Patrick Farnsworth
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lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
Patrick Farnsworth
@lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
330 followers 830 following 95 posts
Host of Last Born In The Wilderness podcast / lastborninthewilderness.com
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lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"In some ways, I argue the most dangerous myth of Manifest Destiny is that it succeeded."

- @maxperrymueller.bsky.social / #WakarasAmerica

𝍌 www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/max...
But he was also defending Native sovereignty. So he's both this person who participates in the settler colonial enterprise very explicitly, but he is also doing so in a lot of ways to defend Native sovereignty. And so he is, I think, this pretty unique figure who exists—he's kind of fully settler and fully Native. But the point of the book is to collapse those distinctions in a lot of ways by pushing back on the narrative that both of the tropes reinforce, that Manifest Destiny succeeded. In some ways, I argue the most dangerous myth of Manifest Destiny is that it succeeded. Because that reduces Wakara and his living descendants, of whom there are many, to the past—relegating him to the past. Instead of seeing him as part of the continual process of what is the renewal, the restoration, the change, the evolution of what is America. - Max Perry Mueller
December 1, 2025 at 6:11 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"Luigi is part of a larger phenomenon, and then when you think about that larger phenomenon, you think about what the social contract on violence is, and then why so many people feel that it's okay to violate it right now."
- @jhr54.bsky.social

🔗 www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/joh...
This impulse to correct through revolutionary violent means is a pretty widespread impulse now. It's not just Luigi’s; it's also racist killers who target synagogues and churches and groups of Black people in supermarkets. So I think Luigi is part of a larger phenomenon, and then when you think about that larger phenomenon, you think about what the social contract on violence is, and then why do so many people feel that it's okay to violate it right now. That's a deeper conversation, and it doesn't focus on personalities and causes as much necessarily and specifically. I think the first thing that happens with a killing like this is they try to invalidate it through one thing or another—defuse it. “Invalidate” isn't the right word—defuse it, and for good reason. You don't want to trigger mass violence. Unless you're in a more explicitly revolutionary context. I don't know. These are deep and complex issues. - John H. Richardson
November 1, 2025 at 5:20 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"We're talking about a full-scale assault on free speech, even the concept of it." - @shaneburley.bsky.social

🔗 www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/sha...
What's happening now is the most concerted assault on speech that I have ever seen, at least in the United States in this kind of public thing. We're talking about hundreds of teachers, healthcare workers, and pilots being put on leave or openly fired—people talking about opening hate crime investigations on them, threatening to pull business permits and driver's licenses. People are being asked at immigration status [hearings] about whether or not they're posting on Charlie Kirk. We're talking about a full-scale assault on free speech, even the concept of it. And yet we're still talking about this as though Charlie Kirk was the victim of this anti-free speech mentality, which just simply is not true. - Shane Burley
October 5, 2025 at 9:45 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"....I think there's a lot of interesting visioning and organizing and policy work that can happen in the vacuum of real governance." - @triofrancos.bsky.social

www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/the...
I think that [the elites have] sort of given up, especially on the right side of the political spectrum, on any notion of what a better future would look like. Because they are aware of how bad it's getting, again, on the climate front, on the ecological front, and on the social, political, and economic front. And so I sense this real nihilism, this kind of hunkering down to protect the assets that they have, to protect the investments they have, to protect their own families in fortified buildings that are safe in a climate changing world. And that's very different, even if the words are denial—the actual actions show you something different, which is “we're going to grab what we can, we're going to protect what we can of our financial interests, and our immediate social or family interests, and we don't have a vision for the future beyond that.” That's very scary in a way, to think that elites have kind of just given up on the notion that there's going to be some better future around the corner. But also, like I've said elsewhere in this podcast, it invites us to kind of fill that gap—us progressives, leftists, social movement organizers, intellectuals, however we identify—to say, Well, what could a future look like? What future are we fighting for? Because it doesn't seem like elites are taking us anywhere good right now. And I think there's a lot of interesting visioning and organizing and policy work that can happen in the vacuum of real governance. - Thea Riofrancos
September 29, 2025 at 4:17 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"I think it's irresponsible to continue to tell the story of progress, like somehow we're going to tech our way out of it and everything is going to be fine." - @royscranton.bsky.social

www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/roy...
We don't know where things are going, but they're probably going to be very bad. And we probably don't have—we probably don't really have any control over the direction of history. In the future—in the near future, in the mid-future, in the long-term future. We're all going to be sort of scavenging and making it up as we go. In that perspective and that situation, I think it's irresponsible to depend on optimism or to tell a story that it's going to work out. I think it's irresponsible to continue to tell the story of progress, like somehow we're going to tech our way out of it and everything is going to be fine. None of that seems responsible to me. I think really we need to look around us. We need to bring our narratives into the reality we live and see the suffering around us. That's the ultimate—that's the bedrock for me of pessimism, that suffering is universal. There are fundamental things you can't change about human existence. - Roy Scranton
August 30, 2025 at 7:25 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
"Understanding that we're a product of our environment, we're a product of the planet, is really important in coming to grips with [the fact] we're just another species that is playing itself out in this grand stage of life on Earth." @race2extinct.bsky.social

soundcloud.com/lastborninth...
We use human exceptionalism in two completely different ways. For most people, human exceptionalism is, we're going to live forever, and humanity is the greatest thing that's ever existed on the planet, and we're the most successful species that has ever lived, etc. But the flip side of that is, we're the most destructive species that's ever lived on the planet; we're terrible; we're just the worst thing that's ever happened—we can't disappear soon enough. But both of those discounts all of the things that happened that precipitated our species, our genus, our behaviors. And just like the section [in the book] on leopards—we were formed as a result of our interaction with other creatures, with other plants, with other animals. We didn't do it all on our own. And so understanding that we're a product of our environment, we're a product of the planet, is really important in coming to grips with [the fact] we're just another species that is playing itself out in this grand stage of life on Earth. - Lyle Lewis
July 4, 2025 at 5:54 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
Xander Dunlap joins me in this wide-ranging interview to discuss permanent ecological conflict, as theorized and documented via numerous case studies in his new book, This System is Killing Us @plutopress.bsky.social

www.patreon.com/lastborninth...
Author and activist Xander Dunlap joins me in this wide-ranging interview to discuss permanent ecological conflict, as theorized and documented via numerous case studies in his new book, This System is Killing Us: Land Grabbing, the Green Economy and Ecological Conflict, published through Pluto Press.
December 4, 2024 at 6:38 PM
lastbornpodcast.bsky.social
This episode is part of an ongoing series with journalist and @lcap.bsky.social founder and activist @joshuapribanic.bsky.social to address the realities of what Long Covid is, and the action needed to address this issue comprehensively.

www.lastborninthewilderness.com/episodes/lca...
Black and white image with a masked activist crouching, with two signs displayed. On the left is a sign with the face of Sen. Bernie Sanders, with the text: "DECLARE LONG COVID A NATIONAL EMERGENCY". On the right is a sign with the face of CDC Director Mandy Cohen with the text: "CDC KILLS". Below the image is the text: ANTIVIRALS NOW / LONG COVID ACTION PROJECT / LAST BORN IN THE WILDERNESS
November 18, 2024 at 5:34 PM