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stevesociety8 · 20 days ago

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Joe Biden stood before the American people, millions of whom were still reeling from the news of Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential race, and reassured them: “We’re going to be OK.”

In his first remarks since his vice-president and chosen successor, Kamala Harris, lost the presidential election, Biden delivered a pep talk from the White House Rose Garden on a sunny Thursday that clashed with Democrats’ black mood in the wake of their devastating electoral losses. Biden pledged a smooth transfer of power to Trump and expressed faith in the endurance of the American experiment.

“Setbacks are unavoidable, but giving up is unforgivable,” Biden said. “A defeat does not mean we are defeated. We lost this battle. The America of your dreams is calling for you to get back up. That’s the story of America for over 240 years and counting.”

The message severely clashed with the dire warnings that many Democrats, including Biden, have issued about the dangers of a second Trump term. They have predicted that Trump’s return to power would jeopardize the very foundation of American democracy. They assured voters that Trump would make good on his promise to deport millions of undocumented people. And they raised serious doubts about Trump’s pledge to veto a nationwide abortion ban.

Now as they stare down four more years of Trump’s presidency, Democrats must reckon with the reality that those warnings were for naught. Not only did Trump win the White House, but he is on track to win the popular vote, making him the first Republican to do so since 2004. Senate Republicans have regained their majority, and they appear confident in their chances of holding the House of Representatives, with several key races still too close to call on Friday morning.

The bleak outcome has left Democrats bereft, unmoored and furious when they previously thought this week would be the cause of joy and celebration. They are now heading into a brutal political wilderness with its current leaders tarnished by advanced age and a catastrophic defeat and a younger generation that is yet to fully emerge.

The party also faces a likely brutal civil war between its leftists and centrists over the best way forward – one that will be fought over the levers of power in the party at every level from the grassroots of all 50 US states to the crowded corridors of Congress in Washington.

The stark reality has left Democrats asking themselves the same question over and over again: how did we get here?

The hypotheses and accusations rose from whispers to shouts starting on Wednesday. Although a handful of Democrats suggested Harris should have done more to distance herself from Biden, few party membersappeared to blame the nominee, who was credited with running the best possible campaign given her roughly 100-day window to close a considerable gap with Trump.

Some Democrats blamed Biden, who withdrew from the presidential race in July only after mounting pressure from his party after a disastrous debate performance against Trump. Jim Manley, who served as a senior adviser to the former Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, said that Biden never should have run for re-election.

“This is no time to pull punches or be concerned about anyone’s feelings,” Manley told Politico. “He and his staff have done an enormous amount of damage to this country.”

In an even more damning indictment, Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker who was applauded for her role in pressuring Biden to step aside, suggested the party should have held an open primary.

“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi told the New York Times on Thursday. “We live with what happened. And because the president endorsed Kamala Harris immediately, that really made it almost impossible to have a primary at that time. If it had been much earlier, it would have been different.”

A number of other senior Democratic aides complained to reporters – on background, without their names attached to the quotes – that Biden had put the party in a terrible position by not reckoning earlier with the widespread concerns over his age and unpopularity. (Biden would have been 86 at the end of his second term, while Trump will be 82 at the end of his.)

The White House pushed back against those gripes, framing Democrats’ losses in a much more global context. Incumbents have lost ground around the world in the past year, a trend that experts largely blame on the anger and disillusionment spurred by the coronavirus pandemic and the ensuing high inflation it caused.

The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, cited this explanation during her press briefing on Thursday, while noting that Biden still believes he “made the right decision” in stepping aside.

“Despite all of the accomplishments that we were able to get done, there were global headwinds because of the Covid-19 pandemic,” Jean-Pierre said. “And it had a political toll on many incumbents, if you look at what happened in 2024 globally.”

Despite those headwinds, Democrats wonder if their communication strategy could have prevented Republicans’ triumph. Leaders of the party are now debating the role of new media and how dominant rightwing influencers, particularly in the so-called “manosphere��, helped propel Trump to victory.

Left-leaning Van Jones posited that Democrats had focused too much on traditional media at the expense of cultivating a leftwing media ecosystem, saying in a Substack Live chat: “We built the wrong machine.”

Or perhaps Democrats’ failure to connect with the concerns of working-class voters cost them the White House, as progressives such as Senator Bernie Sanders argued.

“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic party which has abandoned working-class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” Sanders said in his post-election statement. “In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions.”

But who will lead those discussions? Biden will be 82 when he leaves the White House in January. Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic leader who has now been demoted to minority leader, is 73. Pelosi is 84. Sanders, who won re-election on Tuesday, will be 89 by the time his new term ends.

The party must now look to a new generation of leaders, a pivot that many argue should have come earlier. Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader who still holds out a distant hope of becoming speaker in January if his party can win a majority, might lead the way. Progressive Democrats will probably be looking to popular lawmakers like congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to shape the party’s future. Other rank-and-file members have pointed to Gavin Newsom, the California governor who is already trying to “Trump-proof” his state, as an example for resisting the new administration.

They will have a foundation to work from, party leaders assert. Although Trump’s victory was devastating to them, Democrats protected at least three and possibly five competitive Senate seats while mitigating Republican gains in the House. Even if House Republicans maintain control of the chamber, they will be forced to govern with a narrow majority that proved disastrous during the last session and could pave the wave for significant Democratic gains in 2026.

For now, though, the Democrats who poured their hearts and souls into electing Harris as the first woman, first Black woman and first Asian American woman to serve as president seem exhausted. They have spent most of the past decade warning the country about the dangers of Trump and his political philosophy only for a majority of American voters to send him back to the White House.

While Trump’s first electoral victory sparked a wave of outrage and protests among Democrats, his second win seemed met with a mournful sigh from many of his critics. Right now, Democrats are taking the time to grieve. And then, eventually, they will start to pick up the pieces of their party.

Lauren Gambino contributed reporting

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linguisticssystem · 3 years ago

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who is steven crowder i don't get these references

Buckle down lol this is gonna need a primer:

Steven Crowder is one of the biggest youtube right-wing voices to make the unfortunate habit of reaching people's ears.

He's a failed comedian debate bro who's spewed out every form of bigotry known to man. Several people who are close to him have advised that he doesn't believe a word that comes out of his mouth and just repeats talking points for money. He got famous from his claim that he'll "debate anyone" and that he "just wants to have an exchange of ideas". He then demonstrates this divine debate ability, like all the greats do, by debating unprepared 18 year olds while he has a full book of references and false stats sitting in his lap.

He's the "change my mind" asshole. If you see people mentioning it, they're referencing him, whether out of reverence or abhorrence is up to context lol.

Enter Sam Seder, host of the left-leaning news show Majority Report. Sam Seder has had some of legitimately the best debates I've ever heard against right libertarians, and while I'm biased as I enjoy political debate, I'm not lying when I say it's a joy to listen to these bootstrap bozos get a taste of the logic they're trying to force on everyone else. Sam is a talented rhetorician, and it's obvious to anyone who watches him.

Sam Seder and Crowder were scheduled to have a debate years ago at Politicon, but at some point (presumably Crowder had the courtesy to google Sam), Crowder's crew ghosted the people attempting to set up the debate. The only explanation that the scheduler was able to give Seder for Crowder's disappearance was "he had cold feet" and "his booker (his dad lol) wouldn't let him".

You can probably imagine, Anon, but Crowder has been considered a joke in left wing spaces ever since, though unfortunately it hasn't really spread outside of lefty political knowledge.

Fast forward to now, and Crowder made an unfortunate mistake. He got into a fight with Ethan Klein of H3H3 because Ethan made the unforgivable blunder of advising that people wear masks and get vaccinated during a pandemic.

Crowder offers to debate Ethan to settle the drama, because of course he does. Ethan Klein is not a debater. He's not a politically active channel and isn't up to date on current events. It's an unfair fight and that's why Crowder offered in the first place.

I'm not saying Ethan hasn't had some terrible takes in the past. I'm not saying he's the best person ever. I'm not saying he didn't play a major role in the anti-sjw years of 2016. I'm not even saying that I personally like him. What I AM saying is that Klein's personal politics lean center to progressive, and he Does Not Enjoy Steven's grifting bullshit.

So Ethan Klein and his editor, Dan, let his large, centrist audience in on a little secret. The Legend of Cold Feet Crowder. Klein accepts the offer to debate, and then at the last minute they loop Sam Seder into the call. The result is Crowder losing his shit, looking like a tool on live broadcast, and running away at the speed of light, but not without dropping the little tidbit in the heat of the moment that he thinks that all of his fellow right-wingers are complete morons.

Crowder has harassed practically every minority under the guise of "it's just jokes!!! i thought the left was in favor of freedom of speech!!! sO mUcH fOr ThE tOlErAnT lEfT".

The troll finally got trolled and it's the most satisfying thing I've seen in a really long time. Plus, any opportunity for people outside of leftist spaces to see what a complete joke this dude is is a hard win in my book because he spreads some really hateful shit.

#long post #politics #sam seder #steven crowder #leftisbest #majority report #h3h3 #heatherslogs #if you want links as well like sources lemme know and i'll get them #sorry for anyone who's not really into politics i just #enjoy a good comeuppance story #it's so satisfying #coldfeetcrowder

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stephenjaymorrisblog · 2 years ago

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Dark Brandon Lights Up Voters

Stephen Jay Morris

9-10-2022

©Scientific Morality

All this hype about VR—virtual reality. Those headsets look like blindfolds on space aliens from Planet Oy Vey, just before they administer the death penalty by firing squad, using Jewish laser beams.

You want reality? Just turn your head and look around! But, no—not here in America! Nope. We live in a culture of escapism. My generation used hallucinogenic drugs, like LSD 25, or “Magic Mushrooms,” to escape the dystopian reality of capitalism and protestant Christianity. Timothy Leary predicted, in the 70’s, that people would cease using chemicals and, instead, get high by Cyber means. Well—just look at all those fools with the goofy headsets!

A lot of Americans have their own methodology of escapism. Like religion, for example, or movies. For you Millennial's, it’s been video games. Whatever. This all equates to what I call magic thinking.

Where does magic thinking come from? One’s childhood. Your parents recount or read fairy tales about magic as you sit upon their knee. Your prepubescent imagination fires up and a seed is planted in your subconscious! Soon, religion takes over and you are ready to accept whatever the pastor shouts at you from behind his pulpit. He rants about some omniscient God that will protect his followers—you—by doing magic against evil. A question: Why must he protect you from the evil that he created? Good question! But I digress.

When I was a young kid, my escapist entertainment was comic books. They cost 12 cents each and they were worth every penny! I could gaze at great art work and read imaginative stories. The stories’ subjects were primarily super heroes of various sizes, shapes, and powers. Using their special powers, they’d solve problems and fight against evil.

So, why am I telling you this?

I’m telling you this because a majority of Americans believe in magical thinking, by way of glorifying a dynamic individual. They believe there is one being who can stand up to an army of evil androids, 20 feet tall! I hate to break it to you, but no such thing exists.

Some Americans believe that, with a lot of money, this individual knows the secrets of life and success, and will free you from debt and your fear of evil. This was the crux of the whole Trump appeal. In his followers’ minds, he was going to deliver them from their miserable lives and provide a powerful and prosperous country of which they all could be proud. Fortunately, a lot of us saw through that facade with the realization that we were actually witnessing the great “son” of P.T. Barnum. To Trump, every White Protestant was not a patriotic American, but a stupid sucker that was born just a minute ago.

You see, there is a certain, childish naivete to the White American male. They believe that when their father beats them, it makes them a better person; that authority is always right. If Trump lies or cheats, he has a very good reason. This comes from authority dependency. I use critical thinking, so I know that when Trump does these things, it is because he is an evil asshole! To his followers, however, he is infallible.

Now, in walks President Joe Biden. He is an old fashioned politician. He leads by reading popularity polls. His politics remind me of Hubert Humphrey, a pragmatic centrist. Joe ain’t going to risk his career by saying something reckless or stupid. As Trump’s popularity started to shrink, then Biden donned his superhero outfit. He became more aggressive toward the Alt-Right, which is an easy task to do. It’s like condemning a child molester: everybody agrees with you. Try criticizing the Pope, or the President of Israel—see what it will get you! Now, that is daring!

Oh, don’t get me wrong! I get sadistic joy in Joe Biden’s verbal abuse of Trump. But this “Dark Bradon” shit? This was conceived by a meme artist on social media. It’s very entertaining, but politically useless.

One more point: FDR rules the roost. He went after the Conservatives and welcomed their hatred. He showed the Right-wingers who was boss! History would vindicate Roosevelt of being a “creeping Socialist.” If not for his government programs, America would be a Communist regime by now! He pulled the carpet out from under the Communist movement. The Conservatives, however, are too dumb to realize that. You don’t stop communism with a gun! You stop communism by Democratic Capitalism.

As an Anarchist, I am no friend of Liberals and Progressives, but they are the lesser of two evils: the Conservatives and MAGA jerks. Once we eliminate the Conservatives, then we go after the Libs.

Have a great day! No... Have a nice day!

#american politics #stephenjaymorris #poets of tumblr #anarchism #satire #joe biden #Dark Biden

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adorpheus · 4 years ago

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on fujoshi and fetishization

Lately, more and more, both here on tumblr and on other sites, I keep seeing people spew unfiltered hatred at fujoshi - that is, women who like mlm content such as gay fanfic and fanart featuring men with other men. And I don’t mean like a specific type of fujoshi, like the ones who are genuinely being weird about it, but just like a general hatred for girls (but especially straight identifying girls) who express love for gay romance.

I hate to break this to you all, but women (including straight women!) actually are allowed to like mlm fanfiction and fanart, even enthusiastically so. A woman simply expressing her love of gay fanfic, even if it is in kind of a cringey way or a way that you personally don’t like, is NOT automatically fetishization.

I’ve been on the receiving end of fetishization for my entire life, from a very young age, as many black and brown folx have, so I consider myself pretty well acquainted with how it works. Fetishization isn’t just like, being really into drawings of boys kissing, or whatever the fuck y’all are trying to imply on this god forsaken site.

Fetishization is complicated imo, and can encompass a lot of things, such as (but not limited to):

1 - dehumanization, e.g. viewing a group of people as sexual objects who exist purely for entertainment purposes, rather than acknowledging them as actual people who deserve respect and rights

and

2 - projecting certain assumptions onto said people based on their race/sexuality/whatever is being fetishized. These assumptions are often, but not always, sexual in nature (like the idea that black people in general are more sexual than other races, etc etc etc).

I’m going to use myself as an example to illustrate my point. Please note this isn’t the best or most nuanced example, but it is the most simplistic. A white person finding me attractive and respectfully appreciating my black features as part of what makes me beautiful is not, on its own, fetishization. A white person finding me attractive solely or mostly because I’m a PoC is now in fetishization territory. Similarly, assuming I’m dominant because of my blackness (like saying “step on me mommy” and shit like that) is hella fetishistic.

That being said, theres definitely a difference between how fetishization works in real life with real people, and how it shows up in fandom.

Fetishization manifests in many different ways in fandom, but most commonly on the mlm side of things, I personally see it appear as conservative (or centrist) women who love the idea of two men together, but don’t actually like gay people, and don’t necessarily think LGBT+ people deserve rights (or “special treatment” as its sometimes dog whistled). These women view queer men as sexual objects for entertainment rather than an actual group of people who deserve to be protected from systemic oppression. I’ve noticed that they often don’t even think of the men they “ship” together as actually being gay, and may even express disgust at the idea of a character in an mlm ship being headcanon’d gay. In case its not obvious, this is pretty much exactly the same way a lot of cishet men fetishize lesbians (they see “lesbian” as a porn category, rather than like, what actual LGBT people think of when we read the word lesbian). There’s a pretty popular viral tweet thread going around where someone explains seeing this trend of conservative women who like mlm stuff, and I have also personally witnessed this phenomenon myself in more than one fandom.

The funny thing is, maybe its just me buuuut.... The place I see this particular kind of fetishization happen most is not in the anime/BL fandom, from which the term fujoshi originates - I actually see these type of women way way more in western fandom spaces like Supernatural, Harry Potter, and Hannibal. I can’t stress this enough, there’s a shocking amount of people who are like, straight up trump supporters in these fandoms. If you want to experience it, try joining a Hannigram or Destiel group on facebook and you will probably encounter one eventually especially if you happen to be living through a major historical event. Like these women probably wouldn’t even be considered “fujoshi”, because that term doesn’t really apply to them given they aren’t in the BL/anime fandom, yet they’re the ones I personally see actually doing the most harm.

Of course this isn’t the ONLY kind of fetishizing woman in the mlm/BL world, there are other ways fetishization shows up, but this is the most toxic kind that I see.

A girl just being really into BL or whatever may be “cringe” to you, or she may be expressing her love for BL in a “cringey” way, but a straight woman really enjoying BL is not, on its own, somehow inherently fetishization. Yes, sometimes teenage girls act kind of cringe about how much they like BL and that might be annoying to you, but its not necessarily ~problematic~.

That being said, IT NEEDS BE REMARKED that a lot of the “fujoshi” that you all hate so deeply, are actually closeted trans men or nonbinary people who haven’t yet come to terms with their gender identity, or are otherwise just NOT cishet. I know because I was one of these closeted people for years, and I honestly think tumblr and the cultural obsession around purity is one of the many reasons I was closeted so deeply for so long. STORYTIME LOL!!! In my early adolescence, I was a sort of proto “fujoshi”. I identified as a bi girl who was mostly attracted to men, or as most (biphobic) people called it, “practically straight”. I wrote and read “slash” fanfic and looked at as well as drew my own fanart. We didn’t use the term fujoshi back then, but that’s definitely how I could have been described. I was obsessed with yaoi, BL, whatever you want to call it, to a cringe-inducing degree. I really struggled to relate to most het romances, so when I first discovered yaoi fanfics (as we called them at the time), I fell in love and felt like I finally found the type of romance content that was made for me. I didn’t know exactly why, I just knew it hit different. LGBT+ fanart and fanfiction brought me an immense amount of joy, and I didn’t really think too hard about why.

At some point, in my early 20s, after reading lots of discourse™ here on tumblr and other places like twitter, I started to get the sinking feeling that my passion for gay fanfiction was ~problematic~. I had always felt a sense of guilt for being into mlm content, because literally anyone who found out I liked BL (especially the men I dated) shamed me for liking it all the fucking time (which btw is literally just homophobic, like can we talk about that?). In addition to THAT bullshit, now I’m seeing posts telling me that girls who like BL are cringey gross fetishists who inspire rage and should go die?

Let me tell you, I internalized the fuck out of messages like this. I desperately wanted to avoid being ~problematic~. At the time, I thought being problematic was like the worst thing you could be. I was terrified of being “cancelled”, before canceling was even really a thing. I thought to myself, “oh my god, I’m gross for liking this stuff? I should stop.” I beat myself up over this. I wanted so badly to be accepted, and to be deemed a Good Person by the internet and society at large.

I tried to shape up and become a good ally (lmfao). I stopped writing fanfic and deleted all the ones I was working on at the time. I made a concerted effort to assimilate into cishet culture, including trying to indulge myself more deeply in the few fandoms I could find that had het content I did enjoy (Buffy, True Blood, Pretty Little Liars, etc). I would occasionally look at BL/fanfic/etc in private, but then I would repress my interest in it and not look for a while. Instead I would look at women in straight relationships, and create extremely heterosexual Couple Goals pinterest boards, and try to figure out how I could become more like these women, so I, too, could be loved someday.

This cycle of repression lasted like eight years. Throughout it all, I was performing womanhood to the best of my ability and trying to become a woman that was worthy of being in a relationship. I went in and out of several “straight” relationships, wondering why they didn’t make me feel the way reading fanfic did. Most of all, I couldn’t figure out why straight intimacy didn’t work for me. I just didn’t enjoy it. I always preferred looking at or making gay fanfiction/fanart over actual intimacy with men in real life.

Eventually, I stumbled upon a trans coming out video that someone I was following posted online, my egg started to crack, and to make an extremely long story short, after like 3 years of introspection and many gender panic attacks that I still experience to this day, I realized that I’m uh... MAYBE... NOT CIS..!? :|

I truly believe if I had just been ALLOWED TO LIKE GAY STUFF WITHOUT BEING SHAMED FOR IT, I probably would have realized I was trans way way sooner. Because for me, indulging in my love of gay romance and writing gay fanfic wasn’t me being a weirdo fetishist, it was actually me exploring my own gender identity. It is what helped me come to terms with being a nonbinary trans boy.

Not everyone realizes they are trans at age 2 or whatever the fuck. Sometimes you have to go through a cringey fujoshi phase and multiple existential crises to realize how fucking gay you are AND THATS FINE.

And one more thing - can we just be real here?

A lot of anti-fujoshi sentiment is literally just misogyny. omg please realize this. Its “women aren’t allowed to enjoy things” but, like... with gay fanfics. Some of the anti-fujoshi posts I see come across my dash are clearly ppl projecting a caricature they invented in their head of a demonic fujoshi fetishist onto any woman who expresses what they consider to be a little too much enthusiasm for gay content and then using their perception of that individual as an excuse to justify their disdain for any women, especially straight women, ‘invading’ their ~oh so exclusive~ queer fandom spaces.

god get over yrselfs this is gatekeeping by another name

idk why i spent so long writing this no one is even going to read it, does anyone even still use this site

*EDIT: HOLY SHIT WHEN DOING RESEARCH FOR THIS POST I FOUND OUT THAT Y-GALLERY IS BACK OMG!!!

#rant #fujoshi #I SAID WHAT I SAID #personal #gender stuff

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jgthirlwell · 4 years ago

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2020 Year In Review

This year once again I invited some friends and colleagues to reflect on 2020

JG Thirlwell

Composer

Foetus Xordox Manorexia Steroid Maximus Venture Bros Archer

www.foetus.org

2020 was a troubling and disturbing year. I created a lot of music and experienced a lot of nights waking at 5am in a panic. I deeply missed the sacred experience of being able to see live music. In its absence of that I listened to a lot of music. It was difficult to whittle down this list but here are a lot of albums I enjoyed in 2020, in no particular order.

Le Grand Sbam Furvent (Dur Et Doux) John Elmquist’s HardArt Group I Own an Ion (900 Nurses) Roly Porter Kistvaen (Subtext) Liturgy Origin Of The Alimonies (YLYLCYN) Clark Kiri Variations (Throttle) Dai Kaht Dai Kaht I & II (Soleil Zeuhl) Chromb Le livre des merveilles (Dur Et Doux) Horse Lords The Common Task (Northern Spy) Ecker & Meultzer Carbon (Subtext) Insane Warrior Tendrils (RJ’s Electrical Connections) Jeff Parker Suite For Max Brown (International Anthem) Jacob Kirkegaard Opus Mors (Topos) Tristan Perich Drift Multiply (Nonesuch) Bec Plexus Sticklip (New Amsterdam) Vak Budo (Soleil Zeuhl) Merlin Nova BOO! (Bandcamp) The The Muscle OST (Cineola) Zombi 2020 (Relapse) Regis Hidden In This Is The Light That You Miss (Downwards) Rival Consoles Articulation (Erased Tapes) Sarah Davachi Cantus, Descant (L.A.T.E.) Sufjan Stevens The Ascension (Asthmatic Kitty) Idles Ultra Mono (Partisan) Daedelus The Bittereindeers (Brainfeeder) Boris No (Bandcamp) Aksak Maboul Figures / Un peu de l’ame des bandits / Onze Danses Pour Cobattre La Migraine (Crammed) Noveller Arrow (Ba Da Bing) Felicia Atkinson Everything Evaporate (Shelter Press) Ital Tek Dream Boundary (Planet Mu) Author and Punisher Beastland (Relapse) Sparks A Steady Drip Drip Drip (BMG) Corima Amatarasu (Soleil Zeuhl) Code Orange Underneath (Roadrunner) Deerhoof Future Teenage Cave Artists /Silly Symphonies / To Be Surrounded../ Love Lore(Joyful Noise) Sote Moscels (Opal Tapes) Run The Jewels RTJ4 (Jewel Runners) Oranssi Pazuzu Mestarin Kynsi (Nuclear Blast) Master Boot Record Floppy Disk Overdrive (Metal Blade) Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith The Mosaic Of Transformation (Ghostly International) / Ears (Western Vinyl) Michael Gordon Acquanetta (Cantelope) Neom Arkana Temporis (Soleil Zeuhl) Rian Treanor Ataxia / File Under UK Metaplasm (Planet Mu) Helm Saturnalia (Alter) Ivvvo doG (Halcyon Veil) Robert Normandeau Figures (Empreintes Digitales) Ben Vida Reducing The Tempo To Zero (Shelter Press) Beatrice Dillon Workaround (Pan) Dan Deacon Mystic Familiar (Domino) Sea Oleena Weaving A Basket (Higher Plain Music) Elysian Fields Transience Of Life (Ojet) Rhapsody Symphony Of Enchanted Lands II - The Dark Secret (Magic Circle) Duma Duma (Nyege Nyege) Ulla Strauss Tumbling Towards a Wall / Seed (Bandcamp)

Honorable mentions Carl Stone Stolen Car (Unseen Worlds) Nazar Guerilla (Hyperdub) Iwo Zaluski with the Children of Park Lane Primary School, Wembley The Remarkable Earth Making Machine (Trunk) Nahash Flowers Of The Revolution (SVBKVLT) Cindy Lee Whats Tonight To Eternity (Bandcamp) Insect Ark The Vanishing (Profound Lore) 33EMYBW Arthropods (SVBKVLT) Declan McKenna Zeroes (Tomplicated) Layma Azur Zeii (Bandcamp)

FILM TV Succession ZeroZeroZero Escape at Dannemora 1917 Small Axe : Five films by Steve McQueen Pirhanas Monos The Hater Better Call Saul

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Drew Daniel

Matmos, The Soft Pink Truth

an alphabet of 2020 recordings

Arca “KiCk i” BFTT “Intrusive / Obtrusive” clipping. “Visions of Bodies Being Burned” Duma “Duma” Eilbacher, Max “Metabolist Meter (Foster, Cottin, Caetani and a Fly)” Forbidden Colors “La Yeguada” GILA “Energy Demonstration” HiedraH Club de Baile “Bichote-K Bailable Vol. 2” Ian Power “Maintenance Hums” Jeff Carey “Index[off]” Kassel Jaeger “Meith” Laurie Anderson “Songs From the Bardo” Mukqs “Water Levels” Negativland “The World Will Decide” O’Rourke, Jim “Shutting Down Here” Perlesvaus “These Things Below with Those Above” Quicksails “Blue Rise” Rian Treanor “File Under UK Metaplasm” Slikback “///” Terminal Nation “Holocene Extinction” Ulcerate “Stare Into Death and Be Still” Various Artists “HAUS of ALTR” William Tyler “New Vanitas” Xyla “Ways” Y A S H A “Summations” :zoviet-france: “Châsse 2ᵉ”

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Sarah Lipstate (Noveller)

With all live performances canceled, this was truly the year of demo videos and home studio recording for me. These are 10 pieces of gear that came out in 2020 that helped keep me feeling creative and inspired during lockdown. In no particular order:

EHX Oceans 12 Dual Stereo Reverb - The Oceans 12 ticks all the boxes for what I’m looking for in a great soundscaping reverb. I used the Shimmer and Reverse algorithms in conjunction a lot when I was composing music for a film score.

Chase Bliss Audio Blooper - While I don’t actually own a Blooper, I had the pleasure of borrowing one from Mike of Baranik Guitars after NAMM this year. He made an incredible Blooper-inspired guitar and I was completely charmed by them both. Chase Bliss always delivers pedals that push me creatively and the Blooper truly hits the mark.

Cooper FX Arcades - I love everything Cooper FX has released to-date so the opportunity to access those sounds in one pedal via plug-in cartridges is just awesome.

SolidGoldFX NU-33 - I was asked to do a demo of this pedal for its release and ended up being really charmed by this box’s approach to lo-fi nostalgia. I’ve used it a lot for film scoring and highly recommend adding it to your collection.

Demedash Effects T-120 DLX V2 - I LOVE a good tape echo and the T-120 Deluxe V2 ranks up there with the best I’ve tried. This pedal made its way to me this Christmas and I look forward to making some beautiful sounds with it in the new year.

Hologram Electronics Microcosm - The Microcosm is one of those pedals where you should fully read the manual before diving in but once you put in that initial effort you’ve got a massively powerful tool on your hands. It does glitch like no other. Definitely worth the homework

Azzam Bells MP019 - I discovered this unique instrument through a post on Reverb’s IG page and immediately looked it up and ordered one. These experimental percussion instruments are hand-made in Italy and they’re as beautiful visually as they are sonically. I used it for bowed cymbal and daxophone sounds on a film score and it was absolutely haunting.

Echopark Dual Harmonic Boost 2 - I love the control you have over dialing in the perfect amount of grit with these dual boost circuits. I use it a lot as a textural tool when I’m laying down drones or bringing in big distorted swells. It’s one of the most versatile overdrives in my collection and I love that.

Fender Parallel Universe Series Volume II Maverick Dorado - I was smitten with the Maverick Dorado when I first saw it at NAMM. It has a lot of the specs that I look for in a guitar and the body shape with the Mystic Pine finish just blew me away. I hope that I get to use it live soon.

Polyeffects Beebo - The Beebo is one of those pedals that I genuinely feel is smarter than I am. It’s like an entire computer in one small touchscreen box. I can’t claim to have mastered using it yet but the sounds that I have managed to get out of it so far have been brilliant. I’m looking forward to spending more time with this box in 2021

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HELM 2020 REVIEW

Let's get the bad stuff out the way first, 2020 was undoubtedly an awful year. I'm still not sure how to really respond to seeing a global pandemic bring the capital to its knees and everything I love and hold dear to a grinding halt. Our government fucked it's response, putting profit before people and killing tens of thousands. The Labour Party descended into farce with the newly elected leader Sir Keith revealing himself as a bland centrist with no opposition or ideas. On a personal level it sucked not being able to travel or see my friends in different parts of the world - or even the same country - who I am starting to miss a lot. However, I was fortunate enough to get through the year with my sanity intact. Music, art and culture once again being my main positive. I think I listened to more music than I have in any year ever. I read more books than I have done since I was a teenager probably. I also re-discovered the joys of walking long distances and am extremely thankful for living near a lot of incredible green spaces: Epping Forest, Walthamstow Wetlands, Walthamstow Marshes, Wanstead Park, Wanstead Flats...

Music. My favourite albums of the year.

Oranssi Pazuzu - Mestarin kynsi Wetware - Flail Raspberry Bulbs - Before The Age Of Mirrors Necrot - Mortal Rope Sect - The Great Flood Private World - Aleph Oneohtrix Point Never - Magic Oneohtrix Point Never Pyrrhon - Abcess Time CS+Kreme - Snoopy Speaker Music - Black Nationalist Sonic Weaponry Drew McDowall - Agalma Regis - Hidden In This Is The Light That You Miss Nazar - Guerilla Zoviet France - Russian Heterodoxical Songs (and all the ZF reissues!!) Triple Negative - God Bless the Death Drive Permission - Organised People Suffer Actress - Karma & Desire Acolytes - Stress II The Gerogerigegege - >(decrescendo) Chubby & The Gang - Speed Kills Flora Yin-Wong - Holy Palm Eiko Ishibashi - Hyakki Yagyo The The - See Without Being Seen Prurient - Casablanca Flamethrower Henning Christiansen - L’essere Umano Errabando La Voce Errabando Subdued - Over The Hills And Far Away Rian Treanor - File Under UK Metaplasm Komare - The Sense Of Hearing Shredded Nerve - Acts Of Betrayal Jesu - Terminus Autechre - SIGN Hey Colossus - Dances / Curses Sparkle Division - To Feel Embraced Mark Harwood - A Perfect Punctual Paradise Under My Own Name Still House Plants - Fast Edit The Bug & Dis Fig - In Blue Kommand - Terrorscape Haus Arafna - Asche Khthoniik Cerviiks - Æequiizoiikum Worm - Gloomlord Kraus - A Golden Brain Faceless Burial - Speciation

A shout-out to Jon Abby's AMPLIFY series on Bandcamp / Facebook, which I contributed a new piece of music to.

A shout out to the labels where most of the music I listened to seemed to come from:

The Trilogy Tapes Iron Bonehead Penultimate Press Dais La Vida Es Un Mus

Gigs. Despite live music being destroyed in 2020 I still saw a few unforgettable performances at the beginning of the year.

Graham Lambkin @ The ICA, London Puce Mary / JFK @ The Glove That Fits, London Demilich @ Finnfest, The Garage, London Container / PC World / National Unrest @ Venue MOT, London S.H.I.T / Asid / Chubby & The Gang @ Static Shock Festival, ExFed, London

Books I enjoyed. Most not published this year, but all read in 2020.

Joe Kennedy - Authentocrats David Balzer - Curationism Tom Mills - BBC: The Myth Of A Public Service Simon Morris - Consumer Guide: Special Edition Luke Turner - Out Of The Woods Various - Bad News For Labour Mike Wendling - Alt-Right Baited Area issues 1 & 2.

Film. Three good films I saw this year which I hadn't before.

Suspiria (Remake) Midsommar Cannibal Holocaust

Podcasts. I listened to a lot of these whilst walking.

We Don't Talk About The Weather Novara Media Tysky Sour & Novara FM Grounded with Louis Theroux System of Systems Red Scare loveline episodes Suite 212 NOISEXTRA Social Discipline CONTAIN

TV.

Didn't watch a huge amount and what I did was mostly trash. For some reason I rewatched both series' of This Life, a British drama from the late 90's about a group of young professionals house sharing and navigating their careers. Very cringey and has aged terribly, but it was perversely fascinating to revisit something from that time in the age of the pandemic. Following on from this I binge watched the entire series of Industry which was entertaining enough. A programme about a bunch of horny bankers with what felt like a confused ideology behind it. It seemed stuck between trying to criticise and glorify the culture around the industry, but also protect the industry itself from outside criticism by portraying anyone who may oppose as an insufferable wanker. Currently halfway through Succession which is OK. The Murdoch documentaries on the BBC were excellent and a rare respite from their descent into client journalism.

Thanks to anyone who listened to my music this year also. Best wishes to you all for 2021.

Luke Younger

http://hhelmm.com | http://alter.bandcamp.com

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Elliott Sharp

composer

1. My Nr. 1 lesson: patience. Whether it's bouncing through 30 seconds of severe turbulence at 39000 feet or slogging through 30 minutes of a interminable piece of concert music, one attribute I've tried to develop is the ability to see past the discrete and awaited ending, the exact framing of the immediate process, but put it into the context of a larger time frame. I've found that this year more than all others has demanded it. Breathing helps...

2. Books: revisiting old favorites from the realm of Thomas Pynchon and Philip K. Dick (both especially relevant), digging into John Lomax's portrait of Jelly Roll Morton, the works of Colson Whitehead, random things off of the shelf…

3. Composing: with touring off the table, I focused on that which needed to be written, some requested and commissioned, some spontaneously springing forth. Composing requires that one open the windows wide to the world, which at this moment brought in grief, terror, uncertainty, anxiety, visions of plague and pestilence and incipient fascism. Okay, now shut the window and get to work! How to process, translate, transform? The work can be a comfortable and obsessive cocoon once one learns to handle the radioactive materials and put them into the creativity reactor.

4. Beans! We have long been a fan in our house of the wide world of legumes but this year brought two stars to the front: the black bean and the red lentil. The black bean commands the lofty peaks but the seemingly infinite variations of dal surround it. Ginger, garlic, turmeric, smoked paprika, cayenne, onions, and olive oil form the basis then imagination builds.

5. Online teaching substituted for my canceled conduction of workshops in the Pyrenees Mountains of France. Between the participants and myself, we built a temporary but very congenial space online to share concepts and music. In addition, private lessons brought conversation and music with new friends in Germany, Italy, California, Australia, Illinois, Denmark, Pennsylvania, Spain, Florida, Brazil.

6. What started out as "stress baking" (before I even had heard of the term) soon became a frequent practice that yielded very edible results. The twins preferred the sweeter forays into banana bread and chocolate cake. I tried to find a balance between tried-and-true techniques and experiments in texture and taste with yeasted pumpernickels, multi-grains, and seed breads.

7. While not the same as performing 'live ', online gigs proved that it was possible to generate a surprising amount of adrenaline even without the pheromonal handshaking of a room filled with receptive ears. As a corollary, online recording collaborations with friends worldwide proved to be inspiring and a suitable substrate for sonic experimentation, exploration of new instruments, tunings, effects programming, structures. In these realms, shout-outs to Helene Breschand, Mike Cooper, Henry Kaiser, Tracie Morris, Mikel Banks, Dougie Bowne, Payton McDonald, Billy Martin, Colin Stetson, Jim O'Rourke, Scott Amendola, Roberto Zorzi, Jason Hoopes, Eric Mingus, Melanie Dyer, Dave Hofstra, Don McKenzie, Sergio Sorrentino, Veniero Rizzardi, Taylor Ho Bynum, Scott Fields, Bachir Attar, Karl Bruckmaier, Robbie Lee, Matthew Evan Taylor, Matteo Liberatore, Al Kaatz, David Barratt, Jessica Hallock, Kolin Zeinikov, Robbie Lee, Jeremy Nesse, James Ilgenfritz, Sergio Armaroli, Steve Piccolo, Sandy Ewen, David Weinstein, Jim Whittemore, Chris Vine, Werner Puntigam, William Schimmel.

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Daniel O’Sullivan

(Grumbling Fur, Guapo, Miasma & the Carousel of Headless Horses, Ulver, Sunn O))), Æthenor, Laniakea, Miracle, Mothlite, and This Is Not This Heat.)

Music Richard Youngs - Ein Klein Nein Alabaster DePlume - Instrumentals Hildegard von Bingen - O Nobilissima Viriditas Francisco de Penalosa - Missa Ave Maria Peregrina Carlo Gesualdo - Responsoria 1611 Dirty Projectors - Five EPs Sonic Boom - All Things Being Equal Brother Peter Broderick - Blackberry Richard Horowitz - Eros Of Arabia Duncan Trussell Family Hour Cocteau Twins in the bath

Books/comics Alexander Tucker - Entity Reunion II Derek Jarman - Chroma Stephen Harrod Buhner - Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal Realm The Penguin Book Of Irish Poetry - edited by Patrick Crotty The Gospel Of Ramakrishna - translated by Swami Nikhilananda Lucretius - De Rerum Natura Plotinus - Enneads Ram Dass - Grist For The Mill Lisa Brown - Phantom Twin

Other Fasting / meditation / macrodosing Walks in freshly coppiced woodland (for the smell mainly). Plants / Foraging / Growing Traditional ferments Douglas Sirk movies Mandolorian Writing songs on the piano Rediscovery of Kenneth Graham via my kids

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Karl O’Connor (Regis)

01.Wolfgang Press - Unremembered, Remembered 02. Klara Lewis - Ingrid Live at Fylkingen 03. Jesu - Terminus 04. Dave Ball - Leeds Poly Demos 1979 05. Edwin Pouncey - Rated Sav X (the Savage Pencil Skratchbook) 06. The Bug - In Blue 07. New Order - Power,Corruption and Lies ( Writing Sessions ) 08. JG Thirlwell and Simon Steensland - Oscillospira 09. FM Einheit and Andreas Ammer - Hammerschlag 10. Thurston Moore - By The Fire 11. Body Stuff - Body Stuff 3 12. Ann M Hogan - Honeysuckle Burials 13. Rob Halford - Confess (Autobiography)

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Caleb Braaten (Sacred Bones Records)

Shirley Collins Hearts Ease Dehd Flowers Of Devotion Duma Duma Bob Dylan Rough and Rowdy Ways Green-House Six Songs for Invisible Gardens John Jeffery Passage Drew McDowall Agalma Sweeping Promises Hunger For a Way Out Colter Wall Western Swing & Waltzes and Other Punchy Songs Woods Strange to Explain

My Favorite 90’s Nostalgia Movie Rewatches

Colors Ghost Dog Menace II Society The Player Rounders Safe Starship Troopers Trees Lounge Vampires Waiting For Guffman

Most Culturally Bankrupt Year : 1997

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Charlie Looker

(composer, Psalm Zero, Extra Life, Seaven Teares)

Ten Things That Didn’t Happen in 2020

1. I didn’t write a ton of new music. Don’t get me wrong, I wrote some. I always do. But mostly I focused on my new YouTube channel, essays, and on getting old recordings released. I haven’t even been working a day-job so I thought I was going to write my next Ring Cycle, but I really didn’t find Covid inspiring.

2. Trump wasn’t re-elected. Cool.

3. I didn’t lose anyone to Covid. I am, of course, profoundly grateful for this. But I feel pretty embarrassed remembering group-texting ten friends in March, “We are all going to see a loved one die. Every single one of us. Don’t kid yourselves”. I can get hysterical, and that was somewhat irresponsible of me.

4. No revolution happened. I don’t mean to be smug or cynical, or to belittle anyone’s participation in the protests. But, as far as I can tell, nothing happened in 2020 that promises to reduce police brutality or human suffering of any kind. We’ll see. That burning Minneapolis police station was exciting to watch at the time, if only on an aesthetic level.

5. I have a stack of unread books I bought this year, just staring at me, with nary a crease among them. These include:

Adorno and Horkheimer, The Dialectic of Enlightenment (looks amazing, but I haven’t touched it) Marx, Grundrisse (it’s 1000 pages for fuck’s sake. Amazon also accidentally sent me two copies, and its double presence in the stack is just comical) Reza Negarestani, Intelligence and Spirit (the first 15 pages blew my mind, then my mind blew it off)

6. I didn’t settle into living in LA. I moved here six months before Covid and I was just starting to cultivate some friendships and play shows. This was quashed and I still feel like I still live in New York. I still barely know the layout of the city here.

7. No brand-new buzzy musical artists burst onto the scene, that I can recall. No new hyped micro-genre of the moment. There was just no way for there to be a hot new trend. I’d say that was refreshing, but it wasn’t.

8. Tyson’s return was not awesome. Two minute rounds, ended in a draw. I’ve been getting way into boxing this past year. This fight was a bummer. I’m looking forward to Mayweather vs Logan Paul (LOL) because we know it’s comedy ahead of time.

9. For three weeks in July, I didn’t do a single thing other than watch street fight compilations on YouTube and Worldstar. That’s just grim.

10. There were no school shootings in March. Apparently, this was the first March with no school shootings since 2002. Not a single 7th grader got a hand job in March either. I cannot begin to imagine what it’s like to be a kid now.

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Chuck Bettis

https://chuckbettis.com

Other People's Music released this year:

Coil "Musick to Play in the Dark" (Dais)

Duma "s/t" (Nyege Nyege Tapes) Twig Harper "External Boundless Prison/ in 4 parts EP" (self-release) I.P.Y. (Ikue Mori, Phew, YoshimiO) "I.P.Y." (Tzadik) Kill Alters "A2B2 Live Stream 11/13/2020" (self-release) Krallice "Mass Cathexis" (self-release) Lust$ickPuppy "Cosmic Brownie" (self-release) Doug McKechnie "San Francisco Moog: 1968-72" (VG+ Records) Merlin Nova "Boo!" (self-release) Omrb "Milandthriust, The Graths of Mersh" (self-release) Akio Suzuki & Aki Onda "gi n ga" (self-release) Yoth Iria "Under His Sway" (Repulsive Echo) Wetware "Flail" (Dais)

My own music released this year:

collaborations

Chatter Blip "Microcosmopolitan" (Contour Editions) Matmos "The Consuming Flame: Open Exercises in Group Form" (Thrill Jockey) Reverse Bullets "Dreampop Dsyphoria" (self-release) Snake Union "live at Roulette" (self-release) Snake Union w/ Hisham Bharoocha, Bonnie Jones, Heejin Jang, Matthew Regula "Three Arrows" (Rat Route) Thomas Dimuzio "Balance" (Gench Music) YoshimiO & Chuck Bettis "Live at the Stone" (Living Myth)

solo Chuck Bettis "Arc of Enlghtenment" (Living Myth) Chuck Bettis "Motion Parallax" (Living Myth)

compilation Various Artist "Polished Turds Vol.1" (Granpa)

Music Books read this year

"Intermediary Spaces" by Eliane Radigue/Julia Eckhardt (Umland) "Ennio Morricone In His Own Words" by Ennio Morricone/Alessandro De Rosa (Oxford University Press) "Free Jazz In Japan: A Personal History" by Soejima Teruto (Public Bath Press) "Rumors of Noizu: Hijokaidan and the Road to 2nd Damascus" by Kato David Hopkins (Public Bath Press)

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Maya Hardinge

(musician / artist)

list of things i liked this year

first ever solo road trip through new mexico and Texas right before lockdown experiencing manhattan with no cars on the road . having a car to escape in to nature. (which i craved so much) walks and bike rides with friends… FRIENDS! The web site ‘workaway’ that helped me feel that there were options for escape. playing games weekly on zoom during lock down teaching yoga weekly on zoom. Witnessing and being part of the BLM protests. witnessing and being part of the demise of T sitting on my couch at 6am drinking a cup of tea, appreciating my apt. making time to meditate. halloween without tourists .

some music I’ve bought and/or enjoyed this year Elvis Perkins-Black Coat Daughter Patricia Kokett -Soi soi Henning Christiansen - OP201 Bryce Hackford- Safe Svitlana Nianio and Oleksander - Snayesh yak? rozkazhy Brannten schnure - Sommer im Pfirsichhain Killing Joke - Nighttime David Shea - Tower of mirrors Shakey - Shakey Woodford halse tapes Coil - Musick to play in the dark

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BJ Nilsen

sound artist / composer

Work 2020

Despite Covid 19 lots of things actually did happen.

In Feburary I visited the only active nuclear plant in The Nederlands as part of my "Expanded Field Recording” project together with SML. In March revisited the Acousmonium at the Elevate Festival in Graz with an additional trip deep inside the Schlossberg recording old mining trains. In March and April I did two daily recording projects “Pending and Auditory Scenes” - both of Amsterdam during lockdown. In May did my first Zoom field recording workshop with the CAMP project. In June & July two research trips in Waldviertel, Austria with Franz Pomassl. In August recorded bells and organs in 10 different churches around Amsterdam for Jacob Lekkerkerker. In September recorded Kali Malone at the Orgelpark in Amsterdam. Performed at Heart of Noise Festival in Innsbruck and A4 in Bratislava. Also went ice-skating for first time in 20? Years. In November and December I travelled to Jeju island to record field recordings for a project by Femke Herregraven for the Gwangju Biennale, commissioned for 2021. Did lots of gardening, released two tapes “Call it Philips, Eindoven” and “Zomer 2020” with Sigtryggur Berg Sigmarsson. NOW! Looking forward to 2021.

http://bjnilsen.info https://soundcloud.com/bjnilsen/sets/auditory-scenes-amsterdam

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Vicki Bennett

(People Like Us)

Negativland - True False https://negativland.com/products/truefalse-cd (this came out last year but is so THIS year) Bob Dylan - Rough and Rowdy Ways https://www.bobdylan.com/albums/rough-and-rowdy-ways/ The Soft Pink Truth - We from Shall We Go On Sinning So That Grace May Increase https://thesoftpinktruth.bandcamp.com/album/shall-we-go-on-sinning-so-that-grace-may-increase Carl Stone - Stolen Car https://unseenworlds.bandcamp.com/album/stolen-car Porest - Sedimental Gurney https://porest.bandcamp.com/album/sedimental-gurney Matmos - The Consuming Flame: Open Exercises in Group Form https://matmos.bandcamp.com/album/the-consuming-flame-open-exercises-in-group-form Domenique Dumont - Miniatures De Auto Rhythm https://antinoterecordings.bandcamp.com/album/atn044-domenique-dumont-miniatures-de-auto-rhythm The The - See Without Being Seen https://www.thethe.com/product/see-without-being-seen-cd/ Ciggy de la Noche - Hold Tight HMRC https://soundcloud.com/ciggydelanoche/hold-tight-hmrc Neil Cicierega - Mouth Dreams http://www.neilcic.com/mouthdreams/

and my details: http://peoplelikeus.org/ https://peoplelikeus-vickibennett.bandcamp.com/ pic: http://peoplelikeus.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Welcome-Abroad-promo3-2-scaled.jpg

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DJ Food

Music - Type 303 - Sticky Disco / Analogue Acidbath 7" (45 Live) The British Space Group - The Ley of the Land CD (Wyrd Britain) Squarepusher - Be Up A Hello LP / Warp 10 NTS mix (Warp) dgoHn - Undesignated Proximate (Modern Love) LF58 - Alterazione LP (Astral Industries) Robert Fripp - Music For Quiet Moments series (DGM) Run The Jewels - RTJ4 (BMG) Simf Onyx - Magenta Skyline / The Unresolved 7" (Delights) Luke Vibert - Modern Rave LP (Hypercolour) JG Thirlwell & Simon Steensland - Oscillospira (Ipecac) Aural Design - Looking & Seeing 7" / DL (Russian Library) Luke Vibert - Rave Hop (Hypercolour) Clipping. with Christopher Fleeger - Double Live (Sub Pop) APAT - Terry Riley's 'In C' performed on Modular Synthesizer (YouTube) Field Lines Cartographer - The Spectral Isle LP (Castles In Space) Jane Weaver - The Revolution of Super Visions single (Fire Records) King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - K.G. LP (Flightless) Humanoid - Hed-Set - forthcoming on (De:tuned)

Film / TV - Inside No.9 (BBC) What We Do In The Shadows Season 2 (Netflix) Tales From The Loop (Amazon) Keith Haring - Street Art Boy (BBC) John Was Trying To Contact Aliens (Netflix) The Social Dilemma (Netflix) The Mandalorian (Season 2) (Disney+) Long Hot Summers - The Style Council documentary (Sky Arts) Zappa (Alex Winter)

Books / Comics / Magazines Confessions of a Bookseller - Shaun Bythell (Profile books) The Often Wrong - Farel Dalrymple (Image Comics) Edwin Pouncey - Rated SavX (Strange Attractor Press) Jeffrey Lewis - Fuff (all issues - really late to the party on this one) Rian Hughes - XX - A Novel, Graphic (Picador) Cosey Fanni Tutti - Art, Sex, Music (Faber) Caza - Kris Kool (Passenger Press) Dan Lish - Egostrip Vol.1 Electronic Sound magazine Decorum - Jonathan Hickman & Mike Huddleston (Image) John Higgs - Stranger Than We Can Imagine Simon Halfon - Cover To Cover (Nemperor)

Very few exhibitions or shows this year for obvious reasons

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34 notes · View notes

odinsblog · 5 years ago

Text

The next time you hear an MSNBC or CNN pundit talking about Bernie’s wealth and his three homes, please try to remember a couple of things:

Having a net worth of approximately $3 million, Bernie Sanders is one of the least wealthy Senators in Washington. He makes $174,000 a year from his salary as a lawmaker. Sanders didn’t go to D.C. to get rich, and quite frankly, it shows. Bernie might be richer than you and me, but compared to cable news pundits and his centrist detractors, he’s a pauper. And(!) he wants a wealth tax, to raise taxes so that people in his income bracket & above are taxed at a fairer rate, so that they FINALLY pay their fair share.

Also, about Bernie’s third home:

TruthOrFiction.com and Snopes.com point out that Sanders' wife, Jane O'Meara Sanders, said in that the couple was able to buy the home because they'd sold a property in Maine that her family had held since the early 1900s. She said that she had inherited the vacation home after her parents died, but the family was unable to use it because it was too far from their primary residence in Vermont, so she sold it and also used the proceeds with partial withdrawal from her retirement savings, to finance the purchase of a more suitable vacation home. (source)

Now that that’s cleared up .... let’s consider just two of the pundits who frequently try to call out Sanders:

JOY ANN REID earns half of Bernie’s entire net worth, every year. And her net worth is more than Bernie’s.

And Chris Matthews is far, far wealthier than Bernie Sanders. Matthews was a part of Washington D.C.’s infamous revolving door, where people with political connections leave the government and then cash in to get rich quick.

And that’s just two examples.

So the next time a pundit tries to paint Sanders as some kind of rich bourgeois, please google their net worth and their annual salary. And then double check that check your purse (or wallet) is still there.

Look, nobody begrudges most millionaires. It’s greedy, tax evading, multi-national corporations, it’s billionaires and multi-billionaires we have serious problems with. So if average people were paid living wages, had Medicare for All, had access to a free college education, had universal daycare, and if there was no climate emergency, and if all college debt was cancelled, and if the rich were paying their share and taxed at a fair rate .... well maybe then people wouldn’t be so mad at the ridiculously ultra rich.

I’m reminded of an old saying. Maybe I can tweak it just a little so that it fits MSNBC: “Millionaires paid by billionaires, to persuade voters that Bernie Sanders is the cause of all the problems in world.”

#msnbc #joy ann reid #joy reid #chris matthews #bernie sanders #media bias #politics #false media narratives #msnbc is a joke

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tessatechaitea · 5 years ago

Text

Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child

Darkseid pees out of his eyes.

"It's 2020 and Frank Miller is still doing 'Not' jokes" is the only review of this comic book you probably need.

The Joker and Darkseid are cumming in their pants over the engagement in the election cycle. I guess people who want to stop terrible politicians from making the country a living hell for a vast number of the population are simply falling into their trap! Stupid people who want a better world! Can't they see that the only way to defeat The Joker and Darkseid is to disengage from the circus of election cycles and simply live their own life without any concern for others? Doesn't the electorate know the best life to live is the life that leads to Ayn Randian defenses of their own selfish needs? Just shut up and take what they give you, you dumb fucks. I should probably finish reading this story before I continue to jump from conclusion to conclusion about Frank Miller's point. His ultimate point might simply be that the children will save us all! Or that it doesn't matter if the children change the world or not because the adults will all be dead by then so who fucking cares? Supergirl Lara confronts Darkseid by blasting him with her heat vision. He dies multiple times or something but doesn't somehow. He applauds her rage the way bad guys always do and then calmly sits down to tell all of the children a story. He's going to be sensible and rational which means it will be the truth, I think. Obviously if you have any emotional attachment to your beliefs, they're garbage beliefs. Until you can squeeze all of the humanity out of yourself, the things you believe won't hold up in rational debate! So divest yourself of your rage, children! It will only make you more logical and intellectually stronger! But also divest yourself of your joy and your despair and your other emotions I can't think of! There must be more, right? While Darkseid is distracted regaling everybody with his tale of the anti-life equation, Superboy sneaks up behind him and takes over his Omega Effect. He turns it back on Darkseid and Darkseid disintegrates into non-existence. Unless he was transported back in time. I don't really know how his eyeball lasers work. Darkseid doesn't stay dead for long. He returns as the Omega God, as the end of everything, as the final death of everything on Earth.

But maybe later, I guess?

Batwoman beats up some Jokers and shuts down Trump's ability to broadcast to Gotham. It makes Darkseid angry enough to return for some reason. Probably a metaphorical reason. Or an analogical reason. I think maybe my attention span is seriously slipping! And right when I'm getting to the part that's probably going to explain what the fuck is going on in this comic book. Superboy destroys Darkseid by calling him an old fart. Also maybe a little bit by blasting him with a new super power: neutron vision! Darkseid has now had his powers stripped so far back that a human bouncing a rock off of his head makes him bleed. But still he thinks, "I will manipulate these fools with my lofty words!" But then Greta Thunberg clenches her fist at him and Batwoman says, "You have no power here! We're thinking for ourselves now!" And then that's the end somehow. Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child Rating: I can't comprehend what I just read. Maybe the point was that we shouldn't comprehend what other people want us to comprehend? Maybe it was an anti-propaganda story? Maybe it was just terrible writing pretending to be art? It's so hard to tell because it's trying so hard to be complex! Is it's complexity real or a facade? I can't tell! Maybe I should stick to easier things to understand, like James Joyce's Finnegans Wake or Alan Moore's 1300 page novel, Jerusalem, which I finished. Maybe that's Frank Miller's problem. Maybe he just didn't have enough pages to really get to the point he was trying to make. But then if he did have more pages, how many would he waste by simply repeating the same things over and over again? For those of you who haven't read this (or Superman: Year One), he does that a lot. Not in the good way that Tom King and Gertrude Stein repeat themselves. Just in a way that makes you think, "I got it! Superboy is right in Darkseid's brain." Maybe that's a poor example from this comic book because repeating that over and over works to show how painful Superboy's presence in Darkseid's brain is. But I assure you there were many other examples that I can't make excuses for. I just can't be bothered to dig back through the comic book to find them.

#Dark Knight Returns #The Golden Child #Frank Miller #Rafael Grampa

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thesinglesjukebox · 5 years ago

Video

youtube

THE 1975 - PEOPLE

[5.56]

The 1975 you know is gone! THEY'RE HARDCORE NOW!!!

Alex Clifton: As far as the lyrics & delivery go: a truly punk song, a well-needed wakeup call, and Healey's screaming is how I have felt literally every day for the last four years, which I deeply appreciate. As an actual single: I can listen to this maybe once a month because it's super dissonant and honestly does not help with my constant anxiety that the world will end shortly. [5]

Kylo Nocom: Rightfully devastated punk that would probably sound a lot better if it didn't just seem like yet another damned attempt by the 1975 at appeasing the indie crowd through art-y posturing. Really, throw shit at their debut all you want, they knew exactly what they wanted to do and did all of it with near-perfect pop sheen. Their obsession with their own legacy has led to their musical downfall, and now we have to listen to them condescend and uphold it as somehow significant, as if there aren't artists with significantly more to say than Matty Healy that don't have the resources to have their voices heard. Eclecticism does not equal talent; Healy's inanities will not save us. [3]

Alfred Soto: "Syndrums? What syndrums?" Blustering through a rawk number showing little sweat, The 1975 write a Marilyn Manson take on "Love It If We Made It." It likely portends nothing except increased facility. [5]

Ryo Miyauchi: "People" as just the music is something I can't resist. Matty strutting to the beat of loud ass rock riffs with the tones bleeding from the seams? The guy singing like a snot-nosed know-it-all jerk in love with the spotlight, audibly kissing the camera? He may not be good at screaming as much as he think he does, but him simply giving himself to the moment sounds good enough. But if he also hopes to say something, and for me to feel like he actually did, well, this isn't exactly it. I've long understood that Matty lives in the same fucked-up world as me -- that's what "Love It If We Made It" made sure to do after all -- but I'm honestly exhausted from songs that's reportage and not much else. I can see the world burn down from my own eyes too! If Matty, or whoever else in pop, wants to say something, I need them to expand upon that blank between "republic's a banana, ignore if you wanna" and "fuck it, I'm just gonna get food, girls, gear." Ignoring is easy, I know, but that self-care via self-indulgence can't do much to help anymore. What exists beyond it when it's no longer the go-to step? Matty doesn't have the answer for that here. [6]

Maxwell Cavaseno: The only man who apparently decided that The (International) Noise Conspiracy was just what the world needed, long after even the actual T(I)NC was dissolved, would naturally be Matty Healy. Plenty of 'people' have misattributed this song to sounding like Marilyn Manson's "Beautiful People" which is an association I just simply don't hear at all. Instead I get a lot more of Manic Street Preachers, The Hives, The Blood Brothers, T(I)NC and even their frontman's prior band Refused's last moments. When the soon to be released 1975 album was discussed even in the build for last year's listless and dissatisfying A Brief Inquiry... constant invocations of the band's past as a journeyman post-hardcore act that probably would've died a death in the lower-tier nostalgia bin alongside earthtone9, Devil Sold His Soul, SikTH, Rinoa or The Ocean Fracture. The fodder of so many long gone myspace pages and collections of patches. Now it feels that era is being discussed with a genuine affectionate nostalgia again; and if there's anything this band loves to key in on, it's genre nostalgia. Do they land it? Maybeish. Straight Ahead Rock has admittedly felt less capable in The 1975's hands unless filtered into Glastonbury Festival Anthems a la "Robbers", so hearing them try to defiantly thrash while remaining groovy is either endearing or slight. Still, I admittedly can't think of a 1975 album yet where the key single was the leading one, so for now it feels just like a proposition of yet another shape-shifting going down. [6]

Oliver Maier: Post-hardcore with traces of 13-era Blur could have been the key to finally converting me to the church of the 1975, but this still isn't doing it for me. I don't doubt that Matty Healy is concerned about *vague hand gesture* the state of things, but for a band so aware that sincerity is indeed scary, I always feel as though their ventures into new sonic territory are the product of a desire to impress rather than earnestly communicate, that they might dip their toes into afrobeats or flirt with trap drums only because people don't expect them to. Which isn't a crime! But the punk signifiers here feel like just that: signifiers, gesturing at a genre that's all about urgency in an attempt to reverse-engineer that same quality, but capturing none of its essential recklessness. I prefer the unhinged vocal here to Healy's usual crooning, but paired with lyrics that modulate between the generic, the outright dreadful and the word "fuck" a whole bunch, it's just not enough to dispel the impression of a calculated facsimile of protest music. I could see myself softening on this if the rest of Notes on a Conditional Form sticks to the same sound, which might suggest some real commitment rather than the sense that the 1975 are still just trying on new masks and expecting an A for effort. But I'm not holding my breath. [4]

Rachel Bowles: I was lucky enough to hear this song for the first time live and witness the crowd erupt with infectious anger and joy- somehow knowing every single word of this days old song. There was something truly palpable, political and vital there, Healy has told the press he's never felt more like he's in a punk band and experiencing 'People' live, it's not hard to hear why. At the time I described it as "a Marilyn Manson meets Glassjaw-esque punk screed with enough F-bombs to satisfy even the most discerning teenage contrarian... an anthem that screams with the rage of billions of millennial and Gen Z 99 percenters, powerlessly watching the world burn (literally) as Donald Trump and Boris Johnson pat themselves on the back."Had I not clearly seen Healy & co in front of me, I would never have pegged 'People' as a 1975 song- this new venture into raw punk, however impressive, is just another string in the bow of band that is constantly reinventing themselves. [8]

Joshua Copperman: Let's unpack the worst line in "People"! Part 1: "My generation wanna fuck Barack Obama": A decade ago this might have been a reference to "Crush on Obama," but now any given Gen Z socialist will tell you that Obama wasn't progressive enough, that he was a neoliberal centrist, etc etc. So it's more like fuck Barack Obama. Double meanings! Part 2: "living in a sauna": Could be a climate change reference, but with the next line it's more likely to be a hotbox joke. More double meanings! Except the idea that Earth is itself a hotbox is both funnier and more evocative. Part 3: "Legal marijuana": Both a long-delayed Halsey comeback for that one line in "Colors" and a catalyst for even more double meanings! there's the aforementioned hotbox joke, or it's the ever-ubiquitous "using drugs to numb the pain" thing. Conclusion: This line both says a lot of things and says absolutely nothing, which is what anyone who hates this song will think it does. Oh right, there's a song attached. And it's fantastic. The mix of a gritty aesthetic with bright, clean guitar tones. The ability to make a tuneless song sound as catchy as "Chocolate" but inexplicably less anoying. This is everything I've wanted the 1975 to do, or anyone to do when everything in all genres sounds so listless and geared towards Playlists. Even Idles pandered with the whole 'ten points to Griffyndor' thing. The 1975 is virtually only pandering to emo kids with this one. And edgelords, hopefully putting them on a path to salvation instead of hatred. Or not. Whoever it's for, I'm glad it exists. [9]

Edward Okulicz: Honestly, I know that throwing reductionist comments at male pop stars stepping outside their apparent lane isn't a curative against how such things have been levelled at women over the years, but my initial, and second, and third, and fourth reaction to this song is "omg Matty Healy just shut up and be a pop star, you know, something you're really good at." I'll be over here in sensitivity training if you need me. [4]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

#The 1975 #rock #pop #music #music review #writing

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jewishconvertthings · 7 years ago

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I’m confused about the different branches of Judaism, and why there’s so much “friction” between them. Could you please clarify?

Hi anon,

So this is a huge question and a rather fraught one at that, which is why I’ve been putting off answering it tbqh. But basically, the main differences between the branches are how they view Torah, which consequently defines their practice of Judaism. Branches that view Torah as being the revealed Word of Hashem are going to be a lot stricter in their interpretations and practice than groups that view the Torah as divinely inspired but human-made or entirely written and conceived of by people.

I’m gonna try to go into a bit more detail than that, but keep in mind that this is pretty limited by my experience, which is American and Ashkenazi.

Okay, so divisions within Judaism are interesting, because you’ve got the minhag (tradition) groups: Sephardic, Ashkenazi, and Mizrahi, and then you’ve got several branches within the Ashkenazi tradition (but I don’t think that’s true for the other minhagim – if it is, I am unfamiliar with them and someone who actually knows should correct me). (You’ve also got Karaite Judaism, which is really different because it’s not rabbinic Judaism, meaning they don’t recognize the Talmud even though they are Torah observant.) However, your country also matters; Reform in the United States is different than Reform in Canada and the UK, for example.

The big four movements in American Ashkenazi Judaism are Reform, Orthodox, Conservative, and Reconstructionist. However, there are other, smaller ones as well, such as Humanistic, Renewal, and Traditional. (I’m probably missing some, but those are the less-mainstream ones I’m familiar with.) Within orthodoxy, you’ve got several different groups, the main ones being Hasidic, Modern, and Haredi. (There are further subdivisions of orthodoxy, but I’m out of my depth when it comes to the specifics. If any orthodox folks want to explain this please be my guest!)

Now, as to the stickier subject – this “friction” you mention.

So one major divide is between the so-called “liberal” and “traditional” branches – namely, between Orthodoxy and the other three major movements. (I say so-called because there are plenty of liberal Jews with a deep reverence for Jewish tradition and many traditional Jews with liberal politics.) This divide is caused by differing attitudes towards halacha – orthodoxy views it as strictly binding, whereas the liberal branches view it as more fluid to varying extents.

Within liberal Judaism, the main friction between Reform and Conservative is that Reform Jews view the law (halacha) as non-binding and open to individual interpretation, whereas Conservative Jews view it as binding(ish). Just exactly how binding seems to vary based on the congregation – a self-identified “conservadox” congregation is going to take a lot stricter definition of “binding” than a Conservative congregation that is basically Reform save for preserving the traditional service structure and more of the Hebrew. Reconstructionism, for its part, seems to have separated from both Reform and Conservative because it liked the preservation of tradition of Conservative Judaism, but for cultural reasons, as it took a similar theological view to Reform. (Any Reconstructionists, please correct me if this is wrong.)

Now, to truly understand these differences, you have to look at the history of how these movements came about. The Reform movement was a product of the Enlightenment and a desire to both integrate/assimilate into modernity. Orthodoxy, as a separate movement, came to be labeled as such as a response to the rise of Reform Judaism. (Prior to the existence of the Reform movement, orthodoxy was just sort of the default, with varying degrees and styles of observance between communities and individuals.) In the wake of this split, the Conservative movement formed as a somewhat centrist position – its adherents understood and approved of the Reform movement’s desire to integrate into society/modernity and have a progressive politic, but believed that Reform took its changes too far and dropped too many of the traditional elements of Judaism.

While the current Reform movement has reembraced many of these elements, such as using more traditional Hebrew prayers, encouraging the wearing of kippot and tallit, keeping some elements of kashrut, etc. it still maintains that it is up to the individual Jew to decide what traditional elements bring them joy, spiritual depth, and draws them closer to Hashem. Ergo, Reform Judaism’s relationship to halacha is primarily rooted in meaningfulness – the line in the sand is drawn by each person based on what is meaningful to him or her.

Conservative Judaism seems to utilize a much more traditional means of analyzing halacha, yet does so much more liberally than orthodoxy and also includes non-traditional methods, such as examining the historical context and modern scholarship. It also seems that Conservative Judaism gives weight to, but does not consider strictly binding, the idea that our knowledge and ability to interpret the law goes down over time. That is, within orthodoxy, there is this idea that the sages of the Talmud and subsequent halachic authorities had a much firmer grip on what was actually taught by the Oral Law, and thus we are bound by their precedent. Ergo, if in 2017, our modern scholars say we shouldn’t hold onto the ruling that kitniyot is forbidden during Pesach, in the Conservative movement this would fly – orthodoxy, not so much.

Which is not to say that in orthodoxy there is no change – there are changes, but they are decided (so far as I can tell) for the most part on new situations, using the full existing body of halachic literature as binding precedent. As for changes to existing precedent? I have no idea how those decisions get made, but generally speaking, it seems like this is typically avoided.

(Admittedly, I’m still trying to wrap my head around exactly how and why halachic lines get drawn according to all movements that hold the law even somewhat binding, so this is just my student’s understanding of it.)

Now, unfortunately, a lot of this friction comes to a head with regards to conversion and converts from different movements. A big part of this is related to the recognition of who’s a real rabbi, and thus who can conduct valid conversions. However, the requirements for conversion into the different branches differ as well, which is why the liberal movements are not recognized by Orthodox movements, who view these conversions as not in conformity with halacha.

All that said, while there is unfortunately plenty of in-fighting, there is also in my experience, a great deal of collaboration and cooperation in practice between shuls within the same community. I was recently talking to a self-identified orthodox rabbi (despite his not working for an explicitly orthodox shul) who explained he and his fellow rabbis from other movements had enough rapport with each other that they would happily refer prospective congregants and/or conversion students to each other, should they feel that those individuals would be a better fit elsewhere.

I have also been to plenty of events put on by multiple congregations from different branches, and know people who go to services at more than one shul of different branches. I, myself, typically go to both the Reform and Conservative services my congregation runs, and I’m far from the only one. When I relocate, it’s quite possible that I’ll end up bouncing back and forth between a very politically liberal but still MO congregation and a Conservative congregation that is closer to where I live.

I hope that gives you a better idea of what’s going on with this, and as always, if people want to fact-check me or correct anything I’ve said, please do – I wouldn’t want to misrepresent any particular view.

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thecounterplan · 4 years ago

Text

Chomsky, Bad Faith, and Voting for Ground

by Brice Ezell

Linguist, philosopher, and left-wing activist Noam Chomsky recently appeared on the new podcast Bad Faith, hosted by Briahna Joy Gray, the former National Press Secretary for the Bernie Sanders campaign, and Virgil Texas, one of the co-hosts of the popular comedy podcast Chapo Trap House. The subject of the interview, as framed by Gray and Texas, is the “vote Blue no matter who” line that is peddled to the left in basically every presidential election of my short voting lifetime. As this saying has it, while the Democratic party may not be as left-wing as lefties writ large would like it to be, the GOP poses an active existential threat to life in the country, so it is to the advantage of left-wing individuals to vote for the Democratic candidate, even if the candidate’s left bonafides are wanting or absent. Vote for a candidate you can work with to some degree, instead of -- by voting third party or not at all -- aiding the candidate diametrically opposed to left-wing views.

Gray, who led the interview, argues to Chomsky that “vote Blue no matter who” results in a perpetual bar-lowering for Democratic nominees, and has resulted in the party moving significantly more to the right over the past few decades. She wonders how the Democrats could ever promise progress if the only metric they need to satisfy in order to garner left-wing votes is “not being a Republican.” By using that reasoning, Gray posits, if George W. Bush or Ronald Reagan were up against Trump, it would be incumbent on left-wing voters to cast their ballots in favor of a conservative, simply on the grounds that they “aren’t as bad as Trump.” (I question if, on the long view, Reagan and Bush are actually “not as bad” as Trump, being that their presidencies set up the, respectively, economic and national security infrastructures that Trump has just exploited as much as possible. But that is a conversation for another day.) If voting is an important way for an individual’s voice to be heard, and voting represents one place in which blocs of individuals can negotiate for promises from a candidate on the basis of their vote, then for Gray and Texas it is foolish to give in to “vote Blue no matter who” reasoning, since it kneecaps one of the only ways a relatively small left-wing movement in the United States can gain leverage with the Democratic establishment.

Chomsky concedes that Biden is no left-wing dream candidate, and he acknowledges that Biden’s policies don’t go nearly far enough in addressing major concerns like climate change. However, he argues, the long-term issues with moving the Democratic party to the left are “not the questions that arise” on November 3rd, election day 2020. For Chomsky, the question is simple: does the left want to stop Trump from holding office, given how clearly monstrous his administration is, or will it do nothing, which by extension means potentially aiding Trump in regaining office? If the left can get Trump out of the White House, then it can continue the long process of activist work to get the Democrats to start advocating for policies like the Green New Deal. Chomsky criticizes what he calls “the establishment view” of voting, in which the most important political action individuals take occurs every four years at the ballot box. He claims that this establishment view undergirds Gray and Texas’ claims about leveraging the left vote for concessions from the Democratic party; that process, for him, occurs in an ongoing process in between elections, not simply at the polls. Voting for Biden, per Chomsky’s argument, is a simple, small decision that should take about “10 minutes to make,” but is ultimately just a quick pulling of a lever that requires further activism after the fact.

Listening to this conversation, I found Chomsky’s argument to be the more compelling of the two, though he is glib in calling a vote for Biden a “10 minute action,” given all the voter suppression going on in the United States. But it’s not because Gray and Texas are wrong; in fact, they’re quite right in most respects. So long as the Democrats are content to be “the party of ‘Not Republicans,’” nothing stops them from drifting to the right, or even from just remaining a center-right party rather than a proper left-wing challenge party to the GOP. Moreover, their arguments do hold in the case of the Democratic primary, where voters are presented with progressive candidates that contrast with centrist figures like Biden. During this year’s Democratic primary, “vote Blue no matter who” was trotted out as a line against Bernie Sanders while he was a leading candidate in the race, which only goes to prove Gray and Texas’ diagnosis of the Democratic party as hostile to progressive change. However, in the general election, where the only real choice is the Republican or the Democrat, things change. In listening to the Bad Faith interview, there are three things I felt needed to be clarified further to illustrate a broader point that Chomsky hammered on consistently throughout the interview, a point with which Gray and Texas never really dealt. I’ll lay out each of these three points in turn.

(1) The Relationship Between Voting and Democrats’ Move to the Right: Gray at one point in the interview refers to “Third Way” triangulation, a political strategy beget by the Clinton administration to create a “third way” in between the then-standard Republican and Democratic orthodoxies, a move replicated by New Labour following Margaret Thatcher’s premiership in the United Kingdom. This is a key moment in the Democratic party’s move to the right, but it is worth acknowledging the how of the rightward move. If you accept Gray and Texas’ argument, it seems as if the “vote Blue no matter who” strategy is the result of what occurs during elections, and is therefore something that could be repudiated at the ballot box.

The problem with this argument is that it is not obviously true, and more likely false. As has been documented in numerous studies (here’s one), individual voters and even large interests groups have essentially no effect on policy. Decisions about policy happen at a national level at far remove from individual citizens’ expressions of preference via voting; large corporations and lobbying groups are the ones who actually get to have their fingerprints on legislation. Poll after poll shows that, for example, there exists significant support among the American public for the Green New Deal and universal healthcare of some kind. As Gray rightly notes in the interview, it would actually be an electoral boon for Biden to announce his support for these policies. And yet he won’t: he’s offered some climate legislation, much better than his Democratic predecessors’ legislation if you believe Chomsky, but won’t back the Green New Deal in full, and he’s openly repudiated Medicare for All, as of now the major government-sponsored healthcare proposal advanced by left-wing Democrats. (And yet, ironically enough, the terminally moderate Biden is being pilloried by right-wing media as a trojan horse for a cabal of left-wing radicals, even though the last candidate Biden defeated in the Democratic party -- a feat which he bragged about in the first presidential debate -- was Sanders, a Democratic Socialist.) The fact that Biden isn’t backing left-wing agenda items despite their popularity tells us something: namely, that while Biden has to care about the vote to some extent, he is not ultimately beholden to the voters first and foremost, and should the Democrats inch more to the right on policy, it won’t be because of any inputs they received from the votes in the 2020 election.

This fact bears itself out in a good observation of Gray’s, when she questions Chomsky’s assertion that what’s needed to move the Democrats to the left is sustained activism that transcends election cycles. She points out that right now, activism and protest have reached a fever pitch in 2020, particularly with the intensity of the Black Lives Matter movement’s calls for racial justice and calls for police accountability following numerous acts of police murder and brutality in recent years. Yet Biden, Gray notes, does not seem that interested in seriously curbing police overreach, and has in fact argued for more police funding in some cases. Biden occupies a uniquely vulnerable position at the moment, given that he needs as many votes as possible to beat Trump, and so if he won’t accede to basic requests of activists and protestors (say, reduced funding for police, if not outright defunding) when they are in their most publicly powerful moment, then for Gray and Texas there’s no reason to trust that Biden will acquiesce to any activism once elected.

This is a legitimate worry, but its very legitimacy also undermines Gray and Texas’ argument about the strategic value of threatening to withhold left votes as a bloc if Biden won’t play ball on basic left issues like universal health care. If Biden won’t listen to the general public in a heightened time of activism, when he desperately needs to ensure that his margin of victory over Trump is as wide as possible, we have no reason to believe that he will take seriously even a significant left voting bloc’s threats of vote withholding. (This holds particularly true when one factors the Electoral College into things: if these left blocs feature large amounts of Californians and New Yorkers, for example, Biden has no reason to worry for he will safely win both states.) So while Gray and Texas are correct to lament the Democrats’ rightward drift, it’s not clear to me how voting factors into that shift or could possibly correct that shift. Far more likely, it will do neither.

(2) The Decisionmaking Calculus of the Democrats Based on Voting: Let’s take Gray and Texas’ strategy and run with it in its best-case iteration. The left is able to amass a significant number of voters, an amount that the national Democratic party cannot ignore, who collectively stipulate a list of demands that the Democratic nominee must meet. Should the candidate fail to do so, they will lose the votes of everyone in the left bloc.

First, I presume based on comments that Gray and Texas made in their interview with Chomsky that this is not purely a principled matter; i.e. they would be withholding their votes for strategic political reasons, not simply because “one always must vote for someone perfectly consistent with their principles.” I have seen Gray and Texas dismissed as “Bernie dead-enders,” which seems inaccurate because, as has been widely stated by many left commentators, Bernie himself was a compromise candidate, and only seemed radically left because the US’ two major parties are two different flavors of right-wing. (Bernie, for instance, was widely criticized by the left for arguing, as Biden did, that the police could use more funds for “better training” to prevent instances of police brutality.) If Gray and Texas were making the withholding votes argument purely as a principled matter, I would reject it on the grounds of what the two of them constantly stress to Chomsky: the material needs of ordinary people. A purely principled vote elides such concerns, treating political action as having the right orthodoxy rather than genuine praxis.

So, supposing that this vote withholding is a strategic interest, one to ensure that the left has a seat at the table, we must consider the two possible outcome of the election if the Democrat fails to earn the vote of the left bloc:

Result #1: The Democrat wins.

Outcome for the Left: Having won without the left voting bloc, the Democrat can now feel free to disregard the left entirely, since it secured the victory without needing the left’s votes. This marginalizes the left’s ability to affect change in the party after the election, since the left can now be dismissed out of hand as a statistically insignificant amount of voters that only represent “fringe” interests.

Result #2: The Democrat loses.

Outcome for the Left: “Ralph Nader!” “Jill Stein!” Despite the fact that many of the supposed third-party “spoilers” actually aren’t, the Democrats have never once shown any contrition when they lose close elections, particularly 2016′s, which should have been a layup. Though a more level-headed and sensible party would seek to form coalitions with groups like the left, who are also opposed to the GOP, one can also understand why a political party might be confrontational with a voting group that it believes cost it an election. I think the Democrats are wrong-headed in how they treat the left and third parties, but the point remains: nothing about the party’s history indicates that it is willing to parlay with the left in the event of a close election loss, and banking on that possibility is nothing more than pure idealism.

In neither of these outcomes does the left gain any political or material benefit. Both results end up undermining any good will, however small, the left could hope to cull with the Democratic establishment. “Now,” the Grays and Texases of the world might say, “What reason would the Democrats have to work with the left if they DO win with our bloc of votes? Couldn’t they just ignore the left once they’ve successfully won our votes?”

Well, yes, the Democrats could well do that. As previously established, the party has got on pretty well ignoring the popularity of policies that it should be supporting but, for reasons owing to its material interests in the corporate sector, it refuses to act on. But in terms of outcomes, it is better to be in a position where, as the left, you can credibly claim that you helped the Democrats win the last election; it’s a much stronger bargaining chip than if the left withheld its votes, at which point the Democrats can just say, “Well, we didn’t need you anyways.”

There’s no real “ideal” negotiating strategy for the left in the American government right now. The country is designed at every level to squelch mass action, and there just aren’t enough progressives in government to counteract the moneyed forces in both the Democratic and the Republican parties. When it comes to maximizing the incentives for the Democrats to work with the left, activists can really only hope for marginal gains, but I don’t see how withholding votes improves the left’s standing with the Democrats at all.

(3) Voting for Ground, not for Results: This is a point Chomsky repeatedly stated throughout the interview, but he did so in a vague way that I feel needs more refinement. When Gray raised concerns about the “vote Blue no matter who” doctrine, the disaffection that marginalized voters feel when the Democrats fail to materially support them, and the lack of accountability the DNC has to the left, Chomsky replied with a version of this refrain: “On November 3rd, those questions do not arise. The question we face on election day is: are we going to try to stop one of the worst presidents in American history get back into office, or will we help him?”

For Gray and Texas, those questions about the Democrats’ relationship to the left are relevant to the election, for all of the strategic ideas about bloc vote withholding I’ve already mentioned. But in Chomsky’s eyes, this thinking capitulates to “the establishment view,” in that it puts undue weight on the act of voting as the culmination of an individual’s political actions. In reality, as he has said elsewhere, all one can hope for is “harm reduction”: which vote will bring the least amount of harm into the world? On that view, a vote for Biden clearly represents the least amount of harm.

Gray’s frustration with Chomsky’s repetition of the line “those questions do not arise” in the interview is understandable. In a healthy social democracy that actually grants its citizens a meaningful franchise, those questions would arise in the election. If a general public was feeling that the country needed big, Medicare for All/Green New Deal-sized reforms, voters should be able to make that a pressure point for a candidate. But Chomsky is correct, if imprecise, in saying that the specific choice faced by Americans on November 3, 2020, is simply about Trump remaining in office or not. I want to clarify his point by articulating how I frame voting in all elections, given the structures of the US government and its electoral system, not simply just the Biden v. Trump election this fall.

When an individual votes in America, they vote for ground. That is to say, they do not vote for an individual who promises to do X, Y, and Z things, after which they can expect that individual go to to Washington and make those things happen. Voting should be thought of not at the level of the agent, i.e. the politician specifically, but rather the ground created by that politician being in office as opposed to their opponent, with “ground” here meaning the conditions for political action and negotiation that come about as a result of that candidate and their party gaining office. There are simply too many moving parts, too many checks and balances, to treat a candidate and a party as a discrete set of variables that can be predictably linked with a set of policy results that could come about if they are elected. To see the agent/ground distinction, here’s roughly how I see Gray’s and Texas’ position (agent) in contrast to Chomsky’s (ground):

The Agent View: As a leftist, I will not vote for Joe Biden unless he advocates for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and the elimination of the concentration camps at the US/Mexico border. He need to commit to doing those things in order to earn my vote.

The Ground View: As a leftist, I will vote for Biden because doing so prevents Trump from holding power. Should Biden win the presidency, the ground for activism on issues like climate change is much easier than it would be if Trump were in office, since he would not give any such activists the time of day.

The first view centers the voter’s decision on what they believe Biden, as an individual president, would do if in office. The second view, which I believe to be the correct one, treats the president as someone who may or may not live up to their commitments; ultimately, it will be up to sustained activism to keep the candidate accountable, and they may not be. Major policies like the Green New Deal aren’t going to happen because one candidate who claims to support it wins high office; should it come to pass, it will happen because of years of on-the-ground politics driving up support for the policy across all levels of government. Elections will be small markers of progress or regress along the way, but never the events that cause the change to happen.

By way of example: think to the passing of Obamacare. Ultimately, the bill that got made into law -- despite the Democrats controlling all three houses of government -- was a shell of the step toward universal healthcare that Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign promised, and in fact rooted in a piece of conservative legislation created by the Heritage Foundation. For those caught up in the “hope” and “change” that Obama promised, this was definitely a low blow, a massive concession to the entrenched private insurance industry. Lefties are and have been rightly critical of the Democrats’ failure on health care during the two Obama terms. However, it doesn’t therefore follow that it was a “mistake” to vote for Obama as a leftist, especially if it meant McCain taking office. Had McCain won, we’d be on far worse ground in negotiating for universal health care, and would have much farther to go before achieving even a meagerly satisfying government health care plan like a “public option.”

What’s more, the Obama administration’s blundering of the Obamacare bill points to another failure in the Agent View of thinking: even if a candidate makes lofty promises, and on paper advocates for key policy positions demanded by the left during the primary season, they could just as easily renege on those positions once in office, or try half-heartedly and say that the system wouldn’t let them get it done. What can the left do at that point? The candidate has already won the election. Sure, the left could send in a candidate to primary the incumbent in the next election, but that event is years away, and primary challenges to an incumbent are at best quixotic. Better to treat the incumbent not as an agent who has a great deal of sway in their role as president, but rather as one part of a political landscape that forms the ground from which negotiations are possible. If a left voter goes in expecting the Democratic candidate to be imperfect, and nothing more than one variable among many to strategize around with in creating long-term activist agendas, they will save themselves the pain that comes with foisting unreasonable expectations onto politicians who, almost by definition, fail the American public.

I write all of this not to say that Gray and Texas came to Chomsky from a foolish place. Their arguments are only “anti-electoralist” in the most uncharitable light. And, as I have said, in a reasonable country, their demands would be seen as normal political action instead of “purity politics,” a cursed phrase that needs to be shot into the sun. Gray and Texas clearly want to live in a better world, one where individuals’ votes meaningfully express their political aims and have the capacity to incite change amongst those who govern us. I, too, would like to live in a better world, one where the left wouldn’t constantly have to vote for people who express no interest in advancing left goals. But here I’m reminded of something astute that Brandy Jensen said on Twitter earlier this year, when it briefly looked like there might be a possibility of a Bloomberg/Trump presidential race: “‘which racist, sexist billionaire do you prefer?’ is a question put to you by a system that has already rejected your participation.” I would only add that it’s not just that specific question which evinces our ostensibly democratic system’s indifference to the actual wants of its citizens. Everything about American governance reveals a fundamental disdain for the beliefs and material concerns of the ordinary person. It is a catastrophe that our government is not set up to actually facilitate systemic change as currently constituted, but we must play with the cards we are dealt. Voting against Trump may not be a noble act, but it is what is needed to ensure that the ground on which we do politics get no more rockier than it is already.

#Bad Faith #Noam Chomsky #Briahna Joy Gray #Virgil Texas #voting #election #electoral politics

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