American Thought Leaders - The Epoch Times

Judd Saul says there is no doubt Christians are facing a genocide in Nigeria. “They are wiping out entire communities.” “Since this started happening 30 years ago.” “There’s been 800 Christian communities completely wiped off the map.” “On average, we’re estimating between 5,000 to 10,000 Christians are killed a year.” “35 Christians are killed a day in Nigeria.” “The Nigerian government is not protecting them.” “No one’s talking about the long-term death that occurs after these people are put into camps.” “What is happening in Nigeria is a genocide.” Judd Saul joined me to discuss the ongoing jihadist violence against Christian communities in Nigeria and the devastating long-term consequences for those forced to flee their homes. Full interview here:https://ept.ms/4hbwSnA

“For the last five years, 90% of all Christian persecution deaths worldwide have occurred in Nigeria.” Thousands of Christians are being killed in Nigeria every year for their faith, yet much of the world has no idea. Judd Saul says the crisis goes far beyond the killings, with millions more driven from their homes and left to starve. “It’s not just persecution deaths.” “It’s the 5 million Christians that have been displaced from their homes.” “When a village is attacked, these people have lost everything they own.” “The survivors are shoved and pushed into IDP camps.” “These are refugees within their own country.” “They can’t farm.” “They can’t do anything.” “They’re basically starving to death.” “You have the immediate killings that are taking place.” “But now you have more Christians dying because of starvation and malnutrition.” Watch the full conversation here: https://ept.ms/4hbwSnA

"35 Christians are killed a day in Nigeria on average.” “The Nigerian government is not protecting them,” says Judd Saul, founder of Equipping the Persecuted. "This is a well-organized and funded Fulani Islamic militia who are hell-bent on turning Nigeria into a caliphate,” he says. An estimated 5,000 to 10,000 Christians are killed each year, averaging about 35 deaths per day, according to Saul. 🔴 PREMIERE 9PM ET on @EpochTV: https://ept.ms/4hbwSnA

Freya India blamed declining birth rates and marriage rates on one thing that we don’t talk about enough: P–n addiction. “I think… the birth rates, declining marriage rates, a lot of that can be put down to p–n.” “Where we aren't being intimate with each other because we're busy watching strangers.” Freya India is convinced that the side effects of p–nography addiction are much, much worse than you think. This interview is a must-watch. We discuss declining marriage rates, birth rates, and social media addiction See it for yourself below: https://youtu.be/nbJbwaUB5YM

“Social media is perfectly designed to trap women, and p–n is perfectly designed to trap men.” “Everyone in our generation is addicted to this.” Freya India is sounding the alarm. She told me that she grew up hearing that p–n addiction would not affect other parts of your life. “That’s been so drilled into my generation.” But she doesn’t believe that anymore—at all. “I think for the next generation, we really have to drill it into them that this is not a harmless habit.” “This is not something you can file away.” “It’s gonna bleed into everything.” “And if you want to have a stable relationship, a family, if you even wanna have a strong sense of self-worth, then you need higher standards for yourself.” Watch our conversation below: https://youtu.be/nbJbwaUB5YM

P–nography is becoming many children’s first exposure to sex, warping their view of relationships before they’ve even had one. Freya India is sounding the alarm on this disturbing trend. “They have no clue what it would be like to have a relationship before watching p–n.” “A lot of it is accidental.” “It came up on Instagram.” “It came up on Snapchat.” “That’s their first view of men and their first view of intimacy.” “It’s so warped.” “Often they can be looking at p–n for a decade before they’ve even had a first relationship.” “I'm really trying to get older generations to realize that social media is not just a bad habit.” “It’s quite literally forming their view of the world.” “Before they’ve even entered the world and had proper experiences.” Freya India joined me to discuss her new book, Girls, and why she believes social media is fundamentally changing how children understand relationships, intimacy, and the world around them. Full interview here: https://youtu.be/nbJbwaUB5YM

“Since the rise of social media, girls have really seen themselves as nothing but objects in a marketplace.” Freya India says social media has fundamentally changed how many young women view themselves, relationships, and their future. “That is the aim of their life.” “To sell themselves online and to become almost the perfect product.” “I think that affects not only young women's happiness, because it's a miserable existence to chase likes and followers and these online metrics, but it also affects how they treat men.” “Often they see men as just accessories for their online profiles.” “A lot of young women no longer value getting married or having children.” “The pull of social media is so strong.” “Their view of themselves is that they are literally just an object to be sold.” Watch the full conversation here: https://youtu.be/nbJbwaUB5YM

“Since the rise of social media, girls have really seen themselves as nothing but objects in a marketplace.” “The aim of their life is to sell themselves online and to become the perfect product,” says Freya India, author of ““Girls: Generation Z and the Commodification of Everything." “People initially thought that social media would be a supplement” to human community. “That wasn't the case.” “It was our first encounter of intimacy, or relationships, or community.” “I'm really trying to get older generations to realize that social media is not just a bad habit that young people have, it's quite literally forming their view of the world.” 🔴 PREMIERE 5PM ET on @EpochTV: https://youtu.be/nbJbwaUB5YM

The CCP has created laws that can criminalize people around the world for saying simple things like Taiwan is its own country. “If you promote Uyghurs.” “If you’re a Free Tibet person.” “They can prosecute you under the legal code in absentia.” “You could be prosecuted without your knowledge.” “When you show up in a country that has an extradition law.” “You can suddenly be arrested and be brought to China to face your prison term.” “If you or I promote the idea that Taiwan is a separate country.” “The law allows them to have this legal justification.” I spoke with a retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Col., Guermantes Lailari, to discuss China’s military expansion, the threat to Taiwan, and how Beijing is attempting to extend its legal and political influence across the world. For the whole interview click below: https://ept.ms/4wDa0SH

“The capacity of China’s navy yards is 200 times more than the United States.” The CCP has quietly built a military capable of challenging the United States. Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Col, Guermantes Lailari, breaks down the alarming numbers. “China has been growing its military at such a rapid pace.” “Today, China’s navy is larger than the U.S. Navy.” “China’s Coast Guard is bigger than every other coast guard combined.” “They’ve got so many ships.” “The actual amount of weapon systems that are being built is incredible.” https://rumble.com/v7cj74y-how-beijings-new-law-seeks-to-crush-dissent-worldwide.html

"The only way Xi can achieve [his legacy] is to finish the job that Mao didn't finish - which is to take Taiwan,” says Guermantes Lailari, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel and longtime China researcher. Lailari moved to Taiwan to study the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) up close. In our interview he argues that China poses the most serious long-term threat to Western civilization—not just militarily, but through a combination of legal, economic, psychological, and intelligence operations. 🔴 PREMIERE 9PM ET on @EpochTV: https://ept.ms/4wDa0SH

Nick Freitas says young men must reject a victim mentality and embrace what it truly means to be a man. “What defines a man?” “Your ability to put aside a desire for comfort.” “Or a desire to avoid danger.” “To fulfill your word.” “To protect the people that you love.” “And to protect the things that you love.” “Even this generation of men will have to suck it up and be a man and get the job done. “We're not gonna convince them of that if we don't first acknowledge that for the last 20 years, they’ve largely been told to sit down, shut up, and that they have no place.” “If they choose to be victims.” “I’m gonna tell them they’ve adopted a victim mentality.” “We need them.” “If they don’t like what’s going on in society.” “They need to be a part of the solution.” Nick Freitas says society has spent years telling young men they have no place. His message is simple: reject victimhood, embrace responsibility, and help build something better. https://ept.ms/4fnK4V9

“There is a lot of anti-American propaganda.” Matt Mehan just told me that American art has lost touch with our “character, our faith, our way of life, our love of equality,” and has become increasingly nihilistic. “Think of Game of Thrones or Breaking Bad.” “Breaking Bad is artistically excellent.” “But it is 40+ hours of dark, horrible… underworld drug dealing.” He says we have a “fascination with anti-heroes” in our modern art. “We haven’t done a lot of sincere, straightforward, Capra-esque, love of country, love of family, love of the good.” But his new book, The American Book of Fables, takes a radically different approach. “I traveled the country.” “I read through the history of the country to get the local flavor, but also… the settler’s spirit of the American character.” Watch our conversation below: https://youtu.be/r3m6w4UIpvI

“The very people that claim to wanna stop fascism, Nazism, bigotry, and everything else, are the ones actually allowing for those things to be reconsidered.” Nick Freitas says society spent years telling young men they were the enemy. Now many are searching for answers in dangerous places. “If you wanna know why a lot of young men are starting to entertain ideas, philosophies, and ideologies that we thought were left dead and buried in the 20th century.” “That’s why.” “For 20 years they’ve been told… that they’re Nazis and that they’re fascists.” “Imagine you’re a young man.” “You’re being called these things by people who clearly hate you.” “If all of your enemies hate that thing.” “Maybe it’s time to reconsider that thing.” https://rumble.com/v7cen3o-what-young-men-lose-when-screens-replace-risk-danger-and-real-world-courage.html

In the 1960s, children across every income level were overwhelmingly raised by two married parents. Today, Rob Henderson says that has changed dramatically for working-class and poorer families. “In 1960… 95% of the kids were raised by two married parents.” “For upper and upper middle class kids, by 2005 It declined slightly from 95% to 85%.” “If you look at poor and working class kids, it dropped from 95% to 30%.” “Now if you visit a lot of working class, blue collar, impoverished areas.” “Seeing kids in what the idea of the family is… that’s an anomaly.” @robkhenderson joined me to discuss the dramatic decline of the two-parent family and what that shift has meant for working-class communities. Full interview here: https://ept.ms/4paWT8D

“Most of pop culture” has told young men that they “are responsible for all the world’s ills.” “A young man's obvious and, quite frankly, logical response to that is: Do you mean the civilization that hates me? Or the civilization that was too weak to protect me from the popular culture that hates me? Because either way, that's not an enticement.” As a result, young men are turning toward bad ideologies. What is the solution? “They want a noble mission,” says former Green Beret Nick Freitas, author of “The Manbook.” “They want to do difficult things, they want to do hard things.” 🔴 PREMIERE 9PM ET on @EpochTV: https://ept.ms/4fnK4V9

🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸Happy America 250!! As millions of visitors pour in for the World Cup, many are being struck by what they see: hospitality, optimism, and an incredible American spirit that’s been caricatured for far too long. Matt Mehan’s "The American Book of Fables" is a love letter to that spirit. It’s an ambitious attempt to recover our moral imagination through stories, paintings, history, and poetry. Mehan insists that patriotism is beyond shallow emotion. It’s rooted in gratitude, in shared memory, and in the habits of civic friendship that make self-government possible in the first place. He argues that if Americans lose that, we lose something essential about who we are. There is perhaps no better time than America’s semiquincentennial to reflect on the laws, the beauty, the people, and the principles which gave rise to this great nation. Happy Independence Day, America! 🔴 PREMIERE 5PM ET on @EpochTV: https://youtu.be/r3m6w4UIpvI

“I suspect some people put the World Cup here as a way to try to dilute our 250th anniversary with a kind of more international cosmopolitanism.” “I think insofar as anyone intended that, it’s totally backfired.” “It’s been actually a very stirring patriotic moment.” Matt Mehan says the World Cup has reminded the world what makes America different. He says visitors are experiencing the warmth and hospitality of the American people firsthand. “We are the first country since the Roman Republic that our word for stranger is a positive word.” “Stranger is a friendly word in this country.” “Seeing yourself as others see you is a huge gift.” “That's what we're getting from the World Cup.” I sat down with @MTMehan to discuss his new book, “The American Book of Fables,” and what makes the American experiment unique. We also talked about how the World Cup has become an unexpected reminder of America’s character, hospitality, and national identity. Watch the full conversation here:youtu.be/r3m6w4UIpvI

Rob Henderson explains how “luxury beliefs” have become the new status symbol for elites. And why he says ordinary Americans are often the ones who pay the price. “Luxury beliefs are ideas and opinions that confer status on the affluent and the credentialed.” “While inflicting costs on the less fortunate members of society.” “A core feature of a luxury belief is that the believer is sheltered from the consequences.” “Historically, elites exhibited their status with luxury goods.” “Now… cultural elites exhibit their status through luxury beliefs instead of luxury goods.” “These beliefs signal what kind of family you grew up in.” “What kind of college you went to.” “What kind of job you have.” “The amount of cultural capital you possess.” https://rumble.com/v7c5ui4-why-do-our-elites-push-ideas-they-dont-live-by-themselves-rob-henderson.html

Why do many of our credentialed elite live one way while preaching something totally different? That’s what Rob Henderson wanted to understand when he got to Yale University and saw the well-to-do students at Yale—most of whom grew up in stable, two-parent homes that valued hard work and crime-free, drug-free lifestyles—pushing ideas like dismantling marriage, decriminalizing drugs, emptying prisons, and abolishing police. Unlike most of his fellow students, Henderson had grown up in poverty, never met his father, moved from foster home to foster home, and saw addiction, instability, and family breakdown all around him. And that’s how he came to develop his now famous concept of luxury beliefs: “Luxury beliefs are ideas and opinions that confer status on the affluent… while inflicting costs on the less fortunate members of society.” It’s the new way to signal elite social status—by denigrating the very values that made them successful. 🔴 PREMIERE 9PM ET on @EpochTV: https://ept.ms/4paWT8D