Om anarchySF - an anarchist, science fiction podcast
The podcast companion to anarchysf.com, an archive of anarchist science fiction.
During each episode, we'll analyze one piece of science fiction media which explores themes relevant to left-wing ideology.
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Blowing Shit Up With Your Communist Mech in Lancer (01:12:03)
We talk about the tabletop RPG/War game Lancer and its unusual utopianism
Some topics:
- Those who Walk Away from Omelas and the structure of Dystopia/Utopia
- Reimagining the French Revolution
- The Role of Violence in a Communist Utopia
- Permanent Revolution
Grounding ourselves in Saint of Bright Doors (00:56:42)
We never left, so we are not back. We just like to keep you guessing about episode times. This time we talk about the brilliant Saint of Bright Doors, a decolonial multifaceted dark fantasy novel that's quite a thinker, but also pretty accessible. Give it a read!
Eden recommends playing "Laysara: Summit Kingdom", which kinda fits the theme of this episode.
Eternal Discourse War With Warhammer 40k (01:27:01)
We talk about how to critique the Fascist sentiments in Warhammer 40k, without worrying too much about the degrees of intent or satire behind it.
Acknowledging the Complexities of Humanity with Ammonite (01:15:49)
We talk about Ammonite, a somewhat under-the-radar excellent sci-fi book about a virus killing all the men in a far-off planet and exploring indigenous lands as a colonizer anthropologist
Themes explored:
- Anthrophopolitics and diversity within identity
- Biopolitics and virology
- "Going Native" (TM)
- Some Ursula LeGuin themes
Eden's ep of death-sentence about The Dawn of Everything:
https://soundcloud.com/death-sentence-pod/david-wengrow-and-david-graeber-the-dawn-of-everything
Can we fix it? Maybe! Kinda! With Ixion (01:00:38)
We talk about the sci-fi strategy game Ixion and its somber adventure through space.
Some topics discussed:
- Shameful space
- Space is silence and death
- Gravestone science
- Accelerating the flows
- The eternal recurrence of the same
- Middle management euphemisms
Referenced Some More News video 'Jeff Bezons Learned Nothing in Space':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7TQFFH9gj8&ab_channel=SomeMoreNews
The Potential and Limitations of Clowning on Billionaires on Space Sweepers (00:57:13)
This is an especially rambly episode of us talking about the excellent kitchen sink space romp movie Spacesweepers.
Topics discussed:
- Billionaires hate humanity
- The limits of Villainry
- What internationalism looks like
- The ethics/politics distinction
Raging in alliance with The Only Harmless Great Thing (01:09:30)
We read Brooke Bolander's short and painful novelette and spoke about:
- Nuclear semiotics
- The uses of violence
- The master's tools
- Being pushed to the corner
Optimist Awakenings with Citizen Sleeper (01:16:37)
Citizen Sleeper is touching and optimistic without being saccharine and might be just what we need in these trying times.
The podcast opens with us venting our feelings and thoughts about another demonstration of incredible violence from Israel against the Palestinian people. Free Palestine!
Then we talk some themes. Here's what you can expect:
Gaming under capitalism
Vicious and virtuous cycles
Refugee experience
Care ethics - A softer world is possible)
Intra-class struggles
Radical embodiment (Yes, Eden talks about the body some more)
Repo Virtual repossesses Cyberpunk (01:03:22)
We talk about Corey J White's modern vision of Cyberpunk: Repo Virtual, reimagining the genre and its radical potential.
Topics discussed:
- Data creep
- Radical potential of games
- Firearms in smart cities
- Cyberpunk's questionable beginnings
- Opting in / Opting out
- Identity politics and data dystopia
Referenced pieces:
- Video discussing (among other things) how youtube manufactures identities:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41B5YonixBs&ab_channel=F.DSignifier
- Watched over by machines of loving grace:
https://allpoetry.com/All-Watched-Over-By-Machines-Of-Loving-Grace
Spire, racialization and resistance (01:10:44)
We discussed the role-playing game Spire, with its different ways of representing oppression and the struggle against it.
- Epistemic vice and epistemic resistance
- Construction of knowledge and infrastructure space
- Adevnturism and the challenge of struggling in a hopeless fight
- Good weird and bad weird
Links:
Eden's podcast appearance about magical realism and much more:
https://www.patreon.com/posts/inner-experience-62792132?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copy_to_clipboard&utm_campaign=postshare
Eden's essay on the topic:
https://www.notthesky.com/posts/essays/on-becoming-a-god/
The Materialist Fantasy of Mordew (01:08:12)
Mordew is a down-to-earth, complex fantasy world, and a promising beginning to a promised trilogy. We talk about:
- Realist fantasy
- Materialist morality
- Knowledge and Protagony
- Mark Fisher's Red Plenty
See much more anarchist science fiction at anarchysf.com
External links:
Protagony, by Innuendo Studios:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R943_eAvnWw&t=75s&ab_channel=InnuendoStudios
Woah, the Matrix (01:01:38)
We dive deep into "The Matrix (1999)" and a little bit into the sequels. No Resurrections here as this was recorded before it came out.
Topics discussed:
- What is the Matrix?
- Snooty philosophers vs. the Matrix
- Abolishing everything
- The Messiah Complex
- Do we want to escape to the Desert of the Real?
- Fighting together
Editing took a while, so references to current events are referring to about a month ago, including the sad discussion of Charles Mills' death.
Charles Mills' NYT obituary (many more exist):
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/27/us/charles-w-mills-dead.html
CCK Philosophy's video on Baudrillard and the Matrix:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bf9J35yzM3E&t=804s&ab_channel=Jonas%C4%8Ceika-CCKPhilosophy
Kurt Vonnegut Wrote Some Pretty Good Books (00:54:51)
We talk about a medley of Kurt Vonnegut books, how they play around with cynicism and sentimentalism, how they're anarchist and humble and absurdist.
Near the end Eden mentions this paper by David Graeber and David Wengrow:
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/62756/1/__lse.ac.uk_storage_LIBRARY_Secondary_libfile_shared_repository_Content_Graeber%2C%20D_Farewell%20to%20childhood_Graeber_Farewell%20to%20childhood_2015.pdf?fbclid=IwAR1tVc7d35wbjGhGmH-L2VnhDqUHEMaSiMH0ubzQEaUhZlJcxSX-f4_H80w
Dishonored, not Resentful (00:59:41)
We talk about the video game franchise Dishonored. Topics discussed:
- The means of magical production
- Sociological storytelling
- Resentiment
- Hypocritical opiate (of the masses)
- What good is an individual?
- What to do after a revolution
Oval - Is Reciprocity in Our Nature? (01:11:24)
We had a great time talking about Oval, by Elvia Wilk. It's a complicated little story about being an artist in Berlin and watching as the world around you burns, or turns.
Discussions:
- Leftism's "call to action"
- Reciprocity vs. Transactions
- The Relationship Between Hi-Tech and Art
- How Tech Falls Apart
- Human Nature and Economics
References:
"Hauntology" is discussed in Derrida's "Spectres of Marx"
We mention a video by the great youtube channel space commune, about art and gentrification:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJqBAqM-8KU&ab_channel=SpaceCommune
Elysium, design fiction and fake scarcity (01:11:54)
We talk about a cool little action movie that didn't do well in theatres but has its own little place in our hearts with its scathing critiques of bad environmentalism, bad identity politics, and bad cyberpunk.
Paper on design fiction (though it doesn't use the term):
https://www.hellofosta.com/writing/the-future-mundane
An Unkindness of Ghosts and the Love of Saying No (01:16:43)
We talk about the Rivers Solomon's thought provoking and gut punching "An Unkindness of Ghosts". But we promise there are no spooks! Some rough discussion topics though (Body manipulation, sexual assault and rape).
Topics discussed:
- The pneumatics of power
- The revolutionary potential of food
- Afropessimism
- Racialization
- Midwives
- Gendered Racism
External reading referenced:
- Article about Afropessimism:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/07/20/the-argument-of-afropessimism
- More critical view on Afropessimism:
https://www.academia.edu/44499560/Nick_Mitchell_The_View_from_Nowhere_On_Frank_Wildersons_Afropessimism_Spectre_November_2020_
- Desert:
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anonymous-desert
Aniara also Carries Ruin Within (01:10:20)
We talk about the incredible film adaptation to the early 20th century epic poem Aniara. Pretty depressing stuff, but we refuse to be doomers.
Discussion topics:
- Why are the people who cause calamity in charge of fixing it?
- Why do we obey?
- Why do we work?
- How do temporary hierarchies become permanent?
- Opium for the masses
- The complicity of scientists
Lindsey Ellis video essay on three act structure:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0QO7YuKKdI&ab_channel=LindsayEllis
Oliver Thorn's video essay on airport security:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyzd_a6vLWY&ab_channel=PhilosophyTube
On "efficiency" compromising the readiness of hospitals for a pandemic:
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/09/gambling-with-your-health
Annihilation, Discussions of Bodies Being Morphed (01:00:43)
We talk about Jeff Vandermeer's New-Weird book - Annihilation, a book about climate horror and accepting uncomfortable changes.
Issues discussed:
- The horror of climate change
- Unintelligible politics
- The failure of facts and logic
- Doing better than Lovecraftian racism
- Becoming other
- Permeable boundaries
Moon, Exploitation and Opportunity (00:55:50)
We talk about the excellent solitary space adventure that is Moon (2009). Topics discussed:
- How exploitation is marketed to white men
- Foucault's "Care of the self"
- How space capitalism is an especially risky form of exploitation
- How space can be an opportunity to organize
- The race between capitalist exploitation and worker organization
- Capitalism's obvious failures
Links:
Innuendo Studio's discussion of the right's obsession with cucks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQjVbk6JSck&ab_channel=InnuendoStudios
The Ethics of the Care of the Self as a Practice of Freedom: https://pages.uoregon.edu/koopman/events_readings/cgc/foucault_ethics_concern_for_self.pdf
PhilosophyTube and Mexie's video on the housing market: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qihG6AGjkRk&t=1059s&ab_channel=PhilosophyTube
Current Affairs' Fake Nerd Boys of Silicon Valley: https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/07/the-fake-nerd-boys-of-silicon-valley
Too Like the Lightning, and Enlightenment (01:06:54)
We talk about Ada Palmer's "Too Like the Lightning", how it portrays the enlightenment, gender, politics, all the goodness.
It's a challenging read, but it delivers on its promises
Themes discussed:
- How the social contract makes a new person
- What was the Enlightenment?
- Confusing gender roles
- Fabricating consent
- Ideology
Shadowrun; Acceleration and Mosaics (00:53:23)
We talk about the pen and paper role playing game Shadowrun, focusing on the themes it allows its players and storytellers to explore. Shadowrun is a troperific mix of sci-fi and fantasy that takes everything that's wrong about the world and blows it up at the same time.
Subjects discussed:
- Accelerationism and the Frankfurt school's influence on it
- Reclaiming Cybernetics
- Meaning in postmodern works
- Mosaicism
- Exceptionalism
- Radical infrastructure space
Random Acts of Senseless Violence - The center cannot hold (00:51:36)
We talk about Jack Womack's "Random acts of senseless violence" - a "minute into the future" dystopia told from the perspective of a 12 year old girl. It's gritty and depressing, just our speed.
Topics include:
- How this is a horror story for the Bourgeois
- The atomization of daily life
- Hobbesian themes
- Derrida and the duality between center and periphery
- The merits of a political book with no obvious villain
- The violence/mundanity barrier
Splendor, Misery, Time and Resistance (00:55:07)
We talk about a Sci-fi album by the band Clipping - Splendor and Misery. The album is a prime example of Afro-Futurism, dealing with such topics as time, space, bodies, space travel, slavery, and much more that we couldn't cover.
The discussed album:
https://clppng.bandcamp.com/album/splendor-misery
Topics discussed:
- Queer time and its relevance to race theory
- Space, resistance and the body
- Belonging
- Alternate futures in space
- Anger as a political emotion
- Anarchy and violence
The Telling, Colonialism and the Center (00:55:12)
We discuss one of science fiction's titans: Ursula K. Le Guin, in one of her slightly less read books: The Telling, offering a radical perspective on religion, colonialism and reason. Some themes:
- Center-based vs. non-center-based epistemology
- Decolonialism
- Non-ideal anthropology
- Multiple views on religion
- Ways of life as resistance
Audio on my (Yanai's) side is a bit rough due to a recording issue, sorry about that!
For more information on Decolonialism I would, from my limited experience, recommend Serene Khader's "Decolonizing Universalism" and Vrinda Dalmiya's "Caring to Know" (tangentially related)
