Quillette Podcast
by Quillette
Long-form conversations with scientists, writers, historians, and public intellectuals on the ideas shaping — and dividing — the Western world. Mostly hosted by Jonathan Kay — Canadian journalist, author, and Quillette editor whose books include Among the Truthers, a landmark investigation into conspiracy culture. Kay brings a rare combination of intellectual range, genuine curiosity, and willingness to push back, whether the subject is evolutionary biology, cancel culture, geopolitics, or the philosophy of free speech. Non-dogmatic, evidence-driven, and unafraid of controversy.
Episodes
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Canada’s Unmarked-Graves Social Panic (2021-26) Explained
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay discusses the underlying societal factors that caused his country's journalists, politicians, and academics to uncritically accept false claims that the bodies of 215 Indigenous children had been found on the grounds of a former school.
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Watching a Cancelled Novelist Confront His False Accusers
Podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Amy Hamm about Steven Galloway’s legal campaign against the University of British Columbia scholars who promoted baseless allegations that he was a rapist
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Skeptic vs. ‘Doomer’: How Scared Should We Be of Rogue AI?
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay interviews AI expert Gary Marcus about the possibility that a rogue artificial intelligence will turn us all into paper clips.
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The Price of Affirmative Action in Canadian Academia
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Eric Kaufmann about his new Macdonald-Laurier Institute report, The Equity-Excellence Trade-Off: A Study of EDI in the Canada Research Chairs Program.
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Covering the Culture Wars
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Benjamin Ryan about his journalistic adventures reporting on AIDS, monkeypox, gender activism, and the Jason Arday saga.
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Politicising the Humanities: Sociology as Case Study
Jonathan Kay speaks with University of Hawaii professor Ashley Rubin, co-author of the recently published Special Commission Report on the State of Scholarship in the Humanities and the Humanistic Social Sciences. 00:00 Introduction: the Vanderbilt report 02:30 Do professional associations speak...
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The ‘Sex Recession’ is Real
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay talks to Debra Soh, author of Sextinction: The Decline of Sex and the Future of Intimacy, about neuroscience, hypergamy, elephant seals, politicised sex research, the perils of polyamory, and the sex-repellent scourge of ’phubbing.’
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First Nations Chief, Podcast Pundit, Indigenous Gadfly
Jonathan Kay speaks with Aaron Pete, leader of the Chawathil First Nation in British Columbia, about his community’s socioeconomic challenges, intra-Indigenous politics, the legacy of residential schools, and progressive taboos surrounding of “unmarked graves.”
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The Great Canadian Unmarked-Graves Social Panic (2021-2026)
Mia Hughes and Stella O'Malley of the Beyond Gender podcast interview Quillette's Jonathan Kay about the progressive ideological manias spawned during the Justin Trudeau years.
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Why the Enlightenment Matters
Iona Italia talks to lawyer and historian Adam Wakeling about the enduring importance of Enlightenment values and how to defend them today.
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The Case Against State-Sanctioned Euthanasia
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Kathleen Stock about her new book, Do Not Go Gentle—in which she argues that governments should be denied any institutional role in facilitating the death of their citizens.
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An Ivy League University Looks Inward
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Yale Law School professor Sarath Sanga, co-author of a surprisingly candid new report explaining why the American public is losing trust in the country’s colleges and universities.
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The Last Straight Woman
Senior Writer and Podcast Producer Iona Italia talks to writer Phoebe Maltz Bovy about her latest book: 'The Last Straight Woman: On Desiring Men.'
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Is Fighting Antisemitism a Waste of Time?
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with New York Times columnist Bret Stephens, who encourages Jews to focus on bolstering their community instead of lecturing right-wing bigots and progressive political extremists who can’t be reasoned with.
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Girls in an Online World
Iona Italia talks to writer Freya India about her book 'Girls: Gen Z and the Commodification of Everything.'
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Documenting a Decade of Academic Meltdowns
Podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with filmmaker Ric Esther Bienstock about her new CBC/BBC documentary, Speechless—which explores the rise of censorship and mobbings on campus.
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The Search for Truth
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to author Michael Shermer about his new book, Truth: What It Is, How to Find It, and Why It Still Matters.
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The Historical Case for Israel
In a new book, U.S. District Court Judge Roy Altman traces Jews’ indigenous presence in the holy land over the last 3,231 years.
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The Ayatollahs' Assassins
Iona Italia talks to Roya Hakakian about her book ‘Assassins of the Turquoise Palace’ and the past and present crimes of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
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When Everyone Knows Every Knows...
Iona Italia talks to cognitive psychologist and linguist Steven Pinker about his new book on Common Knowledge and the Mysteries of Money, Power, and Everyday Life.
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Has the Gay Rights Revolution Gone Too Far for the Gay Community’s Own Good?
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with University College London law professor Ronan McCrea about his new book, The End of the Gay Rights Revolution: How Hubris and Overreach Threaten Gay Freedom.
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The Extraordinary Exploits of Agent Zo
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to historian Clare Mulley about her biography of Polish war heroine Elżbieta Zawacka, aka Agent Zo.
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Will Post-Islamist Iran Get a Royal Restoration?
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Iranian-Canadian human-rights activist Kaveh Shahrooz about whether Reza Pahlavi, the eldest son of the last Shah of Iran, might rise to power as a new Prince of Persia.
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Catching a Serial Killer
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Maureen Callaghan about her book American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century.
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Why We Need to Talk About Transgender School Shooters
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with journalist Adam Zivo about the 10 February school shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia—a mass murder perpetrated by a trans-identified male gunman who was initially identified by police and journalists as a woman.
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Guests of the Nation
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to writer Lionel Shriver about her new novel, A Better Life, which tackles the theme of immigration.
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British Columbia’s Radical Political Landscape
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with B.C. politician Dallas Brodie about why her province continues to promote dubious social-justice policies and myths—including the false claim that 215 dead Indigenous children were discovered four years ago in ‘unmarked graves.’
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The Demise of Private Life
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Tiffany Jenkins about her fascinating and provocative new history, 'Strangers and Intimates: The Rise and Fall of Private Life.'
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Understanding Journalistic Groupthink
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay talks to Graham Majin about the recent scandal at the BBC, and the need for reporters to prevent the ‘poison of narrative’ from corrupting their craft
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Fighting for Freedom in Iran
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Iranian writer and journalist Roya Hakakian about the protests in Iran and why and how they might succeed.
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How to Think Like a Human
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to psychologist David Weitzner about the differences between human cognition and artificial intelligence.
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Christmas in Byzantium
Quillette’s Jonathan Kay speaks with History of Byzantium podcast host Robin Pierson about the Christian traditions and imperial culture that took root in the eastern half of the Roman Empire .
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Sri Lankan by Birth, Tamil by Heritage, Canadian by Choice
Prisoner #1056 author Roy Ratnavel discusses his journey from a prison cell in war-torn Sri Lanka to the heights of Canada’s financial industry—and the (sometimes politically incorrect) lessons about race, immigration, and multiculturalism he’s learned along the way.
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The Genius of Jane Austen
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Jane Austen scholar John Mullan to commemorate the 250th anniversary of her birth.
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Marriage and Divorce in America
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to sociologist Nicholas Wolfinger about trends in marriage, divorce, and maternity in the US from the 1950s to the present day.
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A Gay Author’s Escape from Cults, Drugs, Queer Radicalism, and ‘Scrupulosity’
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with writer Ben Appel about his new memoir, Cis White Gay: The Making of a Gender Heretic
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Jesse Brown’s Rude Awakening
In an interview with Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay, Canadaland publisher Jesse Brown discusses how an anti-Israel faction within his own subscriber base tried to cancel him after he began speaking out about the rise of antisemitism.
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Ancient Christianities: The First 500 Years
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with biblical scholar Paula Fredriksen, whose new book describes the theological diversity that existed among Christian communities before Nicene Christianity was adopted as Rome’s state religion in the fourth century.
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Finding Humor in Dark Places
Quillette podcast host speaks with Healing Roar founder and comedian Matthew Pettit, who candidly tells audiences about the severe childhood abuse that once propelled him into a life of sexual confusion, meth addiction, crime, and incarceration.
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A Crisis of Tolerance
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Harry Saul Markham about the increasingly acute threat of Islamism in the UK and the normalisation of virulent antisemitism among British Muslims.
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Is There a Politically Motivated ‘War on Science’? (And If So, Who’s Waging It?)
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with theoretical physicist and cosmologist Lawrence Krauss about his latest book project, in which renowned scholars speak out about threats to open inquiry and the scientific process.
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Machetes in Melbourne
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to criminal justice researcher Andrew Bushnell about the many causes of the recent surge in crime in Melbourne.
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From Cult Child to Chess Wunderkind
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Danny Rensch about his astounding journey from the ‘Church of Immortal Consciousness’ to the role of Chief Chess Officer at Chess.com
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Desexing the Language of Motherhood
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to Dr Karleen Gribble, who works in the field of maternal and infant health, on the impacts of desexed language on women’s healthcare and wellbeing.
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Managing the Growing Gender-Critical Counterrevolution
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay talks with Canadian Genspect director Mia Hughes about the emerging ‘gender glasnost’—and the best way to continue rolling back the excesses of trans activism.
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The End of Woke
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to author Andrew Doyle about his new book, The End of Woke: How the Culture War Went Too Far and What to Expect from the Counter-Revolution.
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When New Netherland Became New York
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Russell Shorto, whose new book chronicles the extraordinary events in 1664 that delivered Manhattan from the Dutch to the British.
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Should Feminists Work with the Right?
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to philosopher Holly Lawford-Smith about her new book, Feminism Beyond Left and Right.
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RFK Jr.’s Unprecedented Attack on Life-saving Vaccines
Quillette podcast host Jonathan Kay speaks with Stanford University infectious diseases expert Jake Scott about the perils of rolling back immunization treatments for COVID, RSV, and Measles.
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The Modular Mind
Managing Editor Iona Italia talks to evolutionary psychologist Rob Kurzban about his book Why Everyone (Else) Is a Hypocrite: Evolution and the Modular Mind.
About this show
Long-form conversations with scientists, writers, historians, and public intellectuals on the ideas shaping — and dividing — the Western world.
Mostly hosted by Jonathan Kay — Canadian journalist, author, and Quillette editor whose books include Among the Truthers, a landmark investigation into conspiracy culture. Kay brings a rare combination of intellectual range, genuine curiosity, and willingness to push back, whether the subject is evolutionary biology, cancel culture, geopolitics, or the philosophy of free speech.
Non-dogmatic, evidence-driven, and unafraid of controversy.
Hosted by
Quillette