Honestly with Bari Weiss

If you haven’t heard of Bryan Johnson or watched the new Netflix documentary about him, Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever, Bryan is a person who has given his life—and his body—over to the science of longevity. That means that he has essentially turned himself into a human lab rat, undergoing hundreds of tests and studies on every human marker imaginable in order to discover the best ways to stop the process of human aging. What he’s found is unconventional, to say the least: He eats dinner at 11 a.m., he has swapped blood with his 17-year-old son, and he measures his nighttime erection lengths—just to name a few of the hundreds of things that you probably have never heard of a person doing in the name of health and longevity. But it’s not just that Bryan wants to reverse aging and live forever. He also thinks we’re at the bleeding edge of a new kind of reality. He believes he’s akin to Amelia Earhart or Ernest Shackleton, and that he’s on the frontier of something big—something that will change everything about humanity as we know it. In that way, this conversation is not just about wacky exercise routines and unusual supplements. It’s a philosophical discussion about the meaning and purpose of life, and what we’re all doing here on this planet.  Today on Honestly, Bryan Johnson tells us about why and how he’s not going to die. If you liked what you heard from Honestly, the best way to support us is to go to TheFP.com and become a Free Press subscriber today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is something so delicious about a single, tight joke in one headline that captures the political moment, or even just the banality of our lives. Here are some examples: “Drugs Win Drug Wars”; “Nation Throws off Tyrannical Yoke of Moderate Respect for Women”; “I Have Decision Fatigue, Says Woman Whose Only Decision in the Last 7 Years Was Not Going to Law School.” These headlines are from satirical news sites like The Onion and Reductress. Both are on the political left. For most of Bari’s life, the big political comedy came from the left. Until The Babylon Bee, which launched in 2016.  The Bee is a Christian conservative satirical news site, which may sound like an oxymoron. It did to us. Until we read it and discovered, it’s funny. Often really funny. While everyone else was busy criticizing and mocking the right, the Bee found success by filling a void. The Bee’s distinctive tagline is “Fake News You Can Trust.”  Here are a few recent headlines: “Biden Cancels Aid to Syria After Finding Out Needy Americans Live There”; “Canadian Dentist Now Offering Euthanasia as Alternative to Cavity Filling.” The crazy thing about the Bee is that the headlines are often not just satire, but prophetic. Here’s an example, in 2020, the Bee posted: “Democrats Call for Flags to Be Flown at Half-Mast to Grieve Death of Soleimani.” And now Ivy League students are flying Hezbollah flags and mourning the death of the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah. In 2021, The Bee published the headline "Triple-Masker Looks Down on People Who Only Double Mask." One day later, CNBC featured a graphic highlighting the higher efficacy of triple-masking.  While the Bee has garnered fame or infamy depending on who you ask, they do try to be equal opportunity critics, poking fun at the right too. Here’s a 2016 headline about Donald Trump: “Psychopathic Megalomaniac Somehow Garnering Evangelical Vote.” And “Shocker: European Supermodel Who Married Billionaire Reality Star Might Not Actually Be Conservative.” Still, in the past few years, The Babylon Bee has been the target of online censorship, deplatforming, and media scrutiny. Twitter suspended the Bee’s account in 2022, after it made a joke misgendering Admiral Rachel Levine, President Biden’s head of the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. The Bee was later reinstated when Elon Musk took over Twitter, who said, “There will be no censorship of humor.” These days, The Babylon Bee still gets fact-checked by Snopes and USA Today, which perfectly encapsulates our internet age: a parody page getting its jokes fact-checked because people really can’t distinguish between truth and humor.  Today on Honestly is the CEO of The Babylon Bee, Seth Dillon, to talk about it all: the Bee’s Twitter suspension, how he views content moderation and censorship in 2025, the concept of punching down in comedy, and the growth of antisemitism on the far right. Seth also shares how he’ll keep being funny during the Trump presidency and why he believes “if it’s a joke we’re not supposed to make, it is probably the one we should be telling.” If you liked what you heard from Honestly, the best way to support us is to go to TheFP.com and become a Free Press subscriber today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This past year was not easy. But 2024 certainly was eventful. Joe Biden dropped out of the race at the eleventh hour, and Kamala Harris’s swift anointment brought us the joy of Brat summer. There was not one, but two assassination attempts against Donald Trump; the continued wars in Ukraine, Israel, Gaza, and Lebanon; the sudden and surprising fall of the Assad regime in Syria; the murder of a CEO (and Luigi Mania); mystery drones over New Jersey; and finally, Trump's decisive reelection to the White House.  On a cheerier note, 2024 was also the year of breakdancing at the Paris Olympics; Claudine Gay’s resignation from Harvard; SpaceX’s first commercial spacewalk; and Israel’s epic spy-thriller, pager-explosion attack on Hezbollah—not to mention they took out Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar as well.  So, what will 2025 bring?  We are starting the year, as we did last December, with a special 2025 predictions episode of Honestly. We called up some friends of the pod—people we trust in their fields—to get a better sense of what’s in store for the year ahead.  Political analyst and former spokesperson at the Department of Justice Sarah Isgur tells us what we can expect in the Trump 2.0 White House. Linguist John McWhorter looks at new words and how language will evolve in the coming months. Our very own Suzy Weiss talks us through the cultural calendar. Stylist Leandra Medine clues us in on fashion trends in 2025, and last but not least: Historian Niall Ferguson tells us, as he did last year as well, whether or not we’re right to have nightmares about World War III—but for real this time.  Some guests cheered us up, whereas others freaked us out. All of them were a pleasure to talk to. We hope you enjoy these conversations with some of our favorite people.   If you liked what you heard from Honestly, the best way to support us is to go to TheFP.com and become a Free Press subscriber today. *** This show is proudly sponsored by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). FIRE believes free speech makes free people. Make your tax-deductible donation today at www.thefire.org/honestly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Whether you believe in the story of the virgin birth and the resurrection, or whether you believe that those miracles are myths, one thing is beyond dispute: The story of Jesus and the message of Christianity are among the stickiest ideas the world has ever seen. Within four centuries of Jesus’s death, Christianity had become the official religion of the Roman Empire. It had 30 million followers—half of the empire. Today, two millennia later, Christianity is still the largest religion in the world. How and why did Christianity take off, and how did it change the world in such radical ways? Here to have that conversation is historian Tom Holland. Tom is one of the most gifted storytellers in the world, and his podcast, The Rest is History, is one of the most popular out there. Each week, he and his co-host, Dominic Sandbrook, charm their way through history's most interesting characters and sagas. I can't recommend it more highly. Holland's book Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind chronicles thousands of years of Christian history, and it argues that Christianity is the reason we have America. That it's the inspiration to both the French and the American Revolutions. That it's the backbone of wokeness as an ideology, but also the liberal forces fighting it. Today, Tom explains how and why the story of Christianity won, how it shaped Western culture and values, and if he thinks our vacation from religion might be coming to an end. Merry Christmas and happy holidays! If you liked what you heard from Honestly, the best way to support us is to go to TheFP.com and become a Free Press subscriber today. **** This show is proudly sponsored by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). FIRE believes free speech makes free people. Make your tax-deductible donation today at www.thefire.org/honestly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices