Podcast Summary: On the Media

Episode: "How Debate Took Over the Internet. Plus, a Case for Confronting the Past."
Date: January 2, 2026
Hosts: Brooke Gladstone, Michael Olinger

Overview

This episode examines the rise of heated debate formats online—focusing on how channels like Jubilee have made political argument a form of viral entertainment and how this trend impacts media, public discourse, and democracy. It then pivots to a second topic: the active attempts to reshape American historical memory, especially around slavery and race, under the Trump administration and why confronting history is crucial for a healthy democracy.

Part 1: The Debate Economy—Jubilee and Viral Argument

The Monetization and Spectacle of Debate

• Opening Theme
  Social media is saturated with "vicious political debates that make bank, but at what cost?" (Brooke Gladstone, 00:07).
• Legacy media and YouTube alike are embracing public debate as entertainment and as a driver of engagement and revenue, such as CBS’s new shows and news channels’ "debate specials" (01:27–02:14).
• Jason Lee, founder of Jubilee, articulates debate’s purported democratic function:
  "You will not agree with everything you hear tonight ... and that is exactly the point. Because the premise of a democracy is that we persuade each other with words and not violence." (Jason Lee, 01:53)

Jubilee’s Rise and Controversies

• Jubilee’s Format:
  Jubilee, a YouTube channel, became a viral sensation with its "Middle Ground" and "Surrounded" debate series, which often pit one central figure (sometimes an expert, sometimes a provocateur) against a large group of ideological opponents (03:05–05:24, 09:23–10:19).
• Metrics and Appeal:
  "Millions. Tens of millions of people watch Jubilee. They've got billions of collective views at this point." (Jason Lee, 05:24)
• Its shows aren’t just educational—they’re engineered for maximum drama and conflict, fueling virality and algorithmic reward:
  "YouTube rewards rage bait, mostly the entire Internet rewards rage bait. That’s what algorithms reward. If you can create these viral clips of people saying extremely shocking things, you will succeed." (Taylor Lorenz, 08:51–09:09)

The Ethics and Consequences of Viral Debate

• Platforming Harmful Views:
  Jubilee’s "radical empathy" approach leads to episodes featuring climate deniers, flat earthers, and ultra-right influencers, sometimes provoking backlash for seeming to legitimize fringe or hateful ideologies (07:46–08:36).
• "Surrounded" Format:
  Episodes like "1 Doctor vs. 20 Vaccine Skeptics" and "1 Conservative vs. 25 LGBTQ Activists" maximize spectacle but often fail to change minds or foster constructive dialogue (10:19–11:14, 13:31–16:39).
  Notable moment: Dr. Mike asks, "Is there anything I could say today that would change your mind?" and a skeptic retorts, "Probably not because I actually read and study." (11:07)

Participant Experiences and Repercussions

• Stacia Underwood (trans activist, "Surrounded" episode):
  Underwood reflects on being cast without knowing she’d face a particularly hostile, high-profile conservative:
  "I definitely wasn’t expecting it to be somebody that was so hateful." (Stacia Underwood, 14:05)
  The episode's virality led to hate, threats, but also positive exposure:
  "I got so many hate comments ... but I also received more of a following ... I was on Piers Morgan Uncensored." (15:06)
• Mehdi Hasan (journalist, Jubilee guest):
  Feels "hoodwinked" by being placed with openly fascist participants:
  "If Jubilee had come to me and said, you’ll be debating one guy who says he’s a fascist and another guy who tells you to get out of the country, I’d have said, I’ll pass, thanks, I’m washing my hair." (Mehdi Hasan, 20:44)
• Participating can amplify not only the progressive guest but aspiring far-right influencers, making cancellation part of their brand:
  "He ran with the Cancel Culture story and raised nearly $40,000 on a crowdfunding site." (22:03)

Can Viral Debate Change Minds? Or Just Entrench Divides?

• Debate’s limits in the algorithmic age:
  "Each side of the debate more or less declare victory with their own communities ... people don’t watch the whole hour and a half. They watch two minutes in their feed or 30 seconds in their feed." (Mehdi Hasan, 23:44)
• Is it worth it?
  "I’m reserving judgment ... millions of people now follow me and Zatteo ... people can say that’s cynical, that’s self-serving, whatever." (21:26)
• The shrinking persuadable public:
  "I do believe people's minds can change ... The debate is how many minds can it change. I think that audience is a shrinking audience." (24:46)

Part 2: History, Memory, and the Fight Over America’s Story

The Trump Administration’s War on Public Memory

• Pres. Trump’s 2025–26 executive order aims to "restore truth and sanity" to American history—removing references to slavery and racism from federal museums, exhibits, and parks (26:34–28:19).
• Examples:
  • Smithsonian exhibits on race and sculpture targeted
  • Orders to remove slavery references from parks and cancel free admission days like MLK Day and Juneteenth (28:19–29:14)
  • Crackdown on "DEI swag" and accusations of museums being "the last remaining segment of woke" (Brooke Gladstone, 27:04; 27:13)

Bryan Stevenson on the Necessity of Honesty and Memory

• Stevenson’s Mission:
  Lawyer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, Stevenson built museums and memorials to teach an honest history of slavery and racial violence (29:42–30:12).
• On confronting the past:
  "I’m not interested in talking about these things because I want to punish America. I want to liberate us. … But we can’t get there if we don’t have the courage to be honest about the things that have held us back." (Bryan Stevenson, 41:29 & earlier, 00:41)
• The politics of ‘national shame’:
  Stevenson notes how American unwillingness to memorialize its own wrongdoing ("We built [the 9/11] memorial almost immediately ... We're not good ... at memorializing the things that we have done wrong.") contrasts with practices in Germany around the Holocaust (32:15–33:49)

Historical Backlash and the Cycles of Progress

• Retrenchment is not new:
  "I don’t know that I agree that we’ve never seen this before ... There was a glorious period. And then it all collapsed. … and then this era of terror, violence … It was a period of greater retrenchment than what we are seeing now." (42:04–44:10)
• Why Stevenson is hopeful:
  “We have never been better situated to win the next phase of this struggle toward a just America than we are right now … Without some of the optics of 2020, these narratives wouldn’t be resonating.” (44:12)
• On institutional resilience:
  Stevenson believes there will be tremendous resistance to false narratives and sees a growing movement of storytellers, journalists, and citizens committed to truth (35:17, 45:30)

The Transformative Power of Truth-Telling

• Redemptive Possibility:
  Stevenson shares a moving story (46:51–50:10) about a Black woman and a white man jointly collecting soil from a lynching site, illustrating how confronting the truth together can foster understanding and healing.
  • "I don’t believe that beautiful things like that always happen when we tell the truth. But I do believe that we deny ourselves the beauty of justice when we refuse to tell the truth."
• Hope as a necessity:
  "I do not believe that we should be hopeless about our capacity to move forward. In fact, ... I think that hopelessness is the enemy of justice." (38:12)

Notable Quotes and Timestamps

• On the logic of viral debates:
  "YouTube rewards rage bait ... If you can create these viral clips of people saying extremely shocking things, you will succeed." —Taylor Lorenz, 08:51
• On debate’s potential and perils:
  “What are we going to do next? Is Jubilee going to have a one Jewish person versus 20 Holocaust deniers? Like, where do we draw the line?” —Mehdi Hasan, 21:04
• On why honest history matters:
  “There’s thriving democracy waiting for us, but we can’t get there if we don’t have the courage to be honest about the things that have held us back.” —Bryan Stevenson, 00:41
• On hope and justice:
  "Hopelessness is the enemy of justice." —Bryan Stevenson, 41:30

Key Segments & Timestamps

• The debate spectacle and Jubilee’s format:
  00:01–01:22, 03:05–09:23
• Flat Earthers, vaccine skeptics, and stacking the deck:
  07:24–13:31
• Social media debate and platforming extremists:
  16:39–24:19
• On the (im)possibility of persuasion in a viral age:
  23:44–25:39
• Trump’s history executive order and museum fights:
  26:34–28:19
• Bryan Stevenson on the necessity and hope of memory and truth-telling:
  29:34–50:12

Conclusion

The episode critically examines the viralization of debate and its power—and peril—in shaping public discourse. While online debates can reach huge audiences and sometimes shift minds, they often exaggerate polarization, platform dangerous views, and commodify outrage. Parallelly, the show's second half spotlights the fundamental importance of honest history, memorialization, and narrative in the ongoing struggle for justice—a struggle that demands both vigilance and hope.

Final Note:
“You will never silence those of us who feel called … to talk about the legacy of slavery … Hopelessness is the enemy of justice.” —Bryan Stevenson (35:49, 41:30)