The Dissidents

In this week's podcast, Mike and Elizabeth discuss research on leadership and stress.  In what may at first seem like counterintuitive findings, military and government leaders had lower levels of the stress related hormone cortisol than non-leaders. A sense of control was a significant mediator of anxiety and stress. We talk about contemporary labor relations and social applications of the fi...

Welcome to a new series of the Dissidents Podcast with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and...

In this week's podcast Elizabeth and Mike talk with Lee Jussim about the new "Princeton Principles for a Campus Culture of Free Inquiry."  Lee, distinguished professor of psychology at Rutgers, joined an interdisciplinary group of professors from many institutions in creating a set of principles that offer contemporary guidelines for the revitalization of higher education's core...

Welcome to a special “Liberal Conversations Series” of the Dissidents Podcast.  In this series we invite guests who have resources, ideas, and viewpoints that will challenge us to reflect on liberal values, what they are, how they are applied, their impact on us as individuals, and why they matter for the larger communities in which we live.   In this episode, Brandy Shufutinsky and Elizabeth Spie...

In this week's episode Mike and Elizabeth discuss the group based emotions we experience as a result of our membership in, or identification with, a group. The article we chose focuses on the motivations for those emotions: first, it feels good to feel like we belong, and second, experiencing group emotions enhances our sense of connectedness. We discuss the good and the bad of group emotions,...

Welcome to a new series of the Dissidents Podcast with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and...

In this week's episode Mike and Elizabeth discuss the ease with which we engage in outgroup accusations and denunciations, use language that divides us, and even accept accusations of conspiracy without skepticism. After being alerted to one potential conspiracy to indoctrinate children, we did a deep dive into UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and t...

Welcome to a special “Liberal Conversations Series” of the Dissidents Podcast.  In this series we invite guests who have resources, ideas, and viewpoints that will challenge us to reflect on liberal values, what they are, how they are applied, their impact on us as individuals, and why they matter for the larger communities in which we live.   This week, Zander Keig and Elizabeth Spievak discuss t...

In this week's episode Mike and Elizabeth discuss the motivation to appear moral without incurring the losses that may accompany actually behaving morally (like being thought of as a cheater or liar).  In one paper, researchers showed that in order to appear fair in the eyes of others, participants engaged in social deception to disguise their selfish behavior.  In another paper, participants...

In this week's episode Mike and Elizabeth talk about getting comfortable with discomfort.  We discuss a series of studies in which people who were prompted to seek discomfort as a sign of growth and learning demonstrated increased willingness to engage in challenging activities.  Some spent more time on improvisational exercises, others read more about COVID 19, gun violence, or opposing polit...

Welcome to a new series of the Dissidents Podcast with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and...

Welcome to a new series of the Dissidents Podcast with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and...

In this episode Mike and Elizabeth discuss the idealistic hopes of utopianism and the difficulties of implementing them in real life.  Mike covers philosophy, and Elizabeth includes references to some famous psychologists who suggested that their field would be at the center of successful utopian community life. We connect utopianism to current politics and communism. Podcast notes: Nagel, T. (199...

During this week's episode, Mike and Elizabeth discuss a unique study in which, over the course of a week, 5 co authors agreed to be ostracized by the other 4, each for 1 day.  The authors documented their experiences of being targets and perpetrators. Despite  foreknowledge and consent, the co authors reported feeling rejected, confused and guilty. Their work and personal relationships were s...

Welcome to a new series of the Dissidents Podcast with your co-hosts, Jennifer Richmond and Brandy Shufutinsky. In this series we explore the radical roots of liberated ethnic studies, how extreme ideology is infiltrating our schools with the aim to indoctrinate instead of educate, and our search for solutions to empower parents, teachers and students, giving them the tools to embrace inquiry and...

In this week's episode, Mike and Elizabeth discuss a recent article on cancel culture. The title of the article, "Blame, then shame," reflects the author's findings that assessment of personal character followed cancellation decisions and demands for apology.  Few participants were interested in debating diverse perspectives.  We talk about what the study's methods and result...

In this week's episode, Mike and Elizabeth talk with Wilfred Reilly, Associate Professor of Political Science at Kentucky State University and author of  Hate Crime Hoax: How the Left is Selling a Fake Race War  and  Taboo: 10 Facts You Can't Talk About.   We discuss COVID learning loss, affirmative action, race, culture, what modern quantitative methods reveal about privilege, and how to...

In this week's  ⁠Dissidents Podcast⁠  Mike Burke and Elizabeth Spievak have their second conversation with Winkfield Twyman, Jr. & Jennifer Richmond about their new book Letters in Black and White. In this episode they explore their debate over Wink’s suggestion of creating a common American identity premised on “Old Americans” and Jen’s criticism that this would be seen as “Sidestepping H...

In this week's episode, Mike and Elizabeth talk with Ken Pope, CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. Ken had a 34 year career in the US Army, consulting and academia.  While in uniform, he served in a variety of Foreign Area Officer assignments in Russia, Europe, the Middle East, and Central America. He had over 12 years of operational fieldwork with a variety of assignments in...

In this second episode about moral identity, Mike and Elizabeth talk about whether threats to ingroup image, specifically the image some liberal leaning whites might prefer to hold about themselves, could prompt dissociation with their ingroup.  The authors of the article we chose believe so, and that this dissociation might be good for social justice causes, but Mike and Elizabeth aren’t so sure....

In this first of two episodes about moral identity, Mike and Elizabeth discuss the possibility that the outrage emblematic of cancel culture may not always be the prosocial justice-focused emotion that the activists claim. Moral outrage might also be used to enhance personal beliefs about moral character.  The research we discuss in this podcast suggests that reminders of personal moral failings i...

In this week’s podcast, cohosts Mike and Elizabeth discuss the tension between the free flow of information and censorship that is ostensibly practiced to assure the well-being of society.  We talk about an article that focuses on how the spirit of patriotism often motivates journalists, citizens, and other information gatekeepers, to practice self-censorship.  The author is focused on factually b...

In this week’s podcast, cohosts Mike and Elizabeth discuss how our perceptions of public opinion influence what we are willing to express, which in turn influences the perceptions and willingness of others to speak up (hence the “spiral” of self-censorship). We talk about why political self-silencing creates challenges that can undermine a well-functioning democracy and the results of a qualitativ...

In the second of two podcasts about personality, Mike and Elizabeth discuss a series of experimental studies that linked a group of traits often referred to as the “dark triad” (Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy) to claims of victimhood and virtue signaling.   We talk about the validity of the dark triad as a construct and the suggestion that those who score high in dark triad traits may b...

This is Letters in Black & White, a short series of the Dissidents Podcast, introducing ideas from the newly released book, Letters in Black and White: A New Correspondence on Race in America. Today's guest is Samuel Hayes III, a Chief Facilities Officer at the College of William and Mary. Sam was responsible for connecting Wink to his Twyman deep roots via the magic of genetic genealogy....