feudalism

Serf’s Up

Sylvia Shawcross Well its enough to drive you around the bend and put bubbles in your veins trying to understand the world as it is unfolding. Watching Mattias Desmet being interviewed here, I remember a criticism of his theory being that he attributes everything bad happening right now to the psychology of the masses and …

We Are in Collective Alexithymia

No words for emotions — alexithymia New psychology research shows maltreatment in childhood is linked to alexithymia in adulthood. Its etymology comes from Ancient Greek. The word is formed by combining the alpha privative prefix ἀ- (a-, meaning ‘not’) with λέξις (léxis, referring to ‘words’) and θῡμός (thȳmós, denoting ‘disposition,’ ‘feeling,’ or ‘rage’). The term can […]

In the Crevasses Between Submission and Revolution (Part II)

Summary of Part I In Part I, I argued that the relationship between political subordination and revolution is ill-conceived if framed in a dualistic way. We are either totally submissive or at the other extreme there is revolution. However, following the work of James C. Scott’s great book Domination and the Arts of Resistance I claimed that […]

Eleven Theses on Socialist Revolution

How should we think about “socialist revolution” in the twenty-first century? I put the term in scare-quotes because it can be hard to believe anymore that a socialist, or economically democratic, civilization is even possible—much less inevitable, as Marx and Engels seem to have believed. Far from being on the verge of achieving something like […]
The post Eleven Theses on Socialist Revolution first appeared on Dissident Voice.

The Culture of Slavery v the Culture of Resistance

Inde etiam habitus nostri honor et frequens toga; paulatimque discessum ad delenimenta vitiorum, porticus et balinea et convivorum elegantiam. Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset. (They adopted our dressing fashion, and begun wearing the togas; little by little they were drawn to touches such as colonnades, baths, and elegant talks. Because they […]

Stop the Press: The 20 Percent Solution

The Great Reset Hymn I have heard a lot of discussion about when the war will end that began in April 2020. Yes, war. I have spent the better part of the past ten months trying to determine what the best attitude or approach to the current unpleasantness ought to be taken. A tension has […]
The post Stop the Press: The 20 Percent Solution first appeared on Dissident Voice.

The Quiet Return of Feudalism

Silicon Valley oligarchs are ushering in a new age of serfdom, aided by the left.
Jorge GONZÁLEZ-GALLARZA
The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class, by Joel Kotkin, (New York: Encounter Books, 2020), 224 pages.
Few policy items have more ominously heralded the ongoing realignment of our politics than Universal Basic Income. That its proponents and detractors can’t seem to agree on what UBI is intended for in the first place is merely a measure of that omen.