Sometime in the past, the exercise of writing history obliged the author to feign objectivity. This author doesn’t shy away from not only sharing his opinion but, more deleteriously, begins his research through a filter of sociopolitical beliefs.
An example can be heard in the Gun Violence episode, in which the podcaster willingly conflates the possession of (assault) guns by whites with the disproprtionate deaths of Blacks by guns, suggesting a casual, if not direct relationship of the former killing the latter. In fact, these two phenomena are more nuanced, particularly when you look at who is killing Blacks and who is conducting mass-killings, and compare that with another fact that the podcaster evades, i.e. gun deaths in America. (Most gun deaths are not caused by mass-shootings). As a rational gun-control advocate, I found the historical information compelling, but the opinionated conclusion disingenuous and counter-productive to serious political debate, as the opinion ends in cul-de-sac of political ideology, rather than the historical elucidation that is full potential of writing about the past. This bias of this example, tragically, is ubiquitous throughout the show.
Topically, I like what the podcaster focuses on, but would listen to it only for footnotes of where to begin serious historical research.
