Superstructure

A guided meditation you can do with your Tungsten Cube.

In this episode, co-hosts Natalie Smith and Maxximilian Seijo argue that the pandemic not only killed neoliberalism as a tacit ideological formation; it also revealed how neoliberal truisms have never captured the actual causal mechanisms and potentials that defined the past 50 years. Fleshing out these claims, Naty and Maxx journey through the work of rockstar economic historian Adam Tooze, focusing in particular on his widely-hailed recent book, Shutdown: How Covid Shook the World's Economy (2021). Naty and Maxx affirm Tooze’s characteristically thorough demonstration of the myriad ways that the world-wide response to the pandemic, however inadequate, dismantled the pillars of neoliberal governance. Yet they also critique the elitist complicity of Tooze’s methodological commitment to historical immanence and inevitability, tracing such impulses to back to John Maynard Keynes’ fatal dismissal of Abba Lerner’s proposal to do away with balanced budgets and revenue-constraints. For the Superstructure crew, by contrast, proceeding “in medias res,” as Tooze puts it, requires an abolitionist attunement to genuine conditions of injustice and possibility, from #Defund and ongoing labor strikes to contests over #MintTheCoin and the Green New Deal. During the conversation, wisecracks and burns abound, per usual. This one, too, is packed with citations, including loving shoutouts to David Stein, Jakob Feinig, Mariame Kaba, Dan Berger, Emily Hobson, Alex Yablon, Nathan Tankus, and Rohan Grey. Link to our Patreon: www.patreon.com/MoLsuperstructure Music: “Yum” from “This Would Be Funny If It Were Happening To Anyone But Me” EP by flirting. http://flirtingfullstop.bandcamp.com Twitter: @actualflirting

This Money on the Left/Superstructure episode is the eleventh premium release from Scott Ferguson's "Neoliberal Blockbuster" course for Patreon subscribers. Typically reserved for Patreon subscribers, this special two-part episode about Toy Story is available to the general public in full. For access to the rest of the course, subscribe to our Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/MoLsuperstructure. If you are interested in premium offerings but presently unable to afford a subscription, please send a direct message to @moneyontheleft or @Superstruc on Twitter & we will happily provide you with membership access. Course Description This course examines the neoliberal Blockbuster from the 1970s to the present. It focuses, in particular, on the social significance of the blockbuster's constitutive technologies: both those made visible in narratives and the off-screen tools that drive production and reception. Linking aesthetic shifts in American moving images to broader transformations in political economy, the course traces the historical transformation of screen action from the ethereal “dream factory” of pre-1960s cinema to the impact-driven “thrill ride” of the post-1970s blockbuster. In doing so, we attend to the blockbuster’s technological forms and study how they have variously contributed to social, economic, and political transformations over the past 40 years. We critically engage blockbusters as "reflexive allegories" of their own technosocial processes and pleasures. Above all, we think through the blockbuster's shifting relationship to monetary abstraction and the myriad additional abstractions monetary mediation entails. Blockbusters: 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968) Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975) Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977) RoboCop (Paul Verhoeven, 1987) Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995) Jurassic Park (Steven Spielberg, 1993) The Matrix (Wachowskis, 1999) Avengers: Infinity War (Joe & Anthony Russo, 2018)

CW: trauma, abuse Will Beaman draws on personal experiences to reflect on how the problematic reduction of “deradicalization” to dialogues between fascists and anti-fascists resembles other forms of emotional and relational abuse. When the imperatives of “coalition-building” require victims of right wing violence to double down on dialogues with hostile interlocutors, the supposedly public realm of ideas resembles an abusive household, in which leaving is not an option. After a cold open from Briahna Joy Gray’s recent interview with Talia Lavin on the “Bad Faith” podcast, Will suggests that distinctly non-carceral and non-“paid for” modes of institutional mediation are necessary for deradicalization to be something more than the emotional blackmail of victims via toxic social norms.

In this special episode, hosts Natalie Smith and @moltopopulare take on the austere sexual politics promulgated by cultural critic and commentator Elizabeth or “Liz” Bruenig. Mirroring the tacit zero-sum logics built into her spouse Matt Bruenig’s analyses of political economy, Liz regularly weaponizes social conservatism and conformity in cruel efforts to shore up a problematic vision of a proper social democratic populace. Natalie and Charlotte lay bare the sadistic violation of sexual freedom and identity that forms the core of Liz's project by examining a wide range of articles on topics such as queer celibacy, the politics of pornography, and 50 Shades of Gray. Link to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/MoLsuperstructure Music: “Yum” from “This Would Be Funny If It Were Happening To Anyone But Me” EP by flirting. http://flirtingfullstop.bandcamp.com Twitter: @actualflirting