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Bill Fletcher Jr. on Black Marxism
Veteran labor activist Bill Fletcher jr. talks about how capitalism is based on the slave trade and colonialism, the Black contribution to Marxism, and the need to organize.
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Remembering King’s roots in labor and socialist movements of the 20th century
As we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. weekend, it’s worth remembering that his legacy was based firmly in the labor and the socialist movements of the 20th century. It takes nothing away from King to highlight how his work built on those movements and his voice was magnified by his association with them.
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The U.S. role in turning countries into shitholes and provoking immigration
Since Trump is a racist, he thinks that countries get to have poor economic and security situations because of the race of the people that inhabit them. That is silly (and dangerous) as history and social science.
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Class, race, and U.S. wealth inequality
People tend to have a distorted picture of U.S. capitalism’s operation, believing that the great majority of Americans are doing well, benefiting from the system’s long-term growth and profit generation. Unfortunately, this is not true. Median wealth has been declining, leaving growing numbers of working people increasingly vulnerable to the ups and downs of economic […]
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What is racial capitalism and why does it matter?
Talk by Robin D. G. Kelley on “What is Racial Capitalism and Why Does It Matter?” recorded November 7, 2017 at Kane Hall, University of Washington, Seattle, WA. Sponsored by the UW Simpson Center for the Humanities.
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The meritocratic myopia of Ta-Nehisi Coates
A question that might sound ludicrous to some: what do Trump and liberals have in common? Answer: a penchant for discussing anything other than class and capitalism—seriously.
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Balfour at 100: A legacy of racism and propaganda
The coming months mark the centennial of Palestine’s forcible incorporation into the British Empire. In November 1917, British foreign secretary Lord Arthur Balfour declared his government’s support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”; in December, Jerusalem fell to British troops.
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W. E. B. Du Bois’s “Black Reconstruction” and the new (Marxist) historiography
What follows is the paper I gave this past weekend at the ninth annual meeting of the Society for U.S. Intellectual History in Dallas. I received excellent comments from our chair, Amy Wood, and from several audience members–comments that have made me rethink some of my argument. But I publish here without editing in the hopes that I receive more comments.
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The Anti-Empire Report #152
If newness doesn’t win everyone’s heart, then BEAUTIFUL will definitely do it. Who likes UGLY military equipment? Even the people we slaughter all over the world insist upon good-looking guns and bombs.
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Radicalizing women’s rights internationally
The recent “burqa bans” in Austria and Quebec appear to be troubling legal manifestations of the rising tide of Islamaphobia in Europe and North America.
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How American racism shaped nazism
Depending on the reader’s perspective, Whitman’s central argument seems either modest or bold, as he claims, “What all this research unmistakably reveals is that the Nazis did find precedents and parallels and inspirations in the United States” (10). The most radical Nazis were often the most enthused about American legal precedents. More moderate, less anti-Semitic members of the Nazi Party tended to be more skeptical of American approaches. For some Nazis, “American race law looked too racist” (5). America “was the leading racist jurisdiction” in the 1930s (138).
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How ‘white people’ were invented by a playwright in 1613
The Jacobean playwright Thomas Middleton invented the concept of ‘white people’ on 29 October 1613, the date that his play The Triumphs of Truth was first performed. The phrase was first uttered by the character of an African king who looks out upon an English audience and declares: ‘I see amazement set upon the faces/Of these white people, wond’rings and strange gazes.’
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FBI launches COINTELPRO 2.0, targeting ‘black identity extremists’
Raise your hand if you identify as a “black identity extremist.” Matter of fact, raise your hand if you’ve ever even heard of the term “black identity extremist.”
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Here’s how Breitbart and Milo smuggled nazi and white nationalist ideas into the mainstream
A cache of documents obtained by BuzzFeed News reveals the truth about Steve Bannon’s alt-right “killing machine.”
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The effect of the whip: The Frankfurt school and the oppression of women
Stuart Jeffries on the Frankfurt School’s absence of women and the points of contact between the thinkers associated with the Institute für Sozialforschung and theorists of feminism.
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There can be no revolution if we do not overcome racism
Cosmas Musumali participated in a seminar on Pan-African Thought at the Florestan Fernandes National School, which is famous in Brazil for its social and political commitment.
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Making ‘Black Lives Matter’ in our schools
How do you kill Mr. Phil and nothing happens?” According to parent Zuki Ellis, this is the question students at J. J. Hill Montessori Magnet School in St. Paul were asking just a few days into summer. On June 16, the Minnesota police officer who fatally shot Philando Castile, or Mr. Phil as students knew him, was acquitted on all charges.
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Germany and the rise of a ‘fascist international’
Germany funds foundations for its political parties. If the far right gets one, we’re one step closer to globalizing the alt-right.
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Take a knee: The revenge of Colin Kaepernick
After Trump’s deranged demand that ownership purge NFL athletes who fail a loyalty test, it felt a little miraculous when, by a quirk of a game being played in London, Sunday morning dawned on the vision of the Jacksonville Jaguars and Baltimore Ravens arm in arm during the National Anthem. Standing with them was Shahid Khan, the league’s first non-white owner. I’d prefer no owners at all, but for now, it was a vision worth kneeling for.
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Merkel clobbered while rightists threaten
A key result of the German elections is not that Angela Merkel and her double party, Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Bavarian CSU (Christian Social Union), managed to stay in the lead with the most votes, but that they got clobbered, with the biggest loss since their founding.