and empathize with them in different ways the more you learn about about more types of people. So I think about the fact that we have this big movement, mostly in the South now, of school choice where we have many states now adopting this view that anyone, no matter their income level, instead of going to public schools, they can take six or $7000 per kid and either send them to a private school, including religious school or homeschool. And I'm really interested in that. I don't think it's totally a good idea, but I don't think it's totally a bad idea. And it depends on the details. But I absolutely empathize with the motivation of families that feel like the deal that they have with public schools around education, particularly on moral education, has collapsed because they feel more distance from what the public schools are trying to do.  

[00:29:27] And combination of Covid restrictions with the study of race and gender and other issues has left people feeling like, man, I can't compromise on some of the values that I hold. And you see this debate and the debate is fascinating. And how is it going to work out and is it going to be good for the kids? Is it going to be good for the kids on the terms of the parents? Again, this is no where I live in Boston. This kind of policy is actually nowhere near us, but it's right near you. I'm not an evangelical Christian. I don't live in the South, but I can really empathize with the feeling that parents have anywhere that like, oh, I feel like I'm not in control. I'm sending my kids to the public school or the public library, and I feel like that we're not mission aligned. I'm trying to figure out how to deal with that. And that's a really important conversation that I think any parent can empathize with. But a lot of people, I think, on the left are not willing to do. They will say those two people are just basically Christian nationalists trying to destroy our school system and destroy our libraries and ban books. But if you actually pay attention to what they're saying, it's a lot more complicated with that, a lot more nuanced. And, sorry, I don't mean to take this conversation a totally different direction, which I assume I just did. But, like I said, it's just an example of you can be in that conversation totally on guard to defend your side against another side, or you can be on that conversation and be like, okay, where do I actually be with you? Where am I making life choices that are consistent with the life choices you're making? And I think you've just realized that empathy and the complexity of how to run a government leads you to all sorts of strange relationships and connections that make the world interesting.  

Sarah [00:31:16] Now, you're not taking it, you're talking it. This is perfect because I know this is going to seem paradoxical, and I'm talking on both sides of my mouth because I just said politics can't hold all that. It's not built to, it's not meant to. But also it's like you kind of horseshoe around that if you accept that, we're talking about so much more when we're talking about politics. Beth always says we're just talking about how we want to live in relationship with each other. That's what politics is about.  I would argue if you had some other places to work out what it means to be a good person-- and I don't care where that is, I don't care if it's a synagogue or a church or a CrossFit gym, I really don't. But if we can put over here, like, let's work out how to be a good person, then if you can accept that, it's like a little miracle that it's also a good political strategy. If you can't circle back around to it's not just that they hate kids and want them to die, but that they maybe have valid concerns that don't match up with mine but that are valid. And if I can empathize with them, then that also surprise, surprise turns out to be a pretty good political strategy. You can ask our Democratic governor in the state of Kentucky.  

[00:32:31] That when you accept that maybe what people's concerns are valid, and even if you don't like the solution they present, that they still have valid political concerns, emotional concerns, psychological concerns, whatever it is, then that that turns back into politics is for power. Then we're meeting people's needs. We're saying this isn't just about convincing you that I'm a good person and you're a bad person, and can't you be a good person like me? But about meeting your actual concerns, meeting your needs so that you feel like the government and politics can do something for you, can hear what you're saying, can address the concerns in ways maybe you don't always love, but sometimes you do. And then we're actually moving the ball forward. We're getting somewhere, which is what we talk about in your class. Like is this a strategy? What's the consequence? What's the goal? That's where we need to be moving instead of just feeling better about the state of the world, which I don't actually think works anyway. I don't think anybody feels better about the state of the world. That's why we have all this anxiety.  

Eitan Hersh [00:33:28] Yeah, that's right. Just to circle back to those protests, it's so hard to pin people down on what anyone wants because it's a very complicated political example. It's very hard. It's tragic. It's been tragic for a long time. But the kind of vilification that's happening is probably not very productive. The lack of building of empathy, the idea that I'm not going to be in conversation or any kind of dialog with someone because I don't want to learn anything from them is probably not the right strategy.  

Sarah [00:34:07] And it's ineffective. It's like exactly what you just said. And I think you see that. I think you see where college campuses, where the administration and the students can enter in some sort of negotiation, in some sort of conversation. But I'm interested in particular we're talking about the big political scene generally, because we'll wrap up, I really want to hear as a college professor where you think colleges have gone astray. There's a lot of conversation about, well, colleges haven't been places that welcomed debate and free speech for a long time, and that there haven't been consequences for civil disobedience in the past and that's what's gotten us into this morass right now. We will allow civil disobedience if it's a favored idea, if it's a favored constituency, but not if it's something that we disagree with. And I wonder what you see because there is this big point that  these are elite universities, they're not reflective of. There's lots of polling right now that most college students are just shrugging, that this conflict is not on their radar. But I do think it matters what's happening at these universities, and it is impactful, and it becomes a part of our sort of political conversation and identity, either defining yourself as opposed to the elite colleges or in favor of the elite colleges. And so I just wonder how you feel about what's being learned right now through these protests. If there's a path forward to where all universities, even elite universities are places that welcome debate and intellectual conversation.  

Eitan Hersh [00:35:37] Yeah, to put it in business terms, I guess, we're in a place of like brand differentiation where you have some schools-- and to be honest, they're mostly state schools and purple and red states-- that are saying, hey, we're going to be a place of actual debate and we're going to put millions of dollars into making sure that there are conservative and liberal faculty, that there are speaker series from both sides,  that students of different political stripes are welcome. And there are other students schools that their brand is to double down sort of a social justice, homogeneous lefty thing. And the schools are in competition for students and for faculty. We'll see how that turns out. I mean, I think it depends on the school in terms of what they value. I personally think we need a lot more of this. You mentioned the article that came out by Rachel Slater, Boston Magazine, about my class. I got so many emails from faculty and other schools, they're like, oh yeah, we should teach something like that here.  

Sarah [00:36:48] That's encouraging.   

Eitan Hersh [00:36:49] I think this is the kind of course that should be offered everywhere. It'll get a lot of students because students want to know this stuff. But you need to have people who want to teach it and teach in a responsible way. And I think that there has been a total lack of engagement with this kind of diversity.  I'll say a couple things. Obviously, the schools have doubled down on racial diversity. They've doubled down on places that are welcome to LGBT people. These have been priorities for the schools. They've made choices about investments around those issues. And, again, some are and some are not making similar investments around ideological diversity, intellectual diversity and so forth. Sometimes schools will say we don't have much control over the culture of our institutions. I say that's not true. That's really not true. And you can see in a couple of ways. The selective schools are basically the only schools because they're selective, that are making choices about which kind of students they're admitting, and they've made all these choices to go away from tests, to move towards like essays that have DEI statements. They're making a lot of deliberate choices about what students they add. They also like can change culture super quickly. I mean, if you think about how quickly universities decided that we're going to ask everyone to put pronouns behind their names, that was to me a controversial decision. It's not obviously a good decision to enforce such a norm, but they did. I mean, it became very, very common very, very quickly. And so I think schools can make a huge impact on the culture of their communities by who they hire and who they admit, and also by all sorts of signals that they send once you're there. And so, again, I think the schools that want to send signals of [inaudible] diversity as a core input to being a good citizen, to being a learned person, then they're going to do that, and I think they're going to thrive. And I think the ones that continue down the path of sort of a [inaudible] are going to suffer.  

Sarah [00:38:57] Thank you so much for coming here and talking about all this and the work that you do. And thank you for your book. I still think about it. I still think about the Democratic Socialists doing car repair workshops to serve the constituency in their party. I think about day cares, I think about it all the time. I think it's such a contribution to our political environment. And, again, I'm going to email you [inaudible] audit that course next time you teach it.  

Eitan Hersh [00:39:20] Sounds good. Okay. So nice talking to you.  

Sarah [00:39:22] Thank you.  

[00:39:23] Music Interlude.  



[00:39:32] Alise, welcome to Outside of Politics. It's a big week for those of us who care about clothes.  

Alise Napp [00:39:37] It is a big week and I would like to say I do care about clothes, but I care more about other people's clothes. I'm a mom of a toddler so everything becomes instantly stained the moment I put-- I had mustard on my shirt before 7:30 a.m. the other morning. So there's something really lovely about seeing other people in just gorgeous, innovative fashion on the steps of the Met.  

Sarah [00:40:02] Well, and I just love all those reels that are, like, me judging the fashion from the Met. And it's like people like slovenly in their sweatpants eating Cheetos, but like, "Oh, I don't think that worked for her.  

Alise Napp [00:40:14] That's basically what I was doing.  

Sarah [00:40:16] I do feel like we have entered a new phase. This felt experimental fashion-wise in a way it has-- I know that Jared Leto came dressed as a cat last year, I get that. But it just felt so structural. I mean, when you have to be picked up at the steps because your dress is made of sand and you can't actually walk up the steps, we've entered a new phase here, friends.  

Alise Napp [00:40:43] I think that's right. I think people have been playing in the edges of this for a little while. But the theme this year-- or I guess rather the dress code, right? Because the Met Gala is actually a fundraiser for the Costume Institute and it is the moment of the year where they're kicking off a new exhibit. And this year's exhibit/the theme of the gala was Sleeping Beauty's Reawakening Fashion because they got out these old clothes that can't be worn and how they restore them. And anyway, whatever. 

Sarah [00:41:10] That means you Kim Kardashian can't wear them either. I know you like to wear old shit that shouldn't be worn, but whatever.  

Alise Napp [00:41:14] That's right. But we're going to invite her and her unnaturally tiny waist anyway. But the dress code, which is technically different, was a garden of time. Which they clarified was taking inspiration from a short story from the 60s. And The New York Times has a really good piece about this that I'll link in the show notes. But basically it's the short story about these aristocrats and their garden and kind of the peasants are coming for them. I'm really reducing this down. My masters literature teachers would be horrified. But the peasants are coming for them, and so they they pluck these flowers to try and turn back time, and they end up turning into statues. And when you know that, all of a sudden you know things about the-- all the beige, which I will say, I did not love all the beige, it really does start to call to this idea of stone and time. And I think to take all this back to your original point, they entered a new phase. I think they gave them more to work with this year. Last year was just, hey, let's, do Karl; come as this cat. And this year I feel like giving them a story to work within really opened up some paths for creativity.  

Sarah [00:42:27] They actually read it or at least their stylist did. I'm excited about that. I love homework. I love homework for a fashion piece. And, look, there's already reels that are like, we're in dystopia. And it's contrasting some of the headlines around the suffering around the world with the Met Gala. To which I say, you're extremely online. Go take a break. Maybe go engage in the Drake Kendrick Lamar feud, which seems to be an outlet for everybody right now. Because, of course, there is enormous suffering in the world. And, of course, there is also enormous beauty and art in the world that sometimes costs a lot of money. And I don't think that's new. I don't think it's something to be fixed. I think that they can coexist. And so watching the way that they pulled through this theme-- which I think we can all agree in day one. I mean, lord, both of those pieces, although I'm not in favor of the eyebrows, we're not going back there. That was just for costume, guys.  

Alise Napp [00:43:21] No more skinny eyebrows.  

Sarah [00:43:22] Do but not be influenced. You can't go back. You can't retrain them. So she definitely had some prosthetic cover. Like, just don't do it. Be influenced by lots of other things. If you want to wear beige, I'll even give in to that. But don't be influenced by the eyebrows because the over plucking you can't come back, guys.  

Alise Napp [00:43:40] Look, her fashion, she works with the stylist Law Roach. And what they do together is just a masterclass. Like what she has shown up wearing to the Dune press tour, what she showed wearing to the Challengers press tour, like girl knows the two of them together she can wear anything and they know how to work a theme. And so what a perfect team to show up and dress her to work together for the Met Gala where the theme is the whole point-- well, it's not the whole point. I do want to say I did see someone online complaining about how well we can't see the intricate beading in the picture, so what's the point? And it's like, well, the point is that this is a room full of fashion people and there is an actual event and fundraiser going on. It's not just for the pictures on the stairs. That's not the main showcase.  

Sarah [00:44:24] Well, and I thought it was so interesting to me because it felt like this very intense experience of the theme, is that there were like artificial intelligence.  

Alise Napp [00:44:43] Katy Perry was gorgeous. Did you see that her mom fell for it. There was an AI version of Katy Perry on the stairs in this beautiful dress, and Katy Perry's mom texted it to her and I was like, hi--  

Sarah [00:44:53] You look amazing.  

Alise Napp [00:44:53] I didn't know you went to the Met Gala. You look great.   

Sarah [00:44:56] Well, and it was weird because immediately I was in a performance. So it was like intermission and I start pulling up Met Gala photos independent of the report and I thought, something's not right. Some of these don't look real and I can't tell. I don't know who's real and who's not, but I sensed immediately something's not right here. And in the Katy Perry ones, I thought either this is artificial intelligence or Katy Perry has been doing some things to her face because her face looked different. Which happens. No judgment, that happens. And I thought, oh, weird. And then I kept seeing this picture of Lady Gaga. Like, was she actually there? Was that real? I could never figure that out either.  

Alise Napp [00:45:33] I don't think she was there. 

Sarah [00:45:33] There was this one where she had this big structural swirl around her that fit the theme. It looked amazing, but I thought, I'm seeing the same pose over and over again. I haven't seen her moving on the red carpet. Is that real? I couldn't tell. I don't know. I just felt like, well, our garden of time has now been disrupted by artificial intelligence. So this feels applicable in weirdly on theme to me as well.  

Alise Napp [00:46:00] I mean, look, it is interesting because there's a little bit of meta narrative going on when the theme is about like the peasants rising up against the aristocrats. I mean, it's like that one year where Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wore the dress that said eat the rich or whatever. It's like they do lean in sometimes I think to a little bit of tongue in cheek of like, we know what this looks like and we're still going to celebrate our industry.  

Sarah [00:46:26] So she wasn't there. I just googled it.  I knew it. I knew that one wasn't right and I knew the Katy Perry one wasn't right. And so I feel good about my being able to spot artificial intelligence.  

Alise Napp [00:46:35] But, man, what an indictment that we really do need some marker just to note that something is made with AI.  

Sarah [00:46:41] Yeah, it was an interesting year, I think, where you could see like, okay, well, this is both-- you know what it is? It's almost like a breakthrough for the Met Gala, which I feel like got the most pre- coverage, current coverage. I feel like this is the first time they talked about, like, this is actually the fundraiser for this institute for the whole year. They do not get any funding. They felt better reporting about it. And this breakthrough where artificial intelligence was presenting ones that tricked people, it just was a breakthrough moment on very many levels.  

Alise Napp [00:47:10] Yeah. And you know what? It's just fun. Like, it's fun to see not just an event where people come super dressed up because we see that. We see red carpets for various other events, but it is fun to have this extra layer of challenge and theme. And what does this mean to you? And just allow people to play within their profession in a way that even in a creative profession, I think a lot of those designers probably really, really enjoy.  

Sarah [00:47:38] Well, and I like that it is separate from an awards ceremony, so we're not presenting ourselves as a nominee or perhaps a winner. We really just get to go full tilt into the experimental component of this and the structural nature of so many of these pieces. And, look, sit down and enjoy some planet Earth and watch the birds strut and watch animals sort of decorate themselves. This is not capitalism, friends. This is just evolution. This is a thing creatures of all species do, which is beautify themselves in a multitude of ways to draw attention. And to me it's like this is just a basic thing that we do, not just humans, but all species in some form or fashion-- no pun intended. Or maybe pun intended. And so I love it. I think it's cool and interesting and beautiful and fascinating, and it does influence us. Whether you care about the Met Gala at all, what happened there will influence you. I can pull up the speech from Devil Wears Prada where she talks about her blue sweater, but it's like it really matters and it happened so quickly now because of the internet, social media, how fast that sort of trickle down will happen.  

Alise Napp [00:49:03] Yeah. My only complaint I'd like to watch this year is it felt like we were missing the millennial celebrity set. Like there were the Gen Z, younger celebs, and there were a lot of older celebs there this year. That's great. Where were my people? Where were the celebs in their 30s? They were also home with their toddlers scrolling the pictures on Instagram.  

Sarah [00:49:21] Well, Taylor was busy. She's in Paris. I think she's done with Paris.   

Alise Napp [00:49:25] No, Paris starts last night.  

Sarah [00:49:28] Okay, so she's busy. And I didn't feel like I knew who the hosts were. Usually I always know who the hosts were. The hosts get a lot of press coverage. I have no idea who the host for this year was.  

Alise Napp [00:49:36] Well, it was it was Anna Wintour, so that makes sense. And J. Lo, who wore a version of what she's worn to every event for the last like five years, just like a silvery, sparkly body suit situation type thing.  

Sarah [00:49:47] I want to give a shout out to all those men in the tuxes who were pulling out Jennifer Lopez's dress, displaying all the dresses that were huge. I mean, oh my gosh, Cardi B's--  

Alise Napp [00:50:00] Cardi B's also was awesome. And the jewelry she was wearing. 

Sarah [00:50:04] And Tyler whose dress was made of sand. It was like a sand sculpture. And they were literally like dead lifting her up the steps. Those men, I don't know their official titles, I hope they get paid well because they did the work for those beautiful pictures and for all the women in these gowns. And there were lots of men in incredible outfit too. Stupid man. Those men in the tuxes on the steps doing all the work for the red carpet, shout out to y'all.  

Alise Napp [00:50:31] For sure. And, look, I love when the men actually play too. Bad Bunny was one of the other hosts and he really went with the theme. Chris Hemsworth was the other host and he did not really try.  

Sarah [00:50:40] He didn't. Yeah. Get it together, Chris.  

Alise Napp [00:50:43] Come on. You're one of the hosts.  

Sarah [00:50:44] I know you're getting through life on that phase, which fair, but come on, step it up, buddy.  

Alise Napp [00:50:49] But it is fun to see a space where men are really getting to start to experiment with fashion. Again, the leading edge of culture, right? They've been experimenting with fashion in a way there for years that has now bled into other spaces and red carpets and events. It's the forefront of creative minds for fashion. And it's just so fun.  

Sarah [00:51:10] Yeah, I think it's fascinating and endlessly fun. And we look forward to hearing about all your favorite looks from the Met Gala. Thank you so much to Eitan Hersh for joining us today. Thank you to all of you who have joined us over on Substack. Make sure and subscribe so you get the new issue today. We send an email every Friday. We will be back in your ears on Tuesday, and until then, have the best weekend available to you.  

[00:51:30] Music Interlude. 

Sarah: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. 

Beth: Alise Napp is our managing director. Maggie Penton is our director of Community Engagement. 

Sarah: Xander Singh is the composer of our theme music with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima. 

Beth: Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

Executive Producers: Martha Bronitsky. Ali Edwards. Janice Elliott. Sarah Greenup. Julie Haller. Tiffany Hasler. Emily Holladay. Katie Johnson. Katina Zuganelis Kasling. Barry Kaufman. Katherine Vollmer. Laurie LaDow. Lily McClure. Linda Daniel. The Pentons. Tracey Puthoff. Sarah Ralph. Jeremy Sequoia. Katie Stigers. Karin True. Onica Ulveling. Nick and Alysa Villeli. Amy Whited. Emily Helen Olson. Lee Chaix McDonough. Morgan McHugh. Jen Ross. Sabrina Drago. Becca Dorval. Christina Quartararo. Shannon Frawley. Jessica Whitehead. Samantha Chalmers. Crystal Kemp. Megan Hart. The Lebo Family. The Adair Family. 

Sarah: Jeff Davis. Melinda Johnston. Michelle Wood. Nichole Berklas. Paula Bremer and Tim Miller.

Alise NappComment