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 radio comedy. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter...
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 explore the mysterious rules of this singular modern concept. Check out all the books and music mentioned in the...
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 conspiracy”, how illiberal politics absorbs liberal rhetoric, and why the left has to stop falling for reactionary narrative...
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-word in contemporary politics and play music from Woody Guthrie, Heaven 17 and Black Sabbath. ACFM wi...
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 anti-capitalism? They digest their thinking with music from Björk and Olivia Rodrigo and ideas from M...
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 heptapods. Sign up to the ACFM newsletter: https://novaramedia.com/newsletters Films, TV & Books: H....
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 believers Blink 182. Find our ever-expanding playlist on Spotify by searching “ACFM”. Sign up to the ACFM newsle...
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 on British imperialism, from anti-landlord lyrics to a requiem for the post-war dream, it’s a narrated pl...
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 and for all your support this year – we couldn’t do it without you. https://novara.media/support Sign ...
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 squatting a form of direct action? They discuss Irish hunger strikers, Montgomery bus boycotters, Greenham Common wom...
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 coming in waves? How can you tell you’re approaching a tipping point? The gang turn such abstract questions into concrete histo...
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”, the gang discuss hippies and punks, counterculture and commerce, and the role of Glastonbury in the national imagi...
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-optimising techies and the pseudo-science of eugenics. They also talk about digital hygiene, the “Cali...
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 parallel emergence of Silicon Valley and the military-industrial complex. Is the entire project of pers...
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 ways of the Kindred of the Kibbo Kift to the modern obsession with lidos and wild swimming. Plus, pas...
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 go in the ’90s? How did TV cops reckon with Black Lives Matter in the 2020s? And which sitcom is a favourite of both Na...
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 of humour. Does satire make us more cynical? Is there such a thing as a national sense of humour? Ar...
From the epic of Gilgamesh to the archetypes of Carl Jung, the mysterious power of myth is at hand. Is Genesis as mythical as Oedipus? How did the fantasy of Brexit become a reality? And what stories underpin the emerging theory of Gilbertism? In this Trip, Jeremy, Nadia and Keir explore the alternate realities created by psychoanalysts and professional wrestlers, and discuss how theorists of myth have fed into both left and right-wing ideologies. Along the way they explore ideas from Barthes, D...
The ACFM groupmind went into overdrive on last week’s Trip, a wide-ranging conversation about the long and violent history of strikes. This time, Nadia, Jem and Keir take a closer look at cultural representations of worker organisation – that is to say, they sat themselves down with a huge stack of old movies and an extra-large bucket of opinions. From blacklisted Hollywood dramas to bawdy British comedies, the gang survey nearly 100 years of strikes on screen – courtesy of directors like Danny ...
In the midst of Britain’s biggest wave of industrial action in years, the gang turn their attention to the long and bloodied history of strikes. Who do we find on the picket line? Nadia, Keir and Jeremy explore a lineage that stretches back hundreds of years, from matchgirls to miners, from 1840s century Chartists to 2020s university lecturers, and from smoggy cities to leafy suburbs. Along the way they ask whether 18th century sailors were the original tech workers, why Britain’s only general s...
Ghosts have already got their own festival: Halloween. So why do they spook us at Christmas too? Do they represent forces of goodness and charity, or some nameless demonic evil? And what gifts have they brought? Jeremy Gilbert shields his eyes from the ghostly apparitions of Jacques Derrida, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and M.R. James as he explores the connections between festive cheer and spectral fear in this Microdose, which accompanies the recent Trip episode on Gifts. An ever-expanding playlist of ...
Adam Smith claimed that “the propensity to truck, barter and exchange… is common to all men”, but anthropologists know that this isn’t the case. In fact, humans tend towards the opposite. So why do we feel compelled to give away our wealth? Nadia, Jem and Keir unwrap the cultural and economic pressures on doing pressies in a loosely festive edition of ACFM. Talking about Santa’s workshop, energy price controls and the lavish tradition of potlatch, they bring in the works of Marcel Mauss and Davi...
We don’t get enough of it. We take drugs all day to fend it off. We’ll do it when we’re dead. And it’s our last line of defence against 24/7 capitalism. Sleep, the main course in life’s feast! The ACFM crew rouse themselves from slumber to wokeness in this month’s Trip, exploring the political and cultural aspects of shut-eye. How has a biological necessity been manipulated by everything from mechanical clocks, electric lighting, screen addiction and the insatiable needs of capitalism? Nadia Idl...
ACFM reunite for spooky season with one thing on their minds: the horror, the horror! Nadia, Jeremy and Keir embark on a historical, literary and cinematic exploration of scary stuff. Why do (some) humans love to be terrified? What can horror teach us about the nature of the universe? What do the latest crop of scary movies say about the fears plaguing our society? From Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to Jordan Peele’s ‘Get Out’, from H.P. Lovecraft’s cosmic horror to Sigmund Freud’s idea of the unc...
We live in irrational times. From the resurgence of interest in astrology, tarot and occultism to the deepening influence of conspiracy theories and positive thinking, culture is experiencing a turn towards the magical. What does that mean for those of us on the “weird left”? Nadia Idle, Jeremy Gilbert and Keir Milburn gather round the cauldron for an episode that will challenge believers and rationalists alike, with music from Siouxsie, Queen and The KLF. Up for discussion: Sigmund Freud, the I...
In 1999, an anonymous Italian collective published a novel called Q. Imagined by its left-wing authors as an “operation manual for cultural disruption,” the book has had a bewildering political afterlife, with its story arc and the collective’s media pranks around Satanic ritual and paedophilia seemingly providing the basis for alt-right conspiracy theory QAnon. Did a ’90s literary prank foment an American insurrection? In a Microdose to accompany an ACFM Trip episode about magic, Keir Milburn s...
How can we care for each other within a system that doesn’t care about us? In this episode, Nadia Idle, Jeremy Gilbert and Keir Milburn get to grips with birth, death and all the social reproduction in between. When did we start putting our elders in care homes instead of our own homes? What happens when childcare is socialised instead of privatised? And why do we seem to be talking about “self-care” more than caring for others? The gang consider these questions and more in a suitably extended e...
In a tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG), a group of people take a trip into an imaginary world, guided by an MC or ‘dungeon master’. Not limited to the Tolkien-esque themes of the famous Dungeons & Dragons, TTRPGs range from gritty sci-fi scenarios to steampunk heist fantasies, and from everyday life to magic, monsters and vampires. In this Microdose, Nadia, Keir and Jeremy gather round the table to talk about how role-playing games have evolved over half a century and what different game-pl...
Games are all around us. They let us escape from drudgery and experiment with other worlds and ways of being. But they can be traps too: apps designed to be addictive, producing only the most hollow sense of achievement. In this Trip, Nadia, Jeremy and Keir throw their polyhedral dice to explore how games shape our inner and outer lives. How has game theory been used to explain human behaviour? How can we make play emancipatory in a gamified world? Is there such a thing as a left-wing game? And ...
