LIVELaura Flanders & Friends - Masha Gessen & Jason Stanley: Is it Doomsday for U.S. Democracy?
What will it take to reject fascism, before it's too late? Masha Gessen and Jason Stanley are two leading experts on autocracy, and they're sounding the alarm. They and their families have escaped totalitarian regimes and oppressive governments; today Gessen and Stanley are pulling back the curtain on the attacks against DEI, trans bodies, civil rights, higher education and more. Is authoritarianism here? Masha Gessen is an acclaimed Russian-American journalist, a Polk Award winning opinion writer for the NY Times and the author of "Surviving Autocracy" as well as "The Future is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia", which won a National Book Award. Forced to leave Russia twice, in 2024, a Moscow court convicted them, in absentia to eight years in prison for their reporting on the war in Ukraine. Jason Stanley is a best selling author and professor whose books include "Erasing History" and "How Fascism Works". He recently left his teaching position at Yale University to relocate to Canada with his family; noting that he is a child of Jewish refugees who fled Nazi Germany. In this historic conversation - the first interview between Gessen and Stanley - the two explore how to be bold in our movements and envision a multi-ethnic democracy. Plus, a commentary from Laura. "Trump has proposed a revived empire, a return to an imaginary past. The Democrats have proposed the way things are now, which are deeply unsatisfying and horribly anxiety provoking for a very large number of people. So we need a vision of a future that is more appealing than the imaginary past." - Masha Gessen; "What I see now is this regime shifting the self understanding of America, from having these democratic ideals . . . God knows they've been imperfect, to a self identity as loving the United States because we've had these great men in our past, and we've conquered the West, and we can punch you in the nose. And that's not a democratic project. That's like what Putin is doing in Russia." - Jason Stanley.
Series Website: https://www.lauraflanders.org
Recent and Upcoming Airings
11.35/4 6:00 am 11.25/4 10:30 am