[A monthly link list of recommended articles, videos, podcasts, photos, tweets … you name it]
[Videos]
MSCTY SCHOOL OF SOUND ART: Term 1 Lesson 3
Paris 1920s in color [60fps, Remastered] w/added sound
re:publica 2022: World of Hatecraft – Rechtsextreme in Gaming-Communities
[Music]
Danger Mouse & Black Thought – Because (feat. Joey Bada$$, Russ, and Dylan Cartlidge)
Massive Attack – Eutopia EP Yes, it is from 2020, but so awesome.
The Smile – Free in the Knowledge
[Podcasts]
Conspirituality 101: Eugenic Pandemic (w/ Beatrice Adler-Bolton) – “In this conversation, Beatrice Adler-Bolton—disability justice advocate and co-host of Death Panel Podcast—says something twice: “Under capitalism, you’re only entitled to the survival you can buy.” Her forthcoming co-authored book is called, provocatively, Health Communism. Part of its argument is that we have to imagine a society in which everyone is entitled to the survival we can share.” This is a huge discovery, not the podcast, the guest. I only just started to listen to her own podcast Death Panel =>
Outdoor Transmission w/ Dr. Theresa Chapple (06/09/22) – “We speak with epidemiologist Dr. Theresa Chapple about how seemingly everyone became convinced that you can’t catch covid outdoors, common misconceptions about the pandemic driven by an overwhelming focus on individual risk assessment, and lessons from her work in the field during the first two years of covid.”
Two Minutes Past Nine [bbc radio 4] – “Twenty-five years on from the largest domestic terror incident in American history, journalist Leah Sottile investigates the legacy of the Oklahoma City Bombing.” Historic view at domestic right wing terrorism in the USA. Podcast from 2020/21.
[Twitter Threads]
A soft-rock station in Vancouver has been playing "Killing In the Name Of" by Rage Against the Machine for hours on a loop.
Whenever someone calls in for a request, they deny it and replay the Rage song again. https://t.co/r2yhK0qTSi
— Tracey Lindeman (@traceylindeman) June 29, 2022
One of the saddest things is that we won't need to wait one or two generations to put covid under control. We could do it with a global strategy in a relatively short time period, if people were informed about the risks, and policy makers chose to work towards containment 💔 https://t.co/W95BDG76wB
— Dr Elisa Perego (@elisaperego78) June 17, 2022
[The Must Read[s] This Month]
“The Beyblade Strategy” or: How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Focused Protection [the new inquiry] – “It is no wonder that many who are immunocompromised find themselves asking, “What exactly is the plan for us?” It is no wonder that many of the medically vulnerable feel unwelcome in society or feel that their place in the world has been “further jeopardized” by covid.” This is an older article, but still so relevant, and since I am a new Beatrice Adler-Bolton fanboy, it has to be up here.
Was ist „Z-Faschismus“, Frau von Redecker? [philosophie magazin] – “Faschismus ist nicht einfach männlich, sondern maskulinistisch. Der Neo-Faschismus greift Männlichkeit in einer spezifischen Weise auf, nicht primär als Natur oder Autorität, sondern als verabsolutierten und zugleich bedrohten Besitzanspruch.” Can I move to Herland please. I’ll cut my dick off.
Why Are So Many Survivors Supporting Johnny Depp? [harpersbazaar] – “Women who have survived sexual assault have been talking about their experiences to defend Johnny Depp in his defamation case against Amber Heard. Why?” Just-world hypothesis could explain a few other things, like T®ump etc.
The Bleak Spectacle of the Amber Heard-Johnny Depp Trial | Michael Hobbes [substack] – “How a washed-up celebrity, men’s rights activists and true crime stans convinced millions of Americans to buy into a conspiracy theory” The huge implications of this horrendous trial, summed up.
[Articles English]
How Jean-Michel Basquiat Rose to Be King of the Art World [hyperallergic] – “The art establishment was never quite sure what to do with a self-taught artist like Basquiat, who owed as much to bebop and William S. Burroughs’s cut-up technique as he did to African influences.” What could have become of him had he not died so young?
Compound pejoratives on Reddit – from buttface to wankpuffin [github] – “Dirty words are, let’s face it, a lot of fun. If you want to express your dislike for someone and a standard insult like “jerk” or “moron” won’t cut it, you can get creative. There are a few reliable recipes for forming derogatory noun-noun compounds in English.” Missing assmunch, but fine.
craiyon – “AI model drawing images from any prompt!” Have fun.
Lithium lore and relentless extractivism in the Democratic Republic of the Congo [wmmna] – “An exhibition at Z33 in Hasselt explores the ecological and humanitarian dimensions of the raw materials necessary to sustain our modern, digital and so-called green lifestyle.” Extractivism will not save the planet.
On Derrick May, Detroit techno and toxic male solidarity | by Annabel Ross – “It is possible to celebrate Detroit techno and at the same time to demand accountability from the figures in the scene who have abused their power. Without it, their legacy is threatened, but that’s not my fault, nor the fault of the women who bravely chose to share their stories. The only people they can blame for that is themselves.” Toxic masculinity hurts everyone. Let’s just stop it.
We’re Not Going Back to the Time Before Roe v. Wade. We’re Going Somewhere Worse [the new yorker] – “We are entering an era not just of unsafe abortions but of the widespread criminalization of pregnancy.” With surveillance capitalism this is now so much worse.
The Neuroglial Hypothesis – A Brains-Eye View of ME/CFS [health rising] – “The extensive neuroglial (microglial) network plays an important role in many processes in the brain including cerebral blood flows, the blood-brain barrier, motor functioning (movement), autonomic nervous system regulation, sleep, sensory gating (problems with stimuli), memory, mood, and cognition. Plus glial cells work in close concert with mast cells to boot.” Quite difficult to understand, but this could be an important puzzle piece for LongCovid.
How hiring the wrong medical “expert” derailed US pandemic response [ars technica] – “An advocate for herd immunity inside the White House pushed to increase infections.” Of course they hired “experts” not for their qualifications but for the message they wanted to hear.
Who gets credit for science? Often, it’s not women [ars technica] – “That’s why a publication released on Wednesday by Nature is significant: It describes data that indicate that women are systematically left off the list of authors of scientific publications. The gap between participation and publication continues even after various factors of career advancement are considered. And it goes a long way toward explaining why science has a problem called a “leaky pipeline,” where women drop out of research at higher rates at each stage of their careers.” Someone surprised?
Documenta drama: the six most controversial (and confusing) things we saw at the Kassel exhibition [theartnewspaper] – “The opening of the quinquennial, curated by Indonesian collective ruangrupa, featured overworked employees and a BDSM party with a provocative entry policy” I dunno, man. PoC getting cancelled is another aspect here.
Documenta Covers Artwork Criticized for Antisemitic Depictions [hyperallergic] – “The Indonesian collective behind the work, Taring Padi, denied antisemitic intent and issued an apology, adding that it was the first time it was shown in “a European and German context.”” This puts things in more perspective, but look bellow for the anti-colonial perspective.
Messi Is Accused of Being the Face of a Blood-Soaked Regime [vice] – “I think that Messi is enabling, empowering and emboldening a dictator. He’s giving credibility or basically white-washing the abuses,” Lina told VICE World News. “He is acting like a curtain for what is happening in the country. He is hiding the repression of the people, the torture, the massacres, the killings.” I am growing increasingly embarrassed that I ever was a soccer/football fan. Nice game, but most players are just greedy, narcissistic assholes. #sportswashing
Absolute Beginners: making the basic goods you might need when economies collapse [wmmna] – “Continuing his exploration into a future that will probably depend more on DIY and basic survival skills than on the thrills of green, sleek smart cities, the artist recently launched Absolute Beginners. The project is a new factory where young people can learn how to make basic goods that used to be produced locally – and which we might need to make again in the uncertain economies of our future.” Skills never hurt.
Noam Chomsky: “Every Time We Build Up Our Military Budget, We’re Attacking Ourselves” [jacobin] – “There’s only one way to bring it to an end. That’s diplomacy. Now, diplomacy, by definition, means both sides accept it. They don’t like it, but they accept it as the least bad option. It would offer Putin some kind of escape hatch. That’s one possibility. The other is just to drag it out and see how much everybody will suffer, how many Ukrainians will die, how much Russia will suffer, how many millions of people will starve to death in Asia and Africa, how much we’ll proceed toward heating the environment to the point where there will be no possibility for a livable human existence. Those are the options.” Noam the lone screamer in the desert, but he is so very right.
Earth Transit – Major passenger rails in the world. Just a map.
May 2022 Global Climate Report [ncei] – “The May global surface temperature was 1.39°F (0.77°C) above the 20th-century average of 58.6°F (14.8°C). This ranks as the ninth-warmest May in the 143-year record, 0.30°F (0.17°C) cooler than the warmest May months (2016 and 2020). It was the coolest May since 2013, but it still marked the 46th consecutive May and the 449th consecutive month with temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th-century average. The ten warmest May months have all occurred from 2010 to present.” Yup.
Mapping How to Laugh Online in Different Languages [preply] – “How many times a day do you laugh on WhatsApp, TikTok, Facebook or Instagram? One of the expressions that we use all the time on social networks is laughter. There are many ways to express it and many different types of laughter. Sometimes we use onomatopoeia and other times we use abbreviations like the popular “LOL”.” I have a few favorites.
Danny Boyle’s Pistol Sells Punk — and the Sex Pistols — Short [jacobin] – “How can someone take a band as exciting, wild, and innovative as the Sex Pistols and make such a conventional, paint-by-numbers miniseries? With Pistol, Danny Boyle found a way.” I enjoyed watching it, but wow did it suck.
Anarchist, publisher, would-be assassin: exhibition documents life of Stuart Christie [the guardian] – “Tribute to the revolutionary thinking of the Glaswegian writer jailed in Spain when a teenager for plotting to blow up Franco” Stuart was so brave.
Right-Wing Judges Say It’s “Harmless” to Label Climate Activist a Terrorist [intercept] – “A court upheld Jessica Reznicek’s excessive sentence for vandalism aimed at stopping the Dakota Access pipeline.” Horrendous precedent. This was destruction of property and it is framed as terrorism.
Forensic Architecture Finds Police Failings in 2020 Hanau Mass Shooting [hyperallergic] – “The report, while focused on the racist attack in Germany, comes as shootings proliferate at an alarming rate in the US.” Great job.
‘Sleep with everyone! Be embarrassing!’ – the dada baroness who shocked society [the guardian] – “She wore soup-can bras, made an explicit film with Man Ray – and may have inspired Marcel Duchamp’s upturned urinal. We explore a thrilling show celebrating the pacy life of ‘The Baroness’” A very inspiring figure in the surrealist art scene, and how typical that hardly anyone knew her.
[Articles German/French]
Eine Debatte über das koloniale Konstrukt [woz] – “Das Geschichtsbild einer ganzen Generation von Indonesier:innen ist vom Erbe der Diktatur und von islamischem Konservativismus geprägt. Dagegen kämpfen Taring Padi und andere indonesische Kunstschaffende an. In seinem Wandbild von 2002 griff das Kollektiv dabei auf eine in gewissen antikapitalistischen Bewegungen verbreitete antisemitische Bildsprache zurück. Nach einer ersten fahrlässigen Stellungnahme haben sie sich für ihre Bildsprache entschuldigt (vgl. «Auf der Arche der inspirierten Solidarität»). Die harsche Kritik in Deutschland habe ihnen vor Augen geführt, dass ihnen vor zwanzig Jahren der Unterschied zwischen Israelkritik und Antisemitismus zu wenig klar gewesen sei. Das kann man als Geste der Bereitschaft zum wechselseitigen historischen Lernen deuten.” Finally. Important context.
Auf der Arche der inspirierten Solidarität [woz] – “Gemeinwirtschaft, Zusammenarbeit und experimentelle Ästhetik. Doch nun steht das grossartige Experiment der «documenta fifteen» im Schatten eines antisemitischen GAU.”
Hirschhausen und Long-Covid – die Pandemie der Unbehandelten [daserste.de] – “Es ist Sommer und wir sind Corona-müde. Ist die Pandemie nicht langsam vorbei? Für Menschen, die an Long Covid leiden, geht die Pandemie jedoch weiter. Aber: es gibt immer noch keine evidenzbasierten Therapien, noch immer treffen sie auf hilflose Ärzt:innen, die in ihrem Praxisalltag mit dem komplexen Krankheitsbild überfordert sind. Noch immer fehlt eine Task-Force und koordinierte Grundlagen-, Therapie- und Versorgungsforschung. Einige Ärzte und Professoren behaupten sogar, die Krankheit sei in erster Line eingebildet, psychosomatisch.”
«Die Infokrieger», Teil 1: Nichts ist wahr und alles ist möglich [republik] – “Trump und Pandemie haben einen Nährboden für ein Medien-Ökosystem geschaffen, in dem Fakten keine Rolle mehr spielen. Auch in der Schweiz: Stricker-TV oder der «Nebelspalter» kämpfen gegen einen «Mainstream», der auf «politischer Korrektheit», Medien und Wissenschaft basiert.” Not much new information, but well done, if somewhat lenghty overview of the swiss rightwing media network.
Zum Wirbel um die Documenta: «Wir sind gar nicht so radikal» [republik] – “Farid Rakun gehört zum Kollektiv Ruangrupa aus Indonesien, das die diesjährige Documenta kuratiert. Die Republik traf ihn zum Interview in Kassel. Dabei waren bestimmte politisch brisante Fragen unerwünscht – bis es doch noch anders kam.” This is an older interview, but since the controversy is blowing up out of proportion now, it needs to be re-read.
Die Ohnmacht der Männer [daslamm] – “Männer müssen das Thema zu sich nehmen, das sagt Lavoyer schon seit Jahren. Dass eine persönliche Betroffenheit zentral sei, um sich zu engagieren – dem sei nicht so. „Ich engagiere mich dafür, weil ich eine gesellschaftliche Änderung vorantreiben möchte und es ein verdammt grosses Problem ist“, so Lavoyer.” Let’s.
Aufarbeitung fünf Jahre nach dem Brand im Grenfell Tower [fluter.de] – “„Die Juristen in der Inquiry tun bestimmt ihr Bestes“, sagt Ed Daffarn. Aber er bezweifelt, dass das genug ist. Beim Brand starben überproportional viele arme und nichtweiße Menschen, erzählt Daffarn. „Aber rassistische Diskriminierung und Klassismus wurden in der Anhörung bislang überhaupt nicht thematisiert.“” The horror continues.
[Older articles, still great]
FTVDIYA : Four Thieves Vinegar [internet archive] – “Anarchist Collective Shares Instructions to Make DIY Abortion Pills” A much needed video instruction.
Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman [gutenberg.org] – “Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman” Might, or might not, be a good time to read or re-read Herland.” Great utopian fiction, didn’t know this one.
From Autonomen to Antifa [the new inquiry] – “Exploring the roots of modern antifa in the German Autonomen movement of the eighties: an interview with George Katsiaficas”
Der Katechismus der Deutschen [gdg] – “Die Erinnerung an den Holocaust als Zivilisationsbruch ist für viele das moralische Fundament der Bundesrepublik. Diesen mit anderen Genoziden zu vergleichen, gilt ihnen daher als eine Häresie, als Abfall vom rechten Glauben. Es ist an der Zeit, diesen Katechismus aufzugeben.”
R.I.P.
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Header Photo: Retro life