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PODCAST

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

The world has never been more connected. Yet never more divided. We yell at each other from inside our echo chambers. But change doesn’t happen inside an echo chamber. It’s time to get out, to stretch our legs, to step on some land mines. It"s time to have an uncomfortable conversation with Josh Szeps. A DM Podcast

society & culture comedy interviews

All Episodes

46:48

"Public Shaming" with Clare Stephens

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/30

Pile-ons, performative outrage, apology rituals, and public humiliation have become a blood sport over the past decade. What happened? Was it a moral panic? A byproduct of new communications technologies? Or a storm in a teacup - a well-intentioned overreach, exaggerated by anti-woke right-wingers? Clare Stephens is a feminist journalist who has spent years at the coalface of cancel culture. She spent years at Australia’s biggest independent women’s media outlet, Mamamia, copping heat

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77:22

"Trans Rights, Women's Rights, Gay Rights, Oh My!”...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/27

What happens when the fight for women's equality collides with transgender rights? Is the anti-trans nastiness of the Elon MAGA-verse now winning? Or is it mere chaff in a new legal regime that privileges gender identity over feminism and gay rights? Where are we, exactly, in the gender wars? The question of who counts as a woman, once banal, is now a cultural lightning rod, shaping debates over prisons, sport, health care, and child rearing. Professor Robert Wintemute is one of the world’s

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23:43

"Mindfulness, Science, Buddhism & Bullsh*t"? with Mo...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/23

You know you should meditate. But you don't have the time. Or you're no good at it. So you occasionally subscribe to a meditation app, you listen to podcast episodes about mindfulness, you nod along sagely about the importance of living in the Now, and you get back to your busy life. It doesn't stick. That's been Josh's story for decades. So when he heard that the founder of one of the world's leading centres for Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction has written a book criticising how meditation is

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124:44

“What’s Comedy For, Anymore?” with Wil Anderson

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/20

The Saudi stand-up controversy, the Jimmy Kimmel brouhaha, the clickification of live shows into viral video clips, the clash of podcasters like Marc Maron vs Joe Rogan over Trumpism... What is comedy for in this algorithmic era of culture wars? Wil Anderson is perhaps Australia's most successful stand-up comic. As well as his countless sold-out live shows, he hosts Gruen, a weekly panel show that has run for seventeen years. Wil and Josh riff on the state of comedy today and go deep into its craft,

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28:49

“Charlie Kirk’s Secret Plan to Take Over America”...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/16

What if the fight for America’s soul wasn’t just political, but theological? A powerful movement inside Christian America believes it is on a divine mission to rescue the nation’s institutions; from education and media to business and government. Their chief cheerleader was Charlie Kirk, whose organisation, Turning Point USA, is now better positioned to reshape American life than when he was alive. In the same month as Kirk's assassination, by sheer coincidence, a book was released

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106:06

"There IS no Housing Crisis, Akshually ☝️" with...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/13

Insane house prices are destroying the middle-class dream of home ownership. Or... are they? Is there actually a housing crisis? Or are most people, in fact, comfortably paying historically-unremarkable mortgage repayments for a desirable product? Economist Cameron Murray argues for this unpopular (you might even say “uncomfortable”) heterodox view. While many of his peers, like our recent guest Peter Tulip, argue that house prices are too high because of a lack of supply, Cameron

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49:26

“Godfather of the Greens”, fmr Senator Bob Brown

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/09

He’s been called the most successful environmentalist in Australian history, and one of the most influential in the world. Former Senator Bob Brown co-founded the world’s first Green Party, in Tasmania in 1972. He led the Australian Greens in Parliament for decades and spearheaded a pivotal moment in global environmentalism, when he helped save the pristine Franklin River from being dammed. Senator Brown joined Josh in Sydney to talk about his life of protest and purpose, from heckling

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83:29

"Gaza 3.0" with Yaakov Katz

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/06

It’s the second anniversary of the October 7th attacks, and the Middle East is abuzz with a new plan that would see an independent Palestinian body administer the Gaza Strip. Could the Gaza War end up delivering real peace? What would it take, in Israel, Palestine and beyond, for the horrors of the past two years to give way to something better than the previous status quo? Yaakov Katz is the former editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post after devoting many years as the paper’s military

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36:18

"Is the UK Falling Apart?" with Dominic Frisby

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/10/02

Is it racist to worry that there are more immigrants in London than white English? Has the UK reached a tipping point in its conversation about Britain’s national identity? What’s going on? Race riots; migrant detention hotels ablaze; the prime minister condemning Elon Musk for using “dangerous and inflammatory” language at a nationalist protest with the far-right agitator Tommy Robinson. What happened to tea cups and crumpets, umbrellas and bowler hats - or even the

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55:36

“Don’t F*** it up, Australia” with MP Allegra Spender

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/29

It’s a fact. The way our governments raise and spend money benefits older, richer people, and disadvantages younger people who are trying to build wealth. If we’re going to hold society together - and keep liberal democracy robust - we need massive economic reform. But what does that mean?Allegra Spender is one of Australia’s most popular members of parliament. She belongs to no political party, although her centre-right group of independents, unofficially called the

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39:59

“We’re Going to be Okay” with social psychologist...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/26

Trump. Gaza. Artificial Intelligence. Authoritarianism. Assassinations. Climate Chaos. Russia. Social media. The far right. Terrorism. Political division. How bad are things? More importantly: How would we know?Every generation believes things are falling apart. And at some point, they’ll be right. But the social psychologist Adam Mastroianni argues that we’re exhibiting a kind of doom paralysis right now.Even if things were as bad as they seem, they’re more likely to be solved -

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59:02

"How the Lab Leak Got Cred" with Elizabeth Finkel

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/22

What happens when the public's understanding of a global event is hijacked by online psuedo-experts? How should scientists express uncertainty when everyone's suspicious? Was Anthony Fauci the victim of a crazed conspiracy, or is there something fishy in the official origins of Covid-19? The inside story of how the Covid lab leak hypothesis went mainstream is just one of the tales which the science journalist Elizabeth Finkel investigates in her new book. Josh is still suspicious of the Wuhan lab so

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162:06

"Can Liberalism Survive?" with Waleed Aly

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/18

What holds liberal democracy together in an age of social media, tribal politics and rising violence? Josh has been trying to get Waleed Aly to submit to doing this show for years, and finally nailed him down. Do not miss this powerful episode. Waleed is a controversial superstar Down Under. He's the recipient of Australia's highest journalism award, a Walkley, and its highest television prize, a Gold Logie, for hosting The Project, a nightly network news panel show, for more than ten years. He's

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61:47

"What IS a Zionist?" with Charlotte Korchak

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/15

What does "Zionism" mean after the destruction of Gaza? As Josh wrestles with this question himself, Charlotte Korchak is his Zionist guide today. She's a young, vibrant, American-born educator about Israel who joined Josh on her whirlwind trip to Sydney. The pair of them wrestle with justice, Jewishness, antisemitism and how Zionism should coexist with a Palestinian state.

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78:10

Charlie Kirk & Guns

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/11

America's pre-eminent conservative youth activist, Charlie Kirk, has been assassinated while speaking at a Utah college. Josh shares his thoughts... and reintroduces a classic monologue about America, violence and guns.

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49:40

Josh Visits the South Pacific: Climate Chaos, Chinese...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/09

What can a stunningly beautiful, dirt-poor, corrupt, tropical-island nation teach us about the battle between China and the West... and about how climate chaos will affect you?A lot, it turns out. In this bonus episode, Josh is on the ground in Solomon Islands, where leaders from across the Pacific are currently attending the 54th Pacific Islands Forum Meeting. Beneath all the happy-talk about foreign aid is a deeper subtext. The big rich players (i.e. Australia) are trying to bribe their tiny South

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34:02

Just Josh: Eulogy for Josh's Dad

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/08

Josh reflects on the death of his dad after years with Alzheimer’s - the strange in-between of losing someone before they’re gone, and the lessons he wishes he’d acted on earlier. Then, a live recording of Josh delivering the official eulogy at the funeral.

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53:22

PREMIUM: "Has Home Ownership Become Hereditary?" with...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/04

Why is housing in Australia so unaffordable, and what can be done about it? Peter Tulip, former economist at the US Federal Reserve and the Reserve Bank of Australia, now chief economist at the Centre for Independent Studies joins Josh to unpack the roots of the housing crisis. They discuss supply and demand, heritage rules, immigration, infrastructure, and why the dream of home ownership is slipping out of reach for younger generations.

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76:05

"Substack's Founders on the Future of the Media" with...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/09/01

What is the future of the media? Are we doomed to inhabit our own social-media news bubbles, tailored by algorithms to keep us “engaged”? Will readers return to old-school news outlets? Or is there a third way? That’s Substack’s bet. The platform is transforming the media landscape by enabling journalists and creators to speak directly to users.Just as Josh was embarking on Substack’s first-ever around-the-world livestream marathon, the company announced a new round of

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60:00

PREMIUM: "Anti-Immigration, the Far Right & the...

Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps ·

2025/08/28

How does an adventurous, open-minded, well-travelled young bloke get interested in nationalism... and then in Western supremacy... and then white pride... Until he becomes so obsessed with protecting Western Civilization from Islam, that he shoots nearly a hundred innocent Muslims and livestreams the massacre to cheering racists around the world? The official government line is that the 2019 Christchurch mosque shooter was a lone wolf. The killer himself cultivated this image. But the movement that

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