Episode 14 Audio: June Lapine (shoe0nhead)

This week, our friend June Lapine (you know her as Shoe0nHead) tells us about her political journey and radicalization among the online left, her personal journey as an online content creator, and why she’s glad she went for Bernie in 2016 — among many other things.

In this episode, June speaks candidly about her relief at the political opportunity that Bernie’s first campaign offered. Juxtaposed with Clinton, Trump was treated as the anti-establishment candidate, an alternative to the elitist Beltway order. (A previous guest on KK&F, Thomas Frank, explains why Trump’s populism is a sham, if you’re looking to revisit these ideas with an expert.) In Bernie, June and so many others found a genuine populist response to the letdowns of neoliberal rule. If Clinton and Trump chose their stances on trade from the perspective of corporate interests, Sanders proposed a policy driven by the interest of the working class. Present in his 2016 campaign, and even more so in his 2020 campaign, was the identification of full-blown class warfare in the U.S., and the message that any victory must belong to the workers. And, of course, this message demands that we pass over the distractions of the culture wars: they’re filled with manufactured outrage and scandal, but they offer zero analysis of how the working class will prevail in its war against the capitalist class. While the right wants you to lose your mind about Satan shoes, leftists get organized to take power for the many, not the few. We’re grateful to June for taking the time to talk about her political journey and work — it’s a story that resonates with so many of us, and we hope you enjoy it. Subscribe to access video of our conversation, and listen to the audio on streaming platforms like Spotify, Pandora, Apple Podcasts, and more!