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rereading parentis Blackshirts and Reds
I’m happy that it’s so! I give it my highest endorsement - concise but solid introductory critique and analysis of 20th century socialism, and his dry sardonic humour is like Lenin’s in places, making it an easy but also informative read
He’s very good in that he doesn’t describe Soviet societies through rose-tinted glasses, but also describes where they went wrong. Like how he talks about disincentives for innovation which heavily contributed to the econnomic decline and ineffective use of labor.
Very much to learn from him and this book in particular.
He’s so talented. I’ve only watched his speeches but really look forward to diving into his writing.
I’ve been reading through The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin. I’ve been enjoying it so far and it’s descriptions of an Anarchist society. It’s also got some somewhat spiritual elements to it, mostly in terms of philosophy, and I find that very interesting as well.
It’s the only explicitly socialist scifi book that I’ve read and it’s beautiful. Would love to know more books like it.
I can’t give you books exactly like the Dispossessed, because Le Guin is Le Guin and nobody is like her, but check out the works of Iain M. Banks, Ken MacLeod and Kim Stanley Robinson.
Capitalist Realism
I’ve been reading Pedagogy of the Opressed, it’s been really good so far!
It’s a concise marxist view on opression and how to combat it with liberatory teaching. It’s very relevant to current events, feels immediately applicable to radicalizing people who are nearly there and developing yourself as a socialist, and I couldn’t recommend it more.
I reread Androids after a long, long time recently and it goes WAY HARDER than I remember. The movie is just a kinda grimey and polluted, in the book the world is really close to being uninhabitable.
It’s fascinating to me because most cyberpunk properties present a world which, while definitely bad and dystopic, is portrayed as sustainable on some level. Thing could potentially suck as much as they suck now forever.
In Do Androids Dream Of Electronic Sheep, the environment is getting worse and worse and everyone still on earth in a decade or two will be dead.
