Any thoughts or texts I should read first? I want to talk about how he mischaracterizes them and lumps them into one category. How he has more in common with them (hyper-reality and narrative theory) and what fuels his war against them. I'm looking for more.

Trump winning makes me wonder if some people who voted for him have a conscious desire or unconscious desire to live in a dystopia. Dystopian movies could be making people want dystopia. Dystopian movies could be a self-fulfilling prophecy. A lot of people in rural, Republican places are doomsday preppers who might want to see their dystopian predictions come true in the future. The last year of Trump’s presidency, 2020, featured a dystopian pandemic, riots, and a severe recession, so it could be that some Trump voters unconsciously desire more years like 2020.

Both at the moment of Trump's win in 2016 and last week, I came back to Benjamin's Theses on the Concept of History: "to seize hold of a memory as it flashes up at a moment of danger...the tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency’ in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We must attain to a conception of history that is in keeping with this insight. Then we shall clearly realize that it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency..."

The crisis creates the catalyst. It creates a dynamic reality in which many things can happen, both good and bad. Had Harris won, little self reflection might have occurred, and the normative path of "incremental improvement" would have been followed. Yes, a better condition overall but not one in which radical transformation was possible. Now, though, we are forced to reckon with the liquefying ground below us and a shattered image of the world.

The authoritarianism looming before us is deeply troubling, but also deeply unstable. It has not crystallized yet, and we have opportunities to form a new picture of reality. To put it in more contemporary terms, what just happened was a rapid deterritorialization where the coherent-but-unstable assemblage of American (global?) politics was broken apart. This opens the possibility that deterritorialization creates “lines of flight” or escape routes from traditional systems, enabling alternative communities or coalitions to form. In the face of Trumpist reterritorialization, oppositional groups—progressive movements, regional governments, or global networks—may innovate new forms of organization or resistance.

Am I overthinking? Is this just cope? Trying to make light of an utterly grim situation?

In my limited personal experience as a bisexual person, I've observed, contrary to popular thought, that it is gay relationships and not straight relationships which feel much more 'natural', on average. Straight relationships tend to be less natural and more cultural in my experience.

In straight relationships, there is the possibility, as well as the pressure, to conform to stricter gender roles and social norms, a pressure which is close to non-existent in homosexual relationships, since queer culture is not as fixed and static as society's heteronormativity. This means that straight relationships experience a much greater deal of censorship and repression (in the psychoanalytic sense of the word).

For example, if a man is interested in a woman, he can't express his desire too quickly or too directly because he risks being labelled a creep or even accused of sexual harassment. If a woman is interested in a man, she also can't express her desire too quickly or too directly because she risks being labelled as a 'whore' or as too easy to get. In my experience this censorship tends to be way less common between two gay men or two lesbian women. Straight relations are more cultural than natural since the instincts, or drives, are more repressed.

Has anyone else, perhaps a queer theorist or some philosopher of some sort, ever discussed something like this?

I recently saw this Carl Sagan quote that seems to be informed by Marxist critiques of ideology:

One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.

Even the title and theme of the book that this quote is from, The Demon Haunted World, implies Derrida. I was searching for evidence of Sagan referencing any of these philosophers but came up dry. There is a non-definitive "Carl Sagan Reading List" taken from his notebooks which only includes some classical Greek philosophy. I know that he had vague socialist tendencies, but maybe his insights were gained through culture or second hand in snippets. Was Sagan actively influenced by critical theory or Marxism, or did he arrive at these conclusions through other routes?

I've been thinking about art for more than 30 years. In recent years I have been try to understand exactly what it is, and to be able to express that in as succinct a statement as possible. The sense I have been working with lately is that art is "a non-logical aesthetic response to a set of conditions". Is this the right forum to get folks to comment on whether that statement is works for others? Thoughts?

Hello!

I am searching for documentaries, series, movies, tv movies, having to do with Theory. To be honest I am particularly interested in media focusing on structuralism-poststructuralism, Frankfurt School, and their modern branches, but I think this post can be a nice place to find media about theory in general.

## Examples:

This movies can be about a thinker, envolving them in the process (e.g. [Derrida (2002)](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0303326/) or not (in case they are produced after the death of the person/ line of thinkers, e.g. [Wittgenstein (1993](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0108583/?ref\_=tt\_sims\_tt\_i\_3)). They might also be created my them to illustrate their concepts (e.g. [The Pervert's Guide to Ideology (2012)](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2152198/?ref\_=nv\_sr\_srsg\_0\_tt\_1\_nm\_0\_in\_0\_q\_zizek%2520ideo)), or even involve more than one thinkers (e.g. [Examined Life (2008)](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1279083/?ref\_=tt\_sims\_tt\_i\_3)). Since borders are constructed, involving content about philosophers that their work resonates in the theory of the past 50 years or so is also welcome!

## Clarification

Since Theory is for the most part -and in contrast to the intentions of the voices in it- seperated from mass culture in most cases, I find it interesting to study the way ideas are framed for the screen, which is a medium that aspires -at least- to get to big audiences. But, I will be honest: this is not a university assignement; I just want to watch some interesting content related to theory. ChatGPTing this question should probably take fewer time, but I think the chat here is irreplaceable.

Sharing a playlist of them is obsiously welcome as well!

I'm interested mostly in social control through the commodification of life and anihiliation of actual critical reasoning. I've read Discipline and Punish already, as well as PS on the societies of control and texts related directly to the latter. Any ideas on where to continue?

I find Haraway intriguing but really difficult to understand. In part of the Cyborg Manifesto, she talks about affinity politics replacing identity politics. Is this explored more by other authors? It seems like she's saying that identity politics is atomizing, which I wholeheartedly agree with, but I lose the thread of argument at some point. I have renewed interest in this after the election and feeling that identity politics, at least on the left, is a losing game.

Are the dividing lines between ages fundamentally invisible?

"What is the Nike of Samothrace compared to a racing engine?"

-Marinetti

Hidden in the middle of the 20th century runs the dividing line between the CENTURY OF ANGRY ENGINEERS and the emergence of the bipolar world, the CENTURY OF CAUTIOUS ORGANIZERS. Fumio Obayashi, a Germanist from Tokyo, suspects the dividing line to be in May and June 1940. This time disappeared in late summer 1940.

Jean-Claude Micke, International Herald Tribune, interviews the scholar.

- The ages, Obayashi, are, as one can read in your work, attributions.

- You read that correctly.

- They don't really exist, so to speak. And therefore, there can't be any dividing lines between them.

- But something was evidently there, and now it's no longer there.

- What do you mean by "something"?

- One needs a thousand tongues to describe it.

- Name one of them.

- Tongue or fact?

- The dividing lines aren't facts.

- But they move through them.

- Invisibly?

- Invisible to those who experience it. Later, uninvolved and from a distant place, one can see the dividing lines.

- See or describe?

- From this position (temporally separated, uninvolved, at a distant location) it's the same.

The International Herald Tribune possesses a worldwide network of correspondents. Young, often underpaid, always curious staff members, graduates of renowned US universities, pursue remote disputes and translate them into articles, into which they insert selected, rarely used WORDS OF GREAT PRECISION.

Obayashi had described in his book a truck convoy of the Paris museum administration that had already departed for southwestern France in October 1939. In crates, they carried with them the Venus de Milo, the Nike of Samothrace, Michelangelo's Slaves, and other artworks of significance. Meaningless numbers were stamped on the crates so that no one could guess which artwork was hidden where. Now, in June 1940, as Obayashi had researched, the convoy was on the move again to bring the treasures to another location that promised greater security. The convoy traveled on a national road parallel to the road on which German tank troops were advancing southwest. One vehicle column knew nothing of the other.

- And what do you want to say with this metaphor? Why are you, as a Germanist, essentially acting as a historian?

- It shows the parallelism of events. As one epoch slides into another.

- Imperceptibly?

- Well, none of the contemporary witnesses noticed it.

- And you deny the engineering character to the drivers of the museum convoy? While you attribute this character to the tank drivers?

- I said ANGRY ENGINEERS.

- They are outraged?

- A lost generation. They exhausted themselves in the battles of the gas war. They were betrayed. All energies into the machines! Engines don't disappoint us. In this sense, the attitudes of the curators leading the museum convoy, all veterans of the First World War, and the trust of the tank mechanics in their vehicles are indeed the same. You're right about that.

- So what's the message then? What's the point of your observation? Of the parallelism?

- An observation.

The conversation took place recently at the Plaza Hotel Jogjakarta. From their historical distance, both conversation partners noticed simultaneities that were surely unknown to contemporaries in June 1940. Thus, in that week when the truck convoys of the French museum administration, driving parallel to the German tanks, were searching on national roads for a second hiding place for the art treasures, work brigades in New York were busy dismantling the World's Fair "BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES." One of the work columns re-excavated a steel cylinder from a depth of 36 meters that had been buried there at the opening of the exhibition. They transported it 80 meters further north, TO BURY IT THERE ANEW. The ton-heavy cylinder contained writing samples from Einstein, a selection of books, patents, an Edison light bulb wrapped in velvet and stored in a separate box, as well as samples of various materials, including clocks and screws. A cover letter to posterity, who should excavate this cylinder in 6000 years, contained a description of the utility value of the objects. The relocation, Professor Obayashi reported, was necessary because the plans for the construction of the skyscraper that was to be erected over the grave of these documents had changed. Now a different plot had been acquired for the construction than originally planned. Thus the cylinder, which Obayashi referred to as a "document," changed its location one last time. The high-rise building above the mausoleum has since been demolished twice by the CAUTIOUS ORGANIZERS and rebuilt to a different scale. This was a reflection of the rapid increases in property value on Manhattan's non-reproducible soil.

- How should I translate CAUTIOUS ORGANIZERS into English? It's a Japanese term.

- It's a business administration category, belongs to business studies. The term must fit the Soviet Union 1941, the USA, Great Britain losing its colonies, and the Axis powers after they are defeated. What's the common denominator for that?

Obayashi cited as an example General Stilwell's tank maneuvers, which he conducted in Florida in May 1940. At the same time, he said, the German 7th Panzer Division was driving through Arras toward the Channel coast. Obayashi has collected the daily reports of these parallel drives. No difference, he claims. It is one and the same action, just on two different stages. You can notice A SEPARATION BETWEEN AGES in that the parallel actions not only increase dramatically but take on a ghostly relationship to each other. For a brief time, the future structure of the CAUTIOUS ORGANIZERS, you could also call them planners, and the structure of the ANGRY ENGINEERS overlap. The engineers, Obayashi adds, however, fall into a strange despair shortly after. They lose their FORWARD-LOOKING ANGER for the rest of the century. In this respect, May 1940 could be counted as belonging to both structures or ages, this month was in the warring countries a TRIUMPH OF ENGINEERS and yet already an ORGY FOR PLANNERS.

- Are then, to speak in your image, the engineers the COMING BARBARIANS? That one quickly brings messages or treasures, the dearest things one has, to safety, that one reports to the appropriate authorities for battle against the arch-enemy? Save yourself if you can?

- The engineers are not barbarians, they are angry.

- Isn't that a sugarcoating of fascism?

- You see it wrong. The ANGRY ENGINEERS are on both sides. In France perhaps 20% more per thousand than in Germany or Italy. In Japan 40% more per thousand than in Europe. Impatient yes, barbarians no.

- But ruthless?

- Certainly ruthless.

- Anger approaches like a machine?

- Exactly so.

https://preview.redd.it/ygu9xaiugozd1.jpg?width=2450&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2ab9eb409c8b6048cc244b3ffdf979164315817b

Sorry if this is overly topical/not academic enough

A lot of “legacy media” center-left outlets like PBS, CNN, etc. are publishing articles about how we need learn to talk to average working class Americans better and that using terms like Latinx and demanding pronouns resulted in trumps victory as it alienated normal Americans.

I can’t imagine a return to class solidarity over identity under the neoliberal status quo, so what is the future of the not right wing contingent from here?

A timely return to a 2017 piece that looks at Trump via the lens of Mouffe and Laclau's politics of populism and enjoyment:

"The election of Trump has seemingly universalized a liberal struggle against the backward forces of populism. What this ‘crisis of liberalism’ elides is the manner in which populism and liberalism are libidinally entangled. Psychoanalytic political theory holds that the populist logics of antagonism, enjoyment and jouissance are not the pathological outside of democracy but its repressed symptoms, what Arditi borrowing from Freud calls “internal foreign territory” (2005: 89). The explosion of emotion and anger which has accompanied Trump and other Republican populists is a return of antagonism suppressed in neoliberalism’s “post-political vision” (Mouffe 2005: 48). In response to the politics of consensus, rationalism and technocracy, embodied by Barack Obama and Clinton, populism expresses the ontological necessity of antagonism in political identity (Laclau 2005). Whether in left formulations of the people vs the 1% or the nationalism of right wing populism, the act of defining an exceptional people against an enemy represents “political logic tout court” (Laclau: 229). The opposition of a people against its enemy is not just a rhetorical strategy commonly defined as the populist style (Moffitt 2016), it is part of the libidinal reward structure of populism."

https://www.boundary2.org/2017/10/olivier-jutel-donald-trumps-libidinal-entanglement-with-liberalism-and-affective-media-power/

I just got what i thought was all the volumes from the library, which turned out to be volume 3. Is it fine to start at 3 and go back or do 1 and 2 give you the context for it in a crucial way that would negate the experience?

Now that the elections are finished, I have seen many people on hell (twitter),say that the idea of whiteness has evolved and somehow overtook the hispanic community in america, to the extent where a majority of latino people have voted for trump even though he has immigration policies that would go against them, many have argued that they have succumbed to this ifea of white supremacy.

what are you thoughts on this and are there any sociological explains to why this can be right or wrong?

Is it in attempt to identify with the bourgeoise?

Dear community,

I am currently in the process of writing a PhD proposal to apply to my university's Department of Communication and got stuck while planning the methodological framework. In short, I am investigating the relationship between folklore objects and youth in precarity. I would appreciate your feedback on whether the following methodological components could be combined:

1. Research Approach: Ethnography
2. Paradigm: Critical Posthumanism
3. Data Collection Methods: Field Notes and Focus Group Interviews
4. Data Analysis Methods: Grounded Theory

Looking for critique about the ways in which majority democracy is itself 'authoritarian' or 'un-democratic'. Can be anarchist, Marxist, or other political traditions even as well. Would like something grounded in affirming minority groups, those who are numerically outmatched by 'the majority' of 'the people'. If I can't find it I'll write something myself.

I am creating a reading group for philosophy and theory in my city!

Ideally, my reading list would start with Marx and Engles, then Gramsci, Lukacs, then to the Frankfurt School, followed by the French tradition and beyond etc etc. (I have a more comprehensive list if you are interested in seeing it).

But realistically I don't expect numbers to be too high at the beginning, and I wouldn't want people to miss out on key texts that join later on. However, I do eventually want people to be aware of the genealogy of political and philosophical ideas, hesne the chronology of my prefered reading list! (I mean, imagine people suggesting reading Deleuze without the necessary knowledge of the history of philosophy?!)

My question is, how would you curate a reading list? Perhaps begin with something like Mbembe or other more contemporary (and clear) thinker, or even journalistic articles that discuss current events through a theoretical lens. Other ideas include chapters from Terry Eagleton's What is Ideology?

Additionally, has anyone else spearheaded a similar reading group, and what was your approach to enlisting members?

And recommendations are welcome!

Hey guys,

I was studying Latin America countries. The contrast between Mexico and Argentina is immense on who they have picked as their leaders, and what the values of those leaders are.

I'd like to hear your thoughts. Not just about the Mexico-Argentina case but using it as a starting point to compare other nations as well.

I know there are things out there. They've been recommended to me but I never wrote them down and now I regret it.

Night from a critical perspective, magical perspective, critical histories, explorations of night in culture/media, phenomenology & night, abstract ideas about night, super obtuse, challenging and intentionally confusing stuff welcome. The weirder the better.

Thought it might be relevant for this sub given the subject matter and the state of the world (and my country).

Don't know how good the translation is; if anyone could provide any insight into it that would be excellent.

I'm new and interested in critical theory but I feel somewhat alienated from it. I'm not trying to rant but to provide some context. I'm from asia (not asian american) and in my culture, it can be described as "collectivist" where I guess it's largely influenced by Confucian ideologies.

Capitalism here is like a sacred cow or a white elephant, it doesn't even get mentioned at all. There are a significant people complaining about stress from high cost of living, housing prices, stressful education system, etc. But no one views these as a structural issue. Even if I do mention about capitalism or share Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed, most are apathetic. To borrow an analogy, people here believe in the American dream of meritocracy.

Having said that, it does seem true that we are powerless to make any changes here. Perhaps this is why it's not an option to consider any changes in the political system considering the huge power imbalance.

I'm wondering if anyone has YouTube channel recommendations that focus or have a body of work on Appalachia. I'm looking for sociological, historical, philosophical, etc. perspectives on the region. I'm seeking videos because I'm disabled and only able to read so much a day due to symptoms. Thanks in advance.