"The price of food keeps us from realising our desires"

November 11, 2020 11:15 AM

"The basic materialist approach to history and politics starts from a concept of man as a material being, and begins explaining everything else about society from there. That puts important emphasis on the connection between the ‘natural world’ and human society. Historically, this has often meant a focus on how humans have appropriated natural resources to wage competitions for status and control among themselves. But as the compound crisis of climate change and COVID-19 accelerates, we should be humbled by the emphatic reassertion of nature’s own causal powers. There’s never been a better time to get back to basics."
posted by Ouverture (4 comments total)

Thanks for the link, the diary sounds fascinating.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 2:44 PM on November 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

This piece covers so much that it's hard to sum up. A really good read and introduction to anti- racism, anti-poverty and anti-capitalist ideas.
posted by emjaybee at 7:03 PM on November 11, 2020 [1 favorite]

I am here to admit that I got pretty lost in the article pretty quickly and gave up. It was too technical, at least for my current mental state.

But it was totally worth starting to read it to learn about Carolina Maria de Jesus and her writing!

If anyone has suggestions of a "...for dummies" version of this article please do post it.
posted by medusa at 7:25 PM on November 11, 2020

"We will find ourselves, much sooner than we think, asking basic questions about how we’re going to secure ourselves and our basic needs." I think many are there right now.
posted by anguspodgorny at 5:23 PM on November 12, 2020