Steven > Recent Status Updates

The more I read about colonial history the more I understand just how much of a backwater Europe was after the fall of the Roman empire. It was a place where violence and negligence by the ruling classes won the day--The conditions were so horrible that it's no wonder that many people wanted to leave. Unfortunately, the consequence of that migration was that it exported European violence elsewhere.

This is the definitive study of colonial Belgium's genocide in what is now the DRC, formerly the "Congo Free State." By some estimates, this genocide had a higher number of fatalities than the Holocaust, but it is hardly ever talked about. I was incredibly surprised to hear that the author directly witnessed a CIA agent bragging about the murder of Patrice Lumumba. A very promising read for sure

I'm a little surprised that the author didn't mention Andrea Dworkin in the section about lesbian feminism?? She's like, the ultimate lesbian feminist

I've been wanting to read this one for a very long time. It's perhaps the most widely-read book about dream yoga in the English speaking world, besides Tenzin Wangyal's book. Namkhai Norbu was a Nyingma master, whereas Tenzin Wangyal is a Bon master, so I am interested in getting a view of the practice from the Buddhist Dzogchen perspective. Om mani padme hum

I love the fact that this author doesn't shy away from the fact that it was women (particularly white women) who were the first progenitors of social purity reforms. A lot of their tendencies ran parallel to the TERF movements we see today--They saw male sexuality as the root of all evil, and they sought to preserve themselves and their families from the deliterious effects of that sexuality via legal reform.

The section concerning homosexuality on the western frontier (between cowboys) was far too short, but was the most enjoyable part of this book so far. I'm assuming it was because there wasn't much documentation of those relationships during that period of history, but the author did include what he could find that was verifiably historical. Cowboys are frequently, secretly fond of each other

I'm not even that far into this book and it's already so compelling. The author is correct in saying that sexual norms are primarily used to demonize people who do not conform to the status quo, and sometimes even between minorities to violently differentiate themselves. Our society is truly messed up.

Man, I had such high hopes for this book, but it's insane 2 me that Karanatsakis spends an entire chapter focusing on what media considers "newsworthy" without mentioning the fact that media is a for-profit, profit driven industry. I would LOVE it if the media focused on some of the large scale social issues that he mentions. But news organizations profit from fear, which is how they stay in business, unfortunately

This author is questioning the framing of significant social issues in the news, but he neglects to mention that news organizations are profit-driven. The reason the media environment thrives on fear and resentment is because that's what makes money. Cops take advantage of that fact and use the media for their own ends, but there is no way that the media is ever going to cover the issues mentioned in this chapter.

Really excited to be reading this one--I saw Alec Karakatsanis on Taylor Lorenz's youtube show, and his points were deeply intriguing to me. As a leftist, I feel like he's engaging in ideological rhetoric too early in this introduction, but we'll see if that improves throughout the book. I'm interested to see what evidence he brings forth in terms of media coverage of cops, because a lot of it is really egregious

Emma Goldman is one of my personal heroes, but listening to these essays, I sometimes wonder if she imagined just how much violence would be used to repress leftist tendencies. At times she seems adamant that labor action will be the only thing necessary to start a revolution in the US, when in reality it will take much, much more than that. We will need a massive cultural shift before anarchism becomes viable here.

Let it be known that this book advocates for Vers Supremacy (bottoms I am talking to you)

We're skipping the section about PIV and going straight to anal. Turn the wigs around diva

I'm surprised at how much I'm enjoying this book, because it's speaking my language. As a lifelong meditator I'm able to ascertain exactly what the author is talking about. It's not "scientific" in any sense of the word but hey, if it works it works