America & The Punisher

Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything

Benjamen Walker & Radiotopia

Society & Culture, Personal Journals

4.4 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 23 July 2024

⏱️ 24 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We now have many ways to tell the story of America's tilt towards authoritarianism, but for your host one image sums up the whole sordid business: a mashup of Donald Trump and the Marvel comic book character The Punisher. In this episode we talk with Kent Worcester, author of a new cultural history of the Punisher. It's a conversation about America's fascination with, and attraction to, a black and white vision of justice and vengeance.

Transcript

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0:00.0	You are listening to Benjamin Walker's Theory of Everything.
0:05.0	At Radiotopia, we now have a select group of amazing supporters that help us make all our shows possible. If you would like to have your company or
0:14.8	product sponsor this podcast then get in touch drop a line to sponsor at radiotopia
0:21.4	fm. Thanks. Before we get started I want to tell you about a new
0:26.2	series from our friends over at Mumbai Crime. If you've not heard Mumbai Crime before
0:31.8	it is an audio drama anthology of thrillers set and recorded on
0:36.4	the streets of Mumbai, India. Each season is a complete story full of twist and turns.
0:42.1	They're about to put out their last season on
0:44.4	radiotopia and it's a really special one. They're doing their own reimagining of
0:49.6	Kipling's classic The Jungle Book. In their version the animals are reimagined the
0:53.3	animals are reimagined as factions in the crime-rittled underbelly of Mumbai.
0:59.3	The story follows Mo, an orphan boy who was found left of the train tracks and saved by a gang of thieves called the wolves, who raise him as one of their own.
1:09.0	But things take a turn when he tries to pursue a life away from crime and get to know who his real parents just might be.
1:17.3	The Jungle Book is out now and you'll find it in a whole catalog of stories like it on Mumbai Crimes Podcast Fee.
1:24.4	Check it out wherever you get your podcast.
1:27.4	You are listening to Benjamin Walker Theory of Everything.
1:31.9	This installment is called America and the Punisher.
1:37.0	Over the past eight years in America we've witnessed a birth or perhaps rebirth is a more appropriate term, of scary, authoritarian political
1:47.0	ideas and ideologies. The Republican Party's transformation into the Party of MAGA is one way to tell this story.
1:55.0	But for me, I've found one particular image that totally encapsulates the horror of it all. This image is a mash-up of Donald
2:07.0	Trump and the Marvel comic book character The Punisher. The Punisher is the
2:12.4	guy with a giant skull with long bullet teeth on his chest who basically just guns down everyone who he sees as a criminal. The Trumpishir is this skull image crowned with a shock of orange hair.
	...

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