This is no time to look away. Danger signs are flashing on all fronts, from the bellicose threats against Cuba to the flaming tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. The return of the Democrats will change the tone but not the tenor of our perilous situation. The marketing of liberal wars usually comes in humanitarian guises like the so-called right to protect. But these virtuous claims must be put to the test. That’s what we are here to do. It’s what we’ve done for more than three decades now, even when people have said that we can’t go on. Even when the accounts are low and the prospects bleak. Can’t go on? We must go on. What choice do we have? More

Across France, Spain, India, Belgium, and other parts of the world, young people are taking to the streets, giving voice to a growing international revolt against the destruction of public education, the collapse of social protections, the erosion of democratic rights, and the cruel politics of austerity. Despite their different national histories, these struggles share a growing anger at the savage machinery of neoliberal capitalism, its abandonment of the young, its concentration of wealth and power in the hands of ruling elites, its embrace of militarism, and its systematic destruction of the public institutions and social protections on which democratic life depends. In France, what began as protests against overcrowded classrooms, deteriorating schools, and teacher shortages has grown into a nationwide movement drawing support from parents, university students, workers, and trade unions.   More

The far-right family tree has borne its most recent poisoned fruits of ignorance and hatred in the form of Eduarda Campopiano and Lucas Pavanato, who were among the most voted candidates in the Brazilian elections of 4 October. They follow, in reverse chronological order, transphobic and disinformation delinquent, Nikolas Ferreira; the gun-enthusiast transphobic, evangelical, Christian-values, misinformation ace, actor Juliano Cazarré (who claimed that more men are killed by women in Brazil than vice versa); the violent, toxic members of the “liberal towards economics, conservative towards habits” Free Brazil Movement (MBL) and other political startups that sprang up after the coup against Dilma Rousseff in 2016; the abominable “Church Militant” Allan dos Santos; putsch planner Paulo Figueiredo; the unfunny scourge-of-the-left comedian Danilo Gentili; the thuggish Bolsonaro clan; and the vociferous charlatan guru of Jair Bolsonaro, Olavo de Carvalho. More

Our current media landscape is not simply characterized by an endless stream of daily content and the incessant deluge of AI slop, but by absence. News broadcasts, documentaries, social media feeds and popular culture are continually filled with stories concerning missing people, enforced disappearances, migration, war, environmental loss and digital erasure. What were previously seen More