I’ve been neglecting this place for a while even though I have several draft pieces in the works, and in order to force myself to get some writing done regularly I thought it would be a good idea to do a semi-regular roundup post, where I’ll write about whatever interested me over the past while and I have some thoughts on, from articles and books I’ve read to films I’ve seen and music I’ve listened to, as well as occasionally some of the goings-on at the hellsite called twitter.
Anyway, here are some great articles and books I’ve read recently that I highly recommend:
Alexander Zevin, Unchanging New York
This is a wonderful short piece on the mayor race of New York, which I came across when that was still happening but stuck with me as it very nicely points out the position the left ought to take in relation to electoral politics more generally. As Zevin observes:
So long as the left offers them no real economic alternative, why shouldn’t they vote for someone like Adams, who matter-of-factly draws the connection between policing and an economy that seems to demand it? None of the mayoral candidates truly questioned that economic model. Nor did most of the socialists running for council. They mainly called for redistributing the gains from its frothy markets – in real estate and equities – while continuing to rely on them as drivers of growth. Most simply demanded more affordable units from private developers. But their status as the primary providers of housing should hardly be set in stone, when some of the best buildings we have were erected by public entities or union cooperatives – from the art-deco Amalgamated on the Lower East Side to Tudor-revival United Workers in the Bronx. Given the option, how many would choose the hideously cheap ‘luxury condos’ that sprout like weeds in vacant lots in Bushwick? The idea of ‘trickle down’ prosperity has permeated municipal politics here far more completely than in the places Reagan won. Golden drops do not fall from the ‘super-tall’ residential towers of 57th Street, which suck billionaire wealth into airtight containers rather than see it squandered on the specks a thousand feet below.
For socialists running in city and state elections, the challenge is bigger than crafting legislation to bring these down to size: it is to build a different legislature. What good is winning more seats on the council without a radical critique of that body as catspaw for real estate interests?
I would say this not only applies to city and state races, but to national elections as well: the aim isn’t to merely pass this or that amendment to make life just marginally better for a sub-section of a sub-section of the working class. It is to challenge the entire system which ensures that they are immiserated, dispossessed and exploited in the first place. And unfortunately there aren’t many, if any, politicians of the Soc Dem/New Deal liberal persuasion who engage in this kind of radical critique of the system.
So what does that look like in practice? That brings me to Ralph Miliband’s brilliant critical historical overview of social democracy: Parliamentary Socialism: A Study in the Politics of Labour, which you can find a PDF of here. Miliband shows there in meticulous detail how even when social democracy is at the peak of its power and influence, it nevertheless fails to address the underlying systemic pathologies of capitalism, which inevitably corrupts and overturns whatever meagre amounts of good they are able to realize. Moreover, and this is most important, he shows how social democracy is merely the left-wing of capital, in the sense that it functions as a safety valve for capitalism: whenever the pressure on the system gets too much, Social Democrats/New Deal liberals come in, either on the margins or even in charge of a government, to take the pressure off, without addressing the underlying system that caused this pressure to arise in the first place, and which only, inevitably will make it worse in the future. I don’t believe that anyone can read Miliband’s damning book and still be a Soc Dem/New Deal liberal without lying to themselves about its fatal flaws. For anyone interested, I briefly discussed my alternative view of how to achieve change in this thread.
I intend to write a more detailed review of Parliamentary Socialism when I have the time, but for now I just want to bring attention to one example he provides of a radical politician who ended up being elected into parliament, and how he used his platform in the way that Zevin said leftists ought to use it:
Contrast that with the meekness of “the squad” and the Socialist Campaign Group in the UK Labour Party.
Grayson incidentally has a very interesting story behind him, which you can read about in these articles (including one written by Corbyn!).
Alright, that’s enough for articles and books for this week.
Moving on to film recommendations, I watched Dune last week and really liked it. Denis Villeneuve is a great director, one of the best ones around today, whose every movie I’ve seen up till now I’ve loved, so I didn’t expect it to be any different with Dune. Probably his best film to date is Incendies, so do check that out if you can. It’s about the Lebanese Civil War and the horrors that stay with those who were involved with it long after. But going back to Dune, politically it reminded me of Avatar in the sense that there is an anti-imperialist theme to it, which I’m interested to see play out in the second part. But aside from the political under or overtones of it, it’s just a very emotionally resonant story and well worth watching.
I also saw Good Times, and really liked that too. It isn’t as good as Uncut Gems, but still a great insight into the day to day life of “the underclass”, and the desperate attempts to get out of it.
Marvel’s What If was pretty decent as mindless entertainment when you have some time to kill, but The Umbrella Academy is some of the worst trash I’ve ever seen. The acting is horrible, the writing is atrocious, the plot is just asinine in every imaginable way. There are a few interesting action scenes, but they’re completely pointless as you couldn’t give less of a shit about any of the characters involved in them. It’s a perfect case of how giving good material to a shitty director and writer inevitably leads to a total mess.
If you have any recommendations for films/shows/music feel free to add it in the comments, and I may get to it by the next roundup!
I’ll end the roundup with some music. I’ve been listening to Dark Side of the Moon over the past few days. Here’s just one perfect song from a perfect album that’s been on repeat: