Welcome back to the Weekend Press! Today, Joe Nocera drinks with Alex Berenson, who just got the government to admit it violated his First Amendment rights. Spencer Klavan breaks down the brand-new Odyssey trailer. Peter Richmond reflects on returning to the farm that saved his father. And more!
But first: Is therapy making Americans weaker?
It’s not an opinion you expect to hear from a psychotherapist. But that’s exactly what Jonathan Alpert, who has been practicing for over two decades, believes.
“For years, my profession has trained clinicians to elevate validation over challenge, affirmation over interpretation, and emotional fluency over the harder work of behavioral change,” he writes in today’s essay.
By way of example, he tells the story of a patient who came to him feeling “furious with a friend” for canceling dinner plans. Instead of trying to understand what had happened, she used the language of therapy—“trauma,” “violation of boundaries,” “toxic”—to justify her anger.
What makes Alpert really worried is how this bad therapy scales up. “The same therapeutic scripts that encourage patients to pathologize difficult bosses and disappointing partners now teach citizens to reinterpret ordinary democratic differences as evidence of danger,” he writes.
Read Alpert’s piece to understand how therapy is making us emotionally articulate but psychologically brittle—and why that’s so dangerous.
“You’re pining for a daddy you didn’t even know.” That’s a line from the latest teaser for Christopher Nolan’s upcoming adaption of the “Odyssey”—starring everyone from Anne Hathaway to the rapper Travis Scott—and it triggered more fearful speculation that Nolan is smothering one of history’s oldest stories with the tastes of modern Hollywood. As someone who has loved the “Odyssey” since he was a boy, classics professor Spencer Klavan understands that fear; but, as he writes in this week’s Things Worth Remembering, this is precisely the kind of conflict that defines Odysseus himself.
This week, a huge win for free speech was largely ignored by the mainstream media when the government settled Berenson v. Biden. In doing so, it acknowledged violating the First Amendment during the pandemic by pressuring X to ban the account of a journalist who was saying heretical things about Covid-19. That journalist, Alex Berenson—a former pharmaceutical reporter for The New York Times—recently sat down with Joe Nocera to talk about his departure from the paper of record, his campaign against cannabis, and how he lost friends in lockdown. “People told me to stop talking, then they yelled at me to stop talking.”
In our hectic, urban, screen-addled age, it has become trendy to pine for a rustic, rural lifestyle, but few of us actually go back to the land. That’s what Peter Richmond’s father did after experiencing almost unimaginable trauma. “During the war, he had commanded a thousand men on three islands in the Pacific, watching many of them die,” Richmond writes. “He came home a quiet, intense man of few words” and found his “piece of heaven on earth”—a small, sagging house at the end of a dirt road, with no plumbing or electricity. In today’s Ancient Wisdom, Richmond reflects on why, 65 years after his father’s death, he decided to go back to the farm.
Second Thought
Is Hollywood the new Detroit? From streaming to labor strikes to the specter of AI, many of us these days have been wondering if the movie industry is on its way out. On this week’s episode of Second Thought, Suzy Weiss sits down with screenwriter and 20-year film industry veteran Allan Loeb to discuss what’s changing on the big screen—and what might endure. Plus, they discuss the time he asked Tom Holland (of Spider-Man fame) about his attachment style; his AI companion Frank; and why betting on baseball is “the crystal meth of gambling.”
Listen to the episode wherever you get your podcasts, or watch the YouTube vid below. And if you want to keep up to date with everything Suzy does, don’t miss her newsletter!
Knock Knock, It’s Cupid!
Knock knock, it’s Cupid! A new batch of ads from single Free Pressers is live on the site. Click here to meet an album artwork designer in London with an impressive Duolingo streak; a fly-fishing, bird-watching cyclist in Reno; or a Kentucky-based Army reservist looking for his man. Your special someone could be just one email away! If you’d like to take a chance at Free Press love, write a paragraph that defines you, your age, where you live, and what you’re looking for, and send it over to Cupid@TheFP.com.
We’ve published a lot of stories this week that’ll make you stop and think, including Suzy Weiss’s analysis of the latest Sydney Sweeney drama and Joanna Stern’s experiment in love and AI.
How should you spend your weekend? We asked our fellow Evan Gardner for his recommendations…
🎵Listen . . . To Kacey Musgraves’s new album, Middle of Nowhere. After a brief foray into psychedelia, Musgraves’s latest project is a return to form: a sober, straight-shooting country album. Songs like “Rhinestoned” or “Horses and Divorces” showcase her wordplay at its finest, and together they do what country music does best, which is zooming in on a map dot, a back road, or a worn-out barstool and spinning it into an entire universe.
🌅 See . . . The sunrise. I started going for a morning walk for MAHA reasons (the spectrum of light exposure within 15 minutes of waking up, I’m told, does wonders for your circadian rhythm), but even if you don’t buy any of that, I promise it’s worth it. For one, there’s nothing like feeling fresh air instead of a screen first thing in the morning—but you also get to see the sky turn colors it won’t go near at any other time of the day. Health hack or not, it’s hard to have a bad day when you’ve started it with that sight.
🍿Watch . . . Taylor Sheridan’s new Yellowstone spin-off, Dutton Ranch, which was released on Friday. (How is the man so very productive?) It’s worth a watch purely for the epic landscape shots, but the real draw consists of the protagonists, Rip and Beth. Rip is your typical brutal cowboy—large, bearded, domineering, and mean—and Beth is a natural-born rebel. And yet somehow, the two found their way into one of the most tender and complex relationships on TV. (Disclaimer: Yes, this show is on Paramount; and yes, I can’t wait to try our office’s Dutton Ranch–themed lunch, which I hope is more than just salad dressing.)
That’s all, folks! Have a great weekend.
RACISTS COME IN ALL COLORS.
I'm all for River Page calling out racists.
Racists like Chud should be "socially" shunned.
That takes no guts.
Grow a pair River and try calling out Ibram X. Kendi.