The Regrettable Century

For all of our claims to be historical materialists, there is nothing that the left loves more than a great leader to guide us to victory. If we are to make history, but not in circumstances of our own choosing, what role do we actually have to play as individuals? What role does the extraordinary person play in making history? “History is made in such a way that the final result always arises from conflicts between many individual wills, of which each in turn has been made what it is by a host of particular conditions of life. Thus there are innumerable intersecting forces, an infinite series of parallelograms of forces which give rise to one resultant — the historical event.” Thomas Carlyle, On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (1840) http://history.furman.edu/benson/fywbio/carlyle_great_man.htm On the Role of the Individual in History https://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1898/xx/individual.html Karl Marx and his conception of history https://mronline.org/2018/05/11/karl-marx-and-his-conception-of-history/ The individual and the Marxist view of history https://www.marxist.com/the-individual-and-the-marxist-view-of-history.htm Music- Armageddon Blues by Power Trip Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

No. Woke Capitalism Is Not Your Friend https://www.jacobinmag.com/2020/06/brands-corporate-publicity-racial-justice Where Are the Woke Capitalists Now? https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/04/01/where-are-all-woke-capitalists-now Woke Capitalists Can Save America https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/05/how-the-woke-capitalists-can-save-america/#13af4c0671ed The Rise of Woke Capital https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/opinion/corporate-america-activism.html Why Corporations Can No Longer Avoid Politics https://time.com/5735415/woke-culture-political-companies/ Woke America Is Pre-Revolutionary Russia https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/woke-america-pre-revolutionary-russia/ Until Black Women Are Free, None of Us Will Be Free https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/until-black-women-are-free-none-of-us-will-be-free The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we have unlocked the second half of our discussion with Phd Candidate Chris Manno. We discussed the differences between objective, subjective, and instrumental reason and how philosophers have moved through these three in stages culminating in the mercenary use of instrumental reason for the justification of the status quo. Modern philosophy has focused on the latter forms of reason to the point of rejecting any objective understanding on the world, a situation that is tailor made for exploitation of people and the planet under capitalism. Horkheimer, Max. Eclipse of reason. Mansfield Centre, CT: Martino Publishing, 2013. Print. Marcuse, Herbert. One-dimensional man : studies in the ideology of advanced industrial society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1991. Print. Music: The Flying Dutchman Overture- Richard Wagner The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We read an article about recuperation and talked about the concept within the context of the contemporary social unrest that is currently gripping the United States. Does every movement for social change eventually get recuperated? Yes. Is it still worth engaging in social movements? Also yes. To hear the full episode, join our Patreon for $2 a month. Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we are joined once again by Adam and Don from Red Library, we even had a brief appearance by Kevin. We continue our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity. McCarraher believes that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world and that Capitalism then became a religion itself, replacing the sacramental enchantment of the pre-capitalist world with a pecuniary enchantment that he calls Mammonism. In our third installment we deal with the Robber Barons, corporate personhood, and the birth of American Imperialism. McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print. MUSIC: Satyricon- Mother North The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we are joined by Swedish podcaster, activist, social worker, and Christian communist, Mir Bal to talk about Christianity and Marxism. We continue with our unending project of reuniting the cold and the warm streams of Marxism, by talking about the draw of Christians to the liberatory message of Marxism and what Marxists may be able to take away for the liberatory message of radical Christianity. Horn. Western European liberation theology : the first wave (1924-1959. Oxford New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print. Catholic Case for Communism- Dean Detloff https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2019/07/23/catholic-case-communism Catholicism and Marx an Introduction- Chase Padusniak https://www.patheos.com/blogs/jappersandjanglers/2017/06/catholicism-marx-introduction/ Marxism and Liberation Theology- Michael Lowy https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Va-4lh8qfXtv-YEDt2VuAGABdPEhBYs7/view?fbclid=IwAR2TMM9Q3FZQpWuyPBGGMvPBP0CgHmQ-LJqRvT8mIXtcEnVG5YLB8zgrqpo MUSIC: Pete Seeger- God Bless the Grass The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Head over to our Patreon and join for $2 a month to hear part two of our conversation with Chris! Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we are joined once again by Adam from Red Library, but also by fellow Red Librarian Don, who was kind enough to edit the podcast. We continue our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity. McCarraher believes that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world and that Capitalism then became a religion itself, replacing the sacramental enchantment of the pre-capitalist world with a pecuniary enchantment that he calls Mammonism. In our second installment we deal with with a real who's who list of Mammon worshiping malefactors as well as Puritan covenant theology, Mormonism, and slavery. McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print. MUSIC: Satyricon- Mother North The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We had philosophy Phd Candidate Chris Manno join us for a discussion on Marxism and Reason. We discussed the differences between objective, subjective, and instrumental reason and how philosophers have moved through these three in stages culminating in the mercenary use of instrumental reason for the justification of the status quo. Modern philosophy has focused on the latter forms of reason to the point of rejecting any objective understanding on the world, a situation that is tailor made for exploitation of people and the planet under capitalism. Horkheimer, Max. Eclipse of reason. Mansfield Centre, CT: Martino Publishing, 2013. Print. Marcuse, Herbert. One-dimensional man : studies in the ideology of advanced industrial society. Boston: Beacon Press, 1991. Print. Music: Wolves In the Throne Room- Born From the Serpent's Eye The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we are joined by Adam from the Red Library podcast, who was nice enough to record and edit the episode for us. We start our multi part series tackling the monster tome by Eugene McCarraher, The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity. McCarraher believes, much like Max Weber, that capitalism displaced religion and disenchanted the world, but unlike Weber, he believes that Capitalism then became a religion itself. He argues that capitalism is full of religious thinking that grew up in the fields and factories of England, was transported to America by the Puritans, and perfected by evangelicals. We think this topic is right up our alley and have had a blast reading and talking about it. McCarraher, Eugene. The enchantments of Mammon : how capitalism became the religion of modernity. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019. Print. The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Lacanian psychoanalysis has left an indelible mark on the left, with prominent philosophers like Slavoj Žižek and Alain Badiou keeping a Marxist Lacanianism relevant... and we don't really know anything about it. As the only non Lacanian podcast on the Lost Horizons network, we had to look to our network comrade Neil to get a little bit of an understanding. Turin Theory of the Subject of the School http://www.amp-nls.org/page/gb/60/the-turin-theory-of-the-subject-of-the-school Music: ROME- We who fell in love with the sea The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast Well... Here we are still, after all. https://well.transistor.fm/ Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Last week, we read and discussed The End of Policing by Alex Vitale in order to get a better grasp on the history of the police, over-policing, the failure of technocratic reforms, and some of the ideas for the uses of funds after police defunding (be it partial or wholesale). Whether or not the revolt against the police will produce lasting systematic reform reform remains to be seen, but we have to admit that the conversation about how to fix the problem of policing has begun on favorable footing. Vitale, Alex S. The end of policing. London Brooklyn, NY: Verso, 2017. The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

While we were reading about Covid 19 in Salvage last week, an uprising against police brutality began in Minneapolis. We didn't (don't) know what to make of it yet, but it sure did take over a discussion that was supposed to be about pestilence and the left's role in troll vigilantism. Listen to our uninformed and incomplete takes from day one of the unrest. We have a much more complete and thought out take coming for you in a few days. We Are All Unclean- Salvage Editorial Collective https://salvage.zone/articles/we-are-all-unclean-dispatch-two-from-a-changing-world/ The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We are joined by veteran of the podcast wars, C. Derick Varn, for his third appearance on the show, to talk a little about historical Bonapartism and a little more about contemporary Bonapartism. We talked about the contemporary left's perceived need to seek out a Bonapartist savior and drift further and further from the utopian horizons we once sought. The 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ Music: Cro Mags- Hard Times Pop the Left- With Douglas Lain and C. Derick Varn https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/dietsoap/episodes/2019-11-25T07_11_58-08_00 The Emancipation Network http://emancipation.network/ The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Marxism had always contained within it a multiplicity of variations and is possessed, in equal parts, of the potential to be used for illumination and obfuscation. Nothing more clearly illustrates this than the early responses of Marxists to fascism. In our third installment of our series on the history of fascism, we dive into some more Marxist theories of fascism; specifically the German and Austrian Social Democratic Theories, Trotsky and Thalheimer, and then wrap up with a bit of Horkheimer. Our primary source of info for this episode is this wonderful book: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1233-marxists-in-the-face-of-fascism The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we sat down with Patrick of the Radical Thoughts Podcast to talk about Walter Benjamin and his ideas of myth and rationality, capitalism as religion, and a number of other disconnected things that were just fun to talk about. Please check out Radical Thoughts as they read through the entire Zero Books Radical Thinkers series and subscribe to their patreon for bonus episodes. https://www.patreon.com/radicalthoughts/posts Capitalism and Religion- https://cominsitu.wordpress.com/2018/06/08/capitalism-as-religion-benjamin-1921/ Benjamin, Walter, et al. Selected writings. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press, 1996. Benjamin, Walter, and Rolf Tiedemann. The arcades project. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press, 1999. Print. The Lost Horizons Network https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Support the show (http://patreon.com/theregrettablecentury) Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we have something special for you guys, our very first Lost Horizons Network collective podcast release, Here We Are Together, Still...After All. Join Chris and Jason from The Regrettable Century, Adam from Red Library, and Neil from the From78 Podcast as we talk about what it means to be dialectically pessimistic. The Lost Horizons Network Podcast: https://share.transistor.fm/s/c3bf81dd Red Library Podcast: https://www.patreon.com/redlibrary/posts From78 Podcast https://www.patreon.com/from78 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

On Easter Monday, April 24 1916, 1,200 members of the Irish Volunteers and Irish Citizen Army mustered in Dublin and declared the formation of the Irish Republic. Marxist and Irish Republican, James Conolly, led the Irish Citizen's Army in hopes that the Easter Rising would touch off a revolution in Ireland that would lead to the establishment of a Workers' Republic, the death of the British Empire, and the beginning of a socialist world revolution. Over a century later, Ireland is still ruled in the north by what remains of the British Empire, The Republic of Ireland is a Bankers' Republic, and hopes for the world revolution are a nostalgic memory... for now. Manifesto of the Irish Socialist Republican Party (Connolly): https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1896/xx/isrp.htm Connolly and the Paris Commune https://jacobinmag.com/2016/04/james-connolly-paris-commune-easter-rising-tactics?fbclid=IwAR2NFon_XDCsFniTFdsVD1qM_u3m23fbJ88qKzokacYaSqghGlaPIAevu40 Socialism Made Easy (Connolly) -- the only long-ish one: https://www.workersliberty.org/story/2017-07-26/james-connollys-socialism-made-easy-1909-11-political-action-labor Easter Rising Proclamation (original text): https://www.onthisday.com/photos/easter-proclamation-of-1916 Socialism and Nationalism (Connolly):| https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1897/01/socnat.htm https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1897/xx/scirenat.htm Socialism and Religion (Connolly): https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1901/evangel/socrel.htm Socialism in Ireland (Connolly): https://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly/1908/03/socinire.htm Direct Action in Belfast (Connolly): Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week, Jenny, Chris, and Jason read and discussed Jodi Dean's essay: The Four Theses on the Comrade. A comrade is much more than an identity that one adopts. It is an ethos, an ideal for the collective reorganization of the world. We talk about how this is a concept that the left has abandoned and needs to find again. Head over to our Patreon and join for $2 a month to hear the full episode. Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The old world is dying and a new one is being created before our eyes. Thus far, the left has had little if any input into this process. If we don't insert ourselves into the conversation with great haste, a much worse version of our current hellscape will be the outcome. What kind of project will be necessary to salvage the useful pieces of detritus needed to build a better world? To that end, we sat down with our good friend Michael to talk about how to build a better post-apocalyptic world. The Mask of the Red Death: Dispatch One from a Changing World- Salvage Editorial Board https://salvage.zone/articles/the-mask-of-the-red-death-dispatch-one-from-a-changing-world/ The Tragedy of the Worker: Towards the Proletarocene- Salvage Editorial Board https://salvage.zone/editorials/the-tragedy-of-the-worker-towards-the-proletarocene/ Under coronavirus, pro market ideologies are overturned around the world, But its too little, too late. - Jeff Sparrow https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/26/under-coronavirus-pro-market-ideologies-are-overturned-around-the-world-but-its-too-little-too-late?fbclid=IwAR0i6X8SfuLdlHyc119RYYlEqMUsT8XCBnK9ZsnFWJkjIagNCqC4D3YrYWM The world after coronavirus- Yuval Noah Harari https://www.ft.com/content/19d90308-6858-11ea-a3c9-1fe6fedcca75?fbclid=IwAR2f2bCCh3iBuc61PT_Nt4zLbthYaPQuodJsg0ee6Qwoocln65faxeK0cpY A Greater Depression? Nouriel Roubini https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/coronavirus-greater-great-depression-by-nouriel-roubini-2020-03?fbclid=IwAR2f6pVYUmXeacbcOx3TTobG_0vZodG0MVoJ2VrxVqtZPBcshLSQdapm3Vw Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

(PART II) The birth pangs of the bourgeois epoch included a multi faceted opposition in the form of romanticism. This reaction lauded humanity's lost connection to the natural world, to spirituality, and to a forgotten sense of communal life. While it is easy to point out the romantic strain in rightist political ideologies, we often overlook the one that has existed in Marxism since the beginning. Löwy, Michael, and Robert Sayre. Romanticism against the tide of modernity. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001. The Word, the Devil, and the Flesh- JD Bernal https://www.marxists.org/archive/bernal/works/1920s/soul/ Music: Alyans- Na Zare Cosmonaut Magazine https://cosmonaut.blog/ Cosmopod Podcast https://cosmopod.libsyn.com/ Radical Thoughts Podcast https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/patricks-podcast Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Jenny, Chris, and Jason sat down with our friend, rank and file union organizer, and CPUSA member Brad to talk about electoralism and what the hell to do next. Please head over to our Patreon and subscribe for the insanely low fee of $2 a month to hear the rest. https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The birth pangs of the bourgeois epoch included a multi faceted opposition in the form of romanticism. This reaction lauded humanity's lost connection to the natural world, to spirituality, and to a forgotten sense of communal life. While it is easy to point out the romantic strain in rightist political ideologies, we often overlook the one that has existed in Marxism since the beginning. Löwy, Michael, and Robert Sayre. Romanticism against the tide of modernity. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001. The Word, the Devil, and the Flesh- JD Bernal https://www.marxists.org/archive/bernal/works/1920s/soul/ Music: ROME- The Accidents of Gesture Cosmonaut Magazine https://cosmonaut.blog/ Cosmopod Podcast https://cosmopod.libsyn.com/ Radical Thoughts Podcast https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/patricks-podcast Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Our good friend and regular contributor to the show, Steven, brings his legal expertise and knowledge of early soviet law history to this weeks episode. We discuss the Evgeny Pashukanis, Pytor Stuchka, and their contributions to legal theory in the days just after the revolution. There was a debate among legal theorists of the time about whether it is possible to construct a socialist legal system and how the law should be used in a socialist society. Ultimately, Pashukanis would wind up on the losing side of the Socialism in One Country debate and would die for it. Intro to Pashukanis https://www.dropbox.com/s/v4hto1qm5seti8o/Beirne%20%2B%20Sharlet_%20Introduction%20to%20Pashukanis%20%281979%29.pdf?dl=0&fbclid=IwAR1AhfJGWw_YlZTFc6upxEp1g0eckeoXIISoJcatXx0RLub3rHholnE-LNk The Passionate Legal Debates of the Early Years of... https://www.dropbox.com/s/58i5wg5uohkz43z/The%20Passionate%20Legal%20Debates%20of%20the%20Early%20Years%20of%20the%20Russian%20Revolution.pdf?dl=0&fbclid=IwAR05HcbLIu75Un3jH5t1KL8fJJCgMTKSd_Q2Ig5BpxkPmTJOvpAend6OpN8 The trajectory of Yevgeniy Pashukanis and the struggle for power in Soviet law https://www.dropbox.com/s/j6lbz606491nn60/The_trajectory_of_Yevgeniy_Pashukanis_an.docx.pdf?dl=0&fbclid=IwAR1XD0XBMopt0ifkxOUV_iBVVN_1XLrq6TJk1BYyeiz7qcOW2kw3Ra7uaTE Principles of Soviet Criminal Law https://www.dropbox.com/s/pxedstwf8pum00f/Principles%20of%20Soviet%20Criminal%20Law%2C%20Berman%2C%20Harold%20J%2056YaleLJ803.pdf?dl=0&fbclid=IwAR1QWhZuohuU2cmfsLJzfArICrrZgeirgnVqEwdO7iFSgcZ_nDQeTHZeBkk Looking Back And Forward At The Turn of the Century https://www.dropbox.com/s/ldjvuuchv4krvha/15AustlJLSocy101.pdf?dl=0&fbclid=IwAR0vVUJaaPTGVRdwPXFLTNavu8UgH0XrG1QV7_vxg60Pq2WfJunQ6K_9HTE Dont forget to check out our podcast network comrades: From 78 https://twitter.com/From78podcast Red Library https://twitter.com/RedLibraryPod And coming soon, our network website... https://losthorizonsnetwork.com/ Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We had an episode planned where we were going to talk about the Bolsheviks and Early Soviet Law, but our main law dude (Steven from Supreme Leap Forward) got deathly ill and bailed on us. So, we are unlocked one of our Patreon episodes. Please forgive us, but trust that we have some good stuff coming up. Sometimes doing something (anything!) is much worse than doing nothing; we really need to figure out when that is. We read and thought and talked about an article that admonishes us to think and talk and read before acting. We have to stand against a politics of catharsis, a politics that does nothing but makes us feel like we are making a difference. But... then what do we do? I Would Prefer Not To: Žižek’s Bartleby Politics https://medium.com/@mdowns1611/i-would-prefer-not-to-%C5%BEi%C5%BEeks-bartleby-politics-12bd8d9de66a Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we continue our discussion of Splendour, Misery, and Possibilities: An X-Ray of Socialist Yugoslavia by Darko Suvin with our podcast network comrade, Adam from Red Library. Please Check out and subscribe to Red Library and From 78 and be on the lookout for more updates concerning the Lost Horizons Network. Red Library: A Political Education Podcast for Today's Left From 78 Podcast Suvin, Darko. Splendour, misery, and possibilities : an X-ray of socialist Yugoslavia. Leiden Boston: Brill, 2016. A UTOPIA IN THE BALKANS -- CATHERINE SAMARY https://newleftreview.org/issues/II114/articles/catherine-samary-a-utopian-in-the-balkans Splendours, Miseries, and Potentialities of Socialist Yugoslavia- The Berlin Thesis https://www.corsoitalia7.it/2017/03/splendours-miseries-and-potentialities-of-socialist-yugoslavia-the-berlin-theses1/ The Life and Death of Yugoslav Socialism -- James Robertson https://jacobinmag.com/2017/07/yugoslav-socialism-tito-self-management-serbia-balkans Support the show (http://patreon.com/theregrettablecentury) Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We read and discussed Splendour, Misery, and Possibilities: An X-Ray of Socialist Yugoslavia by Darko Suvin with Adam from Red Library. This incredibly dense book was a wealth of theoretical and historical knowledge about one of our favorite subjects, Yugoslavia. The SFRY defies neat categorization and the more we learn about it the more questions we have about the process of transition to communism, workers' self management, radical democracy, markets, and state socialism. It is the perfect meditative subject for a podcast that continually implores Marxists to stop being so certain of everything. Red Library: A Political Education Podcast for Today's Left From 78 Podcast Suvin, Darko. Splendour, misery, and possibilities : an X-ray of socialist Yugoslavia. Leiden Boston: Brill, 2016. A UTOPIA IN THE BALKANS -- CATHERINE SAMARY https://newleftreview.org/issues/II114/articles/catherine-samary-a-utopian-in-the-balkans Splendours, Miseries, and Potentialities of Socialist Yugoslavia- The Berlin Thesis https://www.corsoitalia7.it/2017/03/splendours-miseries-and-potentialities-of-socialist-yugoslavia-the-berlin-theses1/ The Life and Death of Yugoslav Socialism -- James Robertson https://jacobinmag.com/2017/07/yugoslav-socialism-tito-self-management-serbia-balkans Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

In this episode we revisit the topic of Fully Automated Luxury Communism with our friend Annaliese. While we are already on the record opposing the viability and desirability of a socialism without sacrifice, we decided to make a few more critiques we didn't think of making last time, but we also talk a bit about what kinds of futures we would like to see, the nature of work and leisure time, and how much it would suck to have robots do everything. Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Head over to Patreon and sign up for $2 a month to hear the second part of the discussion. https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The British left was epically owned last month in one of the crappiest election results in several generations. While the reaction to this defeat has been largely one of despair and feelings of rudderlessness, we make the case that this is just one in a long line of defeats we will inevitably suffer. Unless we gird ourselves for defeat with a dialectical pessimism, there's no way we will last long enough to make a real difference. Head over to Patreon and sign up for $2 a month to hear the second part of the discussion. https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury This Is Why We Hate You: December Editorial https://salvage.zone/articles/this-is-why-we-hate-you-december-editorial/?fbclid=IwAR0Asf5cKmEYUPcpZE59vzZeKToaC-N7dSDyCdt4X_oiH78AXX24E0ntgYk No False Consolations https://novaramedia.com/2019/12/13/no-false-consolations/?fbclid=IwAR3tuTEtTBK4husLxkYnPz3-vmHY-sCbH0MQGi-EijWxYnbWNq_9lAXPWwg The Last Gasp of Labourism https://left-flank.org/2019/12/13/anti-politics-the-last-gasp-of-british-labourism/?fbclid=IwAR3bHVCrKBS4-F5Tn3ctP_EBW2PUMEpdczUrNJ_cwHCYg-n8Owa1ckpT3uQ Class War Corbynism https://newsocialist.org.uk/class-war-corbynism/?fbclid=IwAR2h7UpFSSEXdywDypP2GSkI6y7aGnM8rCXWl3O-1lQwSx__6uz8aBGKxpw Corbyn’s Defeat and the Democratic Socialists of America https://newpol.org/corbyns-defeat-and-the-democratic-socialists-of-america/?fbclid=IwAR3QaQI_ORrdrLB37PyS4RNu1SELKDkI4ZkiWHkWBluUUdriWhRig0DNwuw What the U.S. Left Can Learn From the Labour Party’s Epic Loss http://inthesetimes.com/article/22220/labour-party-jeremy-corbyn-boris-johnson-uk-brexit-bernie-sanders-left?fbclid=IwAR1w5wzfIZEMiLDXoiI8NPqXQTs3rVPaCFBcWiJd-IiSEvBbucEaoMMyR6k What the U.K. Election Does (and Doesn’t) Teach Democrats https://novaramedia.com/2019/12/13/no-false-consolations/?fbclid=IwAR116Li6Pft50XlzAt4oy5No3DT6E43BJdFfb_C6eoF1nuAOtyssFFQUyOU Music: Oi Polloi- (Expletive Deleted) Everybody Who Voted Tory Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Wherein we continue our discussion with Derick. Head on over tour our Patreon and sign up for $2 a month to check it out. https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The boys--all the good ones--sat down with C. Derick Varn of Pop the Left and the Symptomatic Redness (which can be found on the Zero Books podcast feed) to talk about Socialism in One Country and/or Socialist Internationalism. We tackled the topic that has plagued the workers' movement from the early days of the Socialist International and wrapped it up quite nicely. We have answered the national question and can now proceed forward to proletarian victory. Please check out Part II of our discussion on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Socialism in One Country: A Reassessment -- Erik Van Ree 'SOCIALISM IN ONE COUNTRY' -- Jean Paul Sartre (NLR) Cuba, Che Guevara, and the Problem of “Socialism in One Country” -- Ron Augustin https://monthlyreview.org/2019/01/01/cuba-che-guevara-and-the-problem-of-socialism-in-one-country/ Yugoslav Self-Management: Capitalism Under the Red Banner -- Juraj Katalenac http://insurgentnotes.com/2013/10/yugoslav-self-management-capitalism-under-the-red-banner/ Socialism in One Country & The Cuban Revolution -- Celia Hart http://links.org.au/node/26 Trotsky and the Debate on Socialism in One Country -- Monty Johnstone (NLR) The Revolution Betrayed Appendix: “Socialism in One Country” -- Leon Trotsky, 1936 https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/revbet/ch12.htm Socialism in One Country versus Permanent Revolution -- Stalin, 1925 http://soviethistory.msu.edu/1924-2/industrialization-debate/industrialization-debate-texts/socialism-in-one-country-versus-permanent-revolution/ On Permanent Revolution -- Bukharin, 1924 https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1924/permanent-revolution/index.htm Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Apparently, fully automated luxury communism is more than just a meme. We read some articles about it and decided to have a discussion about its merits and shortfalls. Is a post labor society something that is possible or desirable? Is technology really shifting the base of society in a direction that makes fully automated luxury communism more likely? How do we define the concept of luxury and is it really something we'd like perpetuate? Do we as a civilization, species, or planet even have time for something like this to come to fruition before we face total annihilation? Fully automated luxury communism: a utopian critique https://libcom.org/blog/fully-automated-luxury-communism-utopian-critique-14062015 Fully Automated Luxury Communism — A Review https://medium.com/swlh/fully-automated-luxury-communism-a-review-a127d94dcb9a Is a Post-Work, Post-Scarcity Future Possible? https://www.bookforum.com/print/2602/fully-automated-luxury-communism-by-aaron-bastani-22004 FULLY AUTOMATED LUXURY COMMUNISM: A MANIFESTO BY AARON BASTANI https://societyandspace.org/2019/09/03/fully-automated-luxury-communism-a-manifesto-by-aaron-bastani/ James Bridle on why technology is creating a new dark age https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/16/17564174/james-bridle-new-dark-age-book-computational-thinking-interview Aaron Bastani’s ‘luxury communism’ is a false future https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/fully-automated-luxury-communism-review Review: Fully Automated Luxury Communism http moo s://www.rs21.org.uk/2019/06/09/review-fully-automated-luxury-communism/ Artificial Stupidity https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/artificial-stupidity/ Inventing The Future https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/on-algorithmic-communism/ Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Sometimes doing something is much worse than doing nothing; we need to figure out when that is. We read and thought and talked about an article that admonishes us to think and talk and read before acting. We have to stand against a politics of catharsis, a politics that does nothing but makes us feel like we are making a difference. Check out the full episode on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Marxism had always contained within it a multiplicity of variations and is possessed, in equal parts, the potential to be used for illumination and obfuscation. Nothing more clearly illustrates this than the early responses of Marxists to fascism. In our second installment of our series on the history of fascism, we dive into some Marxist theories of fascism. Our primary source of info for this episode is this wonderful book: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1233-marxists-in-the-face-of-fascism Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

It is the first birthday of the Regrettable Century! We spent the better part of an hour reflecting on our proud moments, regrets, things we changed our minds about (or didn't), and where we would like to go in the future. We've got some heavy material coming up, so enjoy this comparatively light fare. Music: Every Day is Halloween- Ministry Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The movement for proletarian self emancipation is at a low ebb, but in a testament to how stupid and bad the world is, Democrats, Republicans, and European post-fascists have ramped up their rhetorical attacks on the pale ghost of the specter of communism. Anti-communism has always been the stand-in ideology for racist authoritarianism and it serves the same purpose now in a world without a global movement to scare the bourgeoisie. Liberals, attempting to stem a nascent socialist movement, would condemn fascism and communism equally, hoping to stamp out a nascent workers' movement. We sat down to talk about how dumb that is. Losurdo vs. The Category of Totalitarianism http://awm.or.kr/bbs/data/document/1/Losurdo___Critique_of_Totalitarianism_(2004).pdf On the false equivalence of fascism and communism https://jacobinmag.com/2019/10/bulgaria-fascism-nazism-anticommunism-historical-memory?fbclid=IwAR3KlX0_S-giXERD9s2CvrOk-cV0KkKmhXckAjgxSgT0orSlFOrXWH7U7iA Anticommunism in a world without communism https://www.patreon.com/posts/anticommunism-in-28790447 The New Anti-Communism: Rereading the Twentieth Century https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/2811-enzo-traverso-the-new-anti-communism-rereading-the-twentieth-century?fbclid=IwAR2_nrgCygrq0vxJj79ufs4iPJ6ZC8bWSGL83faav1BSKVdP26Jb2eZXhJw Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Steven from The Supreme Leap Forward is back to talk about the KKKriminal INjustice CIStem of the United $nakes of AmeriKKKa. We discuss the courts, restorative justice, twitter pileons/call out culture, and a little about Soviet jurisprudence. Steven's essay mentioned in the episode: Understanding Crime Under Capitalism: A Critique of American Criminal Justice and Introduction to Marxist Jurisprudence- Steven Gilmore The Works of Evegny Pshukanis: https://www.marxists.org/archive/pashukanis/index.htm The other episode we did with Steven http://regrettablecentury.buzzsprout.com/220523/989392-lawyerization-and-its-discontents-a-discussion-on-marxist-jurisprudence-with-steven-from-supreme-leap-forward-part-i Kevin and Steven's Marxist Law Podcast featuring Chris Supreme Leap Forward Episode 12 - Game Of Owns and Feudal Law Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

The slow cancellation of the future has been accompanied by a deflation of expectations, both in the realm of cultural and -- apparently -- technological production. Culture has crawled to a halt, its progress replaced by advances in methods of distribution. Technology is bogged down in a cycle of adding additional cameras to the iphone. Has capitalism outlived its progressive potential? (The TLDR is yes) Mark Fisher: The Slow Cancellation Of The Future https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCgkLICTskQ&t=304s David Graeber: Of Flying Cars and the Declining Rate of Profit https://thebaffler.com/salvos/of-flying-cars-and-the-declining-rate-of-profit We are not living in a technological golden age. https://youtu.be/tvG3dT79TeY Music: Маяк - Выше Звезд Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Check out some Real Nerd Hours when Chris and Jason have a discussion about a not very well known article from an obscure Trotskyist journal written around a decade ago... It generated a little bit of a buzz, but was mostly ignored. We think that was a mistake and we are going to tell you all about why you should care about the decisions of the 10th party congress. https://www.patreon.com/posts/red-jacobins-and-29448338?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=postshare Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

"Perhaps the feeling most characteristic of our current moment is a mixture of boredom and compulsion. Even though we recognise that they are boring, we nevertheless feel compelled to do yet another Facebook quiz, to read yet another Buzzfeed list, to click on some celebrity gossip about someone we don’t even remotely care about. We endlessly move among the boring, but our nervous systems are so overstimulated that we never have the luxury of feeling bored. No one is bored, everything is boring." For this episode we read a couple of articles by Mark Fisher and the Institute for Precarious Consciousness discussing some of the mechanisms that capitalism exploits to dampen our abilities to organize against it. While the production of this episode really is us just feeding more content into a machine that devours our time and creativity, we are kinda hoping this is an example of the capitalists selling us some rope. Mark Fisher: No one is bored, Everything is boring https://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/no-one-is-bored-everything-is-boring/ Institute for Precarious Consciousness: We Are All Very Anxious http://intercommunalworkshop.org/we-are-all-anxious/ Jodi Dean: Communicative Capitalism and Class Struggle http://spheres-journal.org/communicative-capitalism-and-class-struggle/ Music: Savages- Shut Up Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

This week we dive in to the second part of our two part collaboration with Adam from Red Library, who hosts s a great podcast that analyzes and discusses important works of Marxist theory and history. We are big fans, go check them out. This week we continued our discussion on Dialectic of Defeat: Contours of Western Marxism by Russell Jacoby, so if you haven't listened to the first part, do that now. In Dialectic of Defeat, Jacoby examines the losers of the Marxist tradition and argues that there is something to be learned from them, even in their defeat. He exhorts us to read the heretics, doubt the orthodoxies, and truly understand all of the rich and varied currents of Marxism, even if they ultimately failed to create a successful revolution. After all, all of our gods failed us in the end. Either that, or we failed them. Jacoby, Russell. Dialectic of defeat : contours of western Marxism. Cambridge, U.K. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Print. Music: Current 93/Nurse With Wound- Ballad of the Pale Girl Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

Red Library is a great podcast that analyzes and discusses important works of Marxist (and other leftist) literature, and we are big fans. So, we are happy to announce that this week we teamed up with them to read and talk about Dialectic of Defeat: Contours of Western Marxism by Russell Jacoby. The discussion ran long, so it has been broken into two parts. This is part one. In Dialectic of Defeat, Jacoby examines the losers of the Marxist tradition and argues that there is something to be learned from them, even in their defeat. He exhorts us to read the heretics, doubt the orthodoxies, and truly understand all of the rich and varied currents of Marxism, even if they ultimately failed to create a successful revolution. After all, all of our gods failed us in the end. Either that, or we failed them. Jacoby, Russell. Dialectic of defeat : contours of western Marxism. Cambridge, U.K. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Print. Music: Modern Life Is War- Farmer's Holiday Association Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We decided that a good companion to our episode about Melancholia and Organized Pessimism would be a rare recording with all of us (except Kevin) in the same room, talking about a pretty cool movie that we saw over a decade ago. Sign up on our, very reasonably priced, Patreon to access our-- small but ever growing number of-- bonus episodes. https://www.patreon.com/theregrettablecentury Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

When we were kids: history ended, the Christian right launched an all out assault on the gains of the 1960s/70s, the liberals launched an all out assault on the gains of the New Deal/labor movement, and the left launched an all out assault on each others shopping choices. It sucked. The world was recreated in the dumbest and worst possible ways and we are going to let you listen to us talk about how it warped all of our brains. Coming of Age at the End of History https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/04/26/coming-of-age-at-the-end-of-history-2/ Neoliberalism Is A Political Project https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/07/david-harvey-neoliberalism-capitalism-labor-crisis-resistance/ From Revolution to Evolution: The Changing Nature of the Christian Right (1994) http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.857.5145&rep=rep1&type=pdf What Pat Robertson Teaches Us https://jacobinmag.com/2018/03/pat-robertson-cbn-evangelical-christian-sanders The Reagan Counterrevolution Crushes The American Dream https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2014/9/8/1328063/-The-Reagan-Counter-Revolution-Crushes-the-American-Dream How The Christian Right Ended Up Transforming American Politics https://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/brief-history-of-the-christian-right The Sexual Counterrevolution https://prospect.org/article/sexual-counterrevolution Music: Propagandhi- "Stick The Fucking Flag Up Your Goddam Ass, You Sonofabitch" Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We received a really thoughtful and challenging question/comment from one of our Patrons and we decided to give it the attention it deserves, in the form of a full episode. We discuss "pessimism of the intellect/optimism of the will," mourning, melancholy, the church-like euphoria of the mass meeting, and how much it is necessary to bum people out. If you have a question or concern you'd like us to address, send it to our email address [email protected] or message us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, or Patreon. Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We read a bunch of stuff about Walter Benjamin and Enzo Traverso and tried to have a conversation about it. We've only managed to reinforce the idea that "The organization of pessimism" is the only slogan that can save us from death. Traverso, Enzo. Left-wing melancholia : Marxism, history, and memory. New York: Columbia University Press, 2016. Print. Against Revolutionary Pessimism and Optimism: Revolutionary Realism by J. Moufawad Paul http://moufawad-paul.blogspot.com/2016/10/against-revolutionary-pessimism-and.html An Invisible Underground River: On Left-Wing Melancholia- Michael Lowy https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/3289-an-invisible-underground-river-on-left-wing-melancholia How to kill a zombie: strategizing the end of neoliberalism- Mark Fisher https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/how-to-kill-zombie-strategizing-end-of-neoliberalism/ Walter Benjamin’s Gothic Marxism and The Organization of Pessimism: Michael Lowy https://www.radicalphilosophy.com/article/walter-benjamin-and-surrealism Victor Serge: Indispensable Critic of Leftist Illusion- Mitchel Abidor https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2019/02/28/victor-serge-indispensable-critic-of-leftist-illusion/ Four Reasons the European Left Lost- Wolfgang Streeck https://jacobinmag.com/2019/05/european-parliament-elections-results-left?fbclid=IwAR0IIEH5W8SrlH9EfJ31XDLDFjvTZ2lp-ucok0GtxtpDsWzsrSMHQ_oB9DM The Organization of Pessimism: Profane Illumination & Anthropological Materialism in Walter Benjamin https://www.academia.edu/33848834/The_Organization_of_Pessimism_Profane_Illumination_and_Anthropological_Materialism_in_Walter_Benjamin Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

We sat down with C. Derick Varn and solved all the problems that are currently ailing the left. We reconciled the divergent currents of Marxism and wove together the materialist and idealist dichotomy with resounding success, but then lost an hour and a half of audio and were forced to restart the recording; what resulted was a meandering, but entertaining, discussion about just about everything... and religion. Varn's Podcast "Symptomatic Redness" http://zero-books.net/blogs/zero/tag/symptomatic-redness/ and his poetry. http://www.unlikelystories.org/unlikely-books/apocalyptics Music: Des Geyers Schwarzer Haufen- Bauernkreig (German Peasant Revolt Anthem) Further Reading: MacIntyre, Alasdair C. Marxism and Christianity. Notre Dame, Ind: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984. Religion for radicals: An interview with Terry Eagleton https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/the-gospel-according-to-terry Roland Boer on Marxism and Religion http://isj.org.uk/the-full-story-on-marxism-and-religion/ Lenin: The Attitude of the Workers Party To Religion https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1909/may/13.htm Boer, R. (2014). Religion and Socialism. Political Theology, 15(2), 188–209. Fitzpatrick, F. (1967). A. V. Lunacharsky: Recent Soviet Interpretations and Republications. Soviet Studies. Vol. 18. No. 3. pp 267-289 Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

After our Socialism From Below episode, Jason and Chris thought they could have used more time to talk about the 4th Comintern congress and the question of "Workers' Governments." What resulted is an impromptu discussion that we posted on our Patreon. Head on over and sign up for $2. Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop

From Babeuf and Blanqui to Bakunin; from Karl Marx and Kautsky to Kropotkin, an ideological battle rages over the true nature of socialism! But why though? This week we discuss whether or not there really are only "Two Souls of Socialism" and if idea of "socialism from below" is a useful analytical framework around which to organize our politics. Hal Draper’s “Two Souls of Socialism” https://www.marxists.org/archive/draper/1966/twosouls/ Marxism, Anarchism, & the Genealogy of “Socialism From Below” https://uppingtheanti.org/journal/article/02-marxism-anarchism-the-genealogy-of-socialism-from-below Building Socialism From Below- Ben Tarnoff https://www.jacobinmag.com/2018/12/nicos-poulantzas-socialism-from-below-democratic-power Socialism From Below: A Delusion? -Mike McNair https://weeklyworker.co.uk/worker/1071/socialism-from-below-a-delusion/ Music: Back in the USSR by Crisis Send us a message (sorry we can't respond on here). Support the show Visit the Regrettable Century Merch Shop