Reflect, Recharge, Renew

A thirty-day semi-retreat

Photo by Brigitta Schneiter, “Three Christmas Gnomes.”

Grounded will shift into low-power mode during December while its author-publisher takes time to recharge. But first, reflection.

Grounded was born out of desperation for connection during the darkest days of Covid. In early March 2021, I was at the university library, working on a book. Suddenly, like everything else, the library closed. Even though databases and other sources went online during the pandemic, book writing from home was a lonely and dreary pursuit. The library is more than a place for research—it is a social hub. Even though I spent most of my time with my nose buried in a book, I was nestled in a scholarly community.

Working at home, the book became a burden. It was hard to sustain concentration quarantined in my apartment. I needed to do something else. Inspired by my daily reading of Heather Cox Richardson’s, Letters from an American, I took a closer look at Substack. Publishing on the platform wouldn’t cost anything but my time—of which I had plenty during lockdown. I thought, “I can do that.”

My inaugural post, on December 31, 2021, was titled “Stuck.” The backlash against public health measures to prevent the spread of a deadly disease was consequential, and essentially, a sociological problem:

The latest Covid omicron surge puts our problem into stark relief: two incompatible approaches to the pandemic are being pursued simultaneously. A strong conservative movement sees Covid as a matter of individual choice, while the rest of us see a gargantuan crisis of public health. It is the latter, in fact, that correctly defines our situation. A collective action problem can’t be solved by enabling self-interested individuals, on their own personal timetable, to choose appropriate behavior. If you get to pick your paddle and decide upstream is the way to go — while your companions are yelling about the huge waves threatening to capsize the boat— no one is getting to where they want to be.

What had been social fissures before the pandemic were becoming ever-deeper cleavages.

In my second post, I shared a succinct definition of democracy:

“A democracy is a system of government in which parties lose elections.”

I learned this definition on the first day of Professor Adam Przeworski’s graduate political science course. The professor explained how uncertain electoral outcomes are the fundamental feature of democracy. When a candidate concedes an election loss, he fulfills the “democratic bargain.” In effect, the unsuccessful candidate says, “I respect the outcome of the election and resolve to try again next time.” . . .

Preworski’s additional insight: “elections are a peaceful substitute for rebellion.”

As the January 6 anniversary approaches, we may ask: do we want insurrection or peace? It’s easy to see possibilities for insurrection on the horizon; where do we find pathways for peace?

Little did I know—in 2021—that working out variations on the themes of social order and democracy would keep me busy for the next two years.

Is Grounded a newsletter? A blog?

Substack calls its writers’ publications “newsletters.” That is an ill-fitting description of my writing and its purpose.

I have no “news” to distribute in “letters.” I’m not a blogger, either. As a fairly private person, my interest in sharing my life and its travails with the world is minimal. And—it turns out—I can’t write anything short. Aiming for a column-length article (about 800 words), I produce 2,000-word essays; with effort, these can be whittled down to 1,500 words. Including the endnotes!

My initial posts came from trying to make sense of what was going on: crazy Covid conflicts, supply chain disruptions, and Black Lives Matter protests. Posts became editorials that grew up to be articles that evolved into analytic essays. And here we are.

Consider the platform

For writers, Substack is the quick and easy route to publishing. For academics, Substack is a way to speak to a general audience and share expertise using non-technical language. The barriers to entry are low: there’s no need for authors to buy a domain, get a hosting service, or wrestle with templates, formatting, and graphic design—the normal route to setting up a website. This lack of friction has been a godsend to writers and experts who want to break out of their silos. It’s especially attractive to academics whose research could inform current policy debates. A paper submitted to an academic journal can take up to two years to go through peer review, revisions, and editing before publication. Then maybe, some journalist will find the work suitable for a news story peg and then . . . the public may be informed.

The low cost of publishing on Substack does have a downside. A creeping dark side. The ease of publishing has attracted bad actors seeking to flood the platform with incendiary rhetoric, misinformation, crazy-ass speculation, and general nastiness. The lack of content moderation on Substack, combined with the growth-oriented mindset of its founders, has created a problem for the platform.

The problem began with co-founder Hamish McKenzie promoting the newsletters of Substack’s well-known anti-anti-Trump writers such as Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, and Bari Weiss. These contrarians have large followings and they are not MAGA—but they are authoritarian adjacent.

Substack contrarians have now been eclipsed on the platform by anti-democratic extremists. McKenzie promoted writers known for their racist and misogynistic commentary which has not helped the situation. The publishing world has taken note. To wit, Jonathan M. Katz’s piece for The Atlantic: “Substack has a Nazi Problem.”

The best strategy for dealing with Nazis comes from the pissed-off bartender at the shitty crustpunk bar. This bartender’s advice: toss out the first guy with swastikas on his vest who sits down at the bar even if he’s not causing a problem. If you don’t, the guy will be back with his fascist buddies, and then the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh shit, it's too late because they're entrenched. Before you know it, your place is the Nazi bar.

Hanging out with Nazis never turns out well. I’m hoping the Substack owners figure this out sooner rather than later.

Safe and effective engagement on Substack

Stick with me and you’ll be safe from Nazis. If you read Grounded in your email, you won’t be bothered by bad actors. The relationship of the author-reader via the email distribution is one-to-one. Nazis only sneak in if you use the social network functions of the Substack app. For example, the “Notes” function is Twitter-like, so you may see questionable content come through that portal. I also avoid the “Recommended for you” suggestions. The most efficient way to find interesting new content by reputable writers is to consider recommendations from trusted Substack authors. Those caveats aside, I love the app. I receive half a dozen articles in my Substack app inbox every morning that I consume as eagerly as my morning coffee.

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The Substack publications I read most often (and highly recommend) are:

Journalists

Dan Rather, Steady

Lucian Truscott IV, Lucian Truscott Newsletter

Vicky Ward, Vicky Ward Investigates

Aaron Rupar, Public Notice

Judd Legum, Popular Information

Jessica Valenti, Abortion, Every Day

Lawyers

Joyce Vance, Civil Discourse

Jay Kuo, The Status Kuo

Economists

Robert Reich, Robert Reich

Brad DeLong, Brad DeLong’s Grasping Reality

Historians

Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American

Adam Tooze, AT Chartbook

Thomas Zimmer, Democracy Americana

Stephen Beschloss, America, America

Others

Kareem Abdul-Jabar, Kar33m

Katelyn Jetelin, Your Local Epidemiologist

George Takei (with Team Takei), The Big Picture

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Grounded will continue to appear on Tuesdays during December. I’ll send out tidbits and links to what I’m reading—kind of like a newsletter! I’m just taking a break from the research-write-edit-publish weekly grind until January. Hope you all can recharge and renew with loved ones, music, nature walks, and animal companions.

And now, your moment of . . . nature.

Writing—and reading—about serious subjects can be fairly depressing. That’s why I’ve added a new feature at the end of each essay to lighten our mood. Here’s a story about how a woman’s garden taught her to love winter.

Poppy Okotcha in her garden.

The gardens I have grown have shown me the rhythms of the non-human world and that it is not possible to live in the eternal growth of summer . . . .

Autumn leaves, the resilience of trees and winter chills taught me the unavoidable necessity of cycles—now it’s impossible not to notice the magic in the quiet times and in the decay that brings forth new life.

Related Grounded articles:

Everything Old is New Again (June 20, 2023)

A Succinct Definition (January 4, 2022)

Stuck (December 31, 2021)

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Notes:

Jonathan M. Katz, Substack has a Nazi problem.