This Is Hell!
This Is Hell!
Manufacturing Dissent since 1996
Episodes
Mentioned books

May 4, 2022 • 1h 3min
STAFF PICKS: Feminism Beyond Capitalism / Jessa Crispin
Writer Jessa Crispin rejects today's mainstreamed, neoliberal feminism, and calls for a return to feminism's radical promise: as a sharp-edged, outsider's social critique, as a challenge to the supremacy of capitalism, and as a path towards a radically reorganized society.
https://www.mhpbooks.com/books/why-i-am-not-a-feminist/
https://abortionfunds.org/funds/

May 3, 2022 • 49min
STAFF PICKS: Producing Art and Resistance under Capitalism / Boots Riley
Producer Dan presents a 2018 interview Chuck conducted with the amazing multi talented artist Boots Riley prompted by the release of his movie "Sorry to Bother You."
Also due to the current news surrounding the United States Supreme Court's impending overturning of Roe v. Wade and the coming outlawing of abortions, here is a link to the National Abortion Fund where you can find a local fund to contribute to.
https://abortionfunds.org/about/abortion-funds-101/

May 2, 2022 • 55min
STAFF PICKS: Asad Haider / Beyond identity politics.
Asad Haider, a writer and founding editor of Viewpoint Magazine, delves into the complexities of identity politics. He explains how modern identity politics simplifies oppression and detracts from broader coalitional efforts, tracing its fragmentation back to neoliberalism. Haider critiques how political movements like Black Lives Matter have been co-opted, focusing on elite diversity instead of structural change. He advocates for a return to the radical roots of identity politics, emphasizing the need to unify race and class struggles for genuine liberation.

Apr 28, 2022 • 1h 22min
STAFF PICKS: Cedric Johnson / Race, Class, and the Policing of Inequality
Political scientist Cedric Johnson examines the collisions of race, class, policing and activism in the wake of George Floyd's murder, and explains why the Democratic Party and capital threaten to co-opt and re-direct the protest movement's energy unless it commits to a politics of redistribution and power for the working class.
https://nonsite.org/the-triumph-of-black-lives-matter-and-neoliberal-redemption/

Apr 27, 2022 • 1h 4min
STAFF PICKS: James Doucet Battle / The Biopolitics of Sugar
Anthropologist James Doucet-Battle on sugar, diabetes, racialized science and his book "Sweetness in the Blood: Race, Risk, and Type 2 Diabetes" from University of Minnesota Press.
https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/sweetness-in-the-blood

Apr 26, 2022 • 1h 42min
STAFF PICKS: David Graeber / Bureaucracy and Bullshit Jobs
Dan replays two interviews Chuck did with the late, great David Graeber, the first about his book on bureaucracy "The Utopia of Rules," the second on the book "Bullshit Jobs."
https://www.mhpbooks.com/books/the-utopia-of-rules/
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Bullshit-Jobs/David-Graeber/9781501143335

Apr 25, 2022 • 1h 5min
STAFF PICKS: Panashe Chigumadzi / Black humanity, Black worldlessness
Alex replays Chuck's Oct 2021 conversation with writer Panashe Chigumadzi on her article "The Cry of Black Worldlessness" for Africa Is A Country.
https://africasacountry.com/2021/10/the-cry-of-black-worldlessness

Apr 21, 2022 • 1h 3min
STAFF PICKS: The Power of Pleasure Activism / Adrienne Maree Brown
Writer adrienne maree brown explores the radical, liberatory potential of pleasure - to reclaim the self from the bounds of oppression, to restore our relationships with other people and the planet, and to imagine (and inhabit) the future worlds we hope to win with our activism.
adrienne is author of the book Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good from AK Press.
https://www.akpress.org/pleasure-activism.html

Apr 20, 2022 • 55min
STAFF PICKS: Sarah Ihmoud / Sheikh Jarrah and Beyond
Anthropologist Sarah Ihmoud on the dynamics of colonialist violence and domination against indigenous people in Palestine and across the globe, connecting those struggles across borders, and her article Sheikh Jarrah: The Question Before Us for Jadaliyya.
https://www.jadaliyya.com/Details/42757/Sheikh-Jarrah-The-Question-Before-Us

Apr 19, 2022 • 1h 19min
STAFF PICKS: Ed Sutton & Natasha Lennard / Fascism - Where it comes from, and how to counter it
In another This is Limbo! episode, producer Sebastian muses about what drives fascism and presents two interviews, one with Antidote writer Ed Sutton and one with political analyst Natasha Lennard who both mused on these very questions themselves.


