14: What is Left?

Introduction to 'What is Left?'

Steven Rubio
The existence of the Bad Subjects Collective is a slap in the face of cynical individualism.

A Manifesto for Bad Subjects

The Bad Subjects Collective
By privileging identities based on race, ethnicity, gender and sexual preference, the left has shown a strong tendency to forget about the ways in which class (or economic) identity cuts across these categories.

Beyond Separatism, Dysfunction, and the Left As We Know It

Annalee Newitz, Jillian Sandell
The left, strangely like a Hollywood movie, has yet to figure out what it might mean to act publicly on a personal sense of injustice or oppression.

Deferral, Denial, Disavowal, Discontinuity: Leftism and the Love of Academia

Jonathan Sterne
Intellectuals must make use of the state in order to rid themselves of the state.

Maximum False Consciousness: The Political Economy of American Punk

Joel Schalit
The Cold War defense buildup created the economic infrastructure and cultural imperatives that gave birth to rock'n'roll.

Progressive Politics? The Fall and the P.J. Factor

Heather Borbeau
I met several people in the former DDR who believed life was better before the Wende. (Not hard to believe considering the 40% unemployment in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommer.)

Rejecting the Gay Brain (and choosing homosexuality)

Joe Sartelle
The problem with the "no choice" position on homosexuality is that in order to be effective it requires us to forget about the important distinction between desire and behavior.

Tonya Harding Goes to Berkeley

Eileen O'Malley Callahan
In spite of where my family might 'move,' my experience had taught me that the well-guarded boundaries of privilege would always determine my real movements.

Working With Others

Charlie Bertsch
We must not reject the division of labor within our organizations and the left as a whole merely because it makes capitalism work better. Rather, we should be devising ways of making it work for us.