PlasticPills Critical Theory & Philosophy

PlasticPills Critical Theory & Philosophy

By: Plasticpills

Language: en

Categories: Society, Culture, Philosophy, News, Politics, Arts, Books

The Pill Pod is hosted by a group of PhDs offering their irreverent (and unsolicited) takes on critical theory, philosophy, culture, and politics.

Episodes

Stoicism at the End of the World // 236
Jan 10, 2026

The history of Stoicism is long and complicated, and we didn't want to end with AI alpha male YouTube channels, so here is a rundown focused on Greek Stoicism, some comparisons to Buddhism, and whether or not this philosophy could help in 2026. 

Get all episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:32:16
Samantha: From Zero to American Hero // 233
Dec 06, 2025

From Zero to hero: Samantha Fulnecky has been honoured by the Oklahoma government and named "an American hero" for her paper submission to her Psych course in which she claimed it is demonic to believe in more than one gender. Still, the Pill Pod heats up over whether she deserved the grade she received…

More Pill Pod: https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Read Samantha's essay and the instructors' comments here:
https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/education/2025/11/25/ou-oklahoma-samantha-fulnecky-read-essay-gender-bible/87463858007/





Duration: 01:35:53
Analytic vs. Continental Philosophy 2025 // 231
Nov 29, 2025

It's the bi-yearly event in the ongoing race war between analytic and continental philosophy. Philosophers of all stripes invited themselves to partake in the latest and stupidest skirmish, and so we have undertaken a reading of the match that lit the powder keg: How Continental Philosophers "Argue": On the Unseriousness of the Discipline (https://benthams.substack.com/p/how-continental-philosophers-argue)

Duration: 01:36:06
The Nick Fuentes Signifying Chain // 230
Nov 14, 2025

Access exclusive episodes https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

A Signifying Chain (or symbolic chain, or signifying web) is a structuralist concept developed by Jacques Lacan and others ("The Agency of the Letter"; https://amzn.to/4p6wx6l).

Signifying chains structure discourses and we believe, explain the growing rift in conservative politics.

Duration: 01:03:38
Theory of the Gooner: Baudrillard vs Lacan // 229
Oct 31, 2025

Have a look at our exclusive content https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

The Pill Pod reads Daniel Kolitz' anthropology of the gooners in Harper's Magazine https://harpers.org/archive/2025/11/the-goon-squad-daniel-kolitz-porn-masturbation-loneliness/ and we find it's all connected man

Other sources cited included Lacan Seminar X, Freud Beyond the Pleasure Principle, and Baudrillard Transparency of Evil

Duration: 01:13:15
Pill Pod 228 - Lacan: Traversing the Fantasy $♢a
Oct 30, 2025

Full Ad-free Lacan series: https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

We conclude our Lacan series with what Fink says is the desired end of Lacanian psychoanalysis. And, the ends of psychoanalysis coincide with some valuable insights for Lacan's theorizing beyond psychoanalysis. 
Works cited are Fink's Lacanian Subject (ch. 5; https://amzn.to/4qz1Fgx) and A Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis (ch. 10; https://amzn.to/4hAIKh5).

Duration: 01:35:57
Freud on Film: An Interview with Richard Ledes
Oct 09, 2025

Richard Ledes, director of the films Adieu Lacan and V13, explains his process, namely, adapting French plays about psychoanalysis into English-language films. He connects the seduction of nascent fascism in 1913 Vienna to the present moment a century later.


Find V13 on AppleTV, Prime Video

Find Ledes' catalogue at https://www.richardledes.com/

Always more content at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills








Duration: 00:47:41
Pill Pod 225 - Lacan on the Pervert
Oct 06, 2025

The Pill Pod looks at the structure of the perverts in Episode 5 of our series on Lacan. Find the other episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Sources:
Jacques Lacan - Seminar X, "The Subversion of the Subject and the Dialectic of Desire in the Freudian Unconscious", Ecrits
Bruce Fink - Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis

Duration: 01:12:46
ChatGPT Psychosis: A Lacanian Interpretation // 224
Sep 19, 2025

The Pill Pod looks at the chatbot psychosis phenomenon and compares it to Lacan's clinical structure of psychosis.


This is Episode 4 of our series on Lacan. Find the other episodes Ad-Free at
https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills


Sources:
Jacques Lacan - Seminar III

Bruce Fink - Clinical Introduction to Lacanian Psychoanalysis

"People Are Losing Loved Ones to AI-Fueled Spiritual Fantasies" Rolling Stone: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/ai-spiritual-delusions-destroying-human-relationships-1235330175/

"They Asked an A.I. Chatbot Questions. The Answers Sent them Spiraling" New York Times: https://www...

Duration: 01:18:10
Pill Pod 221 - Capitalist Realism
Sep 12, 2025

1Dime joins Erik and Victor to discuss Mark Fisher's Capitalist Realism. We cover the popularity of the book, the term, and then wonder whether left-populist electoral campaigns perform the same cathartic function as anti-capitalist TV shows.

See more from 1Dime: https://www.youtube.com/@1Dimee
All our public episodes are ad-free: https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:07:56
Pill Pod 220 - Lacan: The Other of Language (preview)
Aug 15, 2025

We wanted to review some Lacan because everybody's still desiring, and Bruce Fink's Lacanian Subject (1995) is quite often touted as the best unofficial intro, and we can see why.

Get this and all our eps at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

This is the book: https://amzn.to/4oubPxQ

Duration: 00:14:37
Pill Pod 219 - Peter Thiel's Deranged Apocalypticism
Aug 11, 2025

In a recent interview with the New York Times Peter Thiel, one of the world's most powerful men, gave ample evidence that he should be institutionalized before he hurts anyone else.

Link to the full interview https://youtu.be/vV7YgnPUxcU?si=qSLrUmKeEblb4jYS

Find all our episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:57:57
Pill Pod 217 - Gaza vs. The United States of Exception: Agamben's Homo Sacer
Aug 01, 2025

Pill pod discuss the public media representations of Epstein and Gaza before a seamless transition into a discussion of Giorgio Agamben's concepts of 1) Sovereignty 2) Bare Life and 3) States of Exception.

The FULL OMNIBUS edition of homo sacer is here, but the sections are also available separately.

Duration: 01:22:50
Pill Pod 215 - The New Woke Right ft. 1Dime
Jul 16, 2025

Pills is away, so 1Dime Tony came present a thesis he's working at. Tony rejoins the pill pod to excavate the terms "woke right" and the semiotics of "woke" more broadly. We don't always agree, but we attempt to deduce which conservative faction is accusing which other of wokeness, although it is sometimes tough going figuring what they mean by the term. Articles:
https://americanreformer.org/2024/05/is-there-a-woke-right/https://reason.com/2025/06/11/the-rise-of-the-woke-right/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/02/woke-right/681716/https://www.theamericanconservative.com/is-woke-right-a-useful-term/If you enjoyed this education, 1Dime has a YouTube channel, a podcast called 1Dime Radio, and...

Duration: 01:20:10
Derrida: White Mythology (preview)
Jun 25, 2025

According to Derrida, metaphysicians have spent 2000 years conceptually boxing-in metaphor because they don't want to admit their dependence on figurative language. This has allowed them to trick themselves into believing that fiction and non-fiction are fundamentally different; that one can be true and the other cannot. In White Mythology, Derrida discovers the metaphors buried in philosophy from Plato to Hegel, even as they try to hide them.

We spent three weeks reading this text, you can find the episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:15:46
Self-Help via Merleau-Ponty and the Flesh of the World (preview)
Jun 18, 2025

We go deeper into Maurice Merleau-Ponty's insights in The Visible and The Invisible, e.g. The Flesh of the World, the Chiasm, and the Intertwining and what these mean for a meditative experience on the daily. 

Get the full episode and tons of others at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:15:26
Pill Pod 212 - The Mass Desire for Fascism
Jun 16, 2025

This week we looked into OG critic of fascism Wilhelm Reich, who wrote The Mass Psychology of Fascism right after the Nazis were elected in 1933. Reich was among the first "neomarxists", and believed that Marxists need to understand psychoanalysis to understand Fascism.

Link to text

Find our full episodes on philosophy and theory at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills









Duration: 01:19:03
Phenomenology via Buddhist Philosophy (preview)
Jun 13, 2025

We compare Maurice Merleau-Ponty's insights in an unfinished work he wrote before his death to the meditations of Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna 18 centuries prior.

This episode and all the rest can be found at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:15:47
Pill Pod 210 - New York Times LIES about "Fascism Experts" fleeing Trump
May 31, 2025

The New York Times has claimed that three "fascism experts" are fleeing Trump and "going abroad". In truth, these are not (all) fascism experts, and they did not flee, in fact they have been in Canada for almost a year because they got jobs at the University of Toronto. We looked into their research, which is the same tired, lib, horseshoe theory bullshit that Nazism and Communism are the same thing.  

Find this and our other episodes for free, ad-free, at www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:12:17
Pill Pod 208 - Prime Minister Mark Carney: Vibes Banker
May 16, 2025

We catch you up on Canadian politics by introducing you to our new Prime Minister via his book VALUE(S): Building A Better World For All (https://amzn.to/4dj1oYJ).  

Bono called it ‘A radical book that speaks out accessibly' (lol)

Duration: 01:09:58
Pill Pod 206 - Trump Declares War on Education
May 08, 2025

Yea we missed a lot of news, but we wanted to cover the Trump regime's war on higher education. As a group with a lot of university affiliations, we hate universities too, but here we try to diagnose the reasons for the recent clashes.

Get all of the content at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:06:35
Pill Pod 205 - PlasticPills Discovers Buddhism
Apr 29, 2025

After a long hiatus, Pills returns to the main show with some new musings over The Last Samurai, Buddhism and the phenomenology of religion. The Kyoto School and Nagarjuna were mentioned in the episode, but we didn't get into much depth this time round. 

Find everything we make at the feed at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:12:34
True vs. False Prophets | Plastic Pills on Religion III
Apr 22, 2025

This is Part 3.

What makes a prophet a prophet? As we are on the civilization decline hill, we are going to experience a higher volume of prophets than usual.

Don't miss an episode https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:27:46
Pill Pod 202 - Paradise has been Lost ft. Victor Hainagiu
Apr 15, 2025

The contemporary political situation has rendered Paradise Lost more relevant now than any time since it was penned by John Milton's daughters. It is an epic, revolutionary in both style and politics, and for this episode we have an expert, Victor Hainagiu, who is writing his dissertation on it. 

Check out William Blake's illustrations of the text: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Blake%27s_illustrations_of_Paradise_Lost

Find all the episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:34:46
Cults of Cleansing | Plastic Pills on Religion II
Apr 11, 2025

The cults of COVID may never go away, but this is why they are to be expected.

This is part II of the plasticpills diatribe on religion focusing on metaphor as the original decision making process in a world and specifically the metaphors of religious laws that begin with keeping your hands clean but end with the mass extermination of people.

Listen ad free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:01:25
Pill Pod 201 - Only German Idealism can save us ft. Christopher Satoor
Apr 05, 2025

So, after decrying philosophy last episode, we are back on it hard again in 201. The Pill Pod interviews Christopher Satoor on Schelling and his conception of freedom from "the freedom essay", also known as THE PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS INTO THE ESSENCE OF HUMAN FREEDOM. 

Chris also does a bunch of interview and video content on YouTube, at https://www.youtube.com/@UCjybB5M-knVLAvrohRXtklQ

get all our content at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:17:34
Death Cult Logic | Plastic Pills on Religion I
Mar 28, 2025

Christo-techno-fascism? I'm hunting down the impulse producing the end of the world and how religion functions as a social technology. As it turns out, we're all still religious.

All the full episodes are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
The videos are available at https://www.youtube.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:00:03
Pill Pod 200 - Why has America Gone Insane?
Feb 13, 2025

A panel discussion on how a once great simulation become, almost overnight, the most schizophrenic spectacle in the history of human society. Is it mere distraction? Is it a war to control our extended nervous system. Should we be worried? 

Find our hidden episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:32:11
Pill Pod 198 - Three Philosophies of Freedom
Feb 05, 2025

The Pill Pod debates the philosophy of freedom from Merleau Ponty, Sartre, Peirce, and Post-structuralism. 

Listen ad-free on https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:21:04
Pill Pod 197 - "Never were we freer than under Nazi Occupation..." (preview)
Jan 21, 2025

This is a preview of an episode on Jean-Paul Sartre and existentialism. Find it at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills. Please join us to support the show and get all our episodes!

Duration: 00:08:07
Finally! New Translation of Marx's CAPITAL is out! Interview w/ Paul Reitter
Jan 15, 2025

Paul Reitter just finished the first translation of Marx's Capital this century. He joins our episode to educate us on why we need a new version, the difficulties of rendering Capital in English, and of course who's mad at him. 

Watch the interview here (video): https://youtu.be/pG0rQi6JwkU
Buy-the-book link: https://amzn.to/3PvOiwc

All public episodes are ad free on patreon at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:30:16
Pill Pod 192 - Marxism vs. Ideology: Althusser
Jan 04, 2025

This is the big one and it's hard to believe we haven't done this particular essay before, but it's the linchpin for the critical theory use of the term "ideology." 


Check the patreon feed for the pdf if you want to check the source text, and to listen ad-free: https://www.patreon.com/c/plasticpills

Duration: 01:19:50
Pill Pod 191 - Marxism vs. Humanism (ft. Diego Ruzzarin)
Dec 28, 2024

This episode is based on an article Althusser wrote in the 60s, Marxism and Humanism, which you can find in "For Marx." He declares that Marxism and Humanism are fundamentally incompatible, which we all agree on because our liberal was at a conference this week.


Get all the eps upon release with no ads at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills


Duration: 01:23:21
Pill Pod 190 - What is Ideology really?
Dec 21, 2024

We read Althusser's "Marxism and Humanism," an Essay from his 1965 collection For Marx in which he declares the two fundamentally incompatible. We didn't make it far into the essay because we were having terminological disputes, but we shall return in finer detail soon.

Get all the eps upon release with no ads at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:17:01
Pill Pod 195 - Luigi's Mansion
Dec 17, 2024

There's big news on the news, and we thought we would take a poke at interpreting this event—if in fact it is one—and giving it an ideological status. 

Catch up on the whole series on ideology ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:01:04
REWIND - Althusser I (Pill Pod 115)
Dec 14, 2024

We have been talking about Althusser once again on the Pod, and in advance of our new dive we are re-releasing an episode about why Althusser might be important.

Duration: 01:25:38
Pill Pod 189 - Theorizing America's Trump Vote
Nov 09, 2024

The federal union of the United States has decided to elect Presinald Trump as its leader from the years 2025-2029, as God wills.

Here, three Canadians provide you with unsolicited opinions about the meaning of this event or lack thereof.

Find this content ad-free for free at www.patreon.com/plasticpills






Duration: 01:15:16
Pill Pod 186 - The Post-Political Singularity Everywhere (preview)
Oct 30, 2024

Today we take the temperature of all the new futures popping up—the various Acc/s, the radical democracies, the Christofascists, and the Magacomms—and psychoanalyze them as all sharing one trait: they're too optimistic to be believed.

Get all the full episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:11:22
Pill Pod 185 - Bataille on Fascist Psychology (preview)
Oct 04, 2024

In 1933, Bataille linked Durkheim's sociology and psychoanalysis to the rise of fascism over the border. The parallels to the present moment are hard to miss.

Get the full episode and many more at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:10:00
Pill Pod 184 - MAGACommunism & Philosophy: HAZ on Marx, Heidegger and Dugin
Oct 04, 2024

MAGA Communism may strike you as contradictory and stupid sounding, but it is backed by 200 tweets of theory which include Marx, Lenin, Dugin, and Heidegger.

We plunge the depths of the MAGA Communist tractatus: "MARXISM IS NOT WOKE" to explore its theoretical aspirations.

Source text: https://x.com/InfraHaz/status/1672279505774448640

Find our recent episodes on fascist philosophy ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:32:09
Pill Pod 183 - Carl Schmitt on the Friend/Enemy Distinction (preview)
Sep 20, 2024

We face the fact that only a Nazi could properly explain American politics.

Get all episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:11:18
Pill Pod 182 - Bataille & Sacrifice (preview)
Sep 07, 2024

Back to business—we talk Aztec myths and Bataille on Sacrifice from The Accursed Share.

Get the full episode and all the others at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:07:32
Pill Pod 181 - Hegelian EGirl Council ft. Jreg
Aug 31, 2024

We don't often have current events to cover, but once in a while the current events are Hegel.

The Hegelian E-Girl Council was to be the head of a new cult, which fell into a Twitter flame war about a week after its launch. Our guest's studio was the physical origin site of the Hegelian E-Girl Council which first blasted into the real world in NYC, and then onto theorytwitter for a glorious week before bursting into flames for the internet's schadenfreude.This was, in our consideration, not the abortive event it may seem at first glance, but...

Duration: 01:17:37
Pill Pod 180 - The Gift by Marcel Mauss (preview)
Aug 29, 2024

We move from Durkheim to Marcel Mauss and his book The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies. Referenced by Bataille, Levi-Strauss, Derrida and Baudrillard—this is a mandatory reading.

The full episode and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:16:33
Pill Pod 179 - The Mana Principle (Preview)
Aug 27, 2024

After a brief recap of the Deleuzo-Guattarian Australian breakdancer we read chapters 6 and 7 of Durkheim's Elementary forms of Religious Life and try to get a hold on the primordial concept of concepts: MANA.

The full episode and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:10:28
Pill Pod 178 - We Solved the World with Diego Ruzzarin
Aug 13, 2024

What do Adin Ross, China, RFK and the Cult of the Individual have in common? This episode... that's it.

All episodes are found only at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Be sure to check out the plasticpills YouTube channel for new CONTENT CONTENT CONTENT this week. https://www.youtube.com/c/plasticpills

Duration: 01:45:07
Pill Pod 177 - Society as Magic, Society as Religion: Emile Durkheim
Aug 06, 2024

Durkheim, one of the founders of sociology, slowly came to the discovery by the end of his career that consciousness, langauge and thought itself were of religious origin. We tried to retrace a few of his steps from The Elementary Forms of Religious Life and try to come up with some examples to illustrate his radical hypothesis.  

All public episodes can be found ad-free, for free, on our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:19:22
Vance & The Dork Conservatives (Preview)
Jul 29, 2024


The full episode (Pill Pod 176) and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:08:16
Pill Pod 175 - The Straussian Plot Against America
Jul 13, 2024

Conspiracy theory or actual conspiracy? Today we investigate how a small cabal of philosophers managed to take over America and caused the invasion of Iraq based on the writings of eminent political philosopher Leo Strauss.  


Listen ad-free, for free, and get the source readings at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:25:36
Trump v. United States (preview)
Jul 09, 2024

We hear this is a big deal and the end of American democracy (or whatever), but we don't all know why. Lucky for us, Victor happens to read Supreme Court decisions on his spare time for fun. Has the sky fallen?

The full episode (Pill Pod 174) and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:16:31
Pill Pod 173 - Biden v. Trump & The Economy of Fear
Jun 30, 2024

We recap the Trump-Biden debate and then discuss the politics and economy of fear. Sources include Armageddon, Strauss, Hegel, and Durkheim.  

Get all our episodes for free, ad-free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:23:22
Dark Academia (preview)
Jun 30, 2024

Some simulationist material analysis in the economy of signs from Pill Pod episode #172. 

The full episode and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

The "Look" of Dark Academia: https://www.pinterest.com/kathrynaesthetics/dark-academia-aesthetic/

Duration: 00:20:17
Pill Pod 171 - Zizek Goes Monarchist
Jun 13, 2024

We discuss Zizek's Hegelian defense of a monarchy to solve the problem of democracy.
https://thephilosophicalsalon.com/in-defense-of-hegels-notion-of-monarchy/


Get all our episodes for free, ad-free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:02:11
Pill Pod 96 - The Malaise of Modernity (Taylor's Version) *UNLOCKED*
Jun 10, 2024

Get the book (it's easy and small:https://amzn.to/3KxgjB3) or listen to the lectures by Charles Taylor starting here: https://youtu.be/j_losVdiARc?si=DCHifoFktqHQDJuw.

Find our second episode and all the others at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:28:41
Pill Pod 170 - The Ethical Dilemma of Killing Nazi Children (Preview)
Jun 05, 2024

We continue reading Simone DeBeauvoir's Ethics of Ambiguity, and try to sus out its particular ethical dilemmas.

The full episode and many more are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:09:16
PP169 - Is Existentialism Ethical?
Jun 05, 2024

We read Simone DeBeauvoir's defense of Existentialism as an ethic that is not hyper-individualistic, nihilistic or absurdist.

Get all our episodes for free, ad-free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Here's the homework: https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/de-beauvoir/ambiguity/

Duration: 01:14:05
PP168 - Ecomarxism (preview)
Jun 05, 2024

This is a preview of one of many exclusive episodes available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Here is your homework in the meanwhile: https://monthlyreview.org/2024/01/01/the-dialectics-of-ecology-an-introduction/

Duration: 00:10:59
Pill Pod 167 - Schopenhauer: Christianity is the Worst Religion
May 11, 2024

We look at Schopenhauer's comparison of various religions' metaphysical explanations for suffering, and why conservative celebrities are converting to the dumbest one.

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills


Schopenhauer on the Sufferings of the World: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/10732/10732-h/10732-h.htm#link2H_4_0002
Ayaan Hirsi Ali converts: https://unherd.com/2023/11/why-i-am-now-a-christian/
Russell Brand gets baptized: https://www.christianpost.com/voices/russell-brand-just-got-baptized-but-what-does-it-mean.html

Duration: 01:13:56
Pill Pod 165 - Dissident Right Fight Night: Yarvin vs. Rufo
Apr 25, 2024

Deviating from our usual strategies for the leftist future, we look to the strategists of the conservative future, as discussed in this article, where Christopher Rufo debates Mencius Moldbug aka Curtis Yarvin. It was pretty anti-climactic so we also veered into some more Moldbuggery found here.

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:24:34
Pill Pod 163 - How to Control a Democracy ft. 1Dime
Apr 10, 2024

This week we discuss how modern liberal democracies co-opt resistance and adapt to internal opposition as a mechanism of inverted totalitarian control. Our guest is Tony from 1Dime, who made a video on what he calls "contained opposition", find it here: https://youtu.be/7uPevWDAYFI.

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Find the 1Dime podcast on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0yQRX2YMFFsCMekReE9toW?si=798a164d02884310

Duration: 01:28:01
Pill Pod 162 - Walter Benjamin: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (preview)
Apr 04, 2024

Erik and Pills read Walter Benjamin's most famous essay (and perhaps the most famous essay of critical theory), The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. 

Get this episode and all other exclusive episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:14:52
Pill Pod 161 - Andy Warhol and the End of Art
Mar 27, 2024

We're still on why everything's ending, this time with another pillar of civilization: art, and modern art in particular. Part of the discussion comes from Frederic Jameson's Postmodernism or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, the cover of which features a (particularly ugly) Warhol print (https://amzn.to/3PD4M6m).  The other two books referenced are The Diary of Andy Warhol and The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, written by the man himself.

Check out the Plasticpills YouTube channel to see the new video about why Warhol is to blame for killing art: https://www.youtube.com/c/p...

Duration: 01:16:30
Pill Pod 160 - Walter Benjamin on Leftist Content Creators (Preview)
Mar 24, 2024

We read Walter Benjamin's (perhaps) undelivered address to the Anti-Fascist Club: The Author as Producer, and try to test whether or not it holds up. 

Get this episode and all other exclusive episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:08:32
Pill Pod 159 - The End of the University
Mar 15, 2024

Most everyone agrees that the university has failed its ideal, but few agree as to the reasons for why this happened. Did it get too arcane? Too expensive? Too woke? Maybe there's a bit of everything, but these explanations forget the most material cause: the private-sector vampires sucking it dry. We read a case study that you can find here

Don't miss an episode! find the full feed ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasicpills

Duration: 01:12:00
Pill Pod 158 - Walter Benjamin & The Idea of History (preview)
Mar 15, 2024

Get the full episode and all episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasicpills

Duration: 00:13:04
Pill Pod 157 - Progressive v. Reactionary Christianity ft. John Hamer
Feb 21, 2024

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Although Conservative Christians are the most attention-seeking of the Flock, our patrons reminded us that there are progressive Christians out there. For the sake of fair and balanced reporting, we invited John Hamer from Centre Place Toronto to represent the leftist side of the Christian Flock. We asked about his view of the church in history and in politics, and read this Christofascist article together. Find more of John's work on Youtube.

Duration: 01:13:51
Pill Pod 156 - Christofascism
Feb 14, 2024

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

What if, instead of letting history end or disappear, we hit the rewind button and let the Church have another shot? We navigate through some stars in the Christofascist constellation and read Why Liberalism Failed (https://amzn.to/3waNh6l) to see what the world might look like if the Catholic intellectuals had their way.

Duration: 01:13:18
Pill Pod 155 - Jean Baudrillard & The Disappearance of History (preview)
Feb 10, 2024

As all things disappear, we have our rountable on Baudrillard's "Illusion of the End." Get the full episode and all episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasicpills

Duration: 00:10:21
Pill Pod 154 - Christian Intellectuals at the End of History
Feb 08, 2024

Listen to our public episodes ad-free, for free, at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

While no one is exactly happy that history has ended, few are quite as perturbed about it as Christian conservatives. We delved into a treasure trove of the Christian brain trust—"The Imaginative Conservative"—to piece together what they think history is for, and how they react to it's having ended.

Duration: 01:08:42
Pill Pod 152 - Fukuyama on The End of History (preview)
Jan 14, 2024

Adjusted for inflation, Francis Fukyama received $1,311,814.68 to write The End of History and the Last Man (https://amzn.to/3tPo5Bt); we want to see what $1,311,814.68 is worth. Get the full episode and many more at https://www.patreon.com/plasicpills

Duration: 00:10:34
Pill Pod 151 - The End of History
Jan 14, 2024

We embark on the notion of "the end of history" by trying to figure out if we have an idea of history. This is mostly inspired by our reading of Fukuyama's book (https://amzn.to/3tPo5Bt) but the series won't be limited to it. Support our efforts and get the full series on https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:24:54
Pill Pod 149 - Gothic Horror: Edgar Allen Poe & The Fall of The House of Usher
Dec 01, 2023

Inspired by the new Netflix series, we read some Poe short stories and compared them to their TV adaptation. Victor Hainagiu (aka Litvic aka @horatiovictor) came on to help us put gothic horror into historical context.   Half our episodes are here, but if you want the other half check us out on https://patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:26:36
Pill Pod 148 - Badiou: Philosophy & Antiphilosophy
Nov 24, 2023

Some oversimplified Badiou plus a look at Wittgenstein's Antiphilosophy (https://amzn.to/47xStiv) Want more episodes? Every other one is posted to https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:02:09
Pill Pod 147 - Authenticity & Existentialism (preview)
Nov 20, 2023

Dr. Phil battles Heidegger and Sartre. Get all of our episodes by becoming a patron at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills.

Duration: 00:05:29
Pill Pod 146 - Heidegger on the Anaximander Fragment (preview)
Nov 17, 2023

Anaximander, Apeiron, Heidegger, Derrida, Logocentrism. It's a mouthful. Get all of our full episodes by becoming a patron at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:06:26
Pill Pod 145 - Metamodernism is just bad
Nov 04, 2023

Postmodernism has fallen. All hail the new dumbuy cult: METAMODERNISM. We took its FRESH NEW RADICAL academic wing out for a spin, as seen in this book: https://amzn.to/3So0kKH. Find tons of content from our all-powerful postmodern windmill at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:29:46
There are no Democratic Systems (Pill Pod 144 Preview)
Oct 27, 2023

Get the full episode and whole lot more at www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:05:46
Pill Pod 143 - Gaza & Frantz Fanon on Violence
Oct 21, 2023

We noticed a few Fanon name drops so this week we decided to read "On Violence" from Wretched of the Earth and see whether it's a useful heuristic for the discourse of violence in Gaza. You can read the chapter here. If you want all our episodes they are on www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:38:49
Pill Pod 142 - Systems Theory Politics in the Shadow of Gaza
Oct 14, 2023

Despite the shadow of Gaza hanging over our consciences this week, we try to introduce Systems Theory via politics. The book is Political Theory in the Welfare State by Niklas Luhmann (https://amzn.to/48Q6I3g), and we hope to give you a glimpse of what it looks like in practice. This is the sixth episode on systems theory, some of which are on here and all of which are on patreon at www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:09:13
Pill Pod 140 - Heidegger Nazi Debate No. 125,421
Oct 02, 2023

The timeloop continues: Another Ukrainian SS soldier in Canada and another wave of books and articles about the dangers of Heidegger following the publication of the third edition of History of Beyng, we reflect on air fryers and moralism after the end of history.

Duration: 01:16:53
Affect Theory and Revolutionary Routines - Interview with Carolyn Pedwell
Sep 08, 2023

Victor interviews Professor Carolyn Pedwell, editor of the Affect Theory Reader (two volumes) and Revolutionary Routines (https://amzn.to/44FykoA). Pedwell argues that minor gestures may be as significant as major happenings, revealing the potential in our ability to remake social or political habits and then to reinhabit everyday life.

Duration: 01:28:39
Pill Pod 137 - Groomer Mythology
Sep 01, 2023

Erik and Pills break down the myths of grooming, childhood, sexuality and the semiotic systems which produced them. The book is Roland Barthes, 195, Mythologies (https://amzn.to/47i5kpd) The rest of this series on myth is available at www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:20:12
Pill Pod 135 - Political Mythologies of the Left and Right ft. Diego Ruzzarin
Aug 15, 2023

Diego Ruzzarin is back on the Plastic Pills Podcast to talk about mythologies of the Left and Right as analyzed by Roland Barthes in his 1957 book (https://amzn.to/47i5kpd). Our previous two episodes covering "Mythologies" (introducing the book and analyzing car commercials) are on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:30:31
Pill Pod 132 - Fairy Tale Feminism
Jul 26, 2023

With the release of the Barbie movie, the feminine symbol has been deployed this summer. But for thousands of summers previous, the role of the feminine was managed by folk stories and fairy tales. Featuring the literary stylings of Victor Hainagiu (known to us as Lit Vic) we broach the topic of the feminine symbolic through the story of Snow White. Check out this version of Neil Gaiman's Snow White in the form of a graphic novel: https://comiconlinefree.net/snow-glass-apples/issue-tpb/1 Follow Lit Vic on Twitter at @HoratioVictor There are many more episodes and tons of bonus content for...

Duration: 01:32:31
Pill Pod 131 - Freedom Isn’t Free
Jul 14, 2023

Everyone speaking on freedom but nobody's asking what it means. "Freedom-from interference" is a 400-year-old definition that covers a few bases but not much beyond that. We looked to Maurice Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology in this book (https://amzn.to/3OdpzwL) to give us something a little better.   Pill Pods #59, #60, #61, #62 are all about Merleau-Ponty in more detail.   Find all the episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:12:13
Pill Pod 130 - We Have Never Been Modern
Jul 08, 2023

Pills and Erik celebrate Latour Day. Cracking one of our old favs (https://amzn.to/3O2fLVp), to discuss the theory island chain, the scheme of actor network theory, and why reality is more complex than theoretical models.  All our episodes are up at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:20:59
Pill Pod 126 - Based Rousseau
Jun 10, 2023

One of those guys we rarely think about but who single-handedly pulled the track lever in the history of philosophy, it's Rousseau. We read Discourse on the Origin of Inequality this week and appraised its significance. Get all our exclusive episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:15:42
Pill Pod 124 & 125 - The Light of Reason and the Eye of the Mind (preview)
Jun 09, 2023

Pill Pods 124 & 125 cover a paper written by Pills, which argues that despite banishing figurative language for the sake of "clarity", Western philosophy has forgotten it was founded on a metaphor equating reason with vision, a metaphor we unknowingly reiterate on the daily. The episodes are available to patron subscribers at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:16:03
Pill Pod 123 - ”Western Civilization” According to Francis Bacon
May 19, 2023

We revisit Atlantis, the new one, in this Victor Hainagiu (Lit Vic) episode where we peer into the the early modern, colonial, proto-capitalist imagination. Find the short story here: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2434/2434-h/2434-h.htm Follow Victor @HoratioVictor Get all our eps at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:16:48
Pill Pod 122 - Mosh Pit Sociology (Preview)
May 13, 2023

Get the full episode, many others, and all the other exclusive content by supporting the podcast at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:11:49
Pill Pod 121 - Obscurantism in French Philosophy: Searle on Foucault & Derrida
Apr 28, 2023

Today we discuss how to pet your professor's ego to get better marks, and review John Searles sassy attempt to take down Derrida by quoting Foucault gossip. Sources come from Reiterating the Differences: A Reply to Derrida and Limited Inc. https://amzn.to/3oIfJc0 More content—video and audio—at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:15:06
Pill Pod 119 - Bernard Stiegler & Posthumanist Post-Marxism (ft. Diego Ruzzarin)
Apr 14, 2023

How many posts can be fit into a title? Diego's back is back and so are we to have a look at why Stiegler believes that the class war is over, the techno/grammatological pharmakon is in and proletarianization has been total. We looked at the first half of "A New Critique of Political Economy", which was suggested to us by a patron (thank you). Find Diego's work (mostly esp) on the internet (he's easy to find). The even-numbered episodes and video lectures are at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:36:18
Pill Pod 117 - Baudrillard as Post-Marxist
Mar 31, 2023

We are still on the lookout for some worthwhile post-marxisms, we found a dude who is post-everything. Our reading is from "Ironic Strategies" from Baudrillard's Fatal Strategies (https://amzn.to/3ZqeDhS), and it turned out to be a pretty seductive text all around. All episodes: https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:30:01
Pill Pod 116 - Guattari & Negri: Communists Like Us (preview)
Mar 24, 2023

New week, new book, and we're still on the hunt for a "post-Marxism" that hits. As usual, we were split on which ingredients we look for in the recipes of political theorists. This is a preview of our debate and all our arguments can be found at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:14:43
Pill Pod 115 - Althusser and Structuralist Marxism
Mar 17, 2023

Erik and Pills duo on Althusser, reading "Contradiction and Overdetermination" from the book For Marx. We read this anticipating a couple episodes trying to figure out what "post-marxism" could mean, and we don't want to strawman, and this is one of my (Pills') favourite bites attempting to delineate what Marxist theory can and cannot aspire to.

Get all the exclusive eps at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:25:38
Pill Pod 114 - POST-MARXISM ft. Diego Ruzzarin (Preview)
Mar 16, 2023

n the 80s, Laclau and Mouffe decided they wanted to succeed Marxism with discourse stuff and some identity politics thrown in. We read their apologetic for Post-Marxism and while Post-Marxism is interesting as a direction, this version of it leaves something to be desired. Find the full episode and many more on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:10:01
Pill Pod 113 - Slavoj Zizek vs Wokeness
Mar 03, 2023

Zizek allegedly wrote an article on the problems of wokeness and we argued about it. Reactionary? Transphobic? Trolling? We don't agree (with each other). The article: https://compactmag.com/article/wokeness-is-here-to-stay The rest of our episodes are available at www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:33:16
Pill Pod 111 - Spectacles of The Integrated Spectacle
Feb 18, 2023

How many of the intellectual left were assassinated by the CIA? THE TRUTH WILL SHOCK YOU! Guy Debord's head inflates by the time he gets to his book written about his own book, Comments on the Society of Spectacle https://amzn.to/3lLEsLa then we argue over whether America or China is more spectacular, in this last episode of our series on the Situationist International. If you like this kind of content there's more at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:24:21
Pill Pod 109 - SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE
Feb 07, 2023

We've been leading up to it, and here is the first spectacle of 2 on Debord's popular book (https://amzn.to/3HRp0pj). Stay tuned for future spectacles. Get the full series on Debord and the Situationist International at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 01:23:28
Pill Pod 108 - Psychogeography (preview)
Feb 07, 2023

This is a preview on our episode covering the Situationist concepts of psychogeography and unitary urbanism, from back when we hoped for such things.   Get the full episode and plenty more at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills

Duration: 00:06:54