Thanks for sharing! This model of thinking of the future as a graph of possible societal states, some more, others less likely, might be helpful. Especially for organizers and for strategic planning.

The model works with the Marxist conception of socialism as a transitional state to communism/anarchism.

I also like, that in this model, societal states are not distinguished by time, but by material conditions. In "weeks when decades happen" a society might go through several states and at other times be stuck in one for a long time.

Some challenges for / limitations I see for this model:

• distinguishing societies (geographicaly?, along production chains?)
• distinguishing states of societies (This is central and not easy. Of course the mode of production and Engels quantitative vs qualitative change would seem to fit, but changes will happen in an asynchronous way across time and space within a single society.)
• thereby also defining transitions better
• accounting for slow quantitative change before the qualitative happens (can simply be left out of this model)
• Analysis of (past) history (Your use of the word "history" fits mostly with a view to the future. Looking at the past, the graph model collapses to the linear model again, because all possibilities are either 100%, if they happened, or zero, if not. From the point of historic materialism as a dialectic method, one might insist on a non linear conception of history even applied to the past.)
• making the dialectic aspects of the graph model more explicit (e.g. with a conception of history as a chain of interlinking forces clashing again and again over contradictions instead of singular states)
• positioning the model within an existing body of historic materialist methods
• dealing with limited information and a multitude of historic narratives and points of view

This is not meant as critique. Every scientific model has limits within which it is applicable. No model needs to do everything. Knowing what it can do is what makes it's application scientific. I only wrote all this, because I really appreciate the idea as a helpful tool to think about things.

I wonder why US propaganda pushes hating on French people so much. Maybe, because they actually have some class consciousness and often do general strikes.

That's very cool of you!

Interesting. I wonder what the best pedagogy is for encouraging this kind of formalized exploration of the experienced incoherence. List flaws in propaganda narratives? Share some background facts about social structures? Point out material contradictions? Assist in analysis of class interests? Explain dialectical thinking? Explore how we got here with historic materialism? Give them space to share limit-situations and encourage limit-acts (like Paolo Freire)?

I didn't try all that, but what kind of worked for me in the context of Palestine is to give very good friends theory home work. But this needs a lot of good will from their side and they have to be leftish leaning all ready.

Yes to the first part about the book being old, but, respectfully, no to the second part.

As someone who is Cis-Het (like bell hooks) I wouldn't feel comfortable talking about trans/NB identities

I get the sentiment, but as someone with a privileged gender role, you have a special duty to use this privilege to spread awareness about the struggles of trans/NB/agender people. You have less backlash from reactionaries to fear if you do. You can do so as an ally and without assuming their perspectives.

Cis audiences not having thought about gender only means they have a need to hear about other perspectives all the more. Non-cis people having thought about it in a repressive society means they need affirmation.

Yes, absolutely. If anyone knows how to stay sane surrounded by libs, please tell me. Seriously, I'm very attuned to liberal bullshit around me and the dissonance and alienation is often just too much for me.

Also, of course these sides aren't equal, since one is the global hegemon. And even if they were equal, our foremost duty is to fight the imperialists at home, because those are the ones we even can fight. For Europe and US that means our primary enemy is NATO.

"The main enemy is at home!" - Karl Liebknecht

"During a reactionary war a revolutionary class cannot but desire the defeat of its government." - Lenin

This is also known as revolutionary defeatism. It's not just libs, even many leftists struggle with this. It's so easy and convenient to fall into the error of social chauvinism. And much better for your career and social standing. And if you're in an org you have much less repression to fear, if you betray our international comrades to national/imperialist interests.

Yes, I also subscribe to this theory. One piece analyst Artur published it a while ago.

I love RevLeftRadio. Notice, how Breht never claims, that adventurism or whatever is a viable strategy for us, but that capturing this moment for propaganda is a good opportunity. I appreciate, how he stresses, where the systemic violence actually is. That's of course the message we should push in face of bourgeoise moralizing. That and demarcating class lines based on material interests as revealed by reactions like those of the media.

The peoples reaction is also an important lesson for doomers or anyone who underestimates the revolutionary potential of the working class. Cause that revolutionary potential still lives and grows underneath all the brain washing. It is constantly being fed by the brutal material reality of the mode of production. No amount of ideology will ultimately be able to keep these material contradictions from surfacing and erupting more and more often in some form or other.

Do they offer that much for information on any murder? Or does it depend on your class? (rhetorical questions)

There is one right there?

Thanks for the writeup. I almost never watch videos because it takes more time and prefer to quickly look over text. Would really appreciate if more video posts were like this.

It sounds similar to [citation needed], which is often used on Wikipedia.

Defining masculinity not as something, but negatively as the opposite of feminity starts in childhood: In the stereotypical ideal of a patriarchal family, the father is absent and emotionally unavailable, the only immediately available role model for a boy would be his mother. But he learns early that to copy her is forbidden for him. So in absence of an example to follow, his role model becomes a negation: "not like mother". Disdain for feminity is a logical consequence.

Thanks, that was a great explanation! I really should read it then. I might not deserve all this credit though, because I already listened to some talks of Harvey on reading Marxs capital on YouTube. It wasn't in a geography context, but something still might have rubbed off. Still your kindness is really appreciated!

I'm wondering about something that's more a political/history question about the field: So I often hear about how geography was the first modern science. Apparently it fueld many advances in how science is organized, including in other fields. The first modern scientific institution is supposed to have been the royal geographic society in Britain. And many learned people at the time at least new some geology. For example the first science fiction writer Jules Vern packs his journey to the center of the earth full of geological lingo, that his intended readership was expected to understand or at least associate with a feeling of modernity and progress.

So I wondered what's special about geography and geology (why weren't engineering, physics, biology etc. first to get big). And I wonder if the following take sounds plausible: that it was important for colonialism and imperialism, but even before that and more significantly for the enclosure of the commons. Many land surveyors were needed for primitive accumulation.

If you want to take people's communally owned land, which there was a lot of, and divide it up and sell it, you need to be able to point on it on a map. So many surveyors needed to learn the trade and got send out to every last village, forest and field to steal people's land, which they needed to live. Of course, thereby at the same time providing the initial funding for capital and also creating a vast army of hungry and newly landless people migrating to the cities to become workers. And to teach the surveyors, you needed professors and institutions and state funding and all that. And this spilled over to newer fields of the natural sciences and replaced the centuries old focus on theology (and law) at the Universities.

And that's how geography helped to start both modern western science and capitalism. And that's why it was always intertwined with the capitalist hegemony from the beginning. And it still is, isn't it? Then again, there seem to be more Marxists among geographers then in other technical fields. I wonder why.

20 or one of the 38's

Thanks for the intuitive explanation of magnetic field lines, it's really cool! I also like this maybe less intuitive explanation of why the magnetic force even exists at all: it's just a relativistic effect. Relativity and the electric force acting on moving charges (contracted relative to stationary opposite charges) create an electro static effect that appears like a new force called the magnetic force.

Of course relativity works both ways and electricity can be understood as a variant of magnetism or both can be understood as a mixture of two forces and relativistic effects.

I felt inspired by chapter three to think about my own childhood. I could think of many little patriarchal "lessons". This is just a selection of tiny incidents. I left out any bullying or the soul crushing inability to talk about feelings with my parents.

• I was friends with two girls in kindergarden, but felt the expectation to only associate with boys in primary school.
• I remember in my (all gender) scout group, a group leader told me not to sit in a particular way, with my legs crossed, because that looked "gay". When asked why she sat in the same way she explained, that as a woman, she was allowed to.
• I remember boys worrying allot about having a "men's bicycle" instead of a "lady's bicycle"
• I remember, how my brother and I had found a doll somewhere and that we later overheard my mother explaining to a friend, that she didn't mind her sons playing with dolls even though they were actually for girls. It sounded like a big deal to us and the new toy was soon discarded.

I totally agree with the highlighting of important parts. Maybe looking inwards and asking how we have first learned patriarchy as children can help to unlearn it. Also, in my experience, talking about my feelings with male socialized people encourages them to open up about theirs as well

About "imperialist white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy: maybe understanding it better might help. In her book "Caliban and the Witch", Silvia Federici explains the origins of patriarchy as a form of primitive accumulation, that helped kick-starting capitalism. I only read one chapter in the middle though, it's still on my list.

If Marx was alive today he would finish capital 2 and 3 and write part 4 on the history of economics like he always planned to do. Then, if he had a third lifetime, he would start on the rest of the many projects outlined in his "Grundrisse". He would finish them in his fourth lifetime and then in his fifth lifetime start to condense everything down into something more readable and put it into modern context. He would finish the project on economic theory in his sixth lifetime.