"In order to understand the nature of the Syrian conflict, it is essential that we remember the first years of the uprising, and, through remembering what took place between 2011 and 2014, dispel the myth that Syria has always been a proxy war or has always been a struggle between a secular government and jihadis. To ignore the years which lead Syria from a democratic uprising to a bloody proxy war is to read history backwards."

On how BIDs push for the criminalization of homelessness using Denver's urban camping ban and Downtown Denver Partnership as its primary example.

For a book-length treatment of this and similar issues, I recommend Randall Amster's Lost In Space: The Criminalization, Globalization, and Urban Ecology of Homelessness (2008) which examines the role BIDs play in criminalizing homelessness using the struggles over the sit-lie ordinances in Tempe, AZ, as a case study.

"for the more lonely children of the revolution, who like their politics with a healthy dose of nihilism that alternately destroys and loves itself and the world."

list of folk punk bands on r/folkpunk

"I introduced my anarchist friend to my other friends. This proved to be awkward."

Graeber on the Rojava revolution.

"How a shy, queer Canadian woman accidentally invented one of the internet’s most toxic male communities."

work is bad.

Really liked this short review, though I'll probably not read the book.

I have a much more positive view of left-libertarianism, but I also always enjoy Alex Strekal's criticism.

Throw all daleks in fountains!

Tim Barker's very good review of a book that seems interesting (especially the COST proposal) but that I'll probably not read.

Jerry would later invest in Apple Computer and become a multimillionaire.

"An undercover antifascist descends through all nine circles of the alt-right inferno."

I'm not gonna help nobody get something my negroes don't have. If I'm gonna die, I'll die now right here fighting you, if I'm gonna die. You my enemy. My enemies are white people, not Viet Congs or Chinese or Japanese. You my opposer when I want freedom. You my opposer when I want justice. You my opposer when I want equality. You won't even stand up for me in America for my religious beliefs, and you want me to go somewhere and fight, but you won't even stand up for me here at home.

The sailors' demands were good.

The Bolsheviks were being assaulted by forces from the reactionary wing of Romanov monarchists, reformist Social Democrats, former Imperial Army officers and soldiers in the anti-communist White Armies along with several foreign nations sending in interventionist forces, aid and supplies for the White Armies. Despite this, Vladimir Lenin regarded the left-wing opposition as the most threatening the Bolshevik regime faced. [...] The authority the Bolsheviks commanded, such as the Cheka and other exertions of control and supremacy were primarily used against left-wing oppositionists rather than the reactionary counter-revolution.

Adam Kotsko on how to read Zizek.