A smashing debut from Scottish observer, pundit, commentator, rapper & social-activist Darren McGarvey (also known as Loki). His sphere? Let’s contract it to poverty-class-community, in which ever order you so desire. Growing up in Pollok, in south Glasgow with a whole heap of hard-knocks, Darren’s authority & experience outstands pretty much everybody in the spectrum at an elevated level (I can only really think of Stafford Scott, who actually doesn’t have as much access to established platforms).

“The black movement had made it clear that all authority was the enemy. And they were giving even the real peace-loving-hippies ideas – and that was scary. It was a loose joining together, a sort of convergence, however tenuous, and that was the real problem in those days. We had to get that rabbit back in the hat. It became an us and them thing.” – officer Len Colsky

”-particularly when they see how former high-ranking Bush administration officials who had advocated for overthrow of Saddam leveraged their government positions, contacts and insider knowledge to make huge fortunes from Iraqi and Kurdistan oil investments. Today, some of these very people continue to sit on the boards of, or have lucrative jobs as advisors to, the very same multinational oil firms.” Continue reading Pipe Dreams-the plundering of Iraq’s oil wealth (Erin Banco): →

By chance rather than choice, I came across Ma Jian sometime in early 2017, settling on Red Dust, which sounded like a rollicking document of a largely lost China through the eyes of a wayward humanitarian, much like Gao Xingjian’s staggering Soul Mountain (a book of great importance to me). Continue reading China Dream (Ma Jian): →