Occupy Wall Street

I'm enthralled by the music video for Damian Marley and Skrillex's song "Make it Bun Dem" and the many artistic and political elements at play. Hat tip to Carol Ann for bringing the video to my attention, and then dissecting the piece with me over a Moroccan-French brunch one Saturday.

On the Series

Economics from the Left is a series dedicated to bringing to the fore the voices of economists from the left, voices much needed in these times of mainstream mediocrity and irrelevance. The worldviews within the series are increasingly more in tune with what the majority of the disenfrachised across the world are coming to understand as their own systemic state of affairs. Underground, rhizomatic, networked and most importantly, viable, these timely responses to the continuous systemic failures of the Capitalist system erupt with the possibilities of better things to come and solidarity against the inanity of mainstream discourse. 

by Natasha Yarotskaya

Russia by mind comprehended cannot be


Nor by wide arshins measured:


Its uniqueness be that—


Photo: Shutterstock

by Maria Brock and Natasha Yarotskaya

The first draft of this letter (for the Romanian magazine Decât o Revistă) was written on November 14, 2011, one day before New York City's Occupy Wall Street encampment was raided. The second draft was finalized on November 22 while I was traveling in Nicaragua. The letter was translated into Romanian and publishd in January. To see how it appeared in the magazine (with accompanying photos by Ahmet Sibdial Sau), click here.

The FX TV series American Horror Story presents an intriguing portrait of America in the new millennium through the distorting lens of the Gothic mode. Essentially a haunted house story, the series (now 2/3 into its first season) refuses to play by the rules or adhere to the mythology of the sub-genre.

I am often shocked when I hear talk about the Occupy Wall Street movement being un-American, or that these people out protesting in the streets should find more constructive things to do with their time. As if they are out there for the fun of it. You know, just didn't feel like going to work that day so they thought they'd go get arrested for walking on a public sidewalk. It constantly amazes me how easily people forget that this country was built on protest and revolution. It’s in our blood.