We Watch Whiteness

This week we're talking about white culture, and what it is trying to tell us about itself on TV, at the movies and in books. We're noticing that white people are anxious--consciously and unconsciously--about their place in the world, and it's fascinating to unpack. First, we look at the new season of Roseanne, a show that explicitly embraces its whiteness and thumbs its nose at anyone who would challenge that. Then, we talk about the hit horror movie A Quiet Place, which explores dystopia in a way that reveals submerged white fears of a brown invasion (we liked the craft of the movie a lot, but it’s got some problems it’s not aware of). We pose the question: what would a self-aware interrogation of being white look like?

Plus, we celebrate JaVale McGee's incomparable stank face, worry about Kanye's tweets (we recorded this episode before his most recent tweets in support of Trump, which we'll have to address another time), and bring you our very first nominee for Song of the Summer...!

One last thing: we're bringing the show to Australia, and we'll be back with new episodes in a couple weeks. Till then, keep stuntin'! Keep shinin'!

Discussed this week:

JaVale McGee (NBA player, Golden State Warriors)

"The Legacy of Childhood Trauma" (Junot Diaz, The New Yorker)

"I Like It" (Cardi B, Bad Bunny and J. Balvin)

Kanye's recent tweets

Roseanne (ABC)

A Quiet Place (directed by John Krasinski)

White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America (Nancy Isenberg, Penguin Books)

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis (JD Vance, HarperCollins)

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City (Matthew Desmond, Broadway Books)

Green (Sam Graham-Felsen, Random House)