Savage Minds

EJRkJKXYJbDiJ69cKu3ZIda Susser, distinguished professor of anthropology at Hunter College and the CUNY Graduate Center, examines the Gilets jaunes (Yellow Vests) movement in France as a volatile yet transformative response to the deepening crises of neoliberalism, democratic erosion, and social fragmentation across the West. Drawing on years of ethnographic fieldwork in Paris, Saint-Denis, and provincial France, Susser argues that the movement disrupted conventional political binaries by creating forms of solidarity that exceeded traditional distinctions between left and right. Through concepts such as “commoning” and “thresholding,” she describes how precarious workers, retirees, migrants, and politically disillusioned citizens forged provisional alliances grounded less in ideology than in shared experiences of dispossession, police violence, economic exclusion, and social abandonment. Susser situates the movement within a broader historical trajectory of grassroots resistance, linking the Yellow Vests to Occupy Wall Street, the Indignados, Black Lives Matter, and earlier traditions of horizontalist organizing. She explores how the protests exposed the consequences of gentrification, rural decline, and the hollowing out of public life, while simultaneously generating new forms of mutual aid, including food collectives and neighborhood support networks during lockdown. The conversation also confronts the contradictions embedded within contemporary progressive politics, including disputes surrounding feminism, immigration, populism, and state authority, as Susser reflects on the increasingly unstable boundaries between emancipatory and reactionary movements. Framing the present moment as one marked by the resurgence of authoritarian tendencies and the normalization of state repression, she argues for the urgent construction of a new “historic bloc” capable of defending democratic space through collective struggle, civic participation, and radically inclusive visions of social justice. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Peter McCullough, an internist, cardiologist, and epidemiologist, reflects on the political, medical, and social consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, arguing that the global response fundamentally altered public trust in science, medicine, and democratic institutions. Drawing on his background in cardiovascular medicine and public health, McCullough discusses studies he believes demonstrate links between mRNA vaccines and myocarditis, sudden cardiac arrest, and broader cardiovascular complications, while explaining the biological mechanisms behind troponin elevation and inflammatory damage within heart tissue. He challenges mainstream public health narratives surrounding vaccine safety, criticizing what he describes as the suppression of dissenting medical voices and the failure of institutions to adequately investigate adverse events associated with mass vaccination campaigns. Extending the discussion beyond medicine, McCullough examines the broader political and cultural atmosphere that emerged during lockdowns, including censorship, social compliance, economic devastation, and the normalization of emergency powers across Western democracies. He argues that public discourse during the pandemic was shaped by coordinated messaging between governments, media organizations, pharmaceutical companies, and global institutions, creating a climate in which skepticism toward official policy became socially and professionally dangerous. Reflecting on athlete deaths, VAERS reporting controversies, vaccine mandates, and unresolved questions surrounding the origins of COVID-19 and the Wuhan laboratory, McCullough contends that the pandemic exposed deep contradictions within modern liberal societies concerning bodily autonomy, transparency, and informed consent. Yet amid this, he points to growing public skepticism toward institutional authority, suggesting that the long-term legacy of the pandemic may ultimately be a broader reevaluation of the relationship between citizens, governments, and public health systems. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Daniel Levy, a political commentator and president of the US Middle East Project, argues that Netanyahu did not stumble into this war—he engineered it. For decades, Levy notes, successive Israeli governments tried and failed to pull the United States into a military confrontation with Iran. He traces what finally made it possible under Trump not to any coherent American strategy but to its opposite: the systematic hollowing out of the interagency process, expertise sidelined, and a small ideological cohort elevated whose interests aligned perfectly with Israeli leadership. Tracing this logic to its conclusion, Levy contends the result is a war serving Israel's ambition for regional hegemony far more than any plausible American interest. Dismantling the claim that attacking Iran was about nuclear threat management, he points out that Israel itself is an undeclared nuclear state and that Iran's supreme leader had issued a fatwa against nuclear weapons. Looking beyond the conflict, Levy asserts that any durable solution requires a decolonisation 2.0—a reckoning with the inequities of the post-colonial order. With American empire visibly fraying and Marco Rubio offering imperialism 2.0 as the alternative, he sees the burden falling squarely on middle powers and non-Western states to chart a different course. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Fiona Girkin, researcher and specialist in female dark personality traits, discusses her PhD findings on female psychopathy, covert manipulation, and the structural silencing of victims—particularly men—who suffer at the hands of toxic women. Girkin argues that female psychopaths differ fundamentally from their male counterparts in their methods: rather than overt physical aggression, they deploy relational aggression—rumour, social sabotage, gaslighting, and the cultivation of protective "posses"—making their behaviour extraordinarily difficult to prove or challenge. She introduces the concept of the "sleeper cell" psychopath: charming, likeable individuals who remain dormant until their power is threatened, then turn ruthless overnight. Her research focused on the community services sector—therapists, social workers, psychologists—where she found far more psychopathic individuals than anticipated, drawn by the covert power that caring roles confer over vulnerable people's lives. Girkin also addresses the professional backlash she faced after speaking publicly about comparable rates of male and female domestic violence, including losing her university position teaching police. She argues that feminist organisations have systematically suppressed recognition of female-perpetrated violence, leaving male victims without resources, disbelieved by courts, and vulnerable to legal weaponisation through divorce and parental alienation. Things are changing, Girkin contends, as female violence becomes less covert and harder to ignore. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, 30-year Army veteran, former Chief of Staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, and Senior Fellow at the Eisenhower Media Network, discusses the deep structural rot he believes is consuming American democracy and its military empire. Drawing on his experience from Vietnam through the Iraq WMD debacle, Wilkerson argues that the United States has become a force as much for evil as for good, and that the current war against Iran represents the most reckless and dangerous expression of that trajectory yet. He traces the unravelling of legitimate statecraft from the post-Cold War squandering of peace dividends, through 9/11 and the institutionalisation of torture under George W. Bush, to what he describes as the Caligula-like presidency of Donald Trump—whom he regards as history’s most brazen grifter and the architect of an illegal war of choice. Wilkerson raises urgent alarm about Pete Hegseth’s injection of Christian Zionist ideology into the Pentagon’s ranks, the militarisation of domestic law enforcement, the looming threat of cancelled midterm elections, and the very real spectre of a second American civil war. A searing, unflinching conversation with one of Washington’s most candid and consequential insiders. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Radhika Desai, professor of Political Studies and director of the Geopolitical Economy Research Group at the University of Manitoba, brings her historical materialist framework to bear on what she calls the “senile” or “moribund phase” of capitalism—marked by deindustrialisation, financialisation, speculative necromancy, ecological destruction, a precipitous decline in political leadership quality, and the imperial wars now ravaging Venezuela, Cuba and Iran. Desai traces the arc from Karl Marx’s monopoly phase thesis through the post-war golden age, the neoliberal turn and its miserly, punitive politics towards working people, to the present moment in which the US-Israeli war on Iran is accelerating the collapse of dollar hegemony and the everything bubble. She connects cultural neoliberalism—identity politics, DEI, pronoun politics—to a deliberate corporate strategy for generating a patina of progressivism while delivering nothing material to working people, with the professional managerial class administering this hypocritical regime. Desai addresses the BRICS question with characteristic nuance, distinguishing between countries that have genuinely rejected neoliberalism and those, like Modi’s India, whose multipolar rhetoric conceals a servile comprador relationship with Washington. Her analysis of the everything bubble, the Triffin dilemma and Iran-driven inflation carries a stark warning—when interest rates rise far enough to contain the oil shock, the dollar system will come down with them. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Michael Fox, a multimedia journalist based in Latin America with two decades of on-the-ground experience, dissects US interventions across the hemisphere—from the Monroe Doctrine’s enduring legacy and Trump’s “Dunro Doctrine” to the January 3rd invasion of Venezuela, capture of Nicolás Maduro, and parallels with the 1989 Panama operation under the guise of drug wars masking oil grabs and geopolitical plays against Cuba, Colombia, and Mexico. As host and producer of podcasts like Brazil on Fire, Stories of Resistance, and season two of Under the Shadow, Fox exposes the weaponization of AI-generated misinformation—fake crowds cheering US troops, manipulated images of Maduro’s detention—and hybrid warfare tactics that erode sovereignty while regional leaders like Gustavo Petro invoke the jaguar awakening resistance amid rightward governmental shifts in Chile, Argentina, and Honduras. Critiquing the true costs of bombings in Caracas—100 dead, millions traumatized—he contrasts mainstream narratives of “clean” tech strikes with harrowing victim testimonies from affected neighborhoods, revealing how US policies fuel migration yet demonize migrants as a boogeyman. Fox draws direct lineages to historical regime changes, puppet installations, and resource colonialism, emphasizing grassroots protests chanting “Down with the Monroe Doctrine” and Caribbean nations’ vocal opposition to boat strikes in their waters. His reporting for NPR, The Intercept, and The Nation prioritizes ground truth over viral fakes, unpacking the human toll of empire’s revival in a multipolar world. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Kajsa Ekis Ekman, a Swedish author, literary critic, and journalist, addresses the "two-front war" against women, marked by the conservative right's abortion rights backlash and the progressive left's problematic views on prostitution and gender identity. She critiques neoliberal and far-left perspectives on sex work, advocating for the term "prostitution" to highlight the dangers and exploitation within the industry, especially on platforms like OnlyFans. Ekman also discusses the global exploitation of surrogacy and calls for its ban due to the suffering of women and commodification of babies. Furthermore, she criticises the exploitation of empathy for women to justify military interventions and the selective empathy displayed by some feminists towards certain victims while ignoring others. Ekman defends feminism as a relevant force against violence and inequality, emphasising the importance of feminists focusing on the dialectical conflict between men and women and advocating for ad hoc movements and alliances to address specific issues like prostitution and surrogacy. She touches on the gendered fear-mongering used to garner support for geopolitical conflicts, the instrumentalisation of women's rights for Western agendas, and the need for feminists to hold their line and avoid conflating issues. She also reflects on the state of contemporary society, criticising the pursuit of money and fame at the expense of values and equality, drawing parallels with the Epstein scandal and the P. Diddy documentary. Finally, Ekman emphasises the need for analytical tools that fit the task at hand, arguing that feminism is not a geopolitical tool and should not be used to justify military interventions or ignore the complexities of international relations. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Ricardo Vaz, a journalist and political analyst in Venezuela, critically discusses the US operation to kidnap Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, highlighting US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s framing of the incident as a domestic law enforcement issue, despite Venezuela being outside US jurisdiction. He critiques the role of corporate media, particularly The New York Times and The Washington Post, which he argues ignored the impending US military action to protect US soldiers, demonstrating their complicity in supporting US imperialist objectives. Vaz characterizes a division within the US political landscape, noting that while Democrats opposed the execution of the kidnapping due to the lack of a plan to install Maria Corina Machado, they continue to support underlying imperial ambitions. Vaz further explores the dynamics of Venezuelan politics, highlighting the long-standing resentment from elite factions towards both Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro. He underscores the elites’ aspirations to re-establish themselves as US-aligned powers in Venezuela, illustrating their predicament where regaining control without US assistance has proven unfeasible. The ascendance of Chávez disrupted their ambitions and engendered a sense of entitlement among the elites who resented the prospect of working-class representation in government. Additionally, Vaz draws attention to the deteriorating situation in Cuba, establishing a critical link to Venezuela’s oil supply, which has been vital for Cuba’s public transportation, airline industry, and electricity generation for the past two decades. This connection emphasizes the broader implications of Venezuela’s political crisis on its regional relationships, marking it as a pivotal issue with significant socio-political ramifications. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Peter Salerno, a retired licensed psychotherapist, nationally recognised expert on personality disorders and pathological relationships, and author of The Nature and Nurture of Narcissism and Traumatic Cognitive Dissonance (2024), discusses his work in the field of narcissism. Beginning with his appearance in the Hulu documentary on Ted Bundy, Salerno rejects the claims by those who believe Bundy’s serial killing was a kind of reactive aggression, criticising those who believe Bundy’s actions were somehow a result of a childhood trauma. To the contrary, Salerno notes how Bundy was able to sustain relationships, even working on a suicide helpline, such that he was able to earn the trust of others, all while Bundy kidnapped, sexually attacked, and murdered others. Salerno draws parallels between this type of psychological assessment of serial killers and the narcissist, where there has been an inclination in the field to understand the narcissist’s aggression and control as reactive instead of proactive. Covering the genetic and biological roots behind narcissism, he highlights the scientific findings and neuroimaging that reveal the physiological underpinnings and genetic propensities towards narcissistic behaviour, noting, “This isn’t just personality. This is all psychopathology and all mental health or mental disorder.” Salerno historicises research in this field, which is rapidly changing in how it frames narcissism and its victims. For instance, he elucidates the damage that narcissists inflict upon others, what he terms “traumatic cognitive dissonance,” observing how narcissists inflict damage by “insert[ing] a dilemma inside of you, and you don’t know what’s real or not.” Evidencing how narcissists often intentionally give mixed messages, causing distress in their victims, Salerno explores how this creates a constant state of ambiguity and confusion in “a normal person who simply wants to collaborate and cooperate,” while chronicling how the trauma of narcissistic abuse plays into the victim’s goodwill as victims often attempt to understand why the narcissist would terrorise another person. Salerno relates how those suffering from traumatic cognitive dissonance are caught in a double-bind as they attempt to rationalise such behaviour by believing that this was reactive abuse which actually keeps them from seeing this person as a proactive abuser as they think: “Well, you know, they must have been really traumatised. That makes sense why they would be treating me this way.” Salerno carefully examines how narcissists seek out loving and trusting victims to exploit, while self-justifying their actions, even reversing and externalising the blame. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Professor Sandra Walklate, Emeritus and honorary professor at the University of Liverpool, discusses her work in victimology and violence against women, including her work in the field of femicide. Drawing upon historical paradigms where the concept of feminicide has been previously employed, Walklate notes various examples from the Americas where femicide was used as a tool in drawing attention to the complicity of the state in hiding the numbers of women’s deaths at the hands of men, only then to be disappeared by the state “with no compunction on the part of the state to pursue why those lives were disappeared.” Noting how some scholars and writers have attempted to extend the definition of the way in which we count femicide into femininicide, she argues the merits of “slow femicide” and accounting for the number of women’s lives lost because of the illnesses that follow on from living with the stress of violence—from their propensity to commit suicide to the long-term effects of experiencing strangulation as a feature of that violence to the associated diseases. Conversely, Walklate questions whether creating a separate legal category for “femicide” in addition to related concepts like “coercive control” in cases of domestic violence truly benefits victims or simply expands the power of a system that has already failed these victims. Underscoring how the law cannot always offer respite to the victims of IPA (Intimate Partner Abuse) due to the reality that the number of people prosecuted for such crimes is infinitesimally small, Walklate observes how “the power of the advocacy voice over the reality of the evidence” has also affected the ways in which policing and the judiciary react towards specific types of violence. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Wolfgang Streeck, a German economic sociologist and emeritus director of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne, discusses the current political situation of leftist political organising and the condition of seeking “justice” in our society, an idea he puts under scrutiny. He points to the complexities and contradictions of justice, while highlighting how today political parties are abandoning their constituents, refusing to help unify differences through connecting people, a praxis Streeck maintains is “the precondition of collective action in pursuit of collective left egalitarian goals.” Discussing how capitalism has captured the social relations between people, Streeck ponders alternative media, what he terms the Samizdat of hyper-modernity—a space where humans can still maintain serious, analytical dialogues—whilst both legacy and social media attempt to obscure deeper social and political critiques. He notes the swift decline of deindustrialisation and the social welfare state of Europe, commenting upon the rise of the billionaire class in conjunction with the number of people who can barely make it to the end of each month. Streeck observes how state violence is enacted with such precision today that it not only has the technological ability to locate the supreme commander of Hamas from a population of two million people in Gaza during a genocide, but it can also proceed to kill him whilst filming his murder. Appraising Friedrich Engels’ theories on the means of destruction alongside the means of production, Streeck hypothesises that one of the motives to continue the war in Ukraine has always been to test the next generation of war machinery while paying billionaires like Elon Musk, who has the power to switch off his Starlink satellite network, to effectively keep the war technology going. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe

Oliver Villar, a political scientist at Charles Sturt University in Australia, discusses his research on US imperial power and Latin American politics, covering his co-authored book, Cocaine, Death Squads and the War on Terror: US Imperialism and Class Struggle in Colombia (Monthly Review, 2011). Villar historicises the role that the US-led counternarcotic policies, specifically Plan Colombia, have played in serving as a pretext for advancing imperialist interests and undermining popular, leftist movements in the country and how the official “wars” on drugs and terror in Colombia are a pretext for the US to maintain an imperialist relationship while ensuring its business interests, as well as the local “narco-bourgeoisie,” can monopolise the cocaine trade. Exploring how US strategy intensified violence by supporting state-linked paramilitary forces, ultimately suppressing domestic labour and peasant struggles, Villar observes that it was during the Clinton administration “where everything starts to unravel” and when the US began to propagandise and brand the revolutionary armed forces of Colombia, leftist guerrillas, as the new “narco-terrorists.” He assesses how the US narrative surrounding Maduro flows in the same direction as propaganda from this earlier era, whereby anyone who “gets in America’s way is now fair game for the narco-terrorist label”, underscoring, “It has nothing to do with drugs.” Oliver relates what is happening in Latin America in conjunction with China’s rapid trajectory as a superpower and its clash with the United States over the control of resources (e.g., minerals and metals in Latin America) and its augmenting global influence. He dissects how the cocaine drug trade and the US-China rivalry in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the globe form part of a larger picture of US global hegemony while offering a critical history of US imperialism, its hegemonic decline, and the so-called “rising threat” of China to explain recent events. Responding to events in Venezuela, Greenland, and the “great power competition” that is unfolding between the US, China, and Russia, Villar elaborates on research from his most recent book, The Political Economy of Dissent (Routledge, 2026), in critically analysing 21st-century imperialism—that is, capitalism in its most aggressive and developed form, which is the driving force behind an intensifying rivalry between the US and China. Get full access to Savage Minds at www.savageminds.co/subscribe