Show Notes
In the years since October 7th, the world has been bitterly polarised over how to make sense of the violence. While polling shows that a majority of people do believe Israel’s actions amount to genocide – having witnessed it with their own eyes via their smartphones – it has been woefully hard to find mainstream media outlets in the West prepared to use this language.
On Downstream this week, Aaron Bastani sat down with Indian essayist and novelist Pankaj Mishra. His most recent book, ‘The World After Gaza’ takes stock of a world order shattered by the genocide, and a media class unprepared to recognise the truth. In response to these crises, Mishra and colleagues have just launched Equator magazine, pulling together leading writers from across the globe who are unafraid to tell the truth.
When did the so-called West first begin to lose standing in the eyes of the rest of the world? Why is the British media class positioned so uniquely close to power, so delusional, and so compromised over Gaza? Will China replace America, in the coming century, as the new hegemonic power? Has it already?
More from Novara Media
Three years ago, just weeks after the genocide began, writer Omar El Akkad posted a tweet, attached to some footage showing the extent of the ruin that Israel had already visited on Gaza. The compelling thought, crystallised in that viral tweet, would go on to become the name of his bestselling book: One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This.
For a century, China underwent a series of invasions, revolutions and counter-revolutions. In China, it’s known as the Century of Humiliation.
This week marked three years since the Hamas attack of October 7th, and the beginning of the Israeli state’s genocidal onslaught against the Palestinian people. In that time, Western leaders from Joe Biden and Donald Trump to Keir Starmer and now Andy Burnham have refused to call the genocide what it is, despite the consensus of genocide scholars. One outlier among Western leaders during this period has been Humza Yousaf.
Huawei makes the pipes and cables that power the Chinese internet. Its global reach has made China into a superpower.
Are we in the era of trauma Top Trumps? ‘Lived Experience’ has become a byword for standpoint authority and progressive politics. It has allowed people from marginalised groups to speak and be heard, and forced us to confront how power plays out in interpersonal dynamics. But it has also become a way for people to brand themselves online, and excuse antisocial or even downright nasty behaviours. Has ‘lived experience’ helped the left, or turned us into self-obsessed therapy-speakers, incapable of communicating with the majority of people?