“The challenge of modernity is to live without illusions and without becoming disillusioned.
I’m a pessimist because of intelligence, but an optimist because of will.”
-- Antonio Gramsci
The old forms of the Left are moribund and the new forms are stupid. We're making a podcast that discusses the need to organize a Dialectical Pessimism and develop a salvage project capable of sparking a new workers' movement for socialism.
A clean, honest, and unsentimental melancholy is required; we are cultivating one and would like to share it with you.
Check us out on Patreon for regular Patron Book Clubs, Regrettable Geopolitics updates, Real Nerd Hours, and more...
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Episodes
Wednesday Oct 07, 2020
Wednesday Oct 07, 2020
For all of our claims to be historical materialists, there is nothing that the left loves more than a great leader to guide us to victory. If we are to make history, but not in circumstances of our own choosing, what role do we actually have to play as individuals? What role does the extraordinary person play in making history?
“History is made in such a way that the final result always arises from conflicts between many individual wills, of which each in turn has been made what it is by a host of particular conditions of life. Thus there are innumerable intersecting forces, an infinite series of parallelograms of forces which give rise to one resultant — the historical event.”
Thomas Carlyle, On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (1840)
http://history.furman.edu/benson/fywbio/carlyle_great_man.htm
On the Role of the Individual in History
https://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1898/xx/individual.html
Karl Marx and his conception of history
https://mronline.org/2018/05/11/karl-marx-and-his-conception-of-history/
The individual and the Marxist view of history
https://www.marxist.com/the-individual-and-the-marxist-view-of-history.htm
Music- Armageddon Blues by Power Trip
Monday Sep 21, 2020
Monday Sep 21, 2020
No.
Woke Capitalism Is Not Your Friend
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/06/brands-corporate-publicity-racial-justice
Where Are the Woke Capitalists Now?
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/04/01/where-are-all-woke-capitalists-now
Woke Capitalists Can Save America
The Rise of Woke Capital
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/opinion/corporate-america-activism.html
Why Corporations Can No Longer Avoid Politics
https://time.com/5735415/woke-culture-political-companies/
Woke America Is Pre-Revolutionary Russia
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/woke-america-pre-revolutionary-russia/
Until Black Women Are Free, None of Us Will Be Free
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/until-black-women-are-free-none-of-us-will-be-free
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Sunday Aug 30, 2020
Sunday Aug 30, 2020
This week we have unlocked the second half of our discussion with Phd Candidate Chris Manno. We discussed the differences between objective, subjective, and instrumental reason and how philosophers have moved through these three in stages culminating in the mercenary use of instrumental reason for the justification of the status quo. Modern philosophy has focused on the latter forms of reason to the point of rejecting any objective understanding on the world, a situation that is tailor made for exploitation of people and the planet under capitalism.
Horkheimer, Max. Eclipse of reason. Mansfield Centre, CT: Martino Publishing, 2013. Print.
Marcuse, Herbert. One-dimensional man : studies in the ideology of advanced industrial society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1991. Print.
Music: The Flying Dutchman Overture- Richard Wagner
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Thursday Aug 27, 2020
Thursday Aug 27, 2020
We read an article about recuperation and talked about the concept within the context of the contemporary social unrest that is currently gripping the United States.
Does every movement for social change eventually get recuperated? Yes. Is it still worth engaging in social movements? Also yes.
To hear the full episode, join our Patreon for $2 a month.
Sunday Aug 16, 2020
Sunday Aug 16, 2020
This week we are joined once again by Adam and Don from Red Library, we even had a brief appearance by Kevin.
We continue our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity.
McCarraher believes that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world and that Capitalism then became a religion itself, replacing the sacramental enchantment of the pre-capitalist world with a pecuniary enchantment that he calls Mammonism.
In our third installment we deal with the Robber Barons, corporate personhood, and the birth of American Imperialism.
McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print.
MUSIC: Satyricon- Mother North
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Sunday Aug 09, 2020
Sunday Aug 09, 2020
This week we are joined by Swedish podcaster, activist, social worker, and Christian communist, Mir Bal to talk about Christianity and Marxism. We continue with our unending project of reuniting the cold and the warm streams of Marxism, by talking about the draw of Christians to the liberatory message of Marxism and what Marxists may be able to take away for the liberatory message of radical Christianity.
Horn. Western European liberation theology : the first wave (1924-1959. Oxford New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.
Catholic Case for Communism- Dean Detloff
https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2019/07/23/catholic-case-communism
Catholicism and Marx an Introduction- Chase Padusniak
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/jappersandjanglers/2017/06/catholicism-marx-introduction/
Marxism and Liberation Theology- Michael Lowy
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Va-4lh8qfXtv-YEDt2VuAGABdPEhBYs7/view?fbclid=IwAR2TMM9Q3FZQpWuyPBGGMvPBP0CgHmQ-LJqRvT8mIXtcEnVG5YLB8zgrqpo
MUSIC: Pete Seeger- God Bless the Grass
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Tuesday Aug 04, 2020
Tuesday Aug 04, 2020
Head over to our Patreon and join for $2 a month to hear part two of our conversation with Chris!
Sunday Jul 26, 2020
Sunday Jul 26, 2020
This week we are joined once again by Adam from Red Library, but also by fellow Red Librarian Don, who was kind enough to edit the podcast.
We continue our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity.
McCarraher believes that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world and that Capitalism then became a religion itself, replacing the sacramental enchantment of the pre-capitalist world with a pecuniary enchantment that he calls Mammonism.
In our second installment we deal with with a real who's who list of Mammon worshiping malefactors as well as Puritan covenant theology, Mormonism, and slavery.
McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print.
MUSIC: Satyricon- Mother North
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Wednesday Jul 22, 2020
Wednesday Jul 22, 2020
We had philosophy Phd Candidate Chris Manno join us for a discussion on Marxism and Reason. We discussed the differences between objective, subjective, and instrumental reason and how philosophers have moved through these three in stages culminating in the mercenary use of instrumental reason for the justification of the status quo. Modern philosophy has focused on the latter forms of reason to the point of rejecting any objective understanding on the world, a situation that is tailor made for exploitation of people and the planet under capitalism.
Horkheimer, Max. Eclipse of reason. Mansfield Centre, CT: Martino Publishing, 2013. Print.
Marcuse, Herbert. One-dimensional man : studies in the ideology of advanced industrial society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1991. Print.
Music: Wolves In the Throne Room- Born From the Serpent's Eye
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78
Sunday Jul 05, 2020
Sunday Jul 05, 2020
This week we are joined by Adam from the Red Library podcast, who was nice enough to record and edit the episode for us.
We start our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity.
McCarraher believes, much like Max Weber, that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world, but unlike Weber, he believes that Capitalism then became a religion itself.
He argues that capitalism is full of religious thinking that grew up in the fields and factories of England, was transported to America by the Puritans, and perfected by evangelicals.
We think this topic is right up our alley and have had a blast reading and talking about it.
McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print.
The Lost Horizons Network
https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/
The Lost Horizons Network Podcast
Well... Here we are still, after all.
https://well.transistor.fm/
Red Library Podcast:
https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts
From78 Podcast
https://www.patreon.com/from78