The Free Press
Confessions of a Former Pro-Palestine Activist
- Title
- Confessions of a Former Pro-Palestine Activist
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- “I truly did not know how horrific October 7 was. I never saw any of this footage on my feed. I never saw anyone repost it. I didn’t know even about the Nova music festival itself...There’s just so much more information I didn’t know. And I think that my story isn’t unique on the pro-Palestine side. I think a lot of people joined the movement without having all of these facts.”
Former pro-Palestine activist Taryn Thomas talks about how groupthink and her social media algorithm prevented her from learning the truth about the 2023 terrorist attacks on Israel.
Find the full interview "Confessions of a Former Pro-Palestine Activist" on YouTube.
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- Is the American Dream Dead?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- America's Founding Contradiction.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- The Founders’ Blueprint for Saving America | Walter Isaacson
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Walter Isaacson is known for writing the definitive biographies of Henry Kissinger, Benjamin Franklin, Leonardo da Vinci, Albert Einstein, Steve Jobs, and Elon Musk. But his new book, The Greatest Sentence Ever Written, is not a biography at all. It’s an analysis—and a dissection—of the words that defined American history and shape our political imagination:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Most of us know this version by heart. But the original formulation read: “We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independant, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness.”
These edits may seem minor. But shifting words lik...
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- Big Tech Has Sabotaged Young Men
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Former Pro-Palestine Activist: We Were Told "Do Not Interact With Zionists"
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- “It was definitely drilled into our minds that debate with Zionists was useless because they don’t care about the babies getting slaughtered…If you did go out of your way to interact with Zionists, you were going against the camp and what the established rules were…It created an echo chamber.”
Former pro-Palestine activist Taryn Thomas explains how she was told to “never interact” with Zionists.
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- The Quarter Zip Movement Is About More Than Fashion
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- The Quarter Zip Movement isn’t only about fashion—it’s a mindset. It’s young men saying, “How I show up matters,” argues Esther Krakue.
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- You're Boring. Read Something.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Why Elites Don't Understand the Poor
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Confessions of a Former Pro-Palestine Activist
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Former pro-Palestine activist Taryn Thomas explains how she was sucked into the anti-Israel movement:
“I just assumed that as a leftist, I should also be pro-Palestine, even if I don't know all of the facts…. If you are silent on the matter, you are contributing to that genocide. And anything that was not super pro-Palestine and even just saying, like, you know, ‘I believe in a two-state solution’ seemed against Palestine….”
Watch the full conversation: https://www.thefp.com/p/confessions-of-a-former-pro-palestine?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=organic-social&utm_campaign=video&utm_content=article
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- What the Rich Keep Getting Wrong About Poverty | Rob Henderson
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Most of us have read 1984 or Animal Farm. But fewer know of George Orwell’s first great work—an unvarnished account of his descent into the world of society’s outcasts. In this episode of Old School, Shilo Brooks sits down with Rob Henderson to discuss Down and Out in Paris and London, which is inspired by Orwell’s real-life plunge into the slums of two great European cities.
Henderson draws on his own trajectory from foster care and poverty to the rarefied worlds of Yale, Cambridge, and elite culture. Their conversation examines why people with privilege so often misunderstand the realities of the poor, how poverty shapes the mind and spirit, and what Orwell ultimately discovered about the divisions—and the common ground—between classes.
Old School is proudly brought to you by the Jack Miller Center. If you believe in the importance of civic education and want to help prepare the next generation to carry on our democracy, join us at JackMillerCent...
- Title
- Confessions of a Former Pro-Palestine Activist
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Think for yourself. Subscribe to The Free Press today: https://thefp.pub/3DmLpLi
When I saw a viral video of Taryn Thomas speaking at an October 7, 2025, vigil at Stanford, I knew she was unique. That’s because only two years before, she was a part of the pro-Palestine movement on her campus.
After Hamas’s attack on Israel, Thomas took part in the first encampments that appeared on campuses across the country and fully submitted to the groupthink that Hamas was a legitimate resistance group. She marched with people who wouldn’t dare associate with Zionists, and accepted an invitation to see the Nova exhibit in Los Angeles only so she could report back to her friends about the “Zionist propaganda.”
But that’s not what happened. Thomas says seeing evidence of the Nova festival and what truly happened on October 7 opened her eyes. In the months that followed, she took a trip to Israel, listened to the firsthand experiences of Israelis and...
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- AI Is Coming for Our Children
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Like social media, AI poses an immense risk to our children.
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt: “We allowed some of the biggest, most powerful companies to test their products on our children—with no guardrails, no control condition, and legal protection against liability…We’re about to make the same mistake in a much bigger way [with AI].”
Watch his full conversation with Bari Weiss: https://thefp.pub/4r2m91z
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- The War Inside the Conservative Movement
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Think for yourself. Subscribe to The Free Press today: https://thefp.pub/3DmLpLi
Today, the American right is in a moment of profound chaos and dysfunction. Many conservatives are alarmed by the antisemitic rhetoric coming from Gen Z commentator Nick Fuentes and his nihilistic Groyper movement. At the same time, Candace Owens is floating conspiracy theories suggesting Israeli involvement in the assassination of Charlie Kirk. And Tucker Carlson—perhaps the most influential right-wing broadcaster—has taken a dark and conspiratorial turn. Even Marjorie Taylor Greene has broken publicly with President Trump over the Epstein files, attacking him on X and across cable news. There is infighting, division, mudslinging, and a general sense of disorientation.
To help make sense of all of this, I was joined on the most recent Free Press livestream by journalist and historian Sam Tanenhaus. His work traces the origins and evolution of the modern conservative movement,...
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- Nicki Minaj Speaks Up for Christians in Nigeria
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Why I Don’t Regret Leaving the Democratic Party
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Evan Barker grew up a Democrat and worked for its biggest progressive stars. Then she voted for Trump—and watched her community turn on her.
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- Liberal Girls *Most* Harmed by Social Media
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Liberal girls were most harmed by social media, says Jonathan Haidt. “It started on Tumblr in 2013.”
“It’s the liberal girls who really rise first and fastest on depression…. Everyone is worse off, but being conservative seems to root you. You’re not as easily pushed into this crazy world.”
Watch the full episode of "Honestly with Bari Weiss" now.
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- The Muslim Brotherhood Media Empire Radicalizing Young Muslims
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- The Muslim Brotherhood’s political wings are outlawed or marginalized across much of the Arab world. But its media apparatus is a main pillar of its survival, “designed to amplify Islamist ideology, sustain its networks in exile, and project influence far beyond where its political chapters may be,” writes Mariam Wahba.
Read Mariam's investigation: https://www.thefp.com/p/how-the-muslim-brotherhood-built-media-empire?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=organic-social&utm_campaign=video&utm_content=article
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- Social Media Is Killing Our Kids. Jonathan Haidt Has the Solution.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Think for yourself. Subscribe to The Free Press today: https://thefp.pub/3DmLpLi
You probably know Jonathan Haidt as the guy trying to save your kids from smartphones and social media apps. Bari sat down with the Anxious Generation author in front of a live audience in New York City to talk about how we got to this point—and where we go from here.
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- Why New York City Has 50,000 ‘Ghost Apartments’
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- The FP’s Lucy Biggers visits a rent-stabilized apartment that’s been empty since 2021, even as New York City faces a housing shortage. And this isn’t an outlier. Because of 2019 rental laws, an estimated 50,000 similar units sit vacant across the city.
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- A Man Should Know: How to Own a Watch
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- "I was wearing my watch the day my children were born, the night I met my wife, and the day we got married," writes Elliot Ackerman.
Read his full piece "A Man Should Know: How to Own a Watch" here: https://www.thefp.com/p/a-man-should-know-how-to-own-a-watch?utm_source=instagram&utm_medium=organic-social
- Title
- The Great Gatsby Exposes Our Sick Society
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- What Is Flying Actually Like??
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Has flying actually been a total nightmare?
Yesterday, on the last day of the government shutdown, The FP’s Austyn Jeffs flew from LA to Vegas to find out.
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- Why Journalism Is Broken Today
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- The Hollow Opulence of Gatsby
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Why The Great Gatsby Still Defines America | Fareed Zakaria on The Great Gatsby
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- It’s been 100 years since The Great Gatsby was published. In this episode, Shilo Brooks sits down with journalist Fareed Zakaria to explore why the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel still feels so modern.
Zakaria shares his experience discovering the classic as an Indian immigrant, describing Gatsby as his gateway to understanding America. Together, they unpack the book’s enduring themes: the allure of reinvention and the American dream, the search for meaning in a world stripped of faith and tradition, and the spiritual hollowness that accompanies wealth and glamor. They also discuss Fitzgerald’s unique partnership with his editor Maxwell Perkins, a writer-editor collaboration that helped transform Gatsby into one of the greatest works of American literature. Plus: Zakaria sounds off on what’s wrong with journalism—and its consumers—today.
Old School is proudly brought to you by the Jack Miller Center. If you believe in the importance of civic education a...
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- Dance Moms Was a "Trainwreck"
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- “It really was like a train wreck.” Dance Moms star Nia Sioux on the “dysfunction” put on full display throughout the show.
Abby “would say things that were out-of-pocket—that were inappropriate. Then, the moms would react.”
Watch the full conversation at TheFP.com.
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- Abby Lee Miller's Racism Toward Nia Sioux
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Dance Moms star Nia Sioux on the racism she experienced during her time on the show.
“I was so young, but I knew things weren’t quite right.”
Watch the full conversation at TheFP.com.
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- Can You Be a Pro-Israel Democrat?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Sen. John Fetterman: “Being devoted to Israel is becoming increasingly incompatible with being a proud Democrat.”
Watch the full episode of Honestly: https://thefp.pub/43slo7F
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- Dance Moms Star Talks Abby Lee, Emotional Abuse, Racism & More | Nia Sioux
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- You may have come across a video on the internet showing a dance teacher yelling “Boring. Yawning. Sloppy. Lazy!” That is Abby Lee Miller of Lifetime’s hit show Dance Moms. Now this meme is just one emblem of a show that captured the cultural zeitgeist for nearly a decade.
The show centered on six dancers, between the ages of 6 and 13 in season 1, who spent 40–60 hours a week filming and training for weekly dance competitions under the tutelage of infamously harsh teacher Miller. All day, Miller would criticize them on their looks, their technique, their attitude, and even their weight. Meanwhile, their mothers would watch the classes from a raised mezzanine, picking fights with each other and with Miller, in pursuit of fame and glory for their respective daughters.
The drama, arguably, sold the series. As Nia Sioux—an original cast member and dancer on the show—writes in her new book, Bottom of the Pyramid, the producers “struck gold with the ...
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- Young People Are Falling For Socialism.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Capitalism is failing young people. So they’re falling for socialism.
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- John Fetterman Speaks: Defying His Party on Israel, Zohran, Shutdown & More
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Think for yourself. Subscribe to The Free Press today: https://thefp.pub/3DmLpLi
Who owns the future of the Democratic Party?
That’s the question on everyone’s mind since last Tuesday night—when the richest city in America elected 34-year-old democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani as its mayor.
You can see Mamdani’s win as a one-off—a charismatic contender facing a rival mired in controversy. But the other way to see it is as emblematic of something larger: a sign about the state—and future—of the left.
Here was a candidate promising to solve the affordability crisis with free childcare, free buses, rent freezes, and even government-run grocery stores. And despite the socialist bent, most establishment Democrats fell in line to support him—from Kathy Hochul and Hakeem Jeffries to Barack Obama, who reportedly called Mamdani to offer himself as a sounding board.
If that’s true—if Mamdani is the new standar...
- Title
- The 3I/ATLAS Mystery
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- There’s a mysterious object flying through our solar system right now.
It’s called 3I/ATLAS—only the third interstellar object humans have ever detected.
The vast majority of astronomers say it’s just a comet. But Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb tells Will Rahn he isn’t so sure.
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- Government Shutdown Ending
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- The government shutdown may be coming to an end. Gabe Kaminsky reports on the latest.
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- The BBC Is a Joke
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- The BBC used to be the gold standard for broadcast journalism. Now it’s mired in scandals, and has become quite frankly, a joke, argues Ester Krakue.
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- Ep 4: Spiral Murder In Detroit
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- During a trial boiling with tension, a second trial was taking place on the internet.
Episode 4 of Spiral Murder In Detroit is out now.
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- How This Thomas Sowell Book Influenced Coleman Hughes
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- When Coleman Hughes first read Thomas Sowell’s "A Conflict of Visions," it flipped his assumptions about inequality. He realized different groups have different histories, cultures, and values—so equal outcomes shouldn’t be the default expectation.
Watch Old School with Shilo Brooks on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts.
- Title
- Who is Thomas Sowell?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Why do we believe what we believe? And how do those beliefs shape our politics?
Thomas Sowell, one of the world’s most influential economists and social philosophers, set out to answer this question in his 1987 book, A Conflict of Visions. In it, he traces the underlying logic behind all modern political divides—why it is that knowing someone’s position on one issue, say gun control, makes it easy to predict their position on a totally unrelated issue, like abortion.
Watch Old School with Shilo Brooks on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts.
- Title
- The 1987 Book that Explains Zohran Mamdani’s Victory
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Why do we believe what we believe? And how do those beliefs shape our politics?
Thomas Sowell, one of the world’s most influential economists and social philosophers, set out to answer this question in his 1987 book, A Conflict of Visions. In it, he traces the underlying logic behind all modern political divides—why it is that knowing someone’s position on one issue, say gun control, makes it easy to predict their position on a totally unrelated issue, like abortion.
In this episode, Shilo Brooks sits down with Coleman Hughes to discuss the book that Sowell himself calls his favorite. Their conversation—recorded well before yesterday’s election of Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani—illuminates why some of us buy into utopian projects of remaking society, while others trust the quiet power of incentive structures like free markets.
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- The Spiritual Cost of the Digital Age | Paul Kingsnorth
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Think for yourself. Subscribe to The Free Press today: https://thefp.pub/3DmLpLi
Do you feel uneasy? Do you feel a level of ambient anxiety? Do you feel despair, despite the fact that we live in the most luxurious time and place in human history? And did my producer offer to give me a Klonopin today? That one I won’t answer.
The point is, you are not crazy. If you feel these things, you are simply attuned to reality—and it’s not a problem that’s solvable with less screen time or with meditation, red light, or sea moss.
My brilliant guest, Paul Kingsnorth, argues that the reason you are feeling this way is not this or that social media app or algorithm or culture war issue. That these are all superficial expressions of a thousand-year battle with what he calls “the Machine.” What exactly that means, he’ll explain tonight…
To personally fight the Machine, Paul has moved his family out of urban England to live off the lan...
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- A Man Should Know: How to Introduce Himself
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- How can today’s lost boys become tomorrow’s good men?
Introducing A Man Should Know—a new series by Elliot Ackerman, Marine veteran and best-selling author, on the timeless lessons that make a man.
The first up: how to introduce yourself. Find the series at TheFP.com
- Title
- These New Yorkers Are Fighting Back
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Despite campaign promises to address “affordability,” lifelong residents of Queens say a 2019 climate bill—fully backed by Zohran Mamdani—would push middle-class homeowners out of New York City.
“Real New Yorkers need to take control…These Mamdani voters come from out of state—they don’t care.”
“We all want a clean environment, but you can't destroy affordable housing.”
Read more on the NYC mayor's race at TheFP.com.
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- Are Conservatives the New Snowflakes?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- “Snowflakes make bad decisions because every choice is guided by the least consequential variable: Does this align with what I want to be true?
Ryan Holiday says that the shoe is now on the other foot: conservatives have become the censorious ones.
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- Why Aren't Young Men Reading in 2025?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Why are young men and boys not reading in America in 2025?
Shilo Brooks: “I suspect there’s plenty of trash that they’re willing to ingest. But what they’re reading are ephemeral things rather than enduring things.”
Shilo Brooks wants to save men from despair. His prescription? Books.
This is the driving vision of the new podcast he just launched with The Free Press called Old School, where he talks to guests about the books that shaped their lives.
Get it now on Spotify, Apple podcasts, and YouTube.
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- How Hamas Keeps Gaza From Thriving
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Princeton Prof Called His Students Out for Being Boring.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Former Princeton professor Shilo Brooks would tell his students that they were boring:
“Y’all are boring as hell . . .and the only way you become interesting is to have ideas that are not your own boring, ignorant ideas. What that means is that you need to read people whose ideas have endured because they stand for something.
“Expose yourself to the best that has been thought so you can become a person who has novel ideas based on arguments that other people who aren’t readers have never heard. You need to have some rough edges when you walk into a room. Don’t be an empty suit.”
Watch the full episode: https://thefp.pub/4oJqg0e
- Title
- The Real Pinocchio Is Much Darker Than Disney
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Will the Ceasefire Collapse?
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- Just over two weeks ago, Israel and Hamas agreed to a historic ceasefire that—after two years of war—brought home the remaining living Israeli hostages from Gaza. Donald Trump repeatedly hailed it as the end of the war and the dawn of a new Middle East.
In the weeks since, Hamas has violated the deal multiple times, and on Tuesday, Israel responded with renewed strikes in Gaza.
Is the ceasefire durable—or about to unravel? And will the war between Hamas and Israel truly end?
Join us today at 10 a.m. ET with Haviv Rettig Gur, The Free Press’s Middle East analyst, to discuss what comes next.
You won’t want to miss it.
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- Nick Cave: How Pinocchio Helped Me Grieve My Son
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
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- Men Are Struggling. Reading Can Help.
- Date posted
- 6 months ago
- Description
- It’s no secret that young men are—sort of—unwell.
They are four times more likely to kill themselves, three times more likely to struggle with addiction, and 12 times more likely to be incarcerated, than women. If that wasn’t enough, record numbers of men are not getting married, not dating, and not enrolling in school or working, and they’re struggling with serious mental health issues.
In response, a cottage industry has emerged—full of influencers and paid courses claiming to teach young men how to become “high value.”
But more deeply, there seems to be an intractable challenge: Young people lack meaning. Fifty-eight percent of young adults say they’ve experienced little or no sense of purpose in their lives over the past month.
Shilo Brooks has a simple idea for all of it. He’s telling young men—and really, all young people—to read. Yes, read. The idea is simple: Reading great books can make stronger and be...
