Aaron Hagey-MacKay opines on satire as sensemaking, and scenarios where we 'bend but don't break'

Aaron Hagey-MacKay opines on satire as sensemaking, and scenarios where we 'bend but don't break'

From Pretty Heady Stuff by Pretty Heady Stuff

April 28, 2026 · 1h 3m

About this episode

Aaron Hagey-MacKay discusses the role of satire in addressing hard truths and climate communication.

Aaron Hagey-MacKay is a Canadian satirist as a longtime writer for The Beaverton and host of ‪The Goose Media on YouTube. In a piece for The Tyee, Aaron writes that "satirists, like journalists and academics, are targeted by authoritarian bullies because satire deals with hard truths." In this conversation, he insists that, while he's not a journalist, he's invested in satire as an "anti-dominant strategy" that allows folks who care about the people and the public to "bully up," assailng the coldness and rabid individualism that have become fixtures of the Second Gilded Age. He doesn't believe that climate communicators have fully internalized the fact that we respond more to messages of affordability and generosity than stories of loss and pain -- though, he acknowledges that miserable stories of collapse and catastrophe have a way of capturing our attention. This is why he wants to tell stories where we "bend, but don't break," using humour and humility to poke holes in the absurd myopia of our chaotic moment. We've seen campaigns against more comfortable, livable ways of being from powerful interests. Forms of narrative capture that…

People in this episode

Guest: Aaron Hagey-MacKay

Topics covered

  • satire
  • climate action
  • communication
  • authoritarianism
  • storytelling

Keywords

  • satire
  • climate change
  • communication
  • storytelling
  • authoritarianism

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: The Beaverton, The Goose Media, The Tyee

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