An absolute smasher of a book! on a page tearing tip. I came across it by chance whilst sifting through the isles in a decent shop. Wus’ this? It’s got pretty poor sleeve design, especially considering the strength & style of the material within. But the vignette on the back convinced me that this was essential reading based on the journalists insight. I wasn’t wrong. Continue reading Nothing Is True And Everything Is Possible – Adventures in modern Russia (Peter Pomerantsev)
An extremely important & timely exposé. Bill Gates is an absolute fucking monster! Beyond his repulsive corporate aggression, brand-bloat, ‘compulsory’-software imposition/unilateral product bondage & horrible diversity-quelling market monopolizing mania of Micro Soft miasma, a much more sick, sinister & damaging agenda is at foot. Continue reading No Such Thing As A Free Gift – The Gates Foundation and the Price of Philanthropy (Linsey McGoey)
So two words to kick the door in with – VITAL & MANDATORY!!! Capitalism & calamity, profit & crisis – are becoming like conjoined twins. War-pollution-incarceration… inflict, sustain, clean-up/eradicate, reaping revenues at every stage. You notice how many of today’s greatest problems/threats/fiascos crawled out of yesterday’s solutions or technological advancements (ISIS/Terrorism, Climate Extermination, Food Insecurity etc’ etc’ etc). Continue reading Disaster Capitalism – Making a killing out of catastrophe (Antony Loenwenstein)
Somehow, despite my huge interest in the topic, I only discovered Joanna Blythman recently. Not unlike fellow peer Felicity Lawrence (who works more on the abuse of workers & modern slavery in large-scale commercial food production), Blythman shares the front-line of food journalism/activism. This is her fifth book on food & deals predominantly with the hidden ingredients & deceptive stealth-feeding from an increasingly abnormal industry. Continue reading Swallow This – Serving up the food industry’s darkest secrets (Joanna Blythman)
“The rise of a major power is made up of thousands of details; like dispatching troops, mining mountains, building trading ports and skyscrapers, and most importantly entering the hearts and minds of the people without anyone noticing.”
This is a book for me that will most definitely be contending for 2016’s best title (I snatched it only this February). In this extraordinary piece, intellectual/observer/moralist/dissident/ analyst/”bad element” Xu Zhiyuan delivers an unprecedented critique & perspicacious reflection on China’s “economic miracle” & the true cost of this disastrous achievement. With remarkable clarity, Xu serves an almost sublime invective, with a grace & composure that almost contradicts the strength of the criticism & quiet outrage that he enacts. Continue reading Paper Tiger – Inside The Real China (Xu Zhiyuan)
Bit of a game changer this one. It’s a rare occasion that such a substantial blow is landed on a central pillar of tabloid tyranny (the most central in this case). It’s also an absurdly inspiring display of how just two deeply dedicated geezers (author & journalist Nick Davies & companion & former Guardian editor Allen Rusbridger) can make an unprecedented change to the unchallenged dominance of the corrupt status-quo, seriously contesting the invulnerability & unilateral hegemony of the corrupt giant & their squalid modus-operandi. Continue reading Hack Attack: How the truth caught up with Rupert Murdoch – Nick Davies
Oh my! This is about as power-punch as it’s going to get. The “current climate” is screaming for arbitrations of this kind of antidote to depurate the thoroughly soiled hoax that shambles into ever worsening positions of contortion & contempt that would probably be comical if it were not so catastrophic & cruel.
Just listen to this for god’s sakes…
Continue reading How Corrupt Is Britain? – Edited by David Whyte
Pure badass! This woman is hard-to-the-core in the best possible sense of the expression. Bereft of any academic dryness or pretention she cuts through like a mythical sabre wielded by a veteran warrior from some ancient fable. Honestly, the first chapter/47 pages of this book have more potency/restorative clarity truth & precision not to mention immaculate critique (the facts generally do that themselves) than half the shit on my shelf (that’s a HELL of a lot kid). Continue reading Capitalism: A Ghost Story – Arundhati Roy
The Divide is one of the greatest & most salient books I have ever read! it’s also a book/subject that is screaming-out for documentary treatment, as really, everybody the world over needs this information in this kind of stark, veridical form with a cutting quality of certifiably overt-clarity, free from academic restraint or pretention.
The crux of the book is juxtaposition, between gigantic & rampant white collar-crime committed by the wealthy &, well, not so much committing crime as, quite literally, just living in poverty which is becoming, without exaggeration – an unofficial crime itself.
Continue reading The Divide – American injustice in the age of the wealth gap – Matt Taibbi
Well it’s about fucking time! Well-off academics recalling ancient childhood experiences of poverty & deprivation or studying contemporary penury from the must of university libraries has got a bit out of control. Oh absolutely, the genuine outrage & in depth & accurate analysis of poverty & the shitter angles of “economically deprived” & destitute communities lives can be exposed & castigated by those that observe the affliction externally rather than suffer directly from it, but the absence of those really on the receiving end in literature putting it in their own words is totally unacceptable. Continue reading Hand To Mouth – The truth about being poor in a wealthy world – Linda Tirado