Fostering Hope in Hard Times: Audio From A Collapsing State

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As we head into the holidays, I wanted to talk about hope. These are hard times. Watching the wealthy and the powerful cement their control over our politics, economy, and culture can decimate our ability to fight back. Authoritarianism relies on weaponized, systematic abuse to make us feel small, alone, and powerless.

Well. You’re not. In this free episode of Audio From A Collapsing State, we discuss how to cultivate hope in the most trying of times as we strive to heal ourselves from the ravages of Neoliberal capitalism and begin reaching out to others and construction coalitions so that we can challenge power and make a better world. There are exercises in this episode meant to lift you up when the going gets hard. And it is going to get hard.

This series of podcasts has largely been subscriber-only. To keep listening as we go step-by-step into how to build those coalitions and eventually the movement that will challenge the wealth class, subscribe today. Below you can find additional resources, including past episodes and articles that help explain that process as well as detail how we arrived at this moment. As you build your connections, feel free to share them so you can be on the same page.

Resources

* Beginning to Resist: Thoughts on how we, as individuals, should spend the months leading up to the second Trump presidency and preparing for the cruel austerity his wealth class donors are going to unleash.

* What the Hell is Going On: Here is an explainer regarding our present circumstances for anyone who has had a feeling that the traditional Democrat / Republican / Red / Blue narrative was hiding something. Here, we go through the problems in the United States and how the wealth class has effectively put itself in a position to totally takeover our government.

* The Oligarchical Order: A primer on how to give up conventional and failed political understandings in favor of seeing how capitalism directs the course of events and where it is leading and what to expect.

* Authoritarianism and the Crisis of Meaning: Here we get into how consumerism represents an addictive drug that has hollowed out our sense of purpose, leaving us to take this as a moment of self-reflection, recognize that we have effectively been made to hate and doubt ourselves, thereby keeping us from realizing we deserve better.

* Americans Should Learn From South Koreans: The attempted coup in South Korea serves as an incredible example for how popular mobilization among the population can change the political paradigm and undermine authoritarian power grabs. We should pay attention and take heed.

* The Snake, The Rat, and Neoliberal Authoritarianism: Using Survivor and reality-TV culture, we discuss how Neoliberalism turned us against one another, rewarded manipulation and other sociopathic behaviors, and simultaneously divorced us from the skills we need to establish trust, intimacy, and solidarity, all things that organizing and creating a movement requires.

* A Thoroughly Confused Country: Americans have little in the way of class consciousness, which was an intentional state desired by the wealth class. This primer gets into the class makeup of the United States, including contradictions and motivations, that will be crucial in understanding as we do our work.

* Authoritarianism as Clarity: As authoritarians take power, the world becomes a lot clearer. We can see who we can trust and who we shouldn’t. This episode gets into the history of Vichy France and the lessons we can learn on how to operate as individuals within an authoritarian environment.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit jaredyatessexton.substack.com/subscribe