Finished vol 1 last night
all caught up just in time for vol 2
Finished vol 1 last night
all caught up just in time for vol 2
I've been thinking a lot over the last couple chapters about how some of the ideas we've learned could help explain just how things got so out of hand with the neoliberal turn of the backend of the last century. Here's a couple thoughts I had as maybe contributing factors:
World War II put a serious dent in the world population - google seems to be saying about 3% of the population was killed. In addition, it caused huge infrastructural destruction that needed to be addressed. And finally, the Allied victory represented a major peak of liberal world order - but this means a geographical limitation on areas you can turn to for cheap labor and raw materials, and indeed much of the history of the immediate postwar era is defined by struggles with decolonization movements (India, Algeria, the Suez...) and with the Red menace - in short, barriers to any further expansion of the hegemony of Western capital. So you then have a situation where right after the war, capital has to do a lot of reinvestment just to rebuild itself, and at the same time, there’s not a lot of able-bodied dudes around to do that work (especially Europe, where the Trente Glorieuses particularly strongly felt), nor are there many good opportunities to send capital outside the imperial core. So now capital has to address the labour market imbalance by raising wages, and this is maybe even a bit of a virtuous cycle because raising wages in real terms means also investing in industries to provide the goods those wages get spent on. But these labor market dynamics are a special period rather than a new norm, because eventually the boomers start entering the workforce, China opens up to capital investment, and the Eastern bloc liberalizes after the Soviet Union collapses.
spoiler
❌❌❌ 38. Jane Adams (thinking of fmr. first lady Abigail Adams, possibly mixed up with ACLU co-founder Jane Addams)
❌❌❌ 83. Kelsey Grammer [American actor, not a woman]
⏱33.5 min
⏱36.5 min
⏱42 min
Karl Marx is an idea, a world-historical heroine, light itself
It is getting genuinely scary, I am pretty sure that if a politician was attacked or killed
Oh no, not the politicians!
[A]t the same time, constant changes take place in the sex [...] of the industrial conscripts. [Fowkes p. 583]
Damn, industrialized forced femming confirmed?
In keeping with the benevolent scientist theme, we could have an academic institution tasked with translating constituent opinions into selections of philosopher kings. Maybe it could be called something like "Election College"
What? So you're telling me that if I'm not focusing MY ENTIRE MENTAL ENERGY into thinking about the fact that I am currently eating or drinking something, I'm gonna choke and probably die or something?
It's just like this: Me drinking water: "Yes this is a nice cup of water and I am relaxed hmmmm I think I will let my mind wander a bit while I relax drinking this water. Maybe I can think abou-" CHOKES AND FUCKING DIES
Like come the fuck on why is the human body like this. You should be able to fucking tell if something's going down my throat. You do so many other things automatically WHY DO YOU NEED ME TO DEDICATE MY THOUGHTS TO DRINKING/EATING TO MAKE THINGS GO DOWN THROAT WITHOUT KILLING ME GOD DAMMIT
alternative sexual archetypes in the marketplace ("fascist mario")