Substack, Legacy Media, and the Voices Being Overlooked

These are just some of the people who don't have national profiles who you should be reading

Just finished watching a live video with Marlon Weems, who runs The Journeyman Substack where he writes about finance, tells stories of his past as one of the few Black stock brokers in the U.S., and does live interviews with other Substack thinkers.

He has almost 10,000 subscribers. But lately things have become stagnant.

His guest was Egberto Willies, who noted that at one point he lost 90 percent of his income when social media changed their algorithms.

Before the election, Substack was a refuge for journalists who could not stay in legacy media and look themselves in the mirror at the same time. Not when our democracy was falling apart around us, and our editors wanted us to be “neutral.”

But since the election, most of the journalism space on Substack has been taken up by people who were OK with what legacy media has been doing the last 10 years, and only recently became alarmed. People with big names and big followings.

The Substack tech bros love big names and ready-made followers.

“When I look at my feed now,” Weems said, “It feels like I’m looking at cable news.”

To fight against this, I try mightily to name check people who blow me away with their think-pieces and social commentary.

People like Weems, Katie Jgln, Celeste Davis, J.P. Hill, Karen Attiah (who is a recent refugee from Columbia University because they canceled her race in America course), Aaron Rupar, Jessica Valenti, Michael Harriot, Jess Piper, Erin Reed, Judd Legum (and his team), Brian Klaas, Critical Resistance (which is anonymous and totally intriguing), Teddy Wilson, Kristin Du Mez, Zach Silk, Michelle Hornish, Joseph Politano, Susan Campbell.

And yes, I do read Heather Cox Richardson. Who doesn’t?

And Joyce Vance and Paul Krugman and Garry Kasparov.

Each one of these people gives me a different perspective, and great insight. And aside from Vance, Krugman and Kasparov, they are voices of everyday people, working in their fields. Some may have stumbled onto a bigger audience (as HCR did during the pandemic), but they all provide context in ways legacy media does not.

It’s like being at a university, honestly.

Lately, though, I have not been discovering new people, as the legacy media refugees have taken root, done livestreams not for content or learning, but for marketing purposes. Which Substack rewards.

And so, I’m going to highlight a few stories from some of the above writers that I found interesting and important this week. And encourage you to go read them.

Michael Harriot on the New Eugenics

The Racist, Far-Right Conspiracy Theories Behind Trump's Policies

Harriot writes:

…understanding obscure white supremacist ideology and exotic extremist dogma might be the only way anyone can comprehend the logic behind some of this administration’s most puzzling decisions.

Indeed.

The firing of Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Linda Fagan during Trump’s first week was a manifestation of the fact that Trump and his Heritage Foundation incels fundamentally don’t think women are smart enough to lead, so therefore Fagan must have been a DEI hire.

Same with Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Lisa Franchetti, who was a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

And, of course, the firing of Admiral C.Q. Brown Jr., who was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

A Black man, in their view, also is not intelligent enough to lead, and must have been a DEI hire.

Honestly, I think the phrase “DEI hire” has come to replace “dirty [fill in the blank].”

Now RFK Jr. wants to incentive women to have more babies. But he doesn’t really want to incentivize ALL women to have more babies.

Harriot points out that in 1980, white people made up roughly 80% of the U.S. population.

Today, they make up 58%.

So we must incentivize white women - focusing on white, Christian women (we don’t need more of us subversive Jews in our society) - to have more babies.

As Harriot notes, birth rates are not falling around the world. They’re just falling in the wrong places for Trump and his white supremacist team.

The Trump Administration even wants to give opportunities, like Fulbright scholarships, based on white fertility.

And they’re threatening to purge women and non-white people from the military. Almost half of our active duty personnel are non-white. As of 2023, 21% are women. And those numbers are rising.

Proof, to the Heritage incels, that white men are being replaced.

It’s eugenics all over again.

In the last 100 years, we have come full circle.

Here’s the thing, though. If Trump purges the military of all of the women and non-white men, how will he fill the ranks?

I know neither Millennials nor Gen Z knows what a draft is. But they might find out soon.

Go read Michael Harriot. Subscribe.

Jessica Valenti

Every day that I read Abortion Everyday I learn something that legacy media used to report on, but don’t anymore as they let themselves be led by the Trump chaos.

Valenti keeps track of abortion legislation and initiatives in every state. She keeps track of assaults on women’s health and basic rights.

Here are three things I learned from her recently:

1. Women in states with abortion bans are twice as likely to die in pregnancy

2. A bill in Texas would “mandate that state wastewater treatment plants test the water for the presence of birth control pills, abortion medication, and hormones associated with gender-affirming care and pregnancy.” Talk about government surveillance!

3. Legislators in Nebraska are trying to criminalize miscarrriages.

These are just three pieces of info I got from Valenti. I don’t read her every day (sometimes I need to just do puzzles or play guitar and read nothing), but I know where I can go to get a comprehensive roundup of what’s happening around the country vis a vis women’s healthcare.

Go read her. Subscribe.

Celeste Davis and Katie Jgln

I’m putting these two women together because they both write about women in history, gender roles, feminist theory. I read them both the moment they hit my inbox. They are both brilliant, inspiring and affirming.

I want to highlight a series that Davis recently did on Patriarchal Masculinity. Which is basically a nicer way of saying “toxic masculinity.”

The series explores how boys are taught not to have empathy; how mass shooters are often driven by misogyny (which I’ve pointed out many times); how patriarchal masculinity is learned, not innate; how more equal societies are, not uncoincidentally, the nations that are on the top of the World Happiness Report.

She even name checks Jgln. Which makes me happy. The two women live and write on different continents, but they complement each other - literally and figuratively. Which is what women should do.

Jgln recently wrote a fascinating piece about how Florence Nightingale was more than a nurse. She introduced the idea of statistically documenting hospital procedures and patient care - making medical care far safer.

For example, few doctors washed their hands between patients, until Nightingale produced charts showing how important the practice is.

Go read both of these writers. Subscribe.

Erin Reed

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Reed, who is the most prolific journalist in the country covering trans issues. She posts so much that it is sometimes overwhelming, but when I don’t have time to read, her headlines and ledes give me good top-line information that I can dig into later if I need to.

Good to know she’s out there. This is important work.

Go read her. Subscribe.

Read every person I’ve mentioned. I will keep trying to recommend two stories a week at the bottom of my pieces.

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