New Discourses

The Birth of Identity Marxism as Critical Theory‘s New Proletariat

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 49
Critical Theory evolved out of a pathological hatred. This hatred isn't just what you expect. Yes, the Critical Theorists hated capitalism, like all Marxists, but they hated something new about capitalism compared against their predecessors. They hated that capitalism works. Critical Theory, the tool of neo-Marxism, therefore grew out of the pathological hatred of the fact that "advanced capitalism," as they call it, which is protected against monopoly abuses, allows the working class to "build a better life." Having a good life, you see, stabilizes them. It takes away their revolutionary will. It makes them love their society and want to maintain it. It, in their view, turns them conservative, and this is intolerable. Prosperous, functioning societies became the target of their bid for cultural revolution in the 1960s. To execute this revolution, though, they needed a new base for revolutionary energy, a new proletariat to awaken to Marxian revolutionary anger. Herbert Marcuse, architect of the New Left, found that new proletariat in identity politics, laying the ground in which the Woke Identity Marxism of today would eventually take root. Join James Lindsay in this episode of the New Discourses Podcast to hear it straight from the sources and to understand more about how we got to where we are today.
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

Herbert Marcuse and the Catastrophe of Solidarity

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 48
Liberation Series, Part 4 of 4
We live in Herbert Marcuse's world. In a previous series on the New Discourses Podcast, James Lindsay made that clearer than ever by reading through all of Marcuse's 1965 essay "Repressive Tolerance" (https://www.marcuse.org/herbert/publications/1960s/1965-repressive-tolerance-fulltext.html), which served as a basis for the strong double standard enjoyed by radical Leftism today (check out the first part in that series here: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/01/how-not-to-resolve-the-paradox-of-tolerance/). In this episode, Lindsay wraps up his four-part series reading through another of Marcuse's frightening essays, "An Essay on Liberation." This fourth and final part of "An Essay on Liberation" (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/1969/essay-liberation.htm) focuses on the role of "solidarity" as the glue meant to hold together his new coalition for liberation, outlined in the first three parts of the essay. Understanding the works of Herbert Marcuse has never been more important.
In this episode, join James as he reads through the final (shortest) part of this essay and connects it to the features of today's clownish world, from Antifa and other radical activism to divisive identity politics to stakeholder capitalism and sustainability metrics. Learn what Marcuse envisioned for his New Left to bring into the world and how it has finally, after fifty years, begun to come to pass. Also, don't miss the other parts in this four-part series on this important and chilling essay: Part 1 (A Biological Foundation for Socialism: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/06/biological-foundation-socialism/), Part 2 (A New Sensibility: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/07/herbert-marcuses-new-sensibility/), and Part 3 (Subverting Forces in Transition: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/08/marcuses-subverting-forces-in-transition/).
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

The Only Thing That Isn‘t Systemically Racist

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 47
Systemic racism is said by Critical Race Theorists "ordinary, not aberrational—'normal science,' the usual way society does business, the common, everyday experience of most people of color in this country." As such, virtually everything is systemically racist, from schools to the SAT to businesses to every policy they can think of to teachers to hobbies like walking, hiking, and being outside to books to birds, fish, and even rocks. Everything is systemically racist. Except one thing, we have now learned: vaccine passports. Despite the fact that vaccine passports, if implemented, will meet the Critical Race Theory definition of racist policy (which Ibram Kendi says is abominable and should be unconstitutional), this fact is not being trumpeted by Critical Race Theorists anywhere. In fact, those who have spoken publicly on the issue, like Nikole Hannah-Jones, have applauded the vax passes. Not only that, but Twitter is locking people out of their accounts and suspending people for sharing satirical memes pointing this fact out. Join James Lindsay in this episode of the New Discourses Podcast for a short discussion of this phenomenon and what it means. (Nota bene: It has come to our attention since the recording of this episode that the eviction moratorium is also strongly systemically racist by the Critical Race Theory definition and yet supported by the Leftist Regime, so there are at least two things that are not, in fact, systemically racist. Three if you count the destruction of black and Latino neighborhoods and black- and Latino-owned small businesses in the wake of the so-called "Black Lives Matter" riots of 2020. Official word is that there is no pattern whatsoever to the strange exemptions from the list of what is systemically racist.)
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

Marcuse‘s Subverting Forces in Transition

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 46
Liberation Series, Part 3 of 4
The more one reads of Herbert Marcuse, the father of the New Left, the less there is to recommend his ideas and more there is to recommend learning about them. This is because thanks to the New Left that he spawned, we live in Herbert Marcuse's twisted world, which may now be in the early stages of collapse. This episode of the New Discourses Podcast features James Lindsay taking us through the third part in Marcuse's infamous 1969 essay, "An Essay on Liberation" (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/1969/essay-liberation.htm). In this part of the essay, Marcuse makes an argument for forging an alliance movement between the bourgeois Leftists students and intelligentsia in the universities and the minority and "ghetto" populations that were, at the time in their militancy movements, showing the necessary energy for revolution. Hear him make the case for the ends justifying the means for Leftist revolutionary movements among other shockers (spoiler: he indicates that his New Left movement should be driven by a refusal to grow up and get a job, for example, because attacking functioning, prosperous, free societies is a moral duty, including by refusing to participate). He even explicitly compares his own movement to what we now call "Clownworld."
This episode of the New Discourses podcast is part three in a four-part series that reads through "An Essay on Liberation."
Part 1: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/06/biological-foundation-socialism/
Part 2: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/07/herbert-marcuses-new-sensibility/
Join James for the whole series as well as his four-part series on Marcuse's "Repressive Tolerance" (1965), starting here: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/01/how-not-to-resolve-the-paradox-of-tolerance/
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

How to Make a Critical Theory Out of Anything

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 45
Critical Theories are almost embarrassingly simple. There's almost nothing to them. A Critical Theory of anything can easily be made by one of two routes. One: Take an existing Critical Theory of something, substitute the domain-specific jargon of some other thing, and then publish. You're a genius revolutionizing (pun intended) your field! Two: Just understand the basic anatomy of a Critical Theory and do the same thing. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, James Lindsay walks you through the idea of a "Critical Car Theory" that challenges "carnormativity" to show you exactly how. It's simple. Choose something imperfect in the world that you'd like to complain about. Identify a politically actionable outcome you hope to achieve, probably a Leftist one. Blame everyone for incidences of the problem by thinking "systemically" and assign them moral complicity and responsibility for the problem you started with. Demand systemic change. Then close off all disagreement or questioning as an attempt to maintain the "status quo" of "the system," which only an evil person who wants those problems to continue would do. That's it. That's the anatomy of a Critical Theory. Join James in this episode to hear how ridiculously simple and absurd it is so you can protect yourself from Critical Theories in other lines of thought.
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

Herbert Marcuse‘s ”New Sensibility”

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 44
Liberation Series, Part 2 of 4
Herbert Marcuse is one of the most influential Leftist thinkers of the 1950s and 1960s, and for that reason he is often regarded as the father of the "New Left," which is reaching something of a crescendo in the Woke Movement of today. His goal was straightforward: liberation. In 1969, he wrote an influential essay (or short book) called "An Essay on Liberation" in which he explains what liberation looks like and how we should achieve it. So that you can better understand the moment we find ourselves in, James Lindsay has been reading "An Essay on Liberation" (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/1969/essay-liberation.htm) for the New Discourses Podcast in full, with his explanation and commentary. This is the second part of that series, reading through part two of Marcuse's infamous essay, "A New Sensibility."
In the first part of the essay, Marcuse lays out a case that we need to change mankind at the "biological" (meaning, it seems, mostly psychological and instinctual) level to make way for a liberated socialism. In this part of the essay, Marcuse explains that man will need to develop a "new sensibility" and even a "new rationality" (Critical Consciousness) in order to break the cycle of repression that he believes characterizes free, liberal societies (i.e., those that aren't Communism). His argument is that what people consider "sensible" constrains and represses their imagination, so a new (liberated, read: communistic) "sensibility" is needed and must replace the old sensibility. Then we will understand how sensibility and reason constrain and repress us and prevent previous (Communist and French) revolutions from succeeding at producing true liberation. It's a truly shocking piece of work, and it is obvious upon understanding it that its general thrust defines the ethos of radical Leftism today in the Critical Social Justice movements that have derived from it.
Part 1 of this series, "A Biological Foundation for Socialism?", can be found here: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/06/biological-foundation-socialism/
Another series on Marcuse's work, featuring his essay "Repressive Tolerance," begins here: https://newdiscourses.com/2021/01/how-not-to-resolve-the-paradox-of-tolerance/
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

Critical Race Praxis and the Weakness of Liberals

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 43
What's happening in our schools? It's obvious to everyone that Critical Race Theory (and the other Theories of Critical Social Justice) have been incorporated into them at virtually every level and in most subjects all across the nation, but the line is that "Critical Race Theory isn't being taught in our schools." To unpack this lie, we have to understand that Critical Theories require praxis, so while the formal and narrow theory of Critical Race Theory may not be being taught in specific, Critical Race Praxis (CRaP) is throughout our schools. It was brought in by Critical Pedagogy, which is the application of Critical Theory to education, which also requires the implementation of Theory, which is known as "praxis." Once you understand this, it's far easier to understand one of the big reasons that (classical) liberals are so ineffective at fighting back against Critical Theories and other forms of Critical Philosophy: it's because they think the argument is about ideas rather than implementation. Praxis is the religious duty of Critical Theorists, and they can keep liberals busy arguing about whether or not the Theory should be taught or banned or not taught or not banned or its details or whatever other thing that doesn't matter while they still go forward applying Theory via praxis in whatever setting. In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, James Lindsay breaks down the distinction and intrinsic relationship between Critical Theory and Critical Praxis and thus why almost the entire discussion of what to do about this problem coming from liberal quarters misses the point and remains ineffective. Join him here to learn where the target is and how to fight this pernicious ideology more effectively.
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

The Woke Manipulation of Democracy

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 42
Many of you will already be very familiar with the fact that the Woke manipulate language, often by meaning more than one thing by a term. One meaning will be quite milquetoast; the other quite radical. Much of Woke activism works by equivocating between these two meanings in a strategic way: boring everyday meanings to gain access and win arguments; specialized meanings to do their activism once they have the power. Among the words that the Woke have strategically manipulated in an important way is democracy. Of course, in nations like the United States and the other contemporary parliamentary democracies, we use democracy to enable republics, to which the Woke are generally strongly opposed. This isn't the only reason for their incessant push for "democracy," though, which is only comprehensible when you understand the relationship between equity (or communism) and democracy. To the Woke, if anyone or any group has any more power, money, or privilege than anyone else (as they see it), there is no equality, thus democracy is skewed. That is, for them, democracy presupposes equity (or communism). In this episode of the New Discourses Podcast, James Lindsay walks you through more pieces of the Woke, neo-Marxist, and Marxist literature to make the case that when the Woke are calling for "democracy," they mean something that demands a very radical agenda along with it.
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-…es/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

Why Critical Race Theory Is Un-American | OnlySubs with James Lindsay, Ep. 49

This episode of the OnlySubs Podcast with James Lindsay is available for FREE to everyone! To get access to all past and future episodes, consider becoming a contributor. Learn more by clicking here: https://newdiscourses.com/2020/12/announcing-new-subscribers-only-podcast-james-lindsay/
Critical Race Theory tries to bill itself as the continuation of the Civil Rights Movement, which was a true achievement of the American Experiment, but is it? Of course it's not (https://newdiscourses.com/2021/02/no-critical-race-theory-does-not-continue-the-civil-rights-movement/). To understand more about this, in this episode of my subscribers-only podcast, James Lindsay OnlySubs, I go through the first paragraph of Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic's Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (https://amzn.to/3zVLOOW) line by line and make it completely clear that Critical Race Theory rejects everything about America while mostly misrepresenting itself. Join me as I take a deep-dive into just what Critical Race Theory sees itself as rejecting.
-James Lindsay
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
https://newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
https://newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-discourses/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.

A Biological Foundation for Socialism?

The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 41
The Critical Theorist and neo-Marxist Herbert Marcuse was one of the most influential radical Leftist thinkers of the 20th century, and this fact is evident throughout his writing. The depth of his radicalism can be seen quite clearly in several of his essays, including his 1965 "Repressive Tolerance" (https://www.marcuse.org/herbert/publications/1960s/1965-repressive-tolerance-fulltext.html), which has been featured on the New Discourses Podcast before in a four-part series (https://newdiscourses.com/2021/01/how-not-to-resolve-the-paradox-of-tolerance/). It may stand out even more prominently in "An Essay on Liberation" (https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/marcuse/works/1969/essay-liberation.htm), written in 1969. In this longer essay, Marcuse lays out what he believes liberation requires, especially at the level of what he refers to as preconditions for that utopian possibility. In this four-part series, James Lindsay presents "An Essay on Liberation" with his commentary. In this first part of the series, he reads through the introduction to the essay and its first of four parts, "A Biological Foundation for Socialism?", in which Marcuse makes the case that to achieve a liberated utopia, man will have to be changed at the level of his fundamental needs, his instincts, and his biology, and that this can be accomplished by making him live in a society that "introjects" a new critical morality into him. It's a truly alarming piece of work, and the resonances of it can definitely be felt today. Join James as he begins to explore this essay by Marcuse on the New Discourses Podcast.
Support New Discourses:
paypal.me/newdiscourses
newdiscourses.locals.com/support
patreon.com/newdiscourses
subscribestar.com/newdiscourses
youtube.com/channel/UC9K5PLkj0N_b9JTPdSRwPkg/join
Website:
https://newdiscourses.com
Follow:
facebook.com/newdiscourses
twitter.com/NewDiscourses
instagram.com/newdiscourses
https://newdiscourses.locals.com
pinterest.com/newdiscourses
linkedin.com/company/newdiscourses
minds.com/newdiscourses
reddit.com/r/NewDiscourses
Podcast:
@newdiscourses
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/new-discourses/id1499880546
bit.ly/NDGooglePodcasts
open.spotify.com/show/0HfzDaXI5L4LnJQStFWgZp
stitcher.com/podcast/new-discourses
© 2021 New Discourses. All rights reserved.