Spiced with clever dark humor and depicted through beautiful cinematography, endearing acting and a powerful soundtrack, ‘Humanist Vampire’ is a modest masterpiece, especially recommended to dreamy, romantic, humanist spirits—that is, to the ones who still believe that, despite this shattered society, human relationships should be put front and center on our agenda.
April 30, 2025, marked the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam war. But what is there to celebrate? Even the talking heads can’t figure out a way to “spin” this in defense of American imperialism. We are still haunted by the ghosts of Vietnam even as we perpetrate genocide against the Palestinians.
Takes up: the opening of Poland’s first abortion clinic; International Women’s Day in Argentina; and a march in South Africa demanding the government declare escalating levels of femicide and violence against women and children a national emergency.
Takes up: 2025 International Transgender Day of Visibility; the organization Free Mom Hugs; LGBTQ+ people in Germany; and the reinstatement of a colonial-era “buggery law” in Trinidad and Tobago.
From immigrants to Transgender people, from workers to students to women, no one is safe. Attacks on many fronts are part and parcel of what is widely recognized as a Trump/Musk coup, but is usually portrayed as normal politics in the media. Institutions cannot be trusted to save us and they need to feel the pressure from people fighting back.
What kind of new world order is Trump heading for? Forced annexation of territories (as in Russia’s war on Ukraine), genocide (as in Israel’s war on Gaza), and neocolonialism (as in the Democratic Republic of Congo) are crucial parts of it. The word “multipolar” cannot hide its imperialist nature.
What it is about this moment of this capitalist society that brought a creature like Trump to the top? The crumbling of society goes beyond economic measures. The symptoms are everywhere of a system that increasingly does not believe in its own future.
Why did the massive resistance eight years ago not prevent Trump’s return? And what is the “Left” today? More important than the unity of the Left is the unity of the movement from theory and the movement from practice.
The 20th century revealed statist socialism to be a dead end. It is a substitute for the self-activity of the masses in motion, which is the only basis for workers’ control of the labor process. Without revolutionary humanist philosophical mediation capitalism will reconstitute around us and block the total reorganization of society. The philosophy of revolution demands an organizational expression.
Takes up: Administrators, teachers, staff, parents and supporters protest bills in Indiana that would reduce public education funding; the fight against a program that separates low-performing schools from their geographical districts in Tennessee; and Trump misusing Title IX to strip Maine of education funding.
Harvard’s rejection of Trump administration demands has become a focus for resistance. However, the silence on Israel’s genocide in Gaza reveals an anti-Palestinian bias at Harvard despite a strong presence of Jewish students and faculty who reject equating criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
Participant’s report of the “Hands Off” protest in Oakland, California. New is the totality of the issues coming together in this moment. Can civil society’s multiple struggles find their own unifying non-state-oriented idea of freedom?
A new turning point has been reached as the Sudanese army has just forced the Rapid Special Forces out of Khartoum. Amid the horrendous level of carnage, not to be forgotten is the need for the Sudanese masses to return to their revolutionary moment.
Letter issued by activists, searching families, artists and writers following the recent discovery of an extermination camp in Teuchitlán, Jalisco, where hundreds may have been executed. The camp was not discovered by the State, but by families of the disappeared.
Participants’ report of a Hands Off march in Detroit, where thousands converged at the Detroit Institute of Arts. It was one of over 1,200 that took place on April 5 in the U.S.
Participants’ report of a HANDS OFF demonstration in Evanston, Ill. The protest was one of over 1,200 taking place in every state of the Union–a first step in taking control of our destiny and creating the kind of world that will make it impossible for fascism to ever rise again.
Takes up: the life of feminist philosopher Sandra G. Harding, who coined the term “standpoint theory”; researched effects of online misogyny on British primary and secondary school students; and increasing global rates of incarceration of women.
Anti-Semitism is being fomented by Trumpism and extreme right-wing parties in Europe. At the same time they attack Palestine solidarity as “anti-Semitic.” Its weaponization endangers Jews, for it obscures the line between false anti-Semitism, and the very real anti-Semitism that exists today and that must be fought.
Participant report from one of hundreds of popular “Tesla Takedown” actions on March 29 around the world. Resistance is growing as more people are exposed to the anti-Trump movement and experience its indispensability.
Why war? To keep the current Israeli government in power. The less democracy, the more power to Netanyahu. But good news: mass protests by Israelis, reserve soldiers not showing up when they receive draft notices, and The Supreme Court holding firm.
DOGE is slashing grants, contracts and jobs in federal agencies. Especially Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility, climate change, education and food safety. Resisting fascism means looking for ways to fight for real reform as steps toward revolutionary development by and for humanity.
Takes up: potential budget cuts in New Jersey affecting people with disabilities; a plan in Nova Scotia, Canada, to relocate all of its citizens living with disabilities from institutional settings; and Frances Vicioso, a Black-Latina storyteller with mental illness and physical disabilities, leading a “Black Disability History” webinar.
In many countries misogyny is state policy, be that in the U.S. where abortion bans are killing women or Iran where the new hijab law has draconian punishments. It’s doubtful if Trump et al comprehend the rage and power that opposes their deadly drive for power and riches.
On March 14, over 3,000 veterans and allies demonstrated at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., against Trump and Musk’s cuts to veterans’ federal jobs, services, and benefits. The demonstration came together quickly showing that people aim to restore democracy.
Israel ended its ceasefire in Gaza not with words but with the slaughter of over 400 Palestinians. The genocide and struggle for freedom call for our deepest solidarity with Palestinian masses’ efforts at self-activity, without which self-determination is out of reach.
Trump began a trade war, insisting that Canada would be annexed by the U.S. He denied the legitimacy of Canada in terms like Russia’s before its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But Canada is not for sale—or for conquest.
On March 7, a task force created by Trump’s executive order cut $400 million in grants from Columbia University, accussing it of continued failure to protect Jewish students “from antisemitic harassment”, and of denying them learning opportunities. This is part of an ongoing repression since last spring’s campus protests against Israel war on Gaza.
More than 200,000 women took to the streets on March 8 in Mexico City. It was a day of protests, marches and conviviality that lasted more than 15 hours. This was the largest International Women’s Day march in the city in recent years.
Gay activist Ed Sederbaum died in November at the age of 78. His activism was multi-faceted. Very appropriately, he was known as the “grandfather of the Queens movement.”
Superintendents, teachers and students resist attempts to destroy K-12 education. We refuse to be less than wholly human, and to give up on the “power and richness of the whole” in education.
Takes up: Three Thai women rescued from a human egg farm in the country of Georgia; the third African Women in Dialogue conference; and the UN Human Rights Committee ruling Ecuador and Nicaragua responsible for violating the human rights of three girls denied abortions.
Trump’s return is a manifestation of capitalism’s tendency toward fascism when destabilized by systemic crises. The questioning of the foundations of this decaying society is linked to a search for an alternative. We have a responsibility to help the movement set its direction by working at the concrete projection of a liberatory banner.
In this review of ‘Marxist Economic Theory’ by Ernest Mandel, Dunayevskaya criticizes Mandel’s denuding economic categories of their specifically capitalistic nature, and his distortion of Marx’s theory of crises.
We, the undersigned, affirm in this statement a set of foundational principles to fortify the new Syria, provide a framework for the transitional period, and help establish the political order for which the Syrian people rose up under the banner of freedom and dignity.
In its latest incursion into Europe, the Trump administration ranted against European liberalism, calling it the greatest threat to Europe, “the threat from within.”It not only campaigned for far-right parties but demanded their elevation to power. Trumpism aims to remake the world under the domination of new forms of fascism.
Takes up: Transgender Day of Remembrance in Chicago; Russian LGBTQ+ activist Andrei Kotov; filmmaker of ‘Crossing’ not showing it in home country, Georgia; and the Constitutional Court of Lithuania striking down “anti-LGBT propaganda” law.
“Grooming gangs” in England have lured thousands of girls into prostitution. Only a few abusers have been convicted. Studying successful tactics and groups created by survivors gives us confidence to replace exploitation with a compassionate society.
Maria Teresa Horta, one of the feminist authors of “The Three Marias” who were freed in the Portuguese Revolution, died on Feb. 4. The book was explicitly revolutionary and made clear that to change women’s lives revolution would have to be so deep as to transform human relationships, including sexuality.
Netanyahu doesn’t want the Gaza ceasefire deal to last, because that might end the war, which would have bad repercussions for him, including having to face his trial on corruption charges. Hamas wants a deal so it can get its VIP prisoners out of jail.
Susan van Gelder presents a mix of reports, information, commentary and dialogue about the ICE raids against immigrants in Southwest Detroit, as well as the actions to resist it.
Rumors about ICE are spreading in Southwest Detroit. In a school, student absences are already elevated. Meanwhile communities are gathering resources and planning activities. The sooner we gather, more people can be helped.
The climate crisis, biodiversity, food, water, and human health are so closely linked that efforts to address one without taking the others into account often backfire. This finding from scientists reflects their hearing climate justice movements.
President Donald Trump is encouraging deadly hate toward women, Blacks, people of color, LGBTQ people, people with disabilities, and immigrants. It is grassroots responses and mutual aid that can block Trump’s power grab. More forms of revolt will erupt in the face of the downward spiral of this capitalist world in crisis.
Takes up: International Criminal Court prosecutors investigating the Taliban’s horrific laws oppressing women as war crimes; the formation of a “morality police” to enforce new restrictions on women in Libya; and “deepfake” porn targeting girls in Toronto, Canada.
The Pelican Bay State Prison hunger strike documentary, The Strike, will air on PBS on Feb. 3. Faruq, a participant interviewed for the documentary, sees the strike as more than history—as an opportunity to reflect on the present and help determine the future.
In California’s worst wildfires in its history, important factors include a century of land and water mismanagement and fossil fuel use that generates global warming. The fires brought out the best, mutual aid from below, and the worst, hateful scapegoating disguising climate denial. A global vision and humane principles in organizing ourselves are fundamental to a sustainable future.
Adele reviews ‘The Cult of Trump,’ whose author explains how so many people could support Trump for President in spite of his criminal activity, bullying personality, and nonsensical campaign speeches.
Farsi translation of the lead article “The U.S. election as manifestation of counterrevolution.”
Facing Trumpist attack on public schools, teacher Susan van Gelder traces history of the struggle in the U.S. for free education, from Reconstruction to the present. She highlights what we must fight for and the forces of retrogression.
Susan van Gelder reviews ‘Peregrina,’ a multimedia 80-minute one-woman performance, telling the story of femicide in Mexico and the movement of Mexican women to combat it.
