Jason Stanley wrote an article for The New York Times in 2011 titled "Ways of Silencing" about the birtherism conspiracy theory.
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Robinson's PodcastSep 23, 2026
The New York Times Opinionator published Jason Stanley's "The Ways of Silencing" on June 25, 2011, and it discusses outlandish claims that President Obama was born in Kenya, which is birtherism. NBC News and Truthout independently describe his 2011 Times piece as concerning birtherism or propaganda about Obama.
What was said
… of hardcore philosopher, before you became known publicly for, I mean, your work on propaganda and authoritarianism, you were best known for Philosophy of Language and epistemology. Why was it, or how was it, that you ended up making this transition? Yeah, the the, I guess my very first piece for The New York Times in 2011 was on the birtherism conspiracy theory. It was called "Ways of Silencing," and oddly, that was spread by Donald Trump. So, in a sense, my career as a public intellectual has exactly overlapped with Donald Trump's public political involvement, and I was writing about it as a Philosophy of Language topic because it seemed to me, you …
Robinson's Podcast · · from the transcriptPost →What we found
Supports. The NYT Web Archive reproduces Jason Stanley's "The Ways of Silencing" from June 25, 2011, and it addresses the claim that President Obama was born in Kenya.[2]
Supports. NBC News states that Stanley wrote a New York Times op-ed in 2011 on how propaganda erodes trust, using the Obama Kenyan-Muslim-spy claims as the example.[1]
Supports. Truthout quotes Stanley saying he started writing publicly in 2011 with a piece about birtherism.[3]
Context. The Hypatia and Wiley citations and the Norton text independently cite the 2011 NYT Opinionator piece under the title "The Ways of Silencing", confirming the title and date.[4][5][6]
Sources
6 sources: 1 tier 2, 5 not rated
- 1Is Trump a fascist? Learning about how fascism works can ...nbcnews.com · tier 2 · cited for: supports
- 2The Ways of Silencing - The New York Times Web Archivearchive.nytimes.com · not rated · cited for: supports
- 3Author Jason Stanley on Trump and the Rise of Fascism ... - Truthouttruthout.org · not rated · cited for: supports
- 4Sincerity Silencing | Hypatia | Cambridge Corecambridge.org · not rated · cited for: context
- 5Kelly Coryell, All Words Matter: The Manipulation behind “ ...nerd.wwnorton.com · not rated · cited for: context
- 6Sincerity Silencing - Mcgowan - 2014 - Hypatia - Wiley Online Libraryonlinelibrary.wiley.com · not rated · cited for: context
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Related claims
- Donald Trump spread the article "Ways of Silencing" written by Jason Stanley.Can’t tell
- Jason Stanley was invited to a conference with the CIA in 2017.Can’t tell
- Jason Stanley was a professor at Yale University for 12 years.True
- Jason Stanley's book How Propaganda Works was published in 2015.True
- Jason Stanley was invited to a State Department conference on propaganda at the Hoover Institute in 2017.Can’t tell