UnHerd with Freddie Sayers

Latest Episodes:

World expert Dr. Pavel Podvig: How likely is a nuclear war? May 20, 2022

Show notes

Freddie Sayers meets Pavel Podvig.

Since the invasion of Ukraine, the outcome that nobody has wanted to contemplate is that of Russian nuclear escalation. Threats that “mirror moves” would be made by the Kremlin if NATO expanded, as we heard in last week’s interview with UN representative for Russia Dmitry Polyanskiy, suggest that a strike might not be out of the question. With Finland and Sweden seeking to join NATO, is nuclear war more likely now that it was three months ago? By trying to push Vladimir Putin to the brink, is the West actually increasing the chance of a nuclear incident? What actually is the sequence of events that would lead to nuclear conflict?

To help us think through this difficult topic, UnHerd invited Dr. Pavel Podvig to the studio. Podvig is a senior researcher in the WMD programme at the Institute for Disarmament Research and a researcher with the programme on science and global security at Princeton University. He runs the world’s premier website dedicated to analysing Putin’s nuclear capability and edited the definitive encyclopedia of Russian nuclear forces. Dr. Podvig joined Freddie Sayers live from his office in Geneva.

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Prof. Michael Sandel: Why the elites don’t deserve their status May 16, 2022

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Freddie Sayers meets Michael Sandel.

Do we deserve what we have? Are the elites any better than the rest of us? Do the right people get to run the world?

One political philosopher who attempts to tackle these big questions is Professor Michael Sandel. A Harvard professor since the 1980s and world famous author of many bestselling books, including 'What Money Can't Buy', and most recently, 'The Tyranny of Merit', Sandel has made the case for overhauling Western neoliberalism. The alternative society Sandel suggests is more forgiving of failure and confers cultural status onto building community rather than capital.

In a wide-ranging conversation with Freddie Sayers, Sandel explores how elite institutions from the Ivy League to Wall Street have given us the wrong idea about who deserves power.

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Kremlin Spokesman: "There is no war in Ukraine" May 12, 2022

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Freddie Sayers meets Dmitriy Polyanskiy.

First Deputy Representative of Russia to the UN Dmitry Polyanskiy joins Freddie Sayers to discuss the nuclear threat against NATO members and possible conclusions to the conflict in Ukraine.

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Curtis Yarvin: Why America should become a monarchy May 08, 2022

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Former computer programmer and political theorist Curtis Yarvin is considered by many to be a dangerous thinker. He has been named in the New York Times and Vanity Fair as a founding member of the burgeoning 'New Right' and caused a stir on Tucker Carlson.

His theories of power seem to have made their way from the fringe blogosphere into the mainstream media. Now, people are trying to make sense of some of what Yarvin wants for the Western nations he criticises and where his thinking might go next.

One particularly bold claim made by Yarvin is that America would be better run as a monarchy, rather than a democracy.

To dig deeper into this esoteric political philosophy, Freddie Sayers invited Curtis Yarvin to the UnHerd studio.

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Danish professor: mRNA vaccine study sends 'danger signals' May 03, 2022

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Freddie Sayers meets Professor Christine Stabell Benn.

A new Danish study reveals disparities in all-cause mortality between mRNA and adenovirus vaccines. The results raise some difficult questions about the unexpected effects of the most popular COVID vaccines. Freddie Sayers speaks to the study's author Prof. Christine Stabell-Benn, from the University of Southern Denmark, to find out more.

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Douglas Murray: The gullible Right has fallen for Putin Apr 25, 2022

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Freddie Sayers discusses the backlash against Western values with Douglas Murray

When Douglas Murray was writing his new book The War on the West, Putin had not yet launched an actual war on the edge of Europe. Now, two months after the invasion of Ukraine, has the battle of ideas he writes about been put into perspective?

Freddie Sayers speaks to Douglas Murray about the factions of the Right who have been fooled by Putin’s ‘woke West’ propaganda and why the war in Ukraine is not the wake-up call we might have expected.

Thanks to Douglas for returning to the channel. His new book, The War on the West, is out now.

Read the post article here: https://unherd.com/thepost/douglas-murray-t…fallen-for-putin/

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Michael Tracey: When does anti-war become pro-Putin? Apr 19, 2022

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Freddie Sayers meets Michael Tracey.

Since the start of the war in Ukraine, Western media has been overwhelmed with support for Zelensky's resistance and condemnation of Putin's invasion. Intervention from the US and Europe has now extended to supplying arms and sanctioning Russia. Some are demanding this support goes even further, suggesting 'no fly zones' or boots on the ground in Ukraine.

Journalist, Substacker and Twitter provocateur Michael Tracey takes a very different view. Despite initially condemning the invasion in February, he has since committed his time to exposing what he calls the 'proxy warmongering’ of Western powers.

Michael Tracey joins Freddie Sayers in the UnHerd studio to discuss why he is so critical of Western intervention in Ukraine and why he refuses to be labelled a Putin apologist.

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Sergej Sumlenny: "Get ready for the break up of Russia" Apr 11, 2022

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Freddie Sayers meets Sergej Sumlenny.

As the war in Ukraine has become more entrenched, there has been much discussion of the small Eastern European states which might be annexed into the Russian Federation.

One political scientist and journalist has taken a different view. Sergej Sumlenny is Russian-born, but lives in Berlin. On Twitter he predicted that rather than expanding, Russia was due to dramatically contract. Might he be right? In principle, Sumlenny argues, Russia's many ethnic states are perfectly poised for secession, some with long histories of agitation and others with a newfound resentment of Moscow in light of the war.

To understand how this split could play out in practice Freddie Sayers invited him to talk UnHerd through the end of the Russian Federation and asks - what happens next?

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Inside China's Zero Covid Camp Apr 07, 2022

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The biggest city in China is in complete lockdown, with no end date in sight. Cases are rising and the 26 million residents of Shanghai are not permitted to leave their homes at all — not even to buy groceries or walk the dog. Footage has emerged of eerily deserted streets, but reliable information about what is really going on inside the strictest “Zero Covid” regime in the world is hard to come by, owing to the Chinese Communist Party’s control of the media.

Now for the first time, UnHerd can reveal the reality of life inside the vast mandatory quarantine facility in Shanghai, erected within the Expo conference centre, to which infected individuals are sent.

Jane Polubotko is a Ukrainian national who has lived in Shanghai for 9 years, working for a Chinese music technology company as a marketing manager. On March 26th she felt slightly unwell, so went for a Covid test — a routine occurrence as her office is currently testing every two days. The next day she was contacted to say that the results were “abnormal,” and an emergency health vehicle appeared at her block of flats to pick her up. There was no paperwork and she didn’t know where she was going.

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Yanis Varoufakis: It's mad to think Ukraine can win Apr 05, 2022

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Commentators on the war in Ukraine seem to have come to a consensus: public figures have a moral responsibility not to challenge anything other than the Russian narrative.

This rejection of balance in favour of propaganda poses a problem for political thinkers like Yanis Varoufakis, who has been accused of 'Westsplaining' and being a Putin apologist in the last week alone.

To give this controversial conversation a chance, Varoufakis joined Freddie Sayers for a wide-ranging discussion about Western pressure on Russia and finding a space for debate in what feels like a binary moment.

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