Diabolical Lies

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit diabolicallies.substack.comIn this conversation…Caro & Katie engage in a close read of the viral Free Press debate TikTok that stars a young woman angry she can’t live on a homestead, and accidentally discover it’s uniquely emblematic of the sort of right-wing radicalization we’re witnessing en masse in the United States.

In this conversation…Caro & Katie talk about abortion in America, starting with leaders in the evangelical church recognizing it as a political tool in the 1970s with which to gain power in the face of unwanted desegregation, to the profound discomfort that modern politicians across the spectrum express about the subject—that is, until maybe, right now. It turns out that American women have never actually been guaranteed the freedom to get an abortion, and to begin changing that, we need a new moral framework.References, Bonus Reading & Timestamps, Oh MyReferences“An Irish Problem,” a knock-your-socks-off essay by Sally Rooney about something that is also, incidentally, An American Problem“Hillary Clinton’s Moral Conflicts on Abortion,” a 2016 profile in The Atlantic that feels, in retrospect, like such an ambulance siren warning for the years to come that it might just inspire you to quit your job, spend a decade or two building a time machine, and go back in time just to try that much harder to get Bernie across the finish line at the DNC“Obama Says Abortion Rights Are Not a Priority,” a 2009 Reuters article that will make you realize the time machine needs to take you back earlier“Jimmy Carter Says Jesus Would Not Support Abortion, Revealing ‘Only Conflict’ Between His Politics and Christian Faith,” an article that will make you say fuck it, the time machine effort is pointless, and inspire you to smash the time machine in a field, Office Space-style, because when it comes to Democrats dropping the ball on abortion, the limit does not apparently exist “Doctors Agreed Her Baby Would Die 3 Months Before She Was Forced to Give Birth,” a Rolling Stone story of a Florida woman who was psychologically, physically, and financially tortured by Ron DeSantis’s abortion lawsThe Turnaway Study (2008), a 10-year longitudinal study of nearly 1,000 women who sought abortions—some of whom accessed care and others who were denied it—that found not only do women who get abortions not regret it (95% reported it was the right choice in the years that followed), but those who don’t receive care accurately predict the hardships they will encounter after being denied care“The Obstacle Course Facing Those Seeking Abortions,” a 2021 interview with reproductive rights expert Carole Joffe that offers insight into just how shitty our “golden age” of reproductive rights under Roe really was“The Religious Right and the Abortion Myth,” a 2022 piece in Politico in which old quotes from Christianity Today prove how little church leaders cared about abortion, and how in 1971, the delegates to the Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution calling for the legalization of abortion, a position they reaffirmed in 1974 and again in 1976 (one year and three years after Roe v. Wade, respectively)Bonus Reading/Listening“The New York Times’ War on Trans Kids,” a truly stellar episode of If Books Could Kill that highlights the Republican strategy of taking a microscopic statistic/nonexistent “problem” and using it to delegitimize an entire civil rights issue“Abortion Is Ancient History and That Matters Today,” a lovely CNN debunking of the “abortion = modernity” fallacy we see everywhere“The Brilliance of Safe, Legal, and Rare,” an Atlantic article highlighting the most annoying “pro-choice” rhetorical argument of all timeTimestamps 0:00 - this episode brought to you by…1:15 - Diabolical Lies makes its first-ever presidential endorsement!!!2:30 - lil explainer on how today’s conversation will unfold, featuring a deranged metaphor/Dane Cook deep cut about three monkeys fucking a coconut4:42 - meet the first monkey that fucked the coconut: the Republican christo-fascist base 12:44 - discussing the OG political pick-me, Phyllis Schlafly 17:01 - meet the second monkey that fucked the coconut: the Supreme Court 35:00 - addressing the post-Dobbs, T.S. Elliott-Wasteland-esque landscape we find ourselves in today40:00 - meet the third monkey fucking the coconut, caro’s personal fave: the feckless pearl-grabbing behavior of Democratic leaders over the years 51:00 - debunking the absolute horseshit fake-ass drunk history claims of “late-term abortion concerns”59:30 - welcome to part two of the conversation, where we wave bye bye to the monkeys that fucked us (yes, dear reader, WE were the coconut all along! i love a good mid-novel plot twist!) and say hello to a new framework called reproductive justice1:01:45 - enter, stage right: famed Irish author and marxist thinker, Sally Rooney1:08:00 - caro finally follows up on her promise for an optimistic hot take on our current moment lol 1:15:40 - yay we made it to part three where we quit whining and start talking about how to actually solve things (gulp) This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit diabolicallies.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit diabolicallies.substack.comOur first bonus episode! The first 40 minutes of this conversation are available to everyone, but if you'd like to become a subscriber, join us on Substack or Apple Podcasts.In this conversation…A critique of work that best illustrates different elements of the, “I used to be a liberal, but…” media personality that purports to have invented a bold new form of centrist, independent thinking—but upon further inspection, it’s…just conservatism, often cloaked in the language of the left.

In this conversation…Two pre-menopausal females break down the replacement theory panic disguised as Reasonable! Political! Concern! and why it’s completely unnecessary and counterproductive to entertain the pronatalist conversation on their terms: that is, litigating the validity of having (or not having) children. It is not, and has never been, about the kids. Bonus ReadingThe Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow, which really puts the whole “the traditional, natural order is the nuclear family with the man at the helm” into historical contextSisters in Hate by Seyward Darby, an absolute banger about the girlbosses of white nationalism“White Noise,” a documentary about Richard Spencer, Lauren Southern, and Mike Cernovich’s rise to viral fame ha ha ha everything’s fine!“The Housewives of White Supremacy” by Annie Kelly, a piece that traces the current anti-feminist resurgence to economic precarity and a mythic past in which everyone had sugar daddies and three-bedroom starter homes“The Cultural Politics Behind JD Vance’s Obsession with ‘Cat Ladies’” by Jacob Rosenberg for Mother Jones, an interview with Dr. Melinda Cooper about how “the legalization of same-sex marriage has shifted the line of deviance from sexuality to reproductivity”“Pro-Natalism” on In Bed with the Right, featuring some of the commentary we discussed from feminist writer Moira Donegan “Warren Hern, America’s Abortion Doctor,” a New Yorker interview conducted by Jia Tolentino with the only octogenarian doctor on the planet that we will personally beg not to retire“Roe Was Never Enough Anyway,” a critique of the landmark abortion case in Boston Review by Rachel Rebouché, in which she casually points out that Roe NEVER ACTUALLY GUARANTEED ABORTION ACCESS TO BEGIN WITH HAHA K COOL“What the ‘Mississippi Appendectomy’ Says About the Regard of the State Towards the Agency of Black Women’s Bodies,” a historical analysis that, fair warning, will radically change your relationship to our nation’s history, and to the practice of colonialism writ large, if you aren’t familiar with this topic“Israel Gave Birth Control to Ethiopian Jews Without Their Consent,” ha ha ha ha ha here we go again same story different colonial project cool cool cool no biggie …and a funny little tiktok to reward you for reading so much depressing shitTime Stamps1:00 Katie sets the scene for the conversation, and makes a startling admission in the meantime5:00 enter, stage left: the interview where JD Vance acknowledged his wife’s skin color in the most American Psycho way possible8:00 Caro takes a moment to shit all over Megyn Kelly 10:00 let’s talk about how *~meaningful*~ it is to have kids, no wait we mean economically important, no wait we mean personally meaningful, NO WAIT —16:00 if you’re wondering whether republicans give a single shit about babies/families/women, take a gander at how they engage with labor unions 21:00 the sneaky little fact that no one discusses in the birth rate conversation 25:00 let’s talk about how tenuous the connections are between marriage, child welfare, and child stability 32:00 who decides what is “natural” and “human” and what is not? 35:30 the first cracks in the pronatalism argument become evident37:00 let’s discuss the Quiverfull movement!!!48:00 exploring the cultural roots and propaganda campaigns that motivate women to lean into the pronatalist movement59:30 how the republican party harnesses the fuck out of nostalgia to make us perceive their DEEPLY IMPRACTICAL goals as highly practical and maybe even inevitable1:05:00 the part where we realize this episode is literally the sequel to agriculture wars 1:08:00 let’s address the elephant in the room, the elephant in question being *checks notes* the virtual elimination of teen pregnancies being somehow bad1:10:00 insert obligatory conservative trans/gender panic here1:17:00 is the birth rate panic actually a marxist panic in disguise????1:21:00 Caro offers a rare optimistic call to arms (cherish it when it happens folks)1:26:00 is anyone else just extremely bored by the ongoing effort to solve the effects of capitalism with more capitalism?1:30:00 Katie drops the thought banger of the fucking century This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit diabolicallies.substack.com/subscribe