Hello, dear listeners. I wanted to re-release this episode because we originally put it out right before the 2020 election, and it feels even more relevant on the eve of the 2024 election than it did four years ago.

Like in the previous two presidential races, words like fascist and fascism

are being thrown around a lot and not without good reason. This interview with political philosopher

Jason Stanley, author of the book How Fascism Works and Professor of Philosophy at Yale University can help us understand

how countries slide into authoritarian systems through propaganda and conspiracy theories

made to manipulate ideas of gender, race, and national values, and to demonize others,

whether they be leftist radicals, academics,

immigrants, queer people, Muslim or Jewish people, whichever villain of the moment will fuel

the most outrage, and thus the most action on behalf of those who say they are the only ones

who can save the true patriots.

As Jason will explain, fascism is not as much a destination as it is a process, one that plays out in different iterations all over the world, but still expresses the same set of values and tactics. This has long been one of our most

popular episodes because it acts, I think, as a good primer to understand how we got to where we

are today, how truth has been systematically eroded in favor of fantasy, and how masses of

people can be manipulated through false stories

and a promise of a better future that will lead to anything but. I'm your host, Chelsea Weber

Smith, and this is American hysteria. Thank you so much, Jason, for coming on the show. It's truly an honor. Thanks so much, Chelsea. It's a

terrific program and podcast you have a vital task you're doing. Well, thank you. I feel the same way

about you. So on that note, as I was reading how fascism works, I was really shocked by how much your content aligned with

American hysteria and how all these different themes that we'd been tying together, all these

different types of panics against different types of people and different types of situations.

I didn't really know that I was kind of talking about the process of fascism,

keyword being process, right?

...