Weird Little Guys

There are a lot of made up reasons for eating an all-meat diet. Steak won't cure your cancer and it probably wasn't that effective at preventing death from diarrhea during the Civil War. As we enter the season of gluttony, let's take a brief tour of the history of guys who think you should be eating WAY more meat. Sources & Further Reading: Salisbury, James (1888). The Relation of Alimentation...

Molly talks to Adam Becker about his book, More Everything Forever See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A final look at the Pioneer Fund's attempt to use racist pseudoscience to overturn the Brown v Board of Education Supreme Court decision. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of E...

Knowledge Fight Country is a platform where Dan Friesen and his guests can chew over the biggest and best ideas being disseminated in right wing media. Through a focus on Alex Jones and figures similar to him, this show will provide a humorous and fun layer on top of discussing the context on why liars lie and how they do it. Listen  here and subscribe to Knowledge Fight Country on the iHeart...

We're revisiting two classic Weird Little Guys episodes from last year about a white nationalist political party's attempt to get their candidate on the ballot. Third Position Original air date: 8/21/25 In 2012, a newly formed white nationalist political party tried to get their candidate on the ballot. The American Third Position Party wanted Americans to vote for Merlin Miller, but how did the p...

In the first level of Knowledge Fight Country, Dan and his guest adventurer Molly Conger set out to understand the context around Tucker Carlson's interview with a welder who is mad about algebra. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A closer look at one of the men on the Pioneer Fund's team of scientists for segregation reveals that he wasn't a scientist at all. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fund. University of Illinois Press. Jackson, John P. Jr (2005). Science for Segregation: Race, Law, and the Case Against Brown v. Board of Educati...

Last week, the DOJ's Civil Rights division announced they were moving to dismiss more than 50 desegregation cases against school districts all over the country. Like the weird little guys trying to overturn the Brown v Board of Education decision in the 1960s, the Trump administration is trying to take us all back to a version of America they think was great. Sources & Further Reading: Reardon...

In the decade after the Supreme Court's ruling in the Brown v Board of Education case, segregationists used every tool available to prevent integration. By the early 1960s, a group of Pioneer Fund-backed scientists had teamed up with the lawyer they hoped could get their pseudoscientific argument against Brown in front of a judge. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding...

Wickliffe Draper's Pioneer Fund started out in 1937 by funding screenings of Nazi propaganda films in high schools. But like most American racists, the 1954 Supreme Court decision in the Brown v Board of Education case changed how he approached the fight for white supremacy. Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The Pioneer Fu...

Sometimes when a weird little guy gets shot, the guy who killed him is just a weirder little guy. Original Air Date: 9/18/2025 Sources: Schmaltz, William H. (2000). Hate: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party. Washington, D.C.: Brassey's Schmaltz, William H. (2013). For Race And Nation: George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party. River's Bend Press Simonelli, Frederick J. (1...

In 1937, the heir to a textile manufacturing fortune established a charitable foundation to funnel money into disseminating propaganda produced in Nazi Germany. Since then, that fund has subsidized the overwhelming majority of research in the pseudoscientific field of 'race science.' Sources & Further Reading: Tucker, William (2002). The Funding of Scientific Racism: Wickliffe Draper and The P...

In 1904, men who believed in 'race science' put hundreds of people in a human zoo at the St. Louis world's fair. Today, those same racist, pseudoscientific views persist, and the men who hold them demand to be taken seriously in the name of academic freedom. Sources & Further Reading: Newkirk, Pamela (2015). Spectacle: The Astonishing Life of Ota Benga. Amistad. Saini, Angela (2019). Superior:...

In 1994, Byron de la Beckwith was finally convicted of murder for killing Medgar Evers in 1963. He died in prison, his story is over. But history repeats itself. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Story of Ju...

James talks with Molly Conger about the javelina and their installable appetite for golf courses. Sources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65x0RvhJNa8   https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2007/nov/05/conservation.sciencenews     https://zoologicalbulletin.de/BzB_Volumes/Volume_56_1_2/049_054_BzB56_1_2_Moraves_Jiri_and_B%C3%B6hme_Wolfgang.pdf    https://www.azgfd.com/w...

In 1964, crosses burned all over Mississippi, signaling a return of the Ku Klux Klan. Their big debut was perfectly timed as a show of support for Byron de la Beckwith. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Stor...

Byron de la Beckwith was tried for the same murder three times. In 1964, it just wasn't generally considered illegal for a white man to kill a black man in Mississippi. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. DeLaughter, Bobby (2001). Never Too Late: A Prosecutor’s Stor...

In the months leading up to the murder of Medgar Evers, the man who killed him was watching his world crumble. Byron de la Beckwith had dedicated his life to the cause of segregation, but it was a losing battle. The governor of Mississippi had backed down, allowing a second black student to enter Ole Miss. Governor George Wallace in Alabama backed down, too. Integration was creeping in all over. T...

In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. Segregated schools didn't react right away, but segregationists did. Within months, the Citizens' Councils began to form in counties across Mississippi. And Byron de la Beckwith was one of the group's earliest and most enthusiastic members. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portra...

Byron de la Beckwith and Medgar Evers never met. Evers didn’t even see the man who killed him. But the man and his killer grew up a hundred miles apart, fought in the same war, worked similar jobs, and were both deeply invested in the outcome over the fight for integration. Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassinatio...

It's a Weird Little Guys classic episode - the story of the Atomwaffen member who murdered two other Atomwaffen members. Stay tuned until the end for some updates to the story. Sources & Further Reading: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67075979/united-states-v-clendaniel/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71119306/united-states-v-brandon-russell/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/white-p...

This week, Molly watched Citizen Vigilante, a new film from the world's worst director. Sources & Further Reading: https://scoutmagazine.ca/remembering-gastowns-ambitious-but-doomed-modern-german-restaurant/ https://www.dailysabah.com/arts/cinema/hanau-attack-film-angers-victims-families https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/03/the-fall-of-armie-hammer-a-family-saga-of-sex-money-drugs-and-...

On the night of June 11, 1963, Byron de la Beckwith murdered Medgar Evers with a single shot. But how did he end up hiding in a bush across the street from the home of a civil rights leader? Sources & Further Reading: Massengill, Reed (2024). Portrait of a racist: Byron De La Beckwith and the Assassination of Medgar Evers. Univ. of Tennessee Press. Zinn, Howard. (1964) SNCC: The New Abolitioni...

Last week, a federal judge ordered the Department of the Interior to stop implementation of a Trump executive order that would whitewash history at National Park sites. A leaked database shows the materials that parks employees had flagged for removal. They want to 'make America great' by erasing its past. Sources & Further Reading: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/03/resto...

In 1980, Texas Klan Grand Dragon Louis Beam was running a paramilitary training camp outside of Houston. But they weren't just training klansmen for the race war. They ran a boy scout camp on the weekends. Sources and further reading: Belew, Kathleen. Bring the War Home : The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America. Harvard University Press, 2018. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/distric...