Where There's Woke

Part 1 of 2. The Department of Education in the state of Oklahoma recently announced that in their search for teachers to address an ongoing shortage in their schools, they'd be partnering with a conservative "edutainment" entity to develop a test to make sure teachers coming from blue states aren't too "woke." Lydia tells us more about this story and we take the JUST RELEASED test to see if we ca...

Part 2 of 2. Andrew Sullivan continues his screed and we continue to tear it apart. But Lydia won't let us leave on an angry note, so she shares her experience attending San Francisco Pride this year - her first Pride EVER! **If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to lydia@seriouspod.com .** Please pretty please consider...

Part 1 of 2. The New York Times unveiled an opinion piece by Andrew Sullivan that basically talked all about how the LGBTQ+ community have gone too far - DURING PRIDE MONTH. We go through this outrageous op-ed and debunk his claims and logic in true WTW fashion. **If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to lydia@seriouspod...

An unsurprising figure is involved in the current battle between Harvard University and the federal government, and he has come out to EXPOSE Harvard's racist and discriminatory practices by sharing a "trove" of internal documents they don't want you to see. Lydia walks us through what these documents are, how things escalated to this point, and what Christopher Rufo wants us to think it all means...

Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr. and his second-in-command, Mr. Brain Worm, have appointed a real piece of work to lead the supposed "autism study" that HHS is conducting; and we had to call in for backup as we take on these anti-vaxxers: Dr. Jenessa Seymour! Jenessa takes us on a deep dive about David Geier and tells us all about the way he's approached science, ethics, and human being...

Karen Attiah , columnist with The Washington Post , was looking forward to teaching her second iteration of the Race, Media, and International Affairs course she developed for Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, when it was abruptly cancelled - with no explanation as to why. We chat with her about the inaugural session of the course in an environment where the Israel-...

Every year, tens of thousands of people run the Boston Marathon, and this year the Right had a bone to pick with one particular participant; we'll give you one guess what the bone was. Independent journalist Frankie de la Cretaz started asking some questions when this popped up in their algorithm, and after seeing their debunking journey in their newsletter , we had to have them on! If you enjoy o...

Part 2 of DOGE's scam-extraordinaire! We dig into the last few claims from the article in The Federalist , as well as some bonus propaganda that Lydia picked up on in the interview. The Limestone Mine If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to lydia@seriouspod.com . Please pretty please consider becoming a patron at patreo...

Lydia watched the DOGE interview on Fox News so the rest of us didn't have to. In it, Musk and his posse make some "shocking" claims about the fraud and waste they're identifying in the federal government. Lydia gives us a deep dive debunk to call out the falsehoods, the misleading statements, and the straight propaganda this "charm offensive" spewed on national television. Part 1 of 2. Revolving...

Representative Jasmine Crockett made an offensive joke about Governor Abbott's disability. The right pretended to care all of a sudden, and it seems that much of the left has decided they don't care. What should we, the woke police, think about this? How should we react? What should we expect from Democrats and each other? **If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can a...

For like... 20 minutes... Megyn Kelly told an upside down world version of the Lively/Baldoni feud. There's a reason conservatives are very interested in this story, and I'll give you a hint it rhymes with pisogyny. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to   lydia@seriouspod.com . Please pretty please consider becoming a...

We complete our Blake Lively Hatestorm Debunk by looking at some fun comparisons. What happens when celebrities who are men happen to have a bad interview, or have a damning tape released of their bad behavior? How does it stack up to a woman who said, "Congratulations on your  little bump!" Equal crime, equal time? I think you know the answer. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-st...

Hey folks, big announcement!!! Our podcast, Gavel Gavel , is now available to the public! No longer is it only available on Patreon! This series on GG, we'll be covering the Blake Lively/Justin Baldoni legal battle. It is so fascinating for a million reasons. But this is a unique and standalone WTW episode, don't worry! The Blake Lively hatestorm that happened (Lydia will catch you up if you're no...

To this administration and this moment. Today we discuss how Harmeet Dhillon plans to not just ruin the Civil Rights Division of the DoJ, but to actively point it in reverse. Lydia breaks it down for us, and along the way we learn about so many things we didn't appreciate enough while we had them. DOJ's Fulton County Jail Investigation , November 2024 Dhillon's piece in Hillsdale College's Imprimi...

That's right, the woke are coming for YOUR Dungeons and Dragons! Look behind you, they're already here! These new woke rules are ruining the game and are actually the racists if you really think about it. Or maybe not and it's the same story of every fake woke controversy? We're not sure because we aren't NERDS*, so we invited an actual expert who is a huge nerd and host of an amazing DnD podcast,...

This is the best. It's just the best. Elon Musk is so pathetic that he tried to fake being a world class gamer, only to completely humiliate himself when he live-streamed himself gaming. Look, it's a dark day for our country as Trump is inaugurated, so treat yourself to something nice. A DOUBLE episode on Elon's catastrophic and very public failure, and with special guest Noah Lugeons! Please pret...

Emily Sturge of Campus Reform is on the case, folks. Under her watch, the National Institute of Health will never misspend another dollar ever again. Lydia debunks the outrage from the Campus Reform article outlining 10 "outrageous" scientific inquiries funded with taxpayer money that the Right wants DOGE to "investigate." Shrimp on treadmills Crab on treadmills Louchébem - Parisian Butcher langua...

This episode also could be called "Jerry Coyne is wrong and a liar." The FFRF published Jerry Coyne's anti-trans lies and then had to apologize. I was going to talk about that and the nature of inadequate apologies, but then I saw one of the claims in Coyne's piece and I HAD to debunk it. The fact that it comes from the UN shows how pernicious and extensive the anti-trans misinformation has become...

The Right Wing media ecosystem is all over Lydia's alma mater, San Jose State University, for a very unserious (surprise) reason: volleyball. Lydia breaks down the "controversy" for us. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to   lydia@seriouspod.com . Please pretty please consider becoming a patron at  patreon.com/wheret...

It is very unfortunate that we weren't able to release this 4th and final part of Trump's MSG rally before the election, because a lot of the analysis was extremely prescient. But it is perhaps even more relevant now, because it features several characters who will be a part of the incoming fascism. And then, of course, the Führer himself. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star re...

A series of amoral grifters each more grifty than the last. Tulsi Gabbard, Tucker Carlson (who sounds INSANE), Terry Bollea, RFK Jr., and somehow more. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to   lydia@seriouspod.com . Please pretty please consider becoming a patron at  patreon.com/wherethereswoke !

It's part 2 of the Trump Madison Square Garden NYC rally, and this one features the funniest thing to ever happen on any of my shows, as we had a very special guest call in short notice! If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-star review! You can always email questions, comments, and leads to   lydia@seriouspod.com . Please pretty please consider becoming a patron at  patreon.com/where...

Part 1! Lydia watched 6 hours of this "not a Nazi" rally to drill down to the highlights (lowlights?) among the speakers, who may very well hold positions in a Trump administration if he's elected. There are hilarious moments, and also quite a lot of really horrible racism and misogyny that we can't allow to be swept under the rug. Please vote. If you enjoy our work, please consider leaving a 5-st...

We interrupt our Yale Law series because this election has us too stressed the f$#% out. It seemed like we'd be ok. It seemed like we were going to win. Now the polls do not look good. What changed? I wanted to talk about the very real possibility that in a few short days, MAGA fascists will have won control of... everything. Absolutely everything. The Presidency, Congress, and of course the Supre...

This is -sort of- part 8 of our series, Jon Ronson's Things Fell Apart Falls Apart S2E6 of Things Fell Apart has yet more anti-woke propaganda and credulous reporting. But before we even get to the meat of that, Ronson plays a few audio clips of some anti-woke scare stories. I decided it would be a good idea to focus on those and do some side quests, which are also still relevant to his BS framing...