Diet Soap - a podcast

 In this episode of Diet Soap, the author and youtube star Ben Burgis joins Douglas Lain to discuss the impasse that the left faces today. Has the left been absorbed by the democratic party for good? Can the left figure out how to intervene and stop an existential catastrophe in Ukraine? Is there any prospect for an independent and radical socialist movement after COVID? 

Jensen Suther is the author of "Spirit Disfigured," and in this episode of Diet Soap Suther explains why Adorno developed "negative dialectics" after the German revolution failed in 1918. Suther also discusses Adorno's understanding of Schoenberg and of Samuel Beckett. 

 Since 2016 Christopher Lasch's books and reputation have both reemerged as relevant in an era when the left has been subsumed under the banner of the democratic party. Specifically, Lasch has been taken up as a figure who can refute the PMC approach to overcoming racism and woke politics, but he has mostly been taken up by the right or by the "post-left." In this interview, Elijah Emery and Douglas Lain discuss what Lasch has to offer socialists and the struggle for socialism. 

Todd McGowan, author of Enjoyment Right & Left and Emancipation After Hegel discusses the difference between Pinkard and Zizek and the question of Hegel's ontological claims in this week's Diet Soap podcast. McGowan also discusses the question of universality and the State in this week's patron's only podcast. 

 Ben Tarnoff, a tech writer and co-founder of Logic Magazine joins Douglas Lain to discuss Tarnoff's book "Internet for the People."  From the back of the book:  "In Internet for the People, leading tech writer Ben Tarnoff offers an answer. The internet is broken, he argues, because it is owned by private firms and run for profit. Google annihilates your privacy and Facebook amplifies right-wing propaganda because it is profitable to do so. But the internet wasn't always like this—it had to be remade for the purposes of profit maximization, through a years-long process of privatization that turned a small research network into a powerhouse of global capitalism. Tarnoff tells the story of the privatization that made the modern internet, and which set in motion the crises that consume it today."  Support Us on Patreonhttps://patreon.com/dietsoap 

Tom Bunyard is a university lecturer at Brighton in the UK. He is the author of the book "Debord, Time and Spectacle," a book from Brill, and he nicely agreed to talk to me about Debord, Time, and chapter four of Society of the Spectacle last week. This conversation came before I finished the script for the Critical Cuts video "Did Marx Ruin Marxism?" It helped to inform the creation of that script.Debord Time and Spectacle by Tom Bunyardhttps://brill.com/view/title/21353Did Marx Ruin Marxism? (Critical Cuts video)https://youtu.be/VQZXD4ySy5wSupport Us on Patreonhttps://patreon.com/dietsoap

Slavoj Zizek and Terry Pinkard join Douglas Lain to discuss Hegel's Spirit or Geist. Is Hegel a philosopher that returns us to metaphysics or did Hegel continue Kant's Copernican turn? Further, must we overcome all metaphysical claims, even negative claims?

Ryan and Lavit discuss San Francisco's new Compassionate Alternative Response Team program and ask whether it's possible that the "unhoused population" in San Francisco will truly benefit from a program that does not spend more to address the material needs of the homeless but instead attempts to change the attitude and social framing around the care that is currently on offer. Can treating homeless people as if they are "worthy of life and dignity" and relying on "trauma-informed, unarmed civilians" to provide help rather than "institutions of control" really improve conditions for the homeless in San Francisco, or is this "new" program just a rebranding effort for a project of neoliberal neglect? 

Former president of the Platypus Affiliated Society discusses his recent publications in Compact and Sublation Magazine. On July 1st Compact published "The End of Millennial Marxism" and we at Sublation published "Dogmatization and Thought Taboos on the “Left.” Cutrone attempts to discuss both of these essays while Doug persists in demanding Cutrone explain Marxism in terms of commodity production, exploitation, and value.The End of Millennial Marxism by Chris Cutronehttps://compactmag.com/article/the-end-of-millennial-marxismDogmatization and Thought Taboos on the “Left” by Chris Cutronehttps://www.sublationmag.com/post/dogmatization-and-thought-taboos-on-the-left

Spencer Leonard and Douglas Lain discuss the history of sedition laws and the way the January 6th insurrection may represent a regression away from democracy. Do the people or masses have a right to change their form of government? Support Us on Patreonhttps://patreon.com/dietsoap