Rev Left Radio posts
Posts: 609
Files: 1710
Uprising in LA: ICE, Mass Deportations, and American Fascism
Alyson and Breht record an emergency podcast on the current riots in LA, and resistance across the country, to mass deportations. Together they highlight recent events, discuss the function of mass deporations in a decaying capitalist system, analyze the spontaneous and militant community response, how terrorizing undocumented workers is a form of labor discipline, the fascist tactic of scapegoati...
Still Laundering Black Rage: DEI as Counterinsurgency
In this incisive conversation, Breht welcomes poet, scholar, and organizer, filmmaker, and host of the Black Myths Podcast Too Black back to the podcast to critically examine the recent attacks on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives. Anchored by the penetrating analysis in Too Black and Rasul Mowatt’s article, "Bootleg Rehab: Still Laundering Black Rage," this episode diss...
Fascism w/ American Characteristics (The Pokepreet Podcast Ft. Breht O'Shea)
"In this episode we are joined by Breht O'Shea to talk about fascism and it's peculiarities in the 21st Century."I went on The Pokepreet Podcast for a second time recently and had a really in-depth and nuanced conversation about fascism, presently and historically; together we discuss how American fascism arising out of the ruins of neoliberalism is qualitatively different than pre...
Dialectics of Nature: Engels on Dialectical Materialism as a Worldview
In this episode, Alyson and Breht explore Friedrich Engels’ Dialectics of Nature, a bold and underappreciated attempt to apply dialectical materialism to the natural sciences. Often dismissed or misunderstood, this unfinished work offers a sweeping view of reality - from physics and chemistry to evolution, human consciousness, and ecological breakdown - through the lens of Marxist philosophy. To...
Teaser: The Role of Labor in Human Evolution
This is small snippet from a much larger episode coming soon wherein Alyson and Breht cover Friedrich Engel’s famous text “Dialectics of Nature”, in which Engels argues for dialectical materialism as a scientifically grounded, philosophically rigorous, and holistic worldview—one that understands nature, society, and thought as deeply interconnected and constantly evolving.Find the clip use...
Fascism with American Characteristics - Ft. Rev Left Radio
"In this episode we are joined by Breht O'Shea to talk about fascism and it's peculiarities in the 21st Century."I went on the Pokepreet Podcast for a second time recently and had a really in-depth and nuanced conversation about fascism, presently and historically; together we discuss how American fascism arising out of the ruins of neoliberalism is qualitatively different than pre...
OTU Under Attack by Landlord Lobby
In this episode, Breht welcomes on Seth from Omaha Tenants United for an in-studio discussion about OTU's slate of recent successes organizing several tenant unions, and a subsequent new legal assault on the organization by the local landlord lobby. The legal implications of this attack are truly monumental for virtually all forms of organizing. They also discuss how landlordism is a feudal ha...
Breht's Homework Answers
I am currently enrolled in a Human Geography class and thought you might enjoy reading some of the answers I routinely give to basic assignment questions XD. 1. What did you find most interesting about the major theories of development?What I found most interesting was how dependency theory and world-systems theory reveal the fundamentally exploitative nature of the global capitalist system. From ...
Unseeing Ideology: A Marxist Analysis of The City & The City
Breht was invited on to The Socialist Shelf podcast to talk about The City & The City by China Miéville -- a genre-bending noir that doubles as a brilliant Marxist allegory. We unpack how ideology shapes perception, how power constructs physical space, the shift we undergo from ideological subject to critical agent, Edward Said and Gramsci's concepts of the organic intellectual, and all the t...
Farce, Finance & Fascism: Margaret Kimberley on Empire in Decay
In this powerful and wide-ranging conversation, Margaret Kimberley—senior columnist at Black Agenda Report and a leader in Black Alliance for Peace—joins Breht to dissect the spectacle of American decline and, as usual, Kimberley offers a razor-sharp analysis of late-stage capitalism’s collapse into cruelty, chaos, and confusion.Together, they explore the Democratic Party’s complicity in u...
Accelerating the Decline Under the Banner of Renewal
Breht begins by preparing to read his Night School lecture on Socialist Revolutions, but then gets monumentally sidetracked into an hour long extemporaneous analysis of the Trump Tariffs, Industrial Policy, Manufacturing, neoliberal globalization, the self-immolation of the U.S.'s international reputation, and the possible domestic trajectories over the next half decade: from the hypothetical ...
Spotify Is Deleting Our Episodes...
Best Of Series (creating a clean back-catalogue) starts tomorrow.Join the Patreon- even for free - to get new public episodes in the meantime.We will also be putting new episodes out on the Red Menacefeed (subscribe on your preferred podcast app)----------------------------------------------------Follow, Subscribe, & Learn more about Rev Left RadioHEREOutro Beat Prod. byflip da hood
The Encampments: Uprising Against the Death Machine
Directors Michael T. Workmanand Kei Pritskerjoin Breht to discuss The Encampments, their award-winning new documentary chronicling the 2024 student-led pro-Palestinian uprisings at Columbia, UCLA, and beyond. We talk about the ethical challenges of filming, fascist state repression faced people who speak out against Israel, the story of Mahmoud Khalil’s ICE detention and its relationship to the ...
Palestine Action: Direct Action Against the Death Machine
In this powerful episode, we sit down with a frontline activist from Palestine Action, the UK-based direct action network targeting Elbit Systems—the Israeli weapons manufacturer responsible for arming and enabling genocide in Palestine and beyond. We dig into the strategy of physically dismantling the military-industrial complex, the stakes of this fight, and the growing number of political pri...
Marxism 101: Intro to Historical Materialism (and the Necessity of Socialism)
In this lecture, Breht provides an accessible but rigorous introduction to the Marxist theory of history: historical materialism. Breht explains how historical materialism is dialectical materialism applied to the evolution of human societies over time, the role that the base-superstructure model has in understanding culture and ideology, the long march from hunter-gatherer communal societies to s...
Trotsky on Fascism (and Lessons for us Today)
In this episode, Alyson and Breht welcome Brendan back on the show for the first time in a few years. Together, we dive deep into Leon Trotsky’s Fascism: What It Is and How to Fight It, a sharp and urgent intervention written in the shadow of the Nazi rise to power. We unpack Trotsky’s class analysis of fascism, the role of the petite bourgeoisie, his searing critiques of both sectarian isolat...
The Current Political Moment, U.S. Imperial Decline, and Organizing a Revolutionary Vanguard Party
In this episode Breht sits down with Brian Becker, a longtime socialist organizer and leading member of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), to break down the current political and economic crisis in the United States and the urgent need for revolutionary organization. As Trump-aligned forces consolidate power, billionaires tighten their grip over the state, and the feckless Democratic Pa...
An Analysis of American Capitalism in Decay (Pokepreet X Rev Left)
Breht goes on the Pokepreet Podcast as a guest to have a fun and fiery conversation about his ideological development, why the United States is so hostile to socialism even relative to other hyper-capitalist countries, the current grotesque state of global capitalism-imperialism, and much more!"In this thought-provoking conversation, we sit down with Breht O'Shea to dive deep into the curr...
Pure Excess: Capitalism, Commodity Fetishism, and the Promise of More
Todd McGowan joins the show once again, this time to discuss his newest book "Pure Excess: Capitalism and the Commodity".Together, he and Breht discuss commodity fetishism, the tensions between Marxism and psychoanalysis, what a critique of the subjective aspects of capitalism offers anti-capitalist politics, the "superstructural malaise" of late capitalism, Desire and Lack, capita...
Spiritual Materialism? Marxism and Mysticism w/ Breht O’Shea
Go like and leave a positive comment on this video on YT to show Adnan some love from the Rev Left Audience please!!!The Adnan Husain Show: What does spirituality on the left look like? In a Ramadan special, Adnan discusses Buddhism and Sufi Islam, the distinctions between mysticism and mystification, spiritual practices and ethics as well as the liberation of the soul w/Revolutionary Left Radio a...
Philosophy Series: Stoicism for Revolutionaries
Breht listens to, reflects on, and critically engages with a public lecture by the late philosopher Michael Sugrue titled Marcus Aurelius' Meditations: The Stoic Ideal. He discusses the philosophy of Stoicism, its insights as well as its limitations, its commodification and bastardization under late capitalism, the dialectical inversion of the philosophy of a Roman Emperor for proletarian revo...
Abolish the Death Penalty: Organizing Toward Abolition
Dawson Hicks from Project Hope to Abolish the Death Penaltyjoins Breht to discuss the organization, its founding by prisoners, its strategies and vision, the Alabama carceral system, the use of nitrogen hypoxia as the newest method of murdering inmates, the benefits of rehabilitation over punishment and slaughter, the utter moral depravity and intellectual mediocrity of U.S. politicians deciding w...
The Sufi Path of Rumi: Islamic Mysticism and The Journey to Divine Love
Dr. Rory Dicksonis a professor of Islamic Religion and Culture and author of several publications on Sufism, the mystical path within Islam. He joins Breht to have an incredibly deep conversation about the Sufi poet Rumi, his life and work, Rumi's relationship to his teacher Shams of Tabriz, the concepts of fana(annihilation of the self) and baqa(subsistence in God), the spiritual practices of...
On The Ground in Gaza: Serving the People in Palestine
Willy Massay returns to the show to discuss his second trip to Gaza as a medical volunteer. He got back two weeks ago and stayed for over a month. He discusses his experiences, the wintry conditions and terrible air quality in Gaza and how both are impacting the health of every single Palestinian on the ground. He also discusses the ceasefire, the spirit of the Palestinian people, and his personal...
Red Hot Take: Dialectics at the Dawn of Techno-Feudalism
"When you love people, it hurts..."
The Nature of All Things: Spinoza’s Philosophical Odyssey
Professor of philosophy Colin Bodayle joins Breht to dive into the profound, unique, and almost mystical philosophy of Baruch Spinoza. Together, they discuss the value of philosophy for all of us, Spinoza as a "philosopher's philosopher", his life and death in 17th century western Europe, his complex geometrical structure of writing, God as Nature as Substance, his forward thinking pol...
Philosophy Series: Nietzsche and the Death of God
Breht listens to, reflects on, and critically engages with a public lecture by the late philosopherMichael Sugrue entitled "Nietzsche and the Death of God". He discusses the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, the politics of modern day Nietzscheans, the death of god and consumer capitalism as a form a nihilism, the ongoing nature of human civilizational and spiritual evolution, the biograp...
"Mirror" by Andrei Tarkovsky: Time, Memory, and Aesthetic Contemplation
Breht is a guest on Left of the Projector(along with Amanda Joy Moon). Together, with the host Evan, the three discuss Soviet Filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky's film "Mirror" from 1975.This is our fourth episode focusing on the films of Tarkovsky. You can find all our other episodes on Tarkovsky's films HERELeft of the Projector:Subscribe:https://leftoftheprojector.comLetterboxd...
City of Ashes: The Los Angeles Wildfires
Alyson - a lifelong and current resident of Los Angeles - and Breht discuss the wildfires ravaging L.A.Together they discuss the acute and structural causes of the fires, the role played by Climate Change, the reactionary propaganda surrounding the fires, the class dynamics at play, the self-serving careerist motivations of bourgeois politicans, the organized grassroots community response on the g...
On the Situation in Syria and its Implications for the Region
Thuraya, Angie, Mohammad, and Edward join Breht to discuss recent events in Syria. Together they discuss what happened, Syria under the Assad government, the hope and concerns of the the Syrian people, the role Syria plays in the axis of resistance, Syria's connections to Palestine, current conditions in Gaza, Israel's ongoing genocide and its actions in Syria, Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (H...
