Red Medicine

Richard Seymour analyses the global far-right, asking how movements across the world have managed to capitalize on the resentment produced by the capitalist system to generate a form of violent rebellion that leaves that same system fully in-tact. Richard Seymour is a writer and broadcaster from Northern Ireland and the author of numerous books about politics including Corbyn: The Strange Rebirth of Radical Politics and The Twittering Machine. His writing appears in the The New York Times, the London Review of Books, the Guardian, Prospect, Jacobin, and innumerable other places including his own Patreon. He is an editor at Salvage magazine. His most recent book Disaster Nationalism: The Downfall of Liberal Civilization,  publishes this month with Verso Books. SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Sasha Warren explores the history of psychiatry in relationship to the development of capitalism. We discuss how best to frame the different movements that have emerged with the intention of transforming or abolishing psychiatry. We then spend some time talking about figures such as Foucault, Fanon, and R. D Laing that may be familiar to listeners as well as some lesser-known figures such as Sylvia Marcos, and Marie Langer.  Sasha Warren is a writer based in Minneapolis publishing work on madness, psychiatry, and the history of medicine. His first book Storming Bedlam: Madness, Utopia, Revolt published earlier this year.  SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

This episode features a recording of live discussion with Richard Seymour and Helen Charman about the medical imaginaries of the far right. This recording is from illness (3), the third in the event series that runs alongside the podcast. We discuss why the far-right has so many paranoid fantasies about medicine, from race science and eugenics, to attacks on trans and reproductive healthcare. Helen Charman is a Fellow and College Teaching Officer in English at Clare College, University of Cambridge. Her critical writing has been published in the Guardian, The White Review, Another Gaze, and The Stinging Fly among others. As a poet, Charman was shortlisted for the White Review Poet's Prize in 2017 and for the 2019 Ivan Juritz Prize for Creative Experiment, and has published four poetry pamphlets, most recently In the Pleasure Dairy. Charman volunteers as a birth companion in Glasgow. Her first book Mother State: A Political History of Motherhood is now available. Richard Seymour is a writer and broadcaster from Northern Ireland and the author of numerous books about politics including Corbyn: The Strange Rebirth of Radical Politics and The Twittering Machine. His writing appears in the The New York Times, the London Review of Books, the Guardian, Prospect, Jacobin, and innumerable other places including his own Patreon. He is an editor at Salvage magazine. His most recent book Disaster Nationalism: The Downfall of Liberal Civilization is now available.   SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Dayna Tortorici, co-editor of n+1 magazine, and Lisa Borst, also a co-editor, dive into their new anthology, The Intellectual Situation. They reflect on the anthology’s diverse essays from 2004-2024, exploring how writing captures the essence of recent political struggles. The duo discusses the emotional weight of narratives during pivotal moments, like the pandemic and social movements. They emphasize the intertwining of personal stories and activism, shedding light on the future of intellectual spaces and the importance of uplifting emerging voices.

Melinda Cooper, a Professor in Sociology at the Australian National University, dives into the complex dance of austerity and extravagance shaping neoliberal monetary policy. She illuminates how the crises of the 1970s birthed a counterrevolution against Keynesian economics, affecting wealth distribution and public finance. Discussing the regressive nature of capital gains tax cuts, she critiques their benefits for the wealthy. The conversation also touches on how reproductive rights debates reflect changing social dynamics amidst these ideological shifts.

Leah Cowan explains the long and complex relationship between British feminism and British policing. From women's suffrage, through the Women's Liberation movement of the 1970s, to recent conflicts over the murder of Sarah Everard by a London Metropolitan Police officer.   Leah Cowan is a writer, editor and previously the political editor of Gal-dem magazine. She is the author of two books Border Nation: A Story of Migration (Pluto Books, 2021) and Why Would Feminists Trust the Police? (Verso Books, 2024) Some of My Best Enemies are Feminists: On Zionist Feminism by Sophie Lewis (https://salvage.zone/some-of-my-best-enemies-are-feminists-on-zionist-feminism/) SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/ SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Ruth Pearce explains the many problems surrounding the recently published Cass Review into trans healthcare for young people. Ruth Pearce is a Lecturer in Community Development at the University of Glasgow and a researcher specializing in trans healthcare. She has edited two books (The Emergence of Trans and TERF Wars) as well as special issues of the International Journal of Transgender Health (Fertility, reproduction and body autonomy) and Sexualities (Trans Genealogies). She is also the author of Understanding Trans Health. SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/ SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Michael Hardt analyses the revolutionary political movements of the 1970s and what they might teach us about political struggle, social transformation, and liberation. Michael Hardt teaches political theory in the Literature Program at Duke University. He is co-author, with Antonio Negri, of the Empire trilogy and, most recently, Assembly. He is co-director with Sandro Mezzadra of The Social Movements Lab. His most recent book is The Subversive Seventies (Oxford University Press.)  SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/

Hannah Proctor, a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow and author of "Burnout: The Emotional Experience of Political Defeat," dives into the emotional intricacies of political struggles. She discusses how personal feelings intertwine with political movements, especially after significant defeats. Proctor reflects on women's transformative experiences during the miners' strike and explores the dynamics of self-criticism within revolutionary contexts. The conversation also emphasizes the duality of hope and despair in activism, advocating for dialogue as a path to social change.

Nick Bano explains how landlords and the state collaborate to produce the housing crisis, generating harm and violence in the process of wealth accumulation. Nick Bano is an author and Barrister who specializes in representing homeless people, residential occupiers, and destitute and migrant households. He has written for Tribune, the New Socialist, and Jacobin. He is the author of Against Landlords: How to Solve the Housing Crisis.  SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/ SUPPORT: www.buymeacoffee.com/redmedicineSoundtrack by Mark PilkingtonTwitter: @red_medicine__www.redmedicine.substack.com/