This week Reason interviewRecorded in front of an audience at New York’s Caveat theatre. This was the first of a series of monthly live “speakeasy” events where I speak with guests who are known for their openness to heterodox thinking and freedom of expression.
I interviewed the only writer—living, dead, or likely ever to be born—who has been favorably compared to Norman Mailer and Roseanne Barr. Laura Kipnis, Northwestern’s professor emerita in film and journalism survived an absurd disciplinary hearing by graduate students. Title IX complaint filed by students alleging they were unsafe following publication of an essay. The Chronicle of Higher Education About “sexual paranoia on campus” (She wrote that in 2017). Unwanted Advancements).
She has just published a new book. The Time of Contagion and Love: A Diagnostic,The effects of COVID-19 are explored in many settings. It will impact our conceptions of sexuality, romance and commitment. What has this done to the already boiling generations of resentments among Boomers, Gen Xers as well as millennials and Gen Zers. Why was it that we allowed governments to control every aspect of our lives for so many years, even intimate?
The “sexual paranoia,” which she used to see confined to universities, has now spread beyond college campuses and into workplaces. Is it possible that the repulsive physical looks of actors such as Harvey Weinstein (ex-President Donald Trump) and Jeffrey Toobin influence our responses to their actions, which are ranging from criminal to just plain disgusting. Why have people who act on intergenerational desires been made to be vilified, despite their support? Why hasn’t the acceptance and blossoming of seemingly endless gender identities and sexual orientations brought about the freedom that was promised?
It is an entertaining, rich and hilarious conversation about human relations in post-COVID times.
Photo credit: Chris Sweda/TNS/Newscom