# Pretty Heady Stuff This podcast features interviews with a variety of theorists, artists and activists from across the globe. It's guided by the search for radical solutions to crises that are inherent to colonial capitalism. To this end, I hope to keep facilitating conversations that bring together perspectives on the liberatory and transformative power of care, in particular. Page: Feed: --- ## [Matthew Huber wants to incite a class realignment to fight global heating & the tyranny of capital](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Matthew-Huber-wants-to-incite-a-class-realignment-to-fight-global-heating--the-tyranny-of-capital-e3n7t8l) _2026-08-10 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ In his recent writing, political theorist Matthew Huber (https://www.maxwell.syr.edu/directory/matthew-t-huber) has been making the point that climate action is needlessly polarizing, and that this polarization can be corrected by abandoning the sorts of virtue signaling and PR pomp and circumstance that sometimes comes with climate communication. In fact, he says in his Jacobin article that it's… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/124039893/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-7-10%2Fd98f3ed6-031b-1d77-3918-643cdd5b03f5.mp3) ## [Nina Newington embraces the uncertainty of organizing to protect the natural world](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Nina-Newington-embraces-the-uncertainty-of-organizing-to-protect-the-natural-world-e3n04ce) _2026-08-05 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Nina Newington is a forest protector, organizer and award-winning author. Join us for a conversation about the connections and solidarities that build strength against extractive projects and the exploitation of nature for profit. Originally from the UK, Newington has lived in many countries before immigrating to Canada. In Nova Scotia, her environmental activism began with the model of Extinction… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/123785038/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-7-5%2F04e3b885-3fe3-f97f-28a3-47cb94160d8c.mp3) ## [Chris Benjamin and Kate Brooks thoughts on how to decarbonize our lives and build a stable, equitable world](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Chris-Benjamin-and-Kate-Brooks-thoughts-on-how-to-decarbonize-our-lives-and-build-a-stable--equitable-world-e3n03fr) _2026-08-05 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Kate Brooks works as the EAC's Community Climate Navigator, collaborating with HalifACT and other community groups to create programs supporting climate action. More recently, she joined the Food Team to assist in developing the Halifax Food Council's website. Kate comes from a public library and adult education background and enjoys learning with and from community groups in the Halifax Regional… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/123784123/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-7-5%2F13fdaeff-94ba-7eb9-d699-233a28f5b2f5.mp3) ## [Sadie Beaton rages against the extractive status quo and raves about resurgent geography](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Sadie-Beaton-rages-against-the-extractive-status-quo-and-raves-about-resurgent-geography-e3mvnns) _2026-08-04 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Sadie Beaton grew up in rural Nova Scotia where she could see a working wharf from her bedroom window and enjoyed countless hours exploring the rugged shorelines and scrubby Acadian forest. She eventually moved to Halifax where she got a B.A. in English from Kings College and a Masters in Resource and Environmental Management from Dalhousie University. In her recent essay "It Flows/Runs… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/123772092/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-7-4%2Ff315bc90-6d28-c0ac-1d1d-0f73315ae1e1.mp3) ## [Katherine Stewart decrypts how Christian fundamentalism is seizing power in the United States](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Katherine-Stewart-decrypts-how-Christian-fundamentalism-is-seizing-power-in-the-United-States-e3lljjs) _2026-07-04 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Katherine Stewart has covered the intersection of faith and politics for over 17 years; her work appears in the New York Times, the New Republic, Religion News Service, the Guardian and elsewhere. Her latest book, Money, Lies and God: Inside the Movement to Destroy American Democracy, is one of Foreign Affairs magazine’s Best Books of 2025. Her previous, award-winning title, The Power Worshippers:… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/122391612/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-6-4%2Ff4357e96-029f-fbc8-be5a-dd73da4c7801.mp3) ## [Alex Marland scrutinizes party loyalty in Canada as a program of coerced consent](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Alex-Marland-scrutinizes-party-loyalty-in-Canada-as-a-program-of-coerced-consent-e3lh7g3) _2026-07-01 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ What are the politics of party loyalty in Canada? Why do politicians follow the leader and rarely rock the boat? What solutions could exist for strengthening Canada's democracy by injecting more dissent into the system? Alongside Mireille Lalancette and Jared J. Wesley, Alex Marland is the author of No “I” in Team: Party Loyalty in Canadian Politics, a book that offers in-depth analysis of the… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/122248131/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-6-1%2F8c71b973-62b6-f1c1-0f86-f581f07a101d.mp3) ## [Carl Wilson referees the poptimism wars & explores nostalgia, protest & world-building in music](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Carl-Wilson-referees-the-poptimism-wars--explores-nostalgia--protest--world-building-in-music-e3lappk) _2026-06-26 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Carl Wilson is a Canadian music critic who has written for many publications including The Globe and Mail. He writes wonderful long thought-pieces on music for Slate. Best known for his classic book Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste, published in Continuum's 33 1/3 series, Wilson unpacks the claims of that book in terms of contemporary trends in music. Let's Talk About Love is… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/122037492/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-5-26%2F2aa78895-2a0e-3313-9b9f-330107810425.mp3) ## [Marta Figlerowicz thinks Maria Janion’s political insights are key to navigating our present chaos](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Marta-Figlerowicz-thinks-Maria-Janions-political-insights-are-key-to-navigating-our-present-chaos-e3kvoi2) _2026-06-18 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Why does the nation trigger so much emotion in us? How does being from a specific country shape our understanding of identity, and when does it drift into dangerous territory? Maria Janion, one of Eastern Europe’s most profound and original intellectuals, explores this fine line, and Marta Figlerowicz unpacks the trajectory of her thinking for us in The Bad Child. Janion witnessed some of the most… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/121675778/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-5-18%2F779bd4a8-a807-4d48-44d8-c305bfab039a.mp3) ## [Alexander Gallant & Joel Plaskett harmonize on concept albums & finding the lyrical in everyday life](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Alexander-Gallant--Joel-Plaskett-harmonize-on-concept-albums--finding-the-lyrical-in-everyday-life-e3knbqo) _2026-06-12 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ Alexander Gallant and Joel Plaskett are songwriters based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. They have both written extraordinary records that take genre and move it a few degrees to the left to make something unexpected. In this conversation, we talk about Plaskett's foundational relationship to the Halifax Pop Explosion of the 1990s, the music that made that scene, and the ways that sacred spaces for… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/121400600/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-5-12%2F426035847-44100-2-9464df519d34c.m4a) ## [Marketplace for AI-Powered Professionals (Sponsored)](https://crawlproof.com/a/vx4r3sHjePid) _2026-06-12 · **Sponsored**_ Find professionals who use ChatGPT, Copilot, and Claude to deliver work faster. ## [Steven Swarbrick conceives of a world where Palestine is free because none of us "belong"](https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/stonemsr/episodes/Steven-Swarbrick-conceives-of-a-world-where-Palestine-is-free-because-none-of-us-belong-e3kb4or) _2026-06-04 · Pretty Heady Stuff_ What might the politics of masochism be able to do for the dangerously stagnant politics of liberation Is masochism more mobilizing than empathy? Empathy requires the Palestinian to be a "perfect victim," to use Mohammed El-Kurd's phrase. It says that the other must remain othered in its incomprehensible but familiar suffering. Masochism, on the other hand, insists that we are all Palestinian, or… [Listen](https://anchor.fm/s/10181c7c8/podcast/play/121000155/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-5-4%2F425502100-44100-2-6644e4ff6a1f6.m4a)