A case for police/prison abolition by Olayemi Olurin. Note this section:
"Yet at the first mention of divesting from this system bit by bit, instead investing in the people and communities the system has enslaved — addressing their material needs so that we may eventually do away with the system altogether — people insist we need police and prisons."
Folks get spooked bc abolitionists rarely admit they mean reform, alternatives, & vision. They just don't want to sound like normie liberals.
There's So Much We Don’t Question About Mass Incarceration
We invest billions of dollars into policing and prisons while still insisting we are not safe.
teenvogue.com
A libertarian feminist reviews Bryan Caplan's dumb book against social justice. From long experience, it's been evident to me that Caplan has refused to engage with the actual feminist and social justice literatures, or even give the activists good faith hearings. Kat Murti sees the same thing in his titular essay on feminism, and points out that this means he's failing the very "ideological Turing test" he coined.
A Libertarian Economist's Denialist Foray Into Feminism
Bryan Caplan's out-of-character diatribe refuses to even acknowledge that women ever had it bad
theunpopulist.net
Always read Glory Liu. Interview with Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins about Liu's new book on Adam Smith's reception history in America.
The Contradictions of Adam Smith
A conversation with Glory Liu about the thinker's influence on American politics, the many ways his work has been misunderstood, and why we remember Smith as a champion of capitalism.
thenation.com
Degrowth can sound pretty reasonable, as it highlights that increasing GDP is perfectly compatible with mass languishing and a burning planet. But the good ideas in degrowth don't actually require abandoning increasing innovation and wealth. And the bad ideas in degrowth—deindustrialization, sufficiency economics, the HOA-fication of society—will tend to lead to central planning, mass impoverishment, and coercion. https://www.liberalcurrents.com/degrowth-neither-left-nor-right-but-backward/
Degrowth: Neither Left Nor Right, But Backward
As we pare away the extraneous elements to get to the core of degrowth, we find an illiberal philosophy fundamentally at odds with human freedom and human welfare.
liberalcurrents.com
I just discovered a pretty nice new podcast, by journalists Ian Dunt and Dorian Lynskey. Dunt is the author of "How To Be A Liberal", which is perhaps best in class among the recent crop of popular defenses of liberalism. The linked episode is on Ayn Rand, where the hosts are ... not fans but nor are they dismissive. Their episode on the word "woke" is really good as well.
Origin Story: Ayn Rand: The ego has landed on Apple Podcasts
Show Origin Story, Ep Ayn Rand: The ego has landed - 14 Nov 2022
podcasts.apple.com
The anti-trans moral panic is replete with scare-mongering about children, from the alleged risks of predators with penises in girls' bathrooms to conspiracy theories of plots to mutilate a generation of children. But this is just another iteration of the ancient strategy of harnessing our natural protectiveness of children to demonize targeted groups. This goes way back to the medieval "blood libel" against Jews.
The Lovejoy Trap: Fascism Masquerading As Care
You can’t fact-check people who are using the Lovejoy Trap because it’s not actually a set of propositions. It’s a stance that brings with it a sense of ownership and control over others in the gui…
liberalcurrents.com
