Cosmopod

Annie and Matthew sit down with Foroogh, Niloo, and Ida from the Slingers Collective, an Iranian leftist media project, to discuss the ongoing protest wave in response to the killing of Mahsa Amini. The conversation covers the history of the imposition hijab in the Islamic Republic and the position of women in Iranian society, including how this varies by class and ethnic background, the status and history of peripheral areas and ethnic minorities in Iran, the state of the Iranian Left and workers’ movement, and the accelerating pace of social protest and revolt in the country. Resources: @Slingerscollect1 on twitter http://slingerscollective.net/ Blackfishvoice: https://instagram.com/blackfishvoice__ Sarkhatism: https://instagram.com/sarkhatism T.me/SarKhatism Collective98: https://instagram.com/collectif98 T.me/Collective98 Collective interview: https://crimethinc.com/2022/09/28/revolt-in-iran-the-feminist-resurrection-and-the-beginning-of-the-end-for-the-regime @Feminists4Jina https://instagram.com/feminists4jina

James, Matthew and Rudy join for a followup on From Paris to Petrograd: State and Revolution in Practice to discuss how the ideas of the party, the masses and democracy changes from Lenin's State and Revolution to the proclamation of the Shanghai Commune during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. We start off talking about Lenin's attitude towards the problem of specialists in the RSFSR, how this was solved by Stalin by strengthening the Party, and how Mao made an immanent critique of Stalin's solution. We then detail the process leading up to the formation of the Shanghai commune, outline the main actors involved and discuss what was unique in Shanghai with respect to other cities in this period. We finish talking about the aftermath of the commune and compare different readings on the GPCR and the Shanghai commune. References: N. Hunter - Shanghai Journal: An Eyewitness Account of the Cultural Revolution E. Perry, L. Xun - Proletarian Power: Shanghai in the Cultural Revolution A. Russo - Revolutionary Culture and Cultural Revolution H. C. Topper - From the commune to the cultural revolution: A discussion of party leadership and democracy in Lenin and Mao Y. Wu - The Cultural Revolution at the Margins: Chinese Socialism in Crisis

Doug Enaa Greene argues that in Trotsky’s work a theory of cultural revolution can be found, one which differs from Mao Zedong’s that was developed in the context of the Russian Revolution and its struggle against bureaucracy.  Narrated by: Will Intro Music: ворожное озеро Гроза vwqp remix Outro Music: We are Friends Forever performed by Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment.

Eric, Rob and Rudy join for the second part of the Afghanistan podcast, which covers the start of the Afghan civil war, the birth of the Taliban and their takeover of the country, 9/11 and the US Invasion, the period of the occupation government and the Taliban resurgence and return. We discuss the origins of the Taliban, and what has made them popular throughout the decades, what the US occupation government meant to the Afghan people, the differences between the first and second Emirates, the enigmatic figure of Mullah Omar, as well as the Taliban-Bin Laden relationships. We conclude with thoughts on what can we learn from this whole period, including thoughts on the topics of stageism and ethnicity. References: Betty Dam - Looking for the Enemy: Mullah Omar and the Unknown Taliban Antonio Giustozzi - The Islamic State in Khorasan Anand Gopal - No Good Men Among The Living: America, the Taliban and the War through Afghan Eyes; The Other Afghan Women Alex van Linschoten, Felix Kuehn - An Enemy We Created: The Myth of the Taliban-Al Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan, 1970-2010

Stani Bjegunac takes a look at different approaches to the national question by historical communists and how we may approach issues of national oppression in a 21st-century context.   Narrated by: Allan Lanterman Allen Lanterman   Intro Music: ворожное озеро Гроза vwqp remix Outro Music: We are Friends Forever performed by Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment.

Rudy joins Darko Suvin, author of many books and pieces on science-fiction and also, an Splendour, Missery and Possibilities: An X-Ray of Socialist Yugoslavia for a discussion on his life-long work. We talk about the role of science fiction in socialist politics, Bertolt Brecht and the estrangement effect, and what emancipation means. We also talk about his life in Yugoslavia, and what he saw as positive and negative from the Yugoslav experience, and what were ultimately the hurdles that prevented Yugoslavia from achieving full emancipation.

Revolution won’t follow a neat and clean schema, fitting easily into one stage or another, argues Tom Frome. Instead, revolution will be a long process, a process that cannot always be categorized with preconceived definitions. The ideal of revolutionary vision never fully survives contact with the messy and unpredictable realities of political change. Narrated by: Riley Intro Music: ворожное озеро Гроза vwqp remix Outro Music: We are Friends Forever performed by Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment.

Rudy joins Esme and Lizette, from the LA Tenants Union for an introductory discussion on language justice. We discuss what language justice and linguicism are and what kind of barriers people face, before discussing the ways the LATU tries to bridge these barriers through their language justice work. We talk about interpretation, how it can be categorized as a service, how to adequately relate to bilingual members in organizing and why they can often feel alienated or burnt out. We finish by discussing where to start with language justice in an organization that has no prior experience with it. Links / Resources mentioned: Antena Aire's Language Justice Resources Language Justice Curriculum at the Center for Participatory Change Simultaneous Interpretation Drives the LA Tenants' Movement

Donald Parkinson sits down with Mike Taber, editor of 'Under the Socialist Banner', a collection of resolutions from the Congresses of the Second International's revolutionary period (1889-1912). Donald and Taber go through the various Congresses and discuss their approaches to a variety of issues such as imperialism, the general strike, immigration, women's emancipation, colonialism, and cooperatives. Struggles between reformists and revolutionaries, militarists and militarists, orthodox Marxists and revisionists would culminate in the collapse of the International with the outbreak of World War One. Taber and Parkinson discuss these struggles and the overall strengths and weaknesses of the Second International.

Amelia Davenport and Renato Flores argue that social media cannot be ignored despite its negative effects on modern culture. Instead, the left needs its own approach to social media that takes into account the values encoded into tech platforms. Narrated by: Allen Lanterman Intro Music: ворожное озеро Гроза vwqp remix Outro Music: We are Friends Forever performed by Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment.