The Ministry for the Future 51-59: Happiness is a Cold Glacier, I Hate LA, Democracy?

One of the great things about this book is how it keeps you on your toes. Matt and Hilary do their best to keep up with its digressions and interruptions, following the flow into conversations about the state, democracy, capitalism, lizard men, and the collective joy of Pepsi commercials. For the first 24 minutes or so they despair over the election of Joe Biden and the vast political emptiness the 2020 presidential campaign seems to signify, so if you're not interested in that, skip it! But if you want to hear Jon Ossoff compared to the ghouls from THEY LIVE!, don't skip it! Then they ask you to stop listening to podcasts. THEN they talk about Crash Day: no more planes, no more cows. A big theme in this episode is the role of the state and the possibility for democratic processes to address the crisis of capitalism, and we'll talk a lot more about that in the next episode. Here, we talk about how America and India variously embody the notion of "nation." We talk about flows and dynamism, of human populations and photons, animals and information. We wonder if bankers really are terrorists (kind of) and what the suggestion of a carbon coin actually means for the relationship between democracy and capitalism (again, more on that next time). Happiness, attachment, cat fights, and the horizon of possibility. Recommended reading:  The Dream Life of Citizens: Late Victorian Novels and the Fantasy of the State by Zarena Aslami (Fordham University Press) Other stuff Matt & Hilary are reading Automation and the Future of Work by Aaron Benanav (Verso) The Autobiography of Malcolm X The Einstein Intersection by Samuel Delaney  Thanks for listening! Permafrost melt is now self-sustaining! Email us at [email protected] Follow us on Twitter @podcastonmars Leave us a voicemail on the Anchor.fm app Rate and review us on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts! Music by Spirit of Space