Best Quillette Podcasts (2025)

1
Canada’s Strange Election Season 20:31

35m ago20:31

20:31

In advance of Monday’s nation-wide vote, Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay discusses Justin Trudeau’s resignation, Pierre Poilievre’s bad luck, the rise of Mark Carney, and the effects of Donald Trump’s aggressive protectionism on Canadian politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices…

1
Hamas Should Never Be Decriminalised 11:34

5d ago11:34

11:34

The campaign to remove Hamas from the UK’s list of proscribed organisations is not about defending free speech or political dissent. It is about legitimising jihadist warmongering.By Quillette

1
Making the Case for ‘Free-Range Parenting’ 23:28

7d ago23:28

23:28

Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with author and TED Talker Lenore Skenazy, whose campaign to give children more opportunities for independent play and learning once earned her the title of ‘America’s Worst Mother.’ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
The Wrongful Exoneration of Adnan Syed Part II: The Legal and Media Circus 1:34:51

6d ago1:34:51

1:34:51

Adnan Syed would never have been released had ‘Serial’ not been made. Advocacy journalism must be treated with caution.By Quillette

1
'The Wrongful Exoneration of Adnan Syed Part I: A Straightforward Murder Case' by Andrew Hammel 1:17:02

6d ago1:17:02

1:17:02

A serious reexamination of this case must begin by setting out the evidence that led the jury to convict.By Quillette

1
Does TED Still Make Sense? 16:29

7d ago16:29

16:29

Last week’s TED Talks in Vancouver featured dozens of brilliant speakers. But the earnest belief that big new ideas can save humanity from itself now feels painfully dated.By Quillette

1
Revisiting ‘Wake in Fright’, A Peculiarly Australian Kind of Hell 25:39

7d ago25:39

25:39

Five decades after its release, Wake in Fright remains a brutally captivating reminder that modernity is just a thin veneer over the darker recesses of the human heart.By Quillette

1
Australia's Population Ponzi Scheme 5:38

8d ago5:38

5:38

The environmental havoc is justified as needed for the economy, but the evidence does not support this claim.By Quillette

1
The Trouble with Tariffs 16:15

16d ago16:15

16:15

Iona Italia talks to John H. Cochrane aka "The Grumpy Economist" about the motivations, effects and implications of Donald Trump's economic policies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
Marxism: The Idea That Refuses to Die 21:53

12d ago21:53

21:53

Its ability to churn out such plausible sounding explanations for historical and social phenomena is part of Marxism’s core appeal. But its grand theoretical framework simply does not hold up.By Quillette

1
How Accurate Is 'Adolescence'? 15:36

22d ago15:36

15:36

Iona Italia talks to William Costello, an evolutionary psychologist whose work focuses on incels, about what the Netflix series 'Adolescence' gets right and wrong about this group. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
Jihadism Is the Problem 13:15

23d ago13:15

13:15

The media’s obsessive focus on the Israel–Palestine conflict obscures the broader picture of the ubiquity of jihadism in the Middle East, and the crucial role it plays in stoking and perpetuating turmoil and strife.By Quillette

1
The Scourge of the ‘Woke Right’ 35:33

30d ago35:33

35:33

Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with author and satirist Andrew Doyle about the worrying rise of illiberal ideologies and cultish political tendencies among conservatives. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
The Fugitive Mind 1:27:01

26d ago1:27:01

1:27:01

My best friend had a psychotic break—our criss-crossing journeys through facts and fictions in thirteen chapters.By Quillette

1
How to Tell if You’re Living in a Patriarchy 26:14

28d ago26:14

26:14

Arguments that patriarchy exists in the West today are largely dependent on reinventions of the concept that would be better dispensed with.By Quillette

1
The Amityville Horror—A 50-Year Old Lie That Won’t Die by Kevin Mims 41:29

28d ago41:29

41:29

Jay Anson’s haunted-house yarn was a highly lucrative hoax, but it struck a popular chord amid the financial precarity of 1970s America.By Quillette

1
The Open Society and Its New Enemies 50:02

1M ago50:02

50:02

What Karl Popper’s classic can teach us about the threats facing democracies today.By Quillette

1
Anti-Zionism, Past and Present 15:38

1M ago15:38

15:38

Quillette’s Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to scholar Izabella Tabarovsky about the Soviet roots of contemporary anti-Zionism and antisemitism. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
Against the Death Penalty 13:49

1M ago13:49

13:49

The state should not assume the right to end the lives of its citizens at will.By Quillette

1
Stalin, Putin, and the Corruption of History 21:26

1M ago21:26

21:26

The history of Soviet totalitarianism is now being rewritten.By Quillette

1
What Explains Women's Fascination With BDSM Fiction? 5:41

1M ago5:41

5:41

Every generation or so (i.e., roughly every 25 years) a woman (it’s always a woman) writes a book about kinky sex—and a very specific type of kinky sex.By Quillette

1
On Book Banning 26:05

1M ago26:05

26:05

Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with book author Ira Wells about the censorship demands emanating from both sides of the political spectrum. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
The Tyranny of Fragility 15:43

1M ago15:43

15:43

How Alexis de Tocqueville foretold the rise of victimhood culture.By Quillette

1
Johann Blumenbach: The First Race Scientist 21:01

1M ago21:01

21:01

The accepted view is that the scientists of the European Enlightenment got the issue of race badly wrong. In fact, some of them got more right than they are usually given credit for.By Quillette

1
A Kinder, Gentler Eliminationism 33:26

1M ago33:26

33:26

Peter Beinart has responded to the 7 October massacre and subsequent Gaza war with a deeply duplicitous book.By Quillette

1
Christianity and the American Polity 15:18

2M ago15:18

15:18

Iona Italia talks to Brookings Institution senior fellow Jonathan Rauch about his latest book, Cross Purposes: Christianity’s Broken Bargain with Democracy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
Australia’s Antisemitism Crisis 15:25

2M ago15:25

15:25

Quillette editor-in-chief Claire Lehmann speaks with Bangladeshi-born Australian psychiatrist and journalist Tanveer Ahmed about the rise of Jew-hatred in their country. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
Israel–Gaza: A War Between Cousins by John Aziz 12:15

2M ago12:15

12:15

Both Israelis and Palestinians have a reasonable claim to live in the Holy Land, based on deep local roots.By Quillette

1
Demystifying Critical Race Theory by Josh Yuter 33:45

2M ago33:45

33:45

Activists on both sides have an incentive to keep Critical Race Theory undefined and ambiguous.By Quillette

1
Trump and the DEI Counter-Revolution by Thomas F. Powers 1:18:22

2M ago1:18:22

1:18:22

Civil-rights law made the DEI world; civil-rights reform can unmake it.By Quillette

1
Universities Are Worth Saving by Jonathan Rauch 24:53

2M ago24:53

24:53

Those seeking to address the crisis on America’s campuses should resist the tendency toward nihilism—the temptation to conclude that we need to just (metaphorically) burn it all down.By Quillette

1
'The Language of Sex' by Marilyn Simon 18:27

2M ago18:27

18:27

While we fuss over definitions and pontificate on freedoms, sex and lust and desire and passion and bodies coming together, remain largely undomesticated.By Quillette

1
The Great Divergence 17:40

2M ago17:40

17:40

Iona Italia talks to evolutionary psychologist David C. Geary about why he believes evolved differences between the sexes have been growing more salient in western societies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesBy Quillette

1
'Apostles of Appeasement' by Oscar Clarke 5:45

2M ago5:45

5:45

A short history of phoney peace groups and their fellow travellers.By Quillette

1
Why There Will Not Be a Beige Future by Razib Khan 9:26

2M ago9:26

9:26

Skin colour, genetics, race, and racism.By Quillette

1
The 100 Million Killed Under Communist Regimes Matter by Razib Khan 9:44

2M ago9:44

9:44

The death toll under Communist regimes is of incredible magnitude. Yet whenever I attack Communism for being an evil ideology, I get a serious number of rebuttals.By Quillette

1
'Trump and the Academic Cocoon' by Heather Mac Donald 19:51

3M ago19:51

19:51

A New York Times op-ed by a Yale historian tries to see universities from the vantage point of an outsider. Instead, it unwittingly illustrates why universities will not self-correct without external intervention.By Quillette

1
'The Weak Horse' by Brian Stewart 14:27

3M ago14:27

14:27

Syria’s crisis demonstrates the importance of power.By Quillette

1
'Anti-Zionism’s German Roots' by Gerfried Ambrosch 20:04

3M ago20:04

20:04

While Islam traditionally treated Jews with contempt, antisemitic conspiracy theories imported from Germany escalated this animosity by vilifying Jews as agents of diabolical evil.By Quillette