The kids aren’t alright

by Natasha Lennard

DISSENT | January 14, 2018

Kids These Days: Human Capital and the Making of Millennials
by Malcolm Harris
Little, Brown and Company, 2017, 272 pp.

When we talk about generations, we tend to talk as if history has always been divided up into them. But the idea of distinct eras of cohorts each defined by some unique spirit is not timeless. The notion of a generation was borne of a conception of history as a machine of progress—a claim central to Enlightenment ideology. When philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder coined the term “Zeitgeist” in 1769, he assumed time was a progressive force driving history forward. Developing this idea, Hegel imagined historical progress as a series of dialectical steps, each bringing the Geist, or World Spirit, closer to its realization of reason and freedom.

The total Marx and the total theory of literature

by Ian Birchall

rs21 | January 05, 2018

Revolutionary reflections is proud to publish a lost gem of Marxist aesthetic theory by Ian Birchall. Originally the piece was given as a paper at a conference on the Grundrisse and the “total Marx” on 5 June 1971 (the day after the death of Marxist theoretician Georg Lukács). It was published in Situating Marx: Evaluations and Departures, edited by Paul Walton and Stuart Hall (Chaucer Publishing Co., London, 1972), and has been out of print for over 40 years. The author would like to thank James B for transcribing the article and Colin Barker for adding some corrections.

The piece focuses on the development of a total theory of literature based on Marx’s writings on the subject, and provides one of the best introductions for anyone wanting to understand what Marx wrote on the subject and how we should relate to it.

Beyond Morally Right, Sanders Says, Fighting Global Oligarchy a “Strategic Geopolitical Imperative”

by Jon Queally, staff writer

Common Dreams | January 15, 2018

Rich American businessman wearing a tuxedo and top hat while holding two bags of money, 1920. (Illustration by GraphicaArtis/Getty Images)

In order to solve the most pressing problems now facing humanity, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Monday called for the rise of a new and international progressive movement that would tackle “structural inequality both between and within nations” by wrenching power from the world’s corporate and monied elites who now control an unprecedented majorities of global wealth and power.

Coal executive’s “action plan” finds success under Trump

by Michael Biesecker

People’s World | January 11, 2018

Coal fired power plant near Joseph City, Arizona. By PDTillman, CC BY 2.0, Wikipedia.

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the early days of the Trump administration, the head of one of America’s largest coal companies sent a four-page “action plan” to the White House calling for rollbacks of Obama-era environmental and mine safety regulations.

“We have listed our suggested actions in order of priority,” Robert “Bob” Murray, the chairman and CEO of Ohio-based Murray Energy, wrote in his March 1 letter addressed to Vice President Mike Pence. “We are available to assist you and your administration in any way that you request.”

U.S: Books Are Everything – Which Must Be Why New York Prisons Want To Ban Most of ‘Em Except Bibles and Coloring Books

by Abby Zimet, staff writer

Common Dreams | January 10, 2018

New York’s Department of Corrections and Community Supervision in its enlightened wisdom has launched a pilot program drastically limiting books, fresh produce and other inmate care packages to six approved vendors selected by the department and listed on its website. Two of the vendors are mail-order companies selling sneakers and electronics, and two more will be added soon. As of December, Directive 4911A is in effect at Greene, Green Haven, and Taconic correctional facilities. If the new rule is deemed a success, the restrictions will be extended to all New York prisons. When DOCCS announced the initiative last March, it said its goal was to “maintain an efficient operation” and “enhance the safety and security” of prisons – aka to stop drugs, cell phones and other contraband from being smuggled in, presumably via novels and oranges. Members of PEN and prisoner advocate groups like Critical Resistance say the rule “appears to have no reasonable basis.”

‘He spoke to what was needed to create an equal society’

Bernadette Hyland talks to playwright TREVOR GRIFFITHS about the continuing significance of the 18th century radical Thomas Paine

Morning Star | January 15, 2018

 

“THESE are the times that try men’s souls,” Thomas Paine wrote in December 1776 during the war of independence with the British, when the American colonists’ morale was at a low ebb.

Haiti: Caribbean Dignity Unbowed

by Professor Sir Hilary Beckles

teleSUR | January 14, 2017

The United States should daily bow before Haiti and thank it for the lessons it taught in how to conceptualize and create a democratic political and social order.

The democratic, nation-building debt the U.S. nation owes the Caribbean, and the Haitian nation in particular that resides at its core, is not expected to be repaid but must be respected. Any nation without a nominal notion of its own making can never comprehend the forces that fashion its origins.

Cuba honors its heroes with pride, just as they defended our independence

by  Eduardo Palomares Calderón

Granma | January 12, 2018

Photo: Estudio Revolución

TERCER FRENTE, Santiago de Cuba.–The Mario Muñoz mausoleum located in the heart of the Sierra Maestra, on Esperanza Hill, yesterday January 11 was the site of a military ceremony presided by Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, for the reburial of remains of combatants who fell in the War of Liberation or after the triumph of the Revolution.

The sacred site received, with the day’s first light, the worthy sons of the homeland who shed their blood for our freedom, or dedicated their lives to the Revolution, to be interred alongside Comandante de la Revolución Juan Almeida Bosque who founded the Third Front here and whose remains occupy the highest point of the site.