Uncancelled Culture (2024) - David Baddiel, Roxane Gay, Andy Mills, Megan Phelps-Roper & Tim Dean

Uncancelled Culture (2024) - David Baddiel, Roxane Gay, Andy Mills, Megan Phelps-Roper & Tim Dean

Author: Festival of Dangerous Ideas February 5, 2025 Duration: 1:01:20

Throughout history we have found ways to regulate human behaviour through the threat of social exclusion. But while the idea of 'cancellation' is not new, the online sphere has radically shifted the way we hold people to account and punish perceived wrongdoing. 

Is redemption possible in the digital age? And can narratives of growth and forgiveness help us shift the power from condemnation to compassion? What does 'forgiveness' look like in the digital age? 

 

David Baddiel is an accomplished comedian, author, screenwriter and television presenter. His works include the Sunday Times Politics Book of The Year – his polemic Jews Don't Count, and The God Desire.

Roxane Gay is an author whose works include AyitiAn Untamed StateThe New York Times' bestselling Bad Feminist, and The New York Times' bestselling Hunger: A Memoir of My Body and the nationally bestselling Opinions: A Decade of Arguments, Criticism, and Minding Other People's Business.

Andy Mills is an American reporter and podcast producer who co-created The Daily at The New York TimesReflector and several documentary series including Rabbit Hole and The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling.

Megan Phelps-Roper is an author and podcast producer who left a life of religious extremism in 2012. She has spent the past decade using her experiences to work with schools on anti-bullying campaigns, with law enforcement organisations investigating deradicalisation, and with tech companies on the intersection of safety, free speech, and the value of dialogue across ideological divides. She hosted and produced The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling.

Chaired by philosopher, Tim Dean.


For more than a decade, the Festival of Dangerous Ideas has curated a space where provocative thinking isn't just welcomed, it's the entire point. This podcast is a direct line to that stage, offering an archive of talks that deliberately unsettle comfortable opinions and interrogate the stubborn problems we often agree to ignore. Each episode captures a live conversation from Australia's original disruptive ideas festival, presenting arguments that can be exhilarating, uncomfortable, and vitally important. You’ll hear from a compelling roster of festival alumni-including leading experts, intellectual troublemakers, and visionary authors-who share perspectives that conventional discourse frequently sidelines. The discussions here aren't theoretical exercises; they grapple with the pressing and difficult issues shaping our society and culture right now. Tuning in means granting yourself access to a decade-long tradition of intellectual courage, where the core assumption is that some truths are only reached by first entertaining a dangerous idea. It’s a chance to listen as boundaries are pushed, not for shock value, but for clarity. The result is a consistently challenging and refreshing audio experience that complicates simple narratives and expands what feels possible to talk about.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Festival of Dangerous Ideas
Podcast Episodes
FODI: The In-Between | 05.5 | Semi-Autonomous | B-Side [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 5:13
A text-generating AI that has been trained with FODI transcripts speaks in conversation with a deepfake AI about violence, conspiracy theories and what it means to be human. Our FODI-trained AI was created using Max Wool…
FODI: The In-Between | 04.5 | The Dancer | B-Side [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:49
Recording art for a post-human world, a machine attempts to describe a human dance. The piece responds to Eleanor Gordon-Smith and Slavoj Žižek's discussion, the power of words to create reality, and the experience of em…
FODI: The In-Between | 03.5 | Within Salt | B-Side [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 5:11
During Sydney's most recent lockdown, sound artist Alexandra Spence submerged a 15 minute-long piece of cassette tape in seawater. The cassette tape contained a field recording of waves, and a recording of Alex's voice o…
FODI: The In-Between | 02.5 | Anthropocene | B-Side [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 5:28
We hear the recorded sound of the invisible electromagnetic landscape that humans created unintentionally, allowing us to tune in to what our environment has to endure. Against a backdrop, we hear the voices of anonymous…
FODI: The In-Between | 01.5 | Light Shines | B-Side [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 4:56
Sydney-based writer Tasnim Hossain records her written take on the meandering histories of Enlightenment discussed by Joya Chatterji and Stephen Fry, and the experimental sounds of the first known recordings of the human…