I’ll admit it: despite the recent podcast boom that has been going on recently, I’ve had trouble sticking to listening to a podcast consistently. That is until I discovered ‘You’re Wrong About,’ a podcast led by Sarah Marshall and Michael Hobbes, two journalists with a penchant
for the past.
The show’s premise is pretty simple: the two hosts re-examine an event that occurred in the past, and they dissect what we were missing in our previous analysis of the situation. Typically, this means either discussing maligned women of the 20th century or examining moral panics of the past and present. The first episode I happened to listen to was their episode about Courtney Love, in which they debunked the theory that she killed her late husband, Kurt Cobain. Other episodes I found particularly interesting were ones about the Enron scandal, human trafficking, and the life of Nicole Brown Simpson. (The two hosts have been on a mission to
cover the O.J. Simpson trial in its entirety, and as one would imagine, it is taking a long time.)
Though most, if not all, of the topics discussed on the show tend to be rather serious, the rapport between Hobbes and Marshall gives each episode a nice touch of levity, while still giving each subject the amount of weight it deserves. One aspect I found most refreshing is their coverage of women, specifically ones who are cast in a harsher light by the media. Both hosts approach each person with a sense of understanding, and they try to sympathize with some of the ‘villains’ of our societal narratives, giving a more well-rounded look into the often one-sided stories we see in the media.
Though I sometimes disagree with some of the conclusions drawn by both Hobbes and Marshall, I cannot deny that every topic they discuss truly makes me think. Their coverage of history has allowed me to look at similar situations today more holistically, and I believe that if everyone looked at the past through a different and more well-rounded lens, we reduce the risk of repeating our past mistakes.
— Blake Ciresa
