they're for cushioned on the underlying fundmentalsals and tt changed thick about life. what surprises me most is a reported on this was the an littal rigor and the depth of strategic thinking. >> everyone one more time, chris leonard. >> thank you very much. i appreciate it. [applause] >> and now more television for serious readers. >> the book is call the panic attack,down radicals in at the age of trump. the author is the associate editor of reason magazine, or reason.com. robby soave, who are these young radicals? >> these are activists who are

particularly causing issues on college campus. you infind them in the streets of places like world as well who are -- ported as well. they'rety. the oldlets wafts free free. due process, aclu value. right now you see attempts to shut down speakers who come do college campuses. even the professors of the activist students who are purport early on the left as wellings the progressive left say they can't have conversation is with these studentses and they risk offending system they do offend them their jobs could be in trouble because they can be investigated. it's changing our culture very quickly and dramatically toward this cancel everybody. wharf is a problematic has to be run out of pock life and that's coming from the activist contingent on the lift. >> all on the leist not tot orient. >> it's very much on right as well. talk about ill liberalism of the right, particular through alt

right, a white nationalist group that has gotten some attention. like the radical left, small in number but loud, vocal, and has had huge effect in the realm of social media primarily and harassing people and making it unpleasant to be online. >> you say that intersectionallity is the operating system of the modern left. what does that mean. >> it's a term that comes to us from sociology. kind in the late 1980s. it was used by socialologists to describe how. i you are person of color, historically you would have experienced racism. i you're a woman, sectionism, and so on. but if you're a black woman you have multiple sources of oppression working against you. so that theory makes total sense to me. but in intersectional practice and activism, your supposed to give the most oppressed person in the activist circumstance the most authority and most defer residence, only they can be the

experts on sources of oexpression activity. so tart get to the thorn where when does this make me the most opressed important? what about these? it's also lent itself toward i think it increasingly fragile health activism on campus it because i see young beam who are exaggerating the extent of their ptsd. when i talk to their professors and they say everyone in miss classroom says they're a survivor of trauma. it's doubtful but they're saying that because having ptsd gives you authority as an activist. so it's incentivizing people see themselves as mentally unwell which is a bad thing. >> how did be get here? >> it's a difficult question. we're talk but broad social and culture change over a long period of time so there's no easy answer i. think that the changing regime o. norms of safety culture in schools and in parenting have probably led to a

generation that through no fault of its own is a little more coddled then the previous generation, less resilient and i'm not blaming young people it's our schools have changed dramatically. if we wet back to 1970s use not find a police officer in a single school in me. todays there are motor vehicles in half of all public high schools. schools are actually very safe. the headlines to the contrary are misleading. schools have the safest place for kids and crime has fallen dramatically. young people are less at risk of kidnapping than ever about but you would get the ideaom going through school, from seeing parents arrested for letting kid play by themselves, those kind of things you get the idea that it is dangerous, and so the purpose of school is to protect me. right? to make me feel safe. and then when safety gets stretched to include emotional safety as well, i think that's when you start to see this tide against words that wound or words that hurt. i need to be protect from that,

the same way the school is responsible for my physical well-being. >> is this a in your view a good trend or not? >> i think it's very concerning, and i am critical of the right also well and i don't want to be causing too much alarm. don't thing it's a generational problem so much that people are talking beaut small subset of a as radical fringe but haven an a poisonous effect or or social discussion and culture. it's miserable to be online. we're seeing young adult novel authors are canceling bangs because they're young sensitivity readers saying you can't say that. that's cultural appropriation. a lot of conversations being closed off just because a small number of militant radical people on the political extremes are saying so, and i think that is bad. >> you give as an example in your book panic attack, the

movie, the documentary -- the movie boys don't cry. >> yes. >> what happened? >> they invited at reed college a progressive liberal arts college in ported, invited kimberly pierce the director of that really ground-breaking film at exposed american audiences to what it's like to be a trans gender person. a sympathetic portrayal of a trans gender person the activists at the college, they shut down the event and wouldn't let kimberly pierce speak. put up signs saying expletives at her, vial thing. they hated her? she cast hilary swank in it and she is not a trans person son, having cast this vie -- this violent its intersectionallate bus only a trans person should be playing a trans role so they hated for authorize that which is self-defeating. wouldn't have been as a big film without hilary swank.

that's an example of the at each other's throat and self-defeating tactic that some of these activists are embracing because of the influence of intersectionallity. >> charles murray invite to middle bury college, he and the professor who invited him both injured. >> right. literally attacked. they were physically assaulted by protesters who thought it was so important to stop what was supposed to be a debate. going to be a debate between murray's perspective and a left of center perspective but they don't want that to happen. when he interview for the book i said don't you think you make charles murray or whoever it look more sympathetic if you're shouting them down and using violence gem them? you're driving people toward them and they say, we are about safety. we are keeping the marginalized anymore our community safe from the harm of charles murray's words and views. so if he ais allow to he speak with he contributed to he emotional or mental up rest of

people we care about' is a really different idea i think about how safety works, so much -- it's at the root of this. >> how small are these alt-right and tifa groups. >> they're extremely small. we're talking about at many of these events, dozens of people, maybe hundreds or thousands nationwide. and they're -- the feed each other because they -- the far right shows up and then the far left shows up and then they throw things at each other. >> he media shows onbecause. >> you don't wasn't to -- the news is thing that happen so when these things happen you have to cover them. but the problem -- the challenge for the media is making them -- is contextualized them and not making these things seem like they're happening more often than the actually are. but they are happening. there was violence in ported against a journalist, a expressive live right of center journalist who writes for the online -- >> who is also gay.

>> yes, and he is gay but because he is critical of antifa's activity shades said he has no right to cover us and they beat him up when he tried to videotape what they were doing. and antifa rejects the idea that people who disagree with them should have right order the far slight have rights. they're symphmilk my ill liberal that i believe is caching on. not their tactics but philosophy that my enemy shoots not have right because they're my enemies. >> do you see a solution and do you offer one in panic attack. >> i think the best thing to do on college campuses is to just answer bad speech with more speech to say, no, i would like to hear someone -- i would like to hear charles murray talk, hear a disperspective when he event happen for the other students are a majority to just stand up and say, no, please stop are want the professors, the left of center professors to

be able to talk to student about the robust history of free speech activism on the left and not feel like they are going -- their jobs going to be at risk if they've say the wrong thing. that's on administrators to recognize the rights of faculty and -- they don't have to take -- don't have to arrest students or throw them out of the campus. they've need to just make a safe space to be actually be able to express ideas counter to the students and have those people not suffer consequences for doing so. >> what are you politics. >> i'm a libertarian so i have ideological beliefs but interesting the it's sort of puts me in the center issue of some of this stuff because aisle sympathetic the goals progressive activist. talk but "black lives matter" in the book. i agree with a lot of what they would like to accomplish. think our criminal justice system is flawed and has had a disparate impact on people of color. so, it's from a position of occasionally whatnotting the

left to succeed that i'm critiqueing their tactics and say this will turn people off or you're saying you need only the most woke, the mose radically progressive people, the good guys. that's six people at the end of the day. even you guys don't agree on that stuff. >> what attracted you to libertarianism? >> i kind of have a boring libertarian origin story. i grew up in a approximately house hold but my parents were libertarian. >> where died you grow up. >> the detroit area. pro business but socially liberal brad lie becking and i decide that's what i scam then i found reason magazine and i started reading reading and nowk that. >> robby soave, the author of "panic attack, young radical nets age of trump." thank you for joining us on booktv. >> my pleasure, thank you.