M.I.A.'s interview with Candace Owens is essential viewing...

...regardless of how you feel about either Owens or M.I.A.

The writing’s on the wall: we’re at the cusp of a sea change in how media navigates difficult conversations on complex subjects — conversations often waged by controversial figures. Say what one will about Candace Owens or Maya Arulpragasam aka M.I.A., but no one can deny what sharp, incisive thinkers they are. Moreover, both Owens and Arulpragasam make it difficult to either completely dismiss or completely sympathize with them, which I find just as admirable as I find it uncomfortable.

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Me personally, I’ve long thought that Owens wastes her prodigious intellect and charisma on being a culture-war operative, almost like an intelligence agent working as a media plant in the service of cynical right-wing ideologues vying for the same control of the public’s awareness as the woke brigade has now. There’s something about her — even in this interview — that comes across (to me) as overly performed and always on the hunt to plug subjects into ideas she wants to promote. As for Arulpragasam, I’ve long thought she has a difficult time articulating her views in a coherent way. But so what? The conversation they had is riveting nonetheless.

More importantly, their exchange (which is no longer on YouTube in full) is a window into the now-undeniable chasm between conversations being held on the ground and the forces trying to dictate the parameters of those conversations. Predictably, the usual media suspects have bemoaned this interview, as if it shouldn’t have taken place. They’re wrong. The days of trying to de-platform or shun people whose views we find troubling — or even downright ugly — are numbered. As they should be. This will soon filter down to the exchanges we have with people day-to-day. And it can’t come a moment too soon.

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