Act Out! podcast

A quick announcement for y'all about Act Out! Get/stay in touch at artkillingapathy.com

Following a relatively sheisty July, Eleanor ruminates on her emotional and mental boundaries, and whether or not it's possible to always respect them. And how does this differ or diverge depending on who you're interacting with - i.e. dear friends & family or a casual comrade. artkillingapathy.com

“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” - George Orwell Without history, we wander through our present and build our future - totally blind. As racists foam at the mouth and shriek about "critical race theory," it seems an apt time to highlight the importance not only of learning history, but in HOW we learn that history...   artkillingapathy.com

A seldom considered connection is the one between genocidal imperialism and body image. But as we sift through history and into the shallow dumbshittery of eugenics, we find not only the drive to mass murder "inferior races," but to define beauty along those very same genocidal lines. Pulling from Sven Lindqvist's work, "Exterminate All the Brutes," this foray into the nerdery follows nefarious threads to the roots of self hatred based on the creation of "inferior races."   artkillingapathy.com

Multiple things can be true at the same time. Our very existence proves that. We exist as multitudes, holding multiple truths not only about ourselves but about the world around us. For instance, the rise in anti-Jewish violence must be condemned AND we must continue to demand an end to the oppression of Palestinians. By embracing these multiple truths, these manifold selves, we resist the rigid monoculture paradigm of a system that demands one way of doing things, one truth, one allegiance, one mind.    artkillingapathy.com

If you're like me - a white person with a background that criss-crosses borders from Europe to the Middle East, you may struggle with the word "home." It might feel hopeless digging into a deep past, before colonialism, to find when our people lived with the land, not just off it. Pulling from Braiding Sweetgrass, I dig in - literally and figuratively - to the earth beneath us, far from "home," and how we can be good neighbors and family members regardless of where on earth we land. Support my GoFundMe!

Shit happens - especially when you're trying to topple the largest empire the world has ever seen. Preparation is therefore key. Preparation that reminds us of our goals and centers those most targeted by the state is vital, so that we avoid white saviourism, replicating harm and derailing our work. Help me create radical art! https://bit.ly/332bt97 artkillingapathy.com   

Are you square pegging it just like me - rounding your edges to appease? A musing on not fitting in, on latching on to boulders sinking with the weight of a cowardly resolve - and on courage, the radical world-building kind.   artkillinagapathy.com

Coming off a particularly vicious bout of food poisoning, I thank you all for the inspiration that brewed up a new spoken word piece for this episode! Meanwhile, let's talk about who profits from our programmed feelings of self-worthlessness, and the insidious nature of this programming. Plus a look at the harshly cut borders between science and magic - may they be blasted through with finely tuned lasers wielded by unicorns ;)   artkillingapathy.com

Cue the "this is so un-American" speeches. Anytime something horrible happens, it's immediately lambasted as being un-American when in reality, it's actually very VERY American. Eleanor dives into the arbitrary dividing lines of borders and nations, the struggle for the state(lessness) of your mind and taking pride in your culture - not your country.   artkillingapathy.com

How do artists and creatives think of their work in terms of dollars and cents? It feels wrong - because it inherently is. Art and creativity, the labor of creation - is the antithesis to a system based on destruction, on profit and quantifiable work over connections that can never be commodified.  This week, we step into the multilayered nerdery of art and capitalism, with some help from dead French philosophers, vinyls, Robinson Crusoe and mixed metaphors.   artkillingapathy.com

Huey P. Newton wrote that "we all belong to one society yet live in different worlds." The layers of self in these worlds, the infinite intersections, the myriad truths are all sources of power - when combined. When kept in sharp and separate boxes, our connections to each other and to our selves are amputated. In order to build, we must color outside the lines - into each other's existence.   Texas Mutual Aid doc: http://bit.ly/2NzLGRk Our mailing list: http://bit.ly/ActOutNewsletter

An anti-capitalist nerderific look at failure, focus and boundaries: Why do we have such a troubled relationship with failure? Why can't we feel the life in the ruins? Oh woe when we take our daily distracted energy into our movements spaces...what kind of worlds could we possibly hope to build? Finally, setting boundaries is anti-capitalist. And it's the only way to show up with fairness and care for yourself and your community.   artkillingapathy.com

Come into the nerdery and help me chew over some of the ideas from Douglas Rushkoff's book Team Human. How do linear belief systems fuck over the planet and ultimately of course, humans too? How can a cyclical perspective change the way we are in relationship with ourselves, each other and the planet? And can we let go of the need to 'own' ideas in favor of embracing ideas buried, silenced or ignored?   artkillingapathy.com

The institutionalization of activism - much like charity - depends on preserving the current capitalist system. So, it feels like an apt and vital time - for a radical change.  At the same time, whatever you call it, if "it" means building for justice, grassroots autonomous power, we're on the same side - and we don't have time to burn bridges. Meanwhile, less than a week into 2021 and we've already got men dressed up as goats taking over the Capitol building...what a time to be alive!   artkillingapathy.com

It's remarkable how much more we can reflect on in the dark... A special solstice thinky-dink nerderific episode on accountability, jagged boundaries and the differences between not caring and self caring.   artkillingapathy.com

As Karen Armstrong writes, "human beings have always been mythmakers." We seek meaning, we seek protection and comfort. But not all myths are created equal. Some myths are incredibly dangerous - they distort and cover up a harsh reality that unless faced, will destroy us. In this tour of the nerdery, Eleanor slides along the spectrum of dangerous myths and offers up some ideas on how we could use acculturation to face the facts and dig up the truth of our past, so that we might build a better future.   artkillingapathy.com  

A cathartic step into the nerdery this week - spinning some spoken word, calling out the grating cheers for a war criminal racist sexist, a symphony requiem mass for the illusions we must lose - if we want to win anything. artkillingapathy.com

Got a special episode for y'all this week - featuring the voices of Deception 2020 - the series I've been doing in the lead-up to the election. Hear from Dan Kovalik, Nick Braña, Dr. Margaret Flowers, Mickey Huff, Eugene Puryear and Leonardo Flores on issues and angles you'd never hear from corporate media. And in all of this, through all of this - we are not alone, we are the solidarity of the shaken.   artkillingapathy.com

Fear is incredibly useful - until it's not. Here's a look at how fear is pushing people to make rash (and ultimately unhelpful) decisions in the face of actual systemic dangers. And this isn't about vote shaming - this is about system shaming. We have to be real about our place and time, the historical context of this election and the work that can't be done by checking a box on election day. artkillingapathy.com

Movement spaces can feel uncomfortable at times - and at times, that's a good thing. But if rigid radicalism is at work, people and spaces will break under the weight of replicated oppression and narrow-mindedness.  Embracing feeling weird, building space to acknowledge our continuing growth while holding ourselves and others accountable is in the DNA of powerful and radical spaces. Here, we can break the stalemate of inaction that so often hits people when they're so afraid to fuck up, so afraid to misstep...   artkillingapathy.com

This week's nerdery hang dissects the problem with equality in a system where people have unequal needs and access. Technology divides, it isolates, but it is not the inherent enemy. That is capitalism - and we don't have to look at a future written by a capitalist scribe. We can write our own, starting now.   artkillingapathy.com

In so many ways, voting doesn't count. And for those who lift their heads from the sand every 4 years just to proselytize the virtues of voting for evil, y'all can fuck right off. Change won't come from voting or petitioning, it comes from mutual aid, community organizing and the myriad possibilities outside the voting booth - all the ways to engage they never talk about, because they know how powerful they can be. artkillingapathy.com

Sometimes you get delicious fish, sometimes you get tires. Either way, to know and to deal with what's beyond the surface, you gotta dig. This isn't just for our selves but for global systems as well. Don't accept their painting of fate - and come to that, don't accept the state! On the other side are possibilities legion. Our work dreaming and building includes nurturing solidarity and making space for other dreams, tactics and emergent ideas.   artkillingapathy.com

Some decisions are binary - yes or no, south or north, on or off. Some decisions include manifold options, backstories, possibilities. Organizing is hardly ever binary. Embracing some nuance - tho it might feel uncomfortable and icky at times - is vital for building power. So you've been to a protest, now what? Some thoughts on what folks can do now to not only fight, but build.   artkillingapathy.com hardroadofhope.com

Any capitalist answer to feelings of worthlessness is no answer at all – it is merely a momentary glaze on a chipping facade of programmed self-hatred and feelings of worthlessness. From body positivity to self-worth and monetary value, let's dive into this sticky and tangled web of life as commodity, consumer - and on the other side, human. artkillingapathy.com hardroadofhope.com

A somewhat trip back to the nerdery - this time it's about language. The power of words - or the lack of power, as it sometimes happens. How what we choose to say or write changes how we think about things. Like ally vs. accomplice, American vs. un-American.   artkillingapathy.com hardroadofhope.com

Step into the nerdery with me as I dig into the seemingly at-odds worlds of science and magic. Plus, I have a hypothesis on the origin of ghosts...no, really. PLUS... The out-of-touch take the pulse of a dying body politic and pronounce it America. Flags made in China flutter in a toxic breeze. Masked vigilantes demand our complicity - in the plot to kill us. The bottom line buckles, and the beast roars.   HardRoadofHope.com ArtKillingApathy.com

Oh what a tangled web! Feeling squirrely today on this release date of my first ever documentary. Either way, we're rolling with it! We're diving head first into the muddy waters of conflicting, contradicting emotions in order to marinate and toast despair, stop chasing happiness and more. Talking Viktor Frankl and obligations to life - and how that chafes against our programming in multiple ways. So...suit up and let's go for a swim.   hardroadofhope.com artkillingapathy.com

Curious instead of judgemental, like a kid with a rose...particularly in this hideous unknown, and this damned storm... it will polish the sky so the brilliance will blind – but I will never be the same PLUS, history on repeat and the multiple cities that exist in one - the stories that have been kept from us that will give us hope. With help from Anarchist Bandits in Belle Epoque Paris.   artkillingapathy.com hardroadofhope.com

May Day! This is crisis. Capitalism's a virus. May Day! Musings from the 134th anniversary of Haymarket. What are the effects of this amputated past? And how is this moment unique in fighting and building for the future? PLUS General Strike demands!   artkillingapathy.com

I had a bunch of notes planned - updates on travels and new projects that I was gonna share. Best laid plans... Welcome to the new era of Act Out! Talking through some of the craziness we're all feeling - not in a cheapened, let's om together kinda way - but in a deep, anti-capitalist way. Here we are - what does here look like, feel like - and what are folks doing, what can folks be doing - to create that light at the end of the tunnel, rather than wait for the powers-that-be to light their path with the flames of our hope? artkillingapathy.com hardroadofhope.com

The end of an era – a look back and a look ahead, to work that's been done, and all yet to come. It's been almost five years of Act Out! and while this chapter is ending, this book is far from written. We're gearing up for deeper dives – beyond surface headlines and rapid fire news cycles – and we want you to be a part of it. So here's to raised fists, to sit-ins and shut downs – and a lot more marching in the streets. See you on the front lines. **NOTE: Stay subscribed to the podcast! It will continue! We'll be back on April 17th with a new format. Got ideas or thoughts on what you'd like to hear? Sign up for our newsletter or visit the Art Killing Apathy site to get in touch!   http://bit.ly/ActOutNewsletter https://www.patreon.com/ActOut https://www.artkillingapathy.com/

Trans rights are human rights – because human rights are only valid if they include every person in their entirety. Next, mining on land is so 20th century – the new frontier of mining is just as deep and dark as it is terrifying and catastrophic. And finally, we hear from the Wet’suwet’en on their ongoing battle to preserve their ancestral homelands. http://unistoten.camp/

A special episode that looks at a grotesque statistic and asks the question – if you can judge a government by how they treat their most vulnerable and marginalized --- how more pointed is that judgement when you look at the hometown of that government? DC and the practice of condemning predominantly black mothers to death. https://www.1199seiu.org/ https://www.dcna.org/

Uncle Sam's manifest destiny is to become king of a global graveyard – how our economic warfare kills and tortures millions worldwide and how folks here and elsewhere are organizing to fight back against so-called sanctions. Next, updates on whistleblowers and publishers and finally a look at building thriving communities in the face of over-policing, prisons and detention. https://sanctionskill.org/ https://www.releasechelsea.com/ https://action4assange.com/ https://freedomtothrive.org/ https://www.patreon.com/ActOut

More than 16,000 quakes of varying sizes have hit Puerto Rico. But the real shocks come from capitalism and colonialism. In this FULL INTERVIEW, coordinators with the Mutual Help Center of Lares talk about the natural and unnatural disasters pummeling their home, and how folks are organizing to withstand them. PLUS it's so important that we connect all of our issues to war - to the giant black hole that's sucking resources, lives and our very futures away from us. https://www.facebook.com/camjibarolares

Thousands of calls to 9-1-1 don't need police. So what if an emergency call could bring out mental health and social workers instead? Enter White Bird Clinic. PLUS, some theories on theories just in time for the year of lip service.   https://whitebirdclinic.org/cahoots/

Caged for seeking freedom – migrants and refugees in the land of the free. Next, zooming out on the global refugee industry – because yes, that too – is a booming business. Finally, global droughts, and the fires of human folly; coal scare tactics leading Australia's climate policy and how grassroots climate activists are fighting a massive mining project in the midst of a firestorm. https://www.freedomforimmigrants.org/ https://frontlineaction.org/

Tho filmed before Iran's military reaction, we touch on some important information regarding Soleimani and the need for loud and resolute international antiwar responses. Updates on bad ass organizers, activists and whistleblowers. Next, what we really need in order to stop the empire and why we can't just lean on letters from the UN. War Fever is high and the propaganda machine is working overtime. Next, water woes in the world's largest fire storm, and what this has to do with an indigenous fight in Canada. Finally, Sunrise El Paso sits down to talk corporate takeovers of public utilities.   https://shutdownicenow.org https://defendembassyprotectors.org https://unistoten.camp sunriseelpaso.org

From Iran to Venezuela to the forests of Southern Illinois to the borderlands. It’s been a full year of Acting Out! Here’s to many more.   artkillingapathy.com

COP 25 is over and the people have spoken – from Chile to Madrid, largely indigenous-led protests are highlighting the uselessness of these climate summits and the danger of falling for greenwashed false solutions in the age of climate chaos. Next, you've likely heard of fracking, but do you know about frac sand mining? Ted Auch from Frac Tracker takes us into this seldom-discussed world of environmental destruction. https://globaljusticeecology.org https://www.fractracker.org/

There's only so much you can take from someone. And with the recent plans to starve some 700,000 Americans, we may have reached that threshold. We dive to the bottom line to uncover the real impetus behind such legislation and the horrifying ways in which we spend money that could - and should – go to we the people. Next up, We don't shut up, we shut down – a message, parallels and lessons from a recent climate court case in Germany http://wedontshutup.org/en/

A whale of a deal for the IMF and all those folks out there who wanna keep consuming but want someone else to deal with the fall out. Next up, the whole damn system is guilty as hell – and that's a heavy thought. And while starting the fight – and more so the build - in your own community might seem a small move to make, it may be the most powerful.   https://carbondalespring.org/ https://thenexteclipse.wordpress.com/ https://www.symbiosis-revolution.org/

Thanksgiving is bullshit. But that doesn't mean that we can't bring some truth to the table while diving into issues such as indigenous foods, farming practices and food sovereignty. Plus, it's not just what we consume - indeed, it's not even our own personal consumption - but rather this global programming on consumption that's killing us. Once we start to question the programming, we'll see the horrors of the program - from cancer alley and beyond. From this space, we can work on dismantling it and building for the future. PLUS Claire Arkin sits down to discuss the colonialist waste trade, false solutions like incineration and the insidious dealings of the plastics industry.

DACA is in the supreme court. Far from being a legislative or constitutional battle for Trump's administration, this is fascist virtue signaling. The arguments over legality thinly veil the systemic truth: this is an overt ramping up of policies already in place with previous administrations. Next up, Never Again Action launches proactive and historically conscious activism, combining outreach with protest.   https://www.neveragainaction.com/

Bolivia was too happy. Ideas that are but dreams here in the US are legislative realities in Bolivia, and that can not stand. Meanwhile, the echoes of US imperialism plays loudly in the streets of Chile. US residents asking when we're gonna reach that tipping point have some important questions to consider. PLUS some news on AFRICOM. Finally, Chairman Omali Yeshitela joins us to talk imperialism, class warfare, revolution and more. "You can not have your whiteness and socialism too. You can not have your whiteness and liberation too.”   https://apspuhuru.org https://www.patreon.com/ActOut

We need to be open and honest about what the empire means and how we all suffer from it – and how these diverse but shared experiences can be our strength, not our fault lines. As we rattle thrones, we must build solidarity and heal – with veterans. Marine veteran and senior fellow at the center for international policy, Matthew Hoh sits down with us to talk about veteran health, suicide and recent news from the empire. https://www.internationalpolicy.org/ https://www.veteransforpeace.org/

Transformation NOT Reformation. From regenerative farming to revolutionary inclusion, these voices from the Forest Convergence tell it like it is, draw connections between our struggles and unapologetically demand real and direct action. Wherever you are, that is your frontline. Know that you have an army on your side. And we must continue to fight. And build.   https://globaljusticeecology.org/ http://onamove.com/ https://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/

Recent reports suggest that eating meat isn't bad for you. But wait before you reach for that burger. Because this isn't just about you personal health - there's a planet at stake here. PLUS deforestation gets a greenwash AND Mei Azaad from Fight Toxic Prisons talks direct action in solidarity with prisoners, and the layers of literal and figurative toxicity driving our prison industrial complex.   https://fighttoxicprisons.wordpress.com/

How high can you go? The costs of health insurance continue to rise sharply. Our push to build power, reach out to others and rattle thrones must escalate in kind. Next, climate and environmental experts fired for researching and spreading the truth. Are we gonna let their voices be silenced? Finally, Nora Barrows-Friedman joins us to talk about her recent trip to Palestine, the farce of elections on both sides of the wall, and our vital role in justice.   https://electronicintifada.net/