mind reader

Today I’d like to share some thoughts around a nexus point between an ongoing colonial capitalist modality of expropriation and the utterly uneven development of artificial intelligence technologies in high-technology western contexts. Both of these spaces are ridden with significant turbulence, colonialism and it’s capitalist modality (or vice-versa depending on your position in geopolitics) has held an extractivist mode closest to its heart since the 1700s, and as recent developments towards large language model technologies in artificial intelligence have burst onto the corporatising scene a slew of under-critiqued ideologies have nested into the heart of their explosive development. We’ve discussed the origins of colonialism, and how colonialism drew on the experiment before it of enclosure and largely capitalist development. Here, we assert that colonisation, while ideologically compatible with many anti-human and...

Last week I shaved my head. Not a foreign experience, but foreign enough that I’m noticing feeling that I have always had but is now obvious in my conscious mind. Why tell you this? It feels similar to a critical awakening, that moment when you understand exactly what someone who carries knowledge really means when they say something profound. From the advice we receive, to the theory we read, the disembodied nature of much of our work and lives keeps us inside the capitalist frame. Making small changes, be it reading theory and finding a positional reality from that theory or exposing nerves through bravery or shaving which make us feel present is the human antidote to that disembodiment. We humans are remarkable machines able to keep ‘grinding through’ but also able to perceive and transform our surroundings. Engagements with people, place, community, theory, reality, and so much more are fundamentally transformativ...

You may have observed that I’ve been pondering the nature of our broken worlds, in particular how this has deep effects on our bodies. From immovable structures, (self)imposed or otherwise, to external features of capitalist system(s) which offer a guise of stability and security but, in reality, limit human agency to capitalist realism, we are conditioned to work above all. This is of interest to me, as I continuously engage with friends and colleagues who suffer with physical ailments derived from constant exposure to high-stress environments. We are so conditioned with this that even our language fails adequately describe how aversely we react to our experienced environments, and often exact even further tolls on ourselves by internalising that which should be processed communally. Just today, I was talking to friends about self-imposed structures that condition agency under the guise of anti-capitalist movement, but i...

Barthes claimed the death of the author in 1967. This claim asked us to reject, or at least challenge, the practice of interpreting texts through the lens of “authorial intent” or biography. A repositioning of the human in a text. Critically, the theory posits that once a work is created, it exists independently of its creator’s intended meaning, background, or historical context. Instead, meaning emerges through the interaction between the text and each individual reader, who brings their own experiences and cultural context to the interpretation. Theoretically, here, poststructuralism is coming to the fore. The poststructuralist critique of authorship, from Barthes to Foucault, fundamentally challenges traditional notions of creative authority and textual meaning. Rather than viewing authors as the source of definitive meaning, poststructuralism sees them as sites where language, culture, and various discourses inters...

It’s been a minute, and there’s been some significant changes for both mind reader and for me as a human. Today I want to take a moment to appreciate the good and bad of what is emerging and present in our world. Our first shared moment is about the tragic, terrible, and inhumane Trump-Musk-drama that is not only a visceral distraction to churn through the absolute worst vitriol and hate speech at the expense of those already deeply marginalised by American society, but also a very real threat to the nature of contemporary social fabric and cohesion. The second is a moment of hopeful futures as energy which has been forestalled far too long begins to surface and push for radically ethical new ways. It has been nearly impossible to ignore over the past month the absolute imposition of ‘noise’ over signal in our news, social medias, and relationships with one another. The now finely honed machine that is Trumpian politics...

We are bound in frames of colonial capitalism with systems of static purpose and design. Unless you live on the periphery, it is highly likely that at least some aspect of your existence fits within the western economic system. And unless you are centralised in a small handful of European nations (with, admittedly, high populations), you are probably contributing to those European nations prosperity, rather than your own. Naturally, with American imperialism this began to shift, and the global flows of resources and moneys are so deeply complex and intently mystified that tracing from primordial origins no longer serves meaningful purpose, but let’s do a little now anyway. Capitalism emerged through violent processes of transformation beginning in 15th century Europe, where leaders leveraged desires for wealth and power to drive colonial expansion across the globe. This involved a dual process of material and ideologica...

Let’s come to terms with some terms. Sorry, I’m not trying to be cute (that’s just effortless). I think it’s important we, as I constantly raise, share a literacy for engagement with big ideas. Sadly, much of the time those big ideas are also terrible ideas — things that dominate our lives, change our ways of being, and interrupt what we might (at least individually) deem antithetical to our being. Ideas, however, are critical and require serious and robust examination as we continually sit in a world dominated by bad ones, and bad faith actors whose entire existence is designed to peddle those ideas. But we also need a binding approach, something that brings us together with hope and possibility – not just doom and gloom about the state of things (which is, admittedly, pretty shit). A few things have pushed this desire to write this morning, some good, some bad. Let’s jump into them. I went for a walk with Harriet Taylo...

As I grow increasingly concerned about the level of influence Zucc has with his near monopoly on social media, I concomitantly grow concerned about the atomisation of workers and mystification of the labour process. Today, I’d like to spend a bit of time talking about social bonds, and the “cohesion” of society. In particular, I think we need to spend some time truly attending to how the common sense has shifted to a worship of individual billionaires, giving way to a rise of front-seat oligarchs directly in control of abstracting worker connection to production, and to direct control of the machinery of government [1]. Naturally, I’m also concerned with how this will play out in Australia given the commencement of Albanese’s campaigning, but let’s take it one step at a time [2]. The atomisation of workers in contemporary times is extreme. Capitalism benefits when solidarity is eroded, and it has played the long game to...

Let’s take a voyage together through three understandings of class. This concept is becoming increasingly interesting to me, particularly in relationship to transformative movements. Across history a great many Marxists, and others who on occasion appropriated from Marx and Marxists (looking at you Bourdieu), have debated class as a (social/political/economic/determining) construct. The brackets, here, are worth some discussion but let’s first think about defining some key terms that will be useful for us as we progress through this discussion. At the source class can be understood in terms of a person’s relative relationship to the means of production. The means of production ranges from: (1) the physical spaces where work happens (factories, farms, offices), (2) the tools and machinery used in production (from hammers to industrial equipment), (3) the raw materials that are used to make things (iron ore, cotton, oil —...

I am constantly forced to think about Elon Musk and his egomaniacal, loud, and unearned positioning in society and emerging formal role in government in the US. Today I want to talk about consent, particularly in how consent has forged Musk as either a “super genius” or “capitalist success story”. He seems to have been depicted, at least in Australia, as an underdog innovator whose singular fortitude has allowed him to rise to power — this, at least, is Rupert Murdoch’s position on things, and you can bet that he wishes he was Musky, too. Obviously, this is a manufacturing of consent to Musk’s businesses — none of which he has meaningfully contributed anything to — and a demonstration of how consent is built. From “humble beginnings” Musk has “changed the world”, they say, which is a significantly empathetic narrative verging on outright lies. The reality, of course, is that “daddy got rich killing people” and he bought s...

With the increase in Musky headlines, I cant help but offer a christmas posting on oligopoly capitalism. This, I argue, is the next phase in the torturous helltrip that is our contemporary political economy, particularly if we see that the USA is the blueprint for modern economies all around the globe — particularly in the margins as they control the status quo for trade and economics from their substantial imperial torment. What we are seeing in the USA, to be clear, is an undeniable turn to fascism, which I need to repeat some of here so people understand the full scale and gravity of what Trump and Musk, amongst billionaire cronies are bringing to their people [1] [2]: - » Gutting abortion access - » Mass deportations - » Abusing warrantless surveillance - » Unleashing force on protestors - » Severely limiting voting access - » Censoring critical discussions in classrooms - » Attacking trans people and regressing fou...

I have been thinking about labour and the nature of exploitation. Not the political party, though they could easily fit under a similar topic sentence. I’m also quite sure you’re thinking “you, thinking about labour? ha!” as though you don’t know precisely what you’re in for reading these dispatches. But I have a configuration of theoretical terrain which I think might be useful to sketch out, and I’m yet to find time to do this in an academic text, so we’re doing it here! You may have heard of essentialising, and the sin of oversimplification. Well let’s do our absolute best to oversimplify the basic equation of the basis of the “economy”. This is a fun one, because who you ask will depend on what part, here, is considered the economy, but enough disclaimers... ```Productive labour``` > Labour Power + Means of Production = Total Value Created > Wages < Total Value Created > Where the difference (Total Valu...