What does it say about a society if it venerates the image of someone being executed by the state for sedition? In this episode, we trace the improbable evolution of Jesus of Nazareth from fervent revolutionary to apolitical, transcendental being. We situate his trajectory in the cross-cultural tradition of prophetic liberation movements, from southeast Asian hill tribes to North American pan-indigenous movements, and alongside other Jewish messiahs, such as the bandit chief Hezekiah and the mysterious sorcerer known only as “the Egyptian.” What all of these eclectic figures—some with a military orientation, some who primarily relied on miracles—had in common was a singular devotion to national liberation. That these politics came to be repurposed for an ostensibly apolitical mythology—a story of sacred victimhood, in which dying is winning—helps us to understand one of the many feedback loops between culture and biology that characterizes contemporary life. It helps us understand how we have become confined to an increasingly narrow range of our evolved potentials, bereft of any sense of real agency—how we come, in other words, to inhabit the biology of defeat.
The Raven Politics of Terra Incognita
Narcissists, Strongmen, and Technocrats pt. 2
Narcissists, Strongmen, and Technocrats pt. 1
Glitching Is the New Tweaking (excerpt)
Myth, Science, Power
Red Sky, Black Snake: Eight Strategic Theses from Standing Rock
#52: Varieties of Scientific Revolution pt. 2
#51: What We Sang in the Mountains to Greet the Gentle Rain pt. 2 (preview)
Varieties of Scientific Revolution pt. 1
What Is Politics? Interview with Daniel pt. 2
What We Sang in the Mountains to Greet the Gentle Rain pt. 1 (preview)
What Is Left Authoritarianism?
What Is Politics? Interview with Daniel pt. 1
Return to the Circle
Philosophy or Schizophrenia?
Prison and Other Stories (excerpt)
Life Is Holy War pt. 2: Asymmetries of Aggression
Life Is Holy War pt. 1: Two Stories about a Mountain
The Life and Death of Radical Environmentalism
Destroying the World Destroyers
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