ACFM

The ACFM gang gather for a midwinter reading of one of the most influential political tracts ever written. Download a version online and follow along as Nadia, Keir and Jem reassess The Communist Manifesto, published in 1848 by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara.media/acfm Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletter...

Which side are you on? Keir, Nadia and Jem consider the ebb and flow of political commitment with ideas and music from Jodi Dean, Gramsci, John Coltrane and the Raincoats. Is cultural production the same as political action? What’s the difference between an ally and a comrade? And why do some communists end up as right-wing turncoats? Find the books and music mentioned in the show: https://novara....

Disruption is a byword for success in the tech industry, but when it affects people’s daily routines – say, when JSO activists are slow-marching down a road – it becomes nothing short of criminal. On this Trip, Jem, Nadia and Keir unpack the political uses and abuses of disruption and the ‘creative destruction’ inherent to capitalism. Featuring music from Björk, Disrupters and St...

Of all the unseen forces that shape human society, could death be the most powerful? The ACFM crew take a leftwing look at mortality in this Trip, asking how capitalism has altered our approach to the inevitable. Jem, Nadia and Keir think about how industrialised workers were taught to prepare for death, why powerful men are obsessed with their legacies, why we failed to ritualise or remember the...

A month after racist riots engulfed the country, the ACFM crew ask what fascism – and antifascism – look like in Britain today. Do the riots and counter-protests mark a return to “street politics”? Why didn’t the Labour party align itself with opponents of the pogroms? And how popular are extreme rightwing views among Britain’s frustrated youth? Jem, Nadia and Keir take a c...

Everybody hates a tourist, as Jarvis Cocker once pointed out, and the ACFM gang are no exception in this ACFM Trip exploring the allure of holidays. Keir, Jem and Nadia consider all the different ways we avoid work, from holy days and vay-cays to grand tours and gap yahs. Does travel make fools of us all, or is there a smarter, more ethical way to go sightseeing? Is the promise of an annual getawa...

What happens when you lose? In this Trip, the ACFM crew explore the role of humility – and humiliation – in politics. Should we cultivate humility to cope with political weakness? Is fear of humiliation a product of patriarchy? Can humility help us be better political thinkers and organisers? And who’s the humblest ACFM host of them all? Nadia, Keir and Jem apply their weird-left lens to the...

The ACFM crew offer their first reactions to Labour’s landslide election win. Can Starmer’s government rescue the public sector? Where will the money come from? And can they make it to a second term? Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Produced and edited by Matt Huxley and Chal Ravens. Help us build people-powered media: https://novara.media/support

After investigating the politics of cool on the last Trip episode, the crew turn their attention to another distinctly modern sensibility: camp. Digging into Susan Sontag’s formative 1964 essay on the camp aesthetic, Nadia, Keir and Jem think about how elements of the artificial, the theatrical and the sentimental come together in camp objects, from porn movies to Tiffany lamps to risqué rad...

What exactly is cool? Well, if it was that easy to describe, it obviously wouldn’t be cool. In this Trip, Keir, Jem and Nadia wonder if cool can ever be politically useful, and what happens when cool is used as a disciplining force. With ideas from Pierre Bourdieu, Norman Mailer and Paul Gilroy, and music from OutKast, Gwen Stefani and Miles Davis, the gang adopt a blank expression to explor...

How do mainstream politicians and pundits contribute to the normalisation of far-right ideas, even as they claim to reject racism and populism? That’s one of many vital questions asked by Aaron Winter and Aurelien Mondon in their book, Reactionary Democracy . Following ACFM’s recent Trip about Fascism , Keir and Jem speak to Aaron and Aurelien about the making of the “woke conspi...

A lot of people are saying that fascism is on the rise. But what are we pointing to when we call a system, or a person, fascist? On this Trip, Nadia, Keir and Jem map out a complicated ideology, from its roots in 19th century industrialisation to its resurgence in ethnonationalism and eco-apartheid. Exploring how different political traditions try to explain fascism, they look for signs of the f-w...

From fecal transplants to the yoghurt-industrial complex, we’ve never been more absorbed in the workings of our gut. But can we trust it? Nadia, Jem and Keir investigate the mysterious connections between mind and body, reason and instinct. How did capitalism separate our minds from our bodies? Is a belief in intuition filling the gap left by religion? And will reclaiming our biomes be a win for a...

Last time on ACFM, the gang explored the impact of UFOs on politics, from deep-state conspiracies to the Posadists. But to really understand how aliens influence our thought – and what our belief in E.T. says about ourselves – we have to go to the movies. In this Microdose, Keir, Jem and Nadia sweep through a century of aliens on screen, from Martian invaders to Mulder & Scully to talking hep...

Should the left care about the existence of aliens? The ACFM gang explore the impact of UFOs on political thought in this Trip. Keir, Jem and Nadia discuss the connections between UFO conspiracies and right-wing thought, why some communists think aliens will bring about world revolution, and whether Fermi’s paradox means we’re not alone, with music from Sun Ra, The Carpenters and true...

Music has the uncanny power to stir up big feelings, which makes it an obvious vehicle for political statements of hope, anger, despair, or how to cast your vote. In this Microdose episode to accompany ACFM’s recent Trip on Protest, Jem takes us through 60 years of plugged-in protest music – no strumming folkies or broadside ballads this time. From hip-hop campaign boosters to new wave takes...

The ACFM gang get together for the last time this year to deliver a Festive 50. Keir, Jem and Nadia select the best bits of culture and politics from 2023, from music, films, books to games, strikes and actions. Unwrap to find sci-fi blaxploitation, comedy history, gobby glam-punk, Judge Dredd analysis, a fresh angle on Silicon Valley billionaires and much more. Thanks for listening to the show an...

Millions have protested against the bombing of Gaza by taking part in marches, boycotts, sit-ins and other demonstrations. But what difference does it make, either to the world or to ourselves? The gang confront a contentious topic in this Trip. Do “A to B” marches ever achieve anything? What about joining hands around an RAF base? Digging up roads? Refusing to pay your taxes? Is squat...

Ever feel like there’s too much change these days? Don’t worry, you’re not (necessarily) becoming more conservative. On this Trip, Nadia, Jem and Keir think about the ebb and flow of political currents, social movements and our inner lives. What’s the difference between being still and being stuck? When does a campaign turn into a movement? Why do we talk about feminism com...

Festivals. The perfect embodiment of the ACFM aesthetic, and even social politics… or are they? As the season comes to a close, Nadia, Jem and Keir ask themselves what festivals are really about. Is it music? Camping? The breakdown of everyday hierachies? Or is it just 20,000 people standing in a field? With help from Bakhtin’s concept of the “carnivalesque” and Bataille’s “excess”, th...

In this bumper Trip, the gang survey the totalising modern phenomenon that is The Internet. Nadia, Keir and Jem dredge up their early interactions with a primitive web and explain how the dream of free and open communication was displaced by closed networks of e-commerce and data harvesting. Following Keir’s recent Microdose episode with Malcolm Harris, they discuss the connections between self-op...

Ahead of an ACFM Trip about the internet, Keir Milburn is joined by Malcolm Harris to talk about the unique political history of his hometown of Palo Alto, the intellectual laboratory for a century of American hegemony. The Kids These Days author tells a story that connects the founding of California, the violent removal of its native population, Stanford University’s eugenicist agenda and the par...

As the longest day arrives in the northern hemisphere, Jeremy, Nadia and Keir ponder our obsession with the great outdoors. How did parks become political? Why do we seek out the strenuous discomforts of hiking, camping and cold water? And what does Jem have against music festivals? They look back on a century of changing attitudes to the outdoors, from radical Edwardian cyclists and the woo-woo w...

After last week’s look at the politics of comedy, this time the gang turn to the gogglebox for a Microdose about sitcoms. Specifically, we’re watching comedy shows set in the workplace – from shoddy B&Bs to big-box superstores, from Wernham Hogg to Springfield Nuclear Power Plant. What lies beyond the double entendres and cheap sexism of the ’70s? Where did workplace humour g...

What’s the point of comedy? Stand-ups were at the forefront of the cultural backlash against Thatcherism, but today’s meme-driven lols are rarely in the service of left-wing politics. Meanwhile, the world’s most powerful people seem intent on having a laugh, from podcasting politicians to presidential comedians. In this Trip, Jeremy Gilbert, Nadia Idle and Keir Milburn put together an ACFM theory...