Season 02: The Rationality Wars

Early pollsters thought they had the psychological tools to quantify American mind, thereby enabling a truly democratic polity that would be governed by a rational public opinion. Today, we malign the misinformed public and dismiss the deluge of frivolous polls. How did the rational public become the phantom public?

In the late 60s and early 70s, Rochdale College was the heart of Canada’s counterculture. It was widely condemned, before an ignominious end. But what really happened in the Hippie High-Rise?

A group of landholding elites waged psychological warfare on the El Salvadoran people, and oppressed them for generations. When a psychologist and Jesuit priest defended the rationality of the people against their oppressors, he paid the ultimate price. 

The psychological establishment has long pathologized diverse forms of sexual identity and gender expression. In the mid-century, a brave movement of gays and lesbians fought back. But in the process, who did they leave behind?

Every protest movement has been dismissed as a mere ‘mindless mob,’ caught in a psychological frenzy. Where did this idea come from, and why does it last?

The Rationality Wars tells stories about the political and intellectual battles to define rationality and irrationality. Behind every definition of rationality, somebody benefits, and somebody is…