Episode 197: Very Fine People with A.R. Moxon

This episode of Across The Margin : The Podcast features an interview with A.R. Moxon, author of The Revisionaries, a genre-bending debut novel that The Washington Post said "might be the weirdest novel of the year." His weekly online newsletter, The Reframe, enjoys a readership of over 10,000 people. His latest release — Very Fine People: Confessions of an American Fool — is the focus of this episode.

For some people, the rise of Donald Trump's MAGA cult represented only ongoing proof of a supremacist nation they had endured all along. Author A.R. Moxon was not one of them. He was caught unaware. Thus begins this confession of an American fool, a methodical mapping of the nation the author failed to see — a nation of "very fine people" too convinced they are exceptionally good to acknowledge the ways they participate in abuse and harm. Very Fine People is an essay collection contemplating what to do about a populist far-right authoritarian uprising involving so many of our friends and family members. Written from 2016 to 2023, it is a work of progressing awareness, pondering the questions "how did we get here?" and "what do we do about it?" In this episode host Michael Shields and A.R. Moxon ruminate over their shared nativity about how many people in their life, and in America, are comfortable with an open white supremacist and fascist as a president of the United States, while considering how it's clear that an emboldened and vocal minority is willing to do anything to protect their supremacy. They talk about the power of love, art, and story in combating a movement riddled with hate, how being frank with language is a way to replace “current ideas with new ones,” how a hope full of rugged resolve exists within all the madness, and so much more.

Grab a copy of Very Fine People here!

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