Teach Me Communism

Christine's teaching us all about Huey Long, aka the Kingfish, Louisiana's wheelin' and dealin' bad boy. We talk demagogues, populism, fascism, and scheming!   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Teach Me Communism on YouTube!   Solidarity foreve...

Another Q&A! This time we cover: political charts and how they relate to communism, artisan goods in the utopia, the October 15 general strike, a brief aside about Blizzard's union-busting, Democratic Centralism, Stalin and Lenin's relationship, and third-worldism/Maoism-Third worldism.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gm...

Join us as we discuss a selection from Disability and Capitalism by Marta Russell. Plus: a brief discussion on Cuba, by popular request. Other topics include charity, rights vs justice, marriage equality, the value of labor/bodies, and Star Trek.   Find the reading here: https://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/5784   Additional resources mentioned: Sins Invalid Home Page Disabilit...

This tale has it all: mysterious bandits, betrayals and DRAMA! Plus, land reform and American imperialism. Join us as we learn about this very long and twisting tale of revolution. Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Teach Me Communism on YouTube...

This week we're watching a 1976 documentary about a coal miner strike in Kentucky. Honestly, the title says it all with this one, I just feel weird having a one sentence description.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Teach Me Communism on You...

Students, teachers, lends us your ears! We're talking education this week, as we read some theory, discuss previous socialist approaches, and imagine our own anarchist utopia of learning.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Teach Me Communism o...

Would you live in an anarchist utopia if it also meant you had to live on a bleak desert moon with very little resources? This week we're discussing the sci-fi novel The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. Le Guin. It's about anarcho-syndicalism, imperialism, and physics! We also talk about gender, faster than light travel, climate change, and land otters. Christine really wants a land otter.   Check us ou...

We return to Cuba this week to take a closer look at the CIA's fumbling, bumbling, very bad no good invasion. Topics include wacky assassination plots, bad plane disguises, and the astounding confidence of white men.    Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe...

It's another biography this week, and this time we're talking about the socialist president of Burkina Faso, Thomas Sankara. His story has everything! Coups, colonialism, betrayal, and... starting a band?   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Tea...

It's time for another art history episode! This time Christine is teaching us about the Federal Art Project, a division of the WPA. You can find the slideshow of artworks discussed on our social media.   Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and subscribe to us at Teach Me Communism on YouTube!   Sol...

We're finally tackling that war that always seems to pop up in our conversations: The Spanish Civil War. We talk leftist unity, mujeres libres, anarchism, the totally coincidental connections between the church and the military as repressive forces, and more.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com...

Back to the mailbag! This week’s topics: an addendum on Ireland, a definition for liberalism, healthcare, L3Cs, tips for young communists, and children’s rights in a communist society. And in our intro segment, Christine gives us the horoscopes of famous commies.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon...

Communist Movie Night is back and this time, we brought a friend: Noam Chomsky! Well, not literally. We’re just watching a movie about him, Manufacturing Consent, which explores the bias in the media and how it plays into capitalism and imperialism.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmeco...

Time to check back on the fight for a unified Ireland. This episode covers events following the Easter Rising up to the Good Friday agreement. We talk about imperialism and the fracturing of the left, so like, the usual topics.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like and...

This week's biography is of abolitionist academic Angela Davis, including her early travels, the Soledad brothers, the People's Park, and more. Reagan accidentally makes UC Berkeley sound super cool. We also look at readings from Women, Race and Class and Are Prisons Obsolete?   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Pa...

We have a dark tale from Latin America this week, full of spies, murder, kidnapping, and lots of weirdly named clandestine organizations. Spoiler: our old pals the CIA are heavily involved. Shocking, we know. Get out your red string, thumbtacks, and bulletin boards, it's gonna be a lot!   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gm...

The title kinda says it all for this one! Christine has been a long-time advocate for fat folks, so they take the lead on debunking some myths, explaining the effects of fat bias, and why this important for the left. Grady once again longs for an android body.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.co...

Vive la commune! Today we're revisiting the Paris Commune, first mentioned in our episode on Lenin's The State and Revolution. Now that we've got the analysis, let's take a deeper look into the events leading up to the commune, their policies, their downfall, and how the world responded to it all. Christine sings a bit of Les Mis at one point.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecom...

This week we're reading one of Vladimir Lenin's premier texts, The State and Revolution. We talk about smashing, organizing, withering, oh my! Sound note: there were some loud dogs in the background, along with a very squeaky door letting them in and out of the house. Apologies for the noise! You can access this text for free at marxists.org, or get Grady and Christine's notes on Patreon: Patreon....

While a real-life megacorporation tries to crush its workers' attempts to unionize, we watch a sci-fi version of our world that's sadly not too far off the mark: the 2018 film Sorry to Bother You, directed by Boots Riley. We bemoan corporate nonsense, crush on various actors, yap about art, and there's a horse, of course.   Check us out on social media: Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teach...

From anarcho-communism to transhumanism, we go through the many types of anarchism out there, giving brief definitions, explanations, and of course, some opinions. And for our bonus segment, we talk about the board game Monopoly.   Check us out on social media! Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   And like a...

In today's episode, we continue our biography of Mao Zedong, starting from the Proclamation of the People's Republic of China and ending with, surprisingly, Mao's death. We'll discuss things like land reform, the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution, and of course we'll wrap up with our own conclusions and analysis at the end.   Because Mao is quite controversial, our approach in these...

Another biography, and this time it's a long one! In part 1 we cover Mao's early life, his beginnings as a communist leader, the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Chinese Civil War, and up to the declaration of the People's Republic of China.   Check us out on social media! Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail.com Patreon: Patreon.com/teachmecommunism   A...

Over the months of doing this show we’ve gotten lots of questions in the vein of “how do I spread the good news of communism”?So in this episode we talk about tips, strategies, and comebacks for converting the liberal in your life. Go forth and proselytize! Apologies for the audio quality on this one; there was construction going on outside.   Check us out on social media! Instagram: @teachmecommu...

It's movie night again! We're watching the new film about the Black Panthers, Judas and the Black Messiah, directed by Shaka King. We talk about how the film covers the Panthers, how to spot a bad liar, and of course, we bemoan the current state of our revolution (or lack thereof).    Check us out on social media! Instagram: @teachmecommunism Twitter: @teachcommunism Gmail: teachmecommunism@gmail....