Who We Are

GREG ELLIS – Voice of Quillette Narrated

Greg Ellis

Greg Ellis is a published author, accomplished director, Annie Award-nominated voice actor and Emmy Award®-nominated actor (ensemble) with an international career that spans stage, screen, television, voice-over and the recording arts. His film credits include Pirates of the Caribbean 1, 3 & 4, Titanic, Star Trek, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and Beowulf. His TV credits include 24, The X-Files, CSI, Dexter, NCIS, Hawaii Five-O, and many more. His voice over credits include blockbuster movies, classic cartoons, and over 100 video game titles.

CLAIRE LEHMANN – Editor-in-Chief

Claire Lehmann

I founded Quillette in 2015, after dropping out of a masters program in forensic psychology. Prior to embarking on my post-graduate studies, I had worked in the non-profit and government sectors in Australia’s capital city, Canberra. My ambition as a teenager was to become an English professor, but I found literary theory as it was taught at university to be unimpressive. However as an undergraduate student of psychology, I found the study of adaptationism, intelligence, personality and individual differences particularly exciting and revolutionary. A large part of my motivation for founding Quillette came from a desire to combine these two different sets of interests (the arts and sciences). Today I live in Sydney with my husband and two children.

RECENT ARTICLE: At Australian Ballot Boxes, the Left’s Empathy Deficit Came Home to Roost

TERRY NEWMAN – Contributing Writer

Terry Newman

I graduated summa cum laude with a BA in Honours Sociology at Concordia University in Montreal. Since then, I have been a marker and teaching assistant at Concordia’s Centre for Engineering in Society. I am currently completing my MA in Sociology, and I am the recipient of a 2016 Joseph Armand-Bombardier SSHRC scholarship for my graduate research. My research interests include, but are not limited to, online communication, online witch hunts and mobs, affect and empathy online, academic jargon, and the non-urban working class in Canada. My writing has also appeared in Medium and The Post Millennial. I am a member of Heterodox Academy.

RECENT ARTICLE: In the Culture Wars, Be a Sancho Panza, Not a Don Quixote

ASHER HONICKMAN – Legal Advisor

Asher Honickman

I am a partner at Matthews Abogado LLP in Toronto. I have successfully represented clients at all stages of litigation and have appeared at all levels of court in Ontario, and before the Supreme Court of Canada. I have broad litigation expertise, including commercial disputes and defamation, constitutional litigation, insurance, personal injury, long-term disability, employment law and professional misconduct. I am the founder of Advocates for the Rule of Law, a legal think tank, and am a co-founder and Board member of the Runnymede Society, a national law student group dedicated to promoting liberty and the rule of law.

DEBRA W. SOH – Columnist

Debra W. Soh

I hold a PhD in sexual neuroscience research from York University. I write a weekly column for Playboy.com and a monthly column for The Globe and Mail, Canada’s national newspaper. My writing also has appeared in Harper’s, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, Scientific American, among others. I have received media coverage in outlets including NPR, the BBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the BBC, National Review, and USA Today. I also co-host Wrongspeak, a political podcast with Jonathan Kay.

I think we need intellectual and viewpoint diversity in order to determine meaningful solutions to societal issues. Heterodoxy is necessary for us to uncover the truth, especially at a time when academics are being told that some questions are too dangerous to pursue.

RECENT ARTICLE: Science Denial Won’t End Sexism

MICHAEL SHELLENBERGER – Contributing Writer

Michael Shellenberger

I’m a Time magazine “Hero of the Environment,” Green Book Award Winner, and President of Environmental Progress, a research and policy organization. My writings also have appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Scientific American, Nature Energy and PLOS Biology. My TED talks have been viewed more than two million times. His latest TEDx talk, “Why Renewables Can’t Save the Planet,” is based on his recent article for Quillette. I can be found at Twitter @ShellenbergerMD

RECENT ARTICLE: Why Renewables Can’t Save the Planet

SPENCER CASE – Contributing Writer

Spencer Case

I am a writer with a PhD in philosophy from the University of Colorado Boulder, where I am currently a lecturer. When I was 18, I joined the U.S. Army Reserve and trained as a public affairs specialist with an emphasis on writing and photography and deployed to Iraq in 2005-2006 and to Afghanistan in 2009-2010. I received my B.A. in philosophy and creative writing from Idaho State University in 2009, an MA in philosophy from CU Boulder 2012 and my Ph.D. from the same school in 2018. I spent nine months in Egypt as a 2012-2013 Fulbright student grantee. During the summer of 2014, I was National Review’s paid intern in New York City. I hope to secure a tenure-track position in the next few years.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Boy Who Inflated the Concept of Wolf

CHLOE VALDARY – Contributing Writer

Chloe Valdary

After spending a year as a Bartley fellow at The Wall Street Journal, I was a brand ambassador for Jerusalem University. I lectured in communities around the world on Israeli society, conflict resolution, interpersonal growth, and reconciliation in previously polarized spaces. I am now taking my ‘Theory of Enchantment’ from the non-profit sector to the corporate world. Combining the psychology of persuasion with profound insights from household names in pop culture, it is a philosophy that can help change agents and corporate leaders navigate an increasingly polarized world and help tap human potential along the way. Over the past two years, I have toured the world and lectured at several universities, including Harvard, Georgetown and Columbia. She has also published op-eds in The New York Times, Atlantic Magazine, The Wall Street Journal and Commentary Magazine.

RECENT ARTICLE: Dear White People, Black People—And All People

PAULINA NEUDING – Contributing Writer

Paulina Neuding

I’m the former Editor-in-Chief of Kvartal, a Swedish language magazine offering new perspectives and deeper insights on sensitive topics much like Quillette. I speak Swedish, German and Polish, read a few other European languages and am a trained lawyer. I have extensive experience working as a high-profile editor in a European setting, and am intimately engaged with Europe’s contemporary culture. My articles have been published in Politico, The Spectator and the The New York Times and from 2019, I will lead the European branch of Quillette, sourcing articles on European culture that are of interest to international readers.

RECENT ARTICLE: Sweden’s General Election Turmoil

IMRAN SAID – Contributing Writer

Imran Shamsunahar

Imran Said is a freelance writer currently based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He has written on international security, history, and politics for several publications including the Nikkei Asian Review, South China Morning Post, and the National Interest.

RECENT ARTICLE: Pax Americana is a Here to Stay

BRADLEY CAMPBELL – Contributing Writer

Bradley Campbell

I am an associate professor of sociology at California State University, Los Angeles. I am broadly interested in the study of moral conflict — clashes of right and wrong — and had written mostly about law, violence, and genocide until I more recently began to examine the conflicts on college campuses over microaggressions, safe spaces, trigger warnings, and free speech. I am the author of The Geometry of Genocide: A Study in Pure Sociology and co-author (along with Jason Manning of West Virginia University) of The Rise of Victimhood Culture: Microaggressions, Safe Spaces, and the New Culture Wars.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Free Speech Crisis on Campus Is Worse than People Think

BRAD CRAN – Contributing Writer

Brad Cran

I’m an award-winning writer and editor who served as Poet Laureate for the City of Vancouver from 2009 to 2011. In response to the introduction of a mandatory muzzle clause imposed on all artists invited to appear at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, I wrote an essay entitled Notes on a World Class City. The essay, which defended the city’s progressive history and dedication to free speech, went globally viral in the lead up to the games. My 2009 book, Hope in Shadows: Stories and Photographs of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, won the City of Vancouver Book Award and has raised over $60,000 for marginalized people in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. I have been a consultant to numerous literary magazines in Canada and have served as editor at Geist Magazine for nearly two decades. I am a graduate of UBC’s Sauder School of Business and work as a digital marketing consultant. The Vancouver Sun says of my lastest book, “Cran is a master at getting us to see the transformative…Ink on Paper is a reassurance that there is a formidable thinker in our midst who has the courage and literary tools to help others comprehend.”

RECENT ARTICLE: A Literary Inquisition: How Novelist Steven Galloway Was Smeared as a Rapist, Even as the Case Against Him Collapsed

BO WINEGARD – Contributing Writer

Bo Winegard

I’m an assistant professor at Marietta College in Ohio. I was born in a small Midwestern town and owe my career to Jim Morrison, the late singer for The Doors. From the mercurial and mysterious singer, I learned of Nietzsche. I didn’t understand him at first, but admired his scintillating prose and insightful observations.

After many years of study, I decided upon a career in psychology, a discipline that allows for eclectic and synthetic thinking.

Intellectual diversity is crucial to obtaining the truth about human nature, about social policy, about society in general, because such topics are incredibly broad and difficult and because it is so easy to allow one’s desires to distort one’s thinking. People want human nature to be one way or another, so they find the science to confirm their preferred views. Without diversity, this understandable human propensity can create a cocoon of sacred errors, protected from criticism not by rational argument but by insults and accusations, snipes and slanders. We need to prevent our media and our academies from constructing a stronger cocoon than they already have. And that means we need to champion intellectual diversity and defend heretics. Even if the heretics are wrong, their criticisms can only strengthen our understanding of the world.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Preachers of the Great Awokening

JONATHAN ANOMALY – Contributing Writer

Jonathan Anomoly

I am a faculty fellow at the Institute for Practical Ethics at UCSD, a founding faculty member of the Philosophy, Politics, & Economics program at USD, and will be a visiting scholar at Oxford University in winter 2019. My current research focuses on the moral and legal dimensions of synthetic biology, including gene editing and the use of synthetic phage viruses to combat antibiotic-resistant bacteria. More generally, I write about the relative role of social norms and legal institutions in solving different kinds of collective action problems. I am co-author of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (Oxford University Press, 2015), and my publications can be found here. You can contact me at anomaly@ucsd.edu.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Grievance Studies Scandal: Five Academics Respond

ROSALIND ARDEN – Contributing Writer

Rosalind Arden

I am a Research Associate at the Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science at the London School of Economics. My Ph.D. is in Behavioural Genetics, focused on intelligence. Being brighter is associated with health benefits in humans. It may also be true in dogs; I am currently probing the feasibility and utility of the dog as a model of ageing and dementia. Follow me on Twitter @Rosalind_Arden_

RECENT ARTICLE: The Grievance Studies Scandal: Five Academics Respond

JOHN R. WOOD, Jr. – Contributing Writer

John R. Wood, Jr.

I’m a writer, community advocate and political figure from Los Angeles. My work has focused on creating dialogue and understanding between polarized communities. I now serve as director of media development at Better Angles. In 2014, as California’s youngest active nominee for congress, I challenged longstanding representative Maxine Waters. Subsequently, I was elected Vice-Chairman of the Republican Party of Los Angeles County, a position I held from December 2014 to May of 2016. Tiring of the partisanship and cynicism of conventional party politics, I turned my attention to the cause of political depolarization.

As a writer and speaker, I focus on race, religion, public policy, social commentary, the intersection of politics and science and political and moral philosophy. My writings have been featured in Areo Magazine, Arc Digital, Better Angels Media, The Washington Times Communities, Reflections (a journal of the Yale School of Divinity), The Flash Report and Black Is Online. I am also the grandson of the late record industry pioneer Randy Wood, of Dot Records and Randy’s Record Shop fame. I live in Los Angeles with my wife and three children.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Spectrum of Black Contrarianism

NEEMA PARVINI – Columnist

Dr. Neema Parvini

I am a senior lecturer in English at the University of Surrey, and a proud member of the Heterodox Academy as well as The Evolution Institute. I have written five books, the latest of which is Shakespeare’s Moral Compass. At a political and cultural moment in which many of us are taking stock and looking for meaning, and in which moral outrage and polarisation seem endemic, this book radically reimagines how we might approach great works of literature to find some answers.

I am currently working on a new book for Palgrave Macmillan called The Defenders of Liberty: Human Nature, Individualism, and Property Rights, a study of 500 years of thinking about freedom in the West, from Machiavelli to Milton Friedman.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Grievance Studies Scandal: Five Academics Respond

CLAY ROUTLEDGE – Columnist

Clay Routledge

I am a behavioural scientist, writer, consultant, and professor of psychology at North Dakota State University. I have published over 100 academic papers and co-edited two books. Much of my work focuses on the human need to find and maintain meaning. My writing has appeared in The New York Times, National Review, The Wall Street Journal, and Scientific American. I also frequently serve as a public speaker and guest on popular podcasts and on radio and television. You can find out more about me at clayroutledge.com or follow me on Twitter @clayroutledge.

RECENT ARTICLE: Social Justice in the Shadows

HELEN DALE – Contributing Writer

Helen Dale

I’m a British-Australian lawyer and policy wonk who moonlights as a novelist from time-to-time. My first novel, The Hand that Signed the Paper, won the Miles Franklin Award, Australia’s equivalent of the Booker Prize. It also generated a storm of controversy that provided the foundation for my political views. I’m a right-leaning classical liberal, unusual in the world of literature and arts.

I read law at Oxford (where I was at Brasenose) and Edinburgh and have practised in regional Queensland, England, Scotland, and New South Wales. England and Scotland have different legal systems and the latter’s use of Roman law gave me the background to write my next two novels, Books I and II of Kingdom of the Wicked, set in a Roman Empire that has undergone an industrial revolution.

I’ve done policy analyses with a focus on civil liberties and the rule of law for politicians, political parties, various private sector bodies, the Reason Foundation, the Cato Institute, and the Law Society of Scotland.

Apart from Quillette, I also write regularly for the Spectator, The Australian, the Cato Institute, and The Daily Telegraph. Occasionally I branch out into Penthouse, The Guardian, and Reason.

RECENT ARTICLE: The UK Labour Party and the System of Diversity

SUMANTRA MAITRA – Contributing Writer

Sumantra Maitra

I was born in Kolkata, India, where I completed a Master of Journalism and Mass Communication, with distinction. After working as a foreign affairs journalist and blogger for a few years, I was offered a Masters scholarship to pursue a Master of International Studies at the University of Otago in New Zealand, which I completed with distinctions in International Politics and Economics before being awarded a Vice Chancellor’s scholarship of research excellence, to pursue a PhD in International Relations at the University of Nottingham in the UK.

I am currently a doctoral researcher and teaching assistant at Nottingham, and a freelance columnist and book reviewer for various publications, including Quillette. My areas of interest and research are great power grand strategy, neorealism, and Naval strategy. I spend a lot of time being needlessly sarcastic about everything on Twitter—time which would be best committed in pursuit of knowledge. You can reach me at @MrMaitra.

RECENT ARTICLE: ‘If I Want to Hold Seminars on the Topic of Empire, I Will Do So Privately’: An Interview with Nigel Biggar

TOBY YOUNG – Associate Editor, Contributing Writer

Toby Young

I was the co-founder of the West London Free School, the first free school to sign a funding agreement with the British government. I am the author of four books, the best known of which, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (2001), was made into a feature film. My play, Who’s The Daddy?, was named Best New Comedy at the 2006 Theatregoers’ Choice Awards. My teaching experience includes working as a teaching fellow at Harvard and a teaching assistant at Cambridge.

RECENT ARTICLE: The Ethics of Cognitive Enhancement

JAMIE PALMER – Senior Editor, Contributing Writer

Jamie Palmer

I studied American Studies in Manchester and Knoxville, Tennessee, in the late 1990s. I subsequently took an MA in Film Theory and Practice at Dublin Institute of Technology and then a post-graduate diploma in Film Making at the London Film School, graduating as a writer-director. Having made an award-winning short film and a couple of music videos, I went on to co-produce, direct, and edit an independent music documentary which was broadcast as part of the BBC’s 2012 Punk Britannia season.

I originally began writing about extremism, free speech, culture, and politics as means of researching my next documentary project but got side-tracked into writing and editing full time. I’ve had a number of essays and articles published in Fathom Journal, Tablet, and the Tower.

Today I am a senior editor at Quillette and occasional essayist who likes liberal democracy, Paul Berman, Italian exploitation cinema, and the Oxford comma.

RECENT ARTICLE: Fundamentalists vs The New York Times

JONATHAN KAY – Canadian Editor, Contributing Writer

Jonathan Kay

I’m the Canadian Editor for Quillette, and co-host of the Wrongspeak podcast. Formerly, I was managing editor for Canada’s National Post newspaper, and editor-in-chief of a Canadian literary magazine. My freelance work appears regularly in the National Post, the Washington Post, The Atlantic, Foreign Affairs and Foreign Policy. In 2014, I served as principal editorial assistant on Justin Trudeau’s memoir, Common Ground. My own books include Among The Truthers (HarperCollins, 2011) and Legacy: How French Canadians Shaped North America (Signal, 2016). Currently, I am working on three commissioned book projects—respectively focused on U.S. policy in regard to intellectual property, the history of the film industry, and the rise of modern board games.

RECENT ARTICLE: ‘Grope-gate’ and #MeToo’s Crisis of Legitimacy

ANDY NGO – Contributing Writer

Andy Ngo

I’m a graduate student in political science at Portland State University and a freelance writer who has been published in The Wall Street Journal, National Review Online, and The American Spectator. Most recently, I joined the Quillette team as a sub-editor after being a contributing writer for about a year. My writing focuses on free expression, the culture wars and religion.

RECENT ARTICLE: Restaurateurs and the Culture War

CAROL HORTON – Contributing Writer

Carol Horton

I am an independent writer interested in the intersection of politics, culture, and spirituality. I have a varied professional background that includes work as a political science professor; research consultant to the nonprofit sector specializing in issues affecting low-income children and families; and yoga teacher and yoga teacher trainer. I am the author of two books and the lead editor on three more. I hold a PhD in political science from the University of Chicago.

I have always valued heterodoxy and intellectual pluralism and believe they are more important than ever as we find ourselves increasingly divided into ideological camps perversely devoted to self-righteous sloganeering and vicious scapegoating. A first step in stopping this madness must be to reclaim public discourse for the public good.

RECENT ARTICLE: Jordan Peterson and the Failure of the Left

JEFFREY TAYLER – Contributing Writer

Jeffrey Tayler

I’m a contributing editor at The Atlantic, the author of seven books (with an eighth forthcoming), and, since 1993, a resident of Moscow. I’m a U.S. citizen, though, and was born in Washington, D.C. To research my articles and books, I’ve traveled to dozens of countries in Europe, Africa, and Latin America.

If I have learned anything from all this travelling and talking to people of different nationalities, it is that exposure to varying opinions and lifestyles helps one arrive at the essence of what is true, just, and universally human. Heterodoxy of all sorts is essential. Yet over the past decase or two, in particular, the range of viewpoints that one may acceptably express in public has narrowed, the polarization the result, and the consequent rise of populist politicians able to capitalize on this. A sickening intellectual and moral cowardice—even bankrupt—has come to dominate much of the media.

RECENT ARTICLE: Speaking Out About Islam: Lubna Ahmed, Rebel With a Cause

MATTHEW BLACKWELL – Contributing Writer

Matthew Blackwell

Over the past seven years I have split my time evenly between studying anthropology and economics part time at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, and the outback (Alice Springs) conducting research into Central Australian Aboriginal cultures.

In 2015, I returned to New Guinea, where I investigated cannibalism and culture-bound syndromes. For the last two years I have been working on completing my first book about the drug legalization debate while I complete my degree.

The tower entrance to the University of Queensland’s Great Courtyard reads, “Great Is Truth and Mighty Above All Things.” This dictate has been lost on too many people around the world. Now more than ever, fashionable ideas are quashing serious intellectual debate. By its very definition, heterodoxy doesn’t seek to advance any particular point of view; it seeks a Popperian marketplace, an open society of ideas, in the hope that truth rises to the top.

RECENT ARTICLE: Devastation and Denial: Cambodia and the Academic Left