Published inHistory and Identity·Sep 4Member-onlyAnti-slavery is older than Jesus and PaulSome fans of Christianity argue that anti-slavery began with the writings of Paul. What follows is an edited and expanded version of my comments on Thomas St Thomas’s Medium post, The Apostle Paul on Slavery. We know opposition to slavery is older than the New Testament. Though Aristotle supported slavery…Slavery3 min readSlavery3 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Aug 31Member-onlyBarbie and the Feminist GazeErasing Men, Class, and Intellectual Property Theft in an Entertaining Gender Reductionist Fantasy — Any discussion of Barbie should start with this fact: its “real world” is as artificial as Barbie Land and maybe more. It looks like the real Los Angeles but its inhabitants aren’t real people. …Barbie6 min readBarbie6 min read
Published inHistory and Identity·Aug 27Member-onlyWhy Right Wingers Say Plymouth Colony was a Failed Communist ExperimentThe Plymouth Colony’s History is an Argument for Worker Co-ops, Not Capitalism Conservatives insist the Pilgrims came to the New World in search of religious freedom, tried to work like communists and nearly starved, then switched to free enterprise and thrived. Their myth springs from distorting the facts: The Puritan…History4 min readHistory4 min read
Published inHistory and Identity·Aug 25Member-onlyFive Notes about Whiteness and Class in the 19th CenturySocial and economic class were always more complicated than we’re told — Sometimes “white” in North America just meant “English-speaking American.” In The great Arizona orphan abduction, Linda Gordon wrote, James Young, a black man at the Contention mine in nearby Tombstone, remarked “Si White and I were the first white men in Tombstone after Gird and Schieffelin.” Young wasn’t claiming to be Caucasian. He just meant he wasn’t a Mexican…History4 min readHistory4 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Aug 23Member-onlyWhat Are You? The Bank Robber Test and Our Ten Most Important IdentitiesWhy Our Many Identities May Contradict Each Other — Ten Kinds of Identity: Scientific: You are defined by your DNA. Familial: You are defined by the people who raised you. Tribal: You are defined by your language and customs. National: You are defined by your tribe’s alliances. Gendered: You are defined by your tribe’s expectations of people of your sex. Racial: You are…Identity10 min readIdentity10 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Apr 6Member-only“write a story about batman versus karl marx” — my first ChatGPT experimentI have to admit the following story is better than a lot of fanfic, and its conclusion is a fair summation of the current state of capitalism versus socialism in the US today. Once upon a time, in a world far different from our own, there was a clash of…Batman3 min readBatman3 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Mar 26Member-onlyThe Zacchaeus Option (for Christians Who Don’t Want to be Perfect)The Middle Way for Good Christians Looks like Socialism — It’s hard for Christians to meet Jesus’s definition of perfection: Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he…Socialism4 min readSocialism4 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Mar 13Member-onlyBarbara J. Fields Comments on the Racecraft of the 1619 ProjectBarbara J. Fields, celebrated historian, co-author of Racecraft, and the only historian with a doctorate to appear in Ken Burns’ The Civil War, has only made a few public comments about The 1619 Project, but those comments are damning. In a recent interview, she said, When I talk to my…History3 min readHistory3 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Mar 8Member-onlyFrom Institutional Racism to Institutional Anti-RacismWhen the cartoonist Scott Adams made a statement that was deemed racist, he was not only denounced thoroughly in the media, but nearly every major newspaper, hundreds of minor ones, his book publisher, and his syndicate canceled his projects. It’s impossible to argue that his treatment is an example of…Dilbert4 min readDilbert4 min read
Published inComrade Morlock’s Journal·Mar 3Member-onlyFour Problems with the Anti-Racist Notion that All White People are RacistMany race reductionists believe as an article of faith that all white people are racist because they were raised in a racist society. It’s an old argument, but Medium just reminded me of it by recommending Christyl Rivers’ “Scott Adams Is Racist, But, So Are You And I. We Must…Racism2 min readRacism2 min read
