Rendering Unconscious

This episode – “Dark Gods of Modernity: Why We Still Need Monsters” – argues that our age is full of monsters, even if we pretend we’ve outgrown them—and that we actually need them. The episode starts with the old role of monsters: they used to patrol the edges of maps and myths, marking what was dangerous or sacred. Dragons, demons, trickster gods gave shape to fears and taboos; they were ways of saying, “There is something here we don’t understand, but it matters.” Modernity claimed to banish them with science and rationalism, yet they’ve only changed costume. Today’s monsters show up as serial killers in prestige TV, pandemics and plagues, rogue AIs, shadowy elites, conspiracy cabals, zombies and apocalypses in endless variations. Even in a secular culture, we keep inventing figures that condense dread, guilt, and awe. The episode’s core claim is that monsters are how a society metabolizes what it cannot face directly. Climate change, systemic racism, algorithmic exploitation, ecological collapse—these a