February 2012
29 posts
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“When I speak, I express the universal, and when I do not [speak], no one can...”
– a deluge of Kierkegaard quotes but this one is great since it totally prefigures Wittgenstein
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“[Intellectuals’] lifework is to judge the great. Such conduct in respect...”
– more from Fear and Trembling.
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“Any serious thinker will seek rejuvenation in the eternal youth of the Greeks....”
– Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling
a good life motto
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“But art is in any case not a relation to a thing, it is a relation between men,...”
– Christopher Caudwell, The Concept of Freedom
Allegedly the passage, acc. Kyle Gann, that convinced Cornelius Cardew to become a Marxist-Leninist. I greatly admire Cardew and will hopefully eventually do a radio special on him, but, despite being (as a couple of my friends and I like to say)...
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In a Silent Way is such a meffin phenomenal record. I’m all for the Feldmanian ‘abstract expressionism’ mode of music, and I like a lot of free improv/free jazz that is very much not in line with any particular mood or theme — just this whole ‘pure blocks of sound that the listener can interpret’ thing — but it’s pretty amazing at how specific of a...
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“Looked at one way – in the manner of Joan Didion, for example, in her harsh,...”
– Novelist Jenny Turner
This. This so hard. Read the whole essay. GA Cohen called his brand of Marxism ‘no-bullshit Marxism’ and as much as I sometimes disagree with his take, I like the idea and ethos. No-bullshit [insert any/every worthwhile political philosophy here.]
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Hopelessly Romantic Cynic: femmesandfamily:... →
femmesandfamily:
theweightofemptiness:
Femmes and Family: On the Fuck Modesty Campaign
whenyrlivinginafascistdream:
femmesandfamily:
It is the Fuck Modesty campaign. Not the Fuck people who are modest campaign.
You can totally choose to be modest, humble,…
See, the problem with your response — and with the original post — is that neither of us were arguing ‘for modesty’ —...
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BOE's Andrew Haldane in the London Review of Books →
quick history of banking and explanation of the crisis. with special/specific focus on banks. standard boozhy ‘bad regulators’/’it’s an aberration’ stuff but good stuff for that.
Femmes and Family: On the Fuck Modesty Campaign →
femmesandfamily:
It is the Fuck Modesty campaign. Not the Fuck people who are modest campaign.
You can totally choose to be modest, humble, whatever you want. If that’s your choice, then that’s awesome. I will never shame someone for expressing themselves the way they want to.
But it is also super great if…
I have to say, I really don’t understand this. I am all for not feeling guilty...
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“The Market has been so mystified by its apologists that we no longer recognize a...”
– Peter Frase
Up there with Doug Henwood for quality, Marxist thinking that does not repeat any sort of party line. Read his blog (he also writes for Jacobin, which is just that whole sort of ‘contrarian but not in that terrible Freakanomics/Penn and Teller sort of way’ write large.) read...
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or, why i don't do year-end lists
intelligence is a concept for the dustbin of history. in fact, junk the entire concept of cardinal ordering (no, not really, but let’s accept that its entire method and ethos has massively overstepped its epistemic bounds).
further explanation, in an attempt to not be excessively gnostic: if you reduce intelligence to computational ability, then it’s an uninteresting concept (and...
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43 percent of voters say random choices from phone... →
bostonreview:
washingtonpoststyle:
This does not link to an Onion article. Via Karen Tumulty
It would also be more democratic than what we have.
#alreadybeendone
“The outrage is tiresome and deeply hypocritical, in all the tiresome ways you’ve...”
– “M.I.A. Shouldn’t Have Apologized.” (via marathonpacks)
the medium is the message
(via hardcorefornerds)
Agreed on both counts. And re: MIA — as Adorno said regarding Orson Welles’ supposed rebellion-through-art,
Whenever [he] offends against the tricks of the trade, he is forgiven...
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On the 'X Things to Do/See/Listen to/Visit Before...
Death = end of the accumulative process, as expressed by an otherwise unremarkable node, a processing machine? : /
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“This is going on the radio so I might as well do this, strike a blow for freedom...”
– Jazz guitarist Sonny Sharrock has a very dry sense of humor.
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(some) anarchists ruin it for everyone else, pt. ∞ →
I should say that of course not all anarchists are like this. I still disagree with the positive solutions they put forth, not on principle but pragmatically, but I still think their negative critique is worthwhile — we have far too many ‘left-leaning’ people who are willing to support the security state and massive civil rights infringement, provided that it’s done by a...
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“I actually dreamed this morning that Obama’s secret drone program was really a...”
– Kyle Gann
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“Taking one step back, private equity firms are just investors. The contemporary...”
– James Kwak clears up some of the confusion about PE/VC and their relation to job creation at his blog, Baseline Scenario
blah blah blah boring finance things blah blah blah cultural studies will save us all, political economy is for boring white men, blah blah blah
January 2012
28 posts
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“For it is the nature of humanity to press onward to agreement with others; human...”
– GWF Hegel
I’m a Tumblr, born under punches
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“All too often, “racism” is the subject of sentences that imply intentional...”
– Adolph Reed
EDIT: I am not a reactionary, Adolph Reed is a prominent member of the black left, etc.
Also, replace every instance of ‘racism’ with ‘the patriarchy’ and the article works as a nice critique of ‘anti-sexism.’
Acousmata: The App Store Instrumentarium →
solarflares:
acousmata:
I recently bought an iPad for the primary purpose of exploring the device’s potential as an experimental musical instrument. After about a week of research, I’ve discovered some very promising and creative software that suggests that the iPad can indeed function as a very powerful means of sound…
Click through for a good roundup of noisy apps.
Looks like I’ll be...
sex, art, and politics: I've said it a thousand... →
sexartandpolitics:
If you’re white you’re racist.
It’s not the end of the world. Shhhhhhh….. Calm down.
But you me and all our white brothers and sisters is raaaaaaccccciiiissssstttttt.
We’re not all cross burning crackers telling n****r lovers that they’re going to hell. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying…
In other news, Santa Claus is not real. Oh wait, I guess I shouldn’t...
“Although, for instance, our world rulers at present have no money left over for...”
– I. Kant, Idea for a Universal History with Cosmopolitan Interest
The folks at Platypus, although sometimes really off the mark, like to make a lot of Kant as the missing link between ‘bourgeois reform’ and ‘socialist reform’, and this is pretty good evidence thereof. This is...
Hardcore For Nerds sez…
what I want to know is how they were making all that money? marginal advertising? premium subscriptions? in the larger sense, though, this is surely the result of prohibition creating an (apparently) lucrative black market
That’s a good question. (quick aside, thanks for giving me the impetus to not just be like ‘blahhh IP boo’, which was my...
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gonna spit a little
megaupload deserved what they got
The police arrived at Dotcom Mansion in Auckland on Friday morning in two helicopters. Mr. Dotcom, a 37-year-old with dual Finnish and German citizenship, retreated into a safe room, and the police had to cut their way in. He was eventually arrested with a firearm close by that the police said appeared to be a shortened shotgun.
“It was definitely not as simple...
“This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as...”
– Jo Freeman
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“Jay-Z says that now that he’s got a daughter, he’s going to stop using the...”
– Chuck D (via b2gs)
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snoterella:
All the sex worker shaming on television makes me sick.
I call this one a false dichotomy. The TV people and the people who promote sexwork as a woman’s prerogative (which you’re not doing but some folks do, including a small set of my fellow feminists I know in person) both forget to think critically: why are most prostitutes relatively poor women? Why isn’t...
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The Weight of Emptiness: The closed mind. →
entarteten:
merelyaspectator:
Whenever someone expresses their dislike for something in this day and age, everyone is so quick to label them as “closed-minded” and “intolerant”. I know there are plenty of bigots and racists, I’m not talking about them, we know they’re idiots. I’m…
This is a good point. Our campus establishmentarian idiot loves to argue troll that left-leaning folks...
“And time is no longer an obstacle, but the means by which the possible is...”
– Eliane Radigue
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Argentina fines drugs firm over baby deaths →
Stick it to em, Kirchner
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“[…] there will always be some independent thinkers, even among the...”
– Kant channels Lenin
