Shows / Literate Machine
Literate Machine
Literate Machine explores media through the lens of culture, history, and politics, examining the ways capitalism, power, and ideology shape and are shaped by the stories we love. Written and performed by Eric Rosenfield, Literate Machine is available as blog entries, newsletter, podcast, and YouTube channel. Literate Machine is available on Apple Podcasts and finer podcast apps everywhere.
Episodes
Literate MachineFiat Currency is not the Problem with the Fed
Fiat currency is not the problem it's made out to be, but there is a real problem with the Federal Reserve Bank of the US Support this channel at…
Literate MachineLanterns is a show about US Imperialism
Lanterns is a superhero TV show that's really about the US war in Iraq and US imperial policy Get Your Copy of The Book: The Ultimate Guide to Rebuilding a…
Literate MachineThe Technofeudal Roadmap to Socialism
What if they were already giving us the tools we need to beat them? Support this project at https://patreon.com/ericrosenfield where you can get early, ad-free…
Literate Machine50k Subscriber Q&A
I hit 50k subs! Here's some questions and answers! Join my Discord server: https://discord.gg/sfHRjccnt9 Support this channel at…
Literate MachineThe Medievalization of Work and the Cooperative Cure
With the economy getting more technofeudal, work is getting more medieval. What if this could play into the hands of creating a more cooperative economy that's…
Literate MachineIs Ground News a Right Wing Psy-Op?
There's some evidence this was done on purpose Text: https://literatemachine.com/2026/08/16/is-ground-news-a-right-wing-psy-op/ Bibliography…
Literate MachineGround News and the War on Truth
Ground News bills itself as a way to evaluate bias in the news, but the way it does so plays into the hands of those who have a reason to make you think all…
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25k Subcribers Q&A
Here's the 25k subscriber Q&A! Passion Project vs. Ambition, Democratic Socialism vs. Market Socialism, Predictions for 2028, 3 Crises that worry me, and the…
Literate MachineWhy Infinite Growth is not Possible
Innovation and the stars will not be enough to give us infinite growth in a capitalist economy and all you have to do to know why is look at the evidence…
Literate MachineAnti-Life or How Capitalism Will Die (with Math)
It seems like the entire economy is being sucked up into the realm of the ultra-rich. Let's explore why this looks like the beginning of the end. Support this…
Literate MachineMooks
Let me challenge your assumptions Support this project on Patreon at https://patreon.com/ericrosenfield where you can get early, ad-free episodes, exclusive…
Literate MachineAnarchy and the Promise of Revolution (V for Vendetta)
The book V for Vendetta posits a battle for the soul of the country between Anarchism and Fascism, freedom and oppression. But what if revolution doesn't…
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Superman and the Case for Open Borders
What does Superman tell us about the ethics of closed borders? Support this project on Patreon at https://patreon.com/ericrosenfield Especially since at this…
Literate MachineGaiman/Trump and the New Thought Behind the Abuse
How the New Thought and Positive Thinking movements helped create Neil Gaiman and Donald Trump and undermined our economy and lives Support this project on…
Literate MachineOur Coming Cyberpunk Dictatorship (Snow Crash)
There's a worst case scenario looming here, isn't there? Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, Curtis Yarvin, Freedom Cities, "Anarcho-Capitalism", and the Neofeudal…
Literate MachineGravity's Rainbow Over Palestine
How Jewish Socialists Made an Outhouse for the European Soul Apologies I had a cold through part of the recording of this and you can hear that my voice is…
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What Do We Do Now?
https://literatemachine.com/2024/11/07/what-do-we-do-now/What do we do now that the orange fascist is back? Support me at: https://literatemachine.com Support…
Literate Machine10,000 Subscriber Q&A
This a Q&A episode in honor of the YouTube channel hitting 10,000 subscribers. Topics include degrowth and socialism, private cities, anime, Loki Season 2, and…
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How Capitalism Becomes Feudalism (Severance and Technofeudalism)
As commerce transforms around the new rent-extracting digital fiefdoms, algorithms and AI become a way to transform skilled labor into machine-learning…
Literate MachineElon Musk, Wokeness, and the Myth of Meritocracy
How Tony Stark, the myth of meritocracy, and our unspoken beliefs about genius explain Elon Musk and the (re)turn of eugenics to the right wing Blog version…
Literate MachineHow Will Capitalism End? The Orville, Eduard Bernstein, and What is to Be Done?
What does comedic science fiction television show The Orville tell us about how capitalism will end? How did Germany go from having the largest and most…
Literate MachineStar Trek into Socialism: or Who Deserves the Future
Does Star Trek show us what socialism looks like? What would it look like if we organized society democratically instead of allowing a few people to control…
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Loki and How Conservatives Become Fascists
Marvel's Loki shows us what fascism looks like, and how it comes to take root within innocuous conservatism. https://literatemachine.com…
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The Confused Ideology of Schitt's Creek
How a show about poverty that can't ever bare to really show poverty illustrates everything we've been blind to. Support the show on Patreon and get early…
Literate MachineDefund the Paw Patrol
Is the Paw Patrol an unintentional conservative utopia? What can the show tell us about how the political spectrum views the police, its purpose, and its…
Literate MachineHow the Hippies Became Yuppies: The Trial of the Chicago 7
How Aaron Sorkin whitewashes the story of hippy activism, and how the hippy activists whitewashed themselves. Text and video version of this episode, as well…
Literate MachinePixar's Soul: Finding Yourself Under Capitalism
Pete Doctor takes us into the meaning of life, but is there something hollow at its center of it? Bibliography and Further Reading * Soul using uncomfortable…
Literate MachineWhy Stories? Henry Fool and What the Artist is For
What does it mean to be an artist? Corrections: * The high school students put one of Simon's poems into their high school yearbook, they don't post it up…
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Doom, Myst, and the War for the Soul of Video Games
In the 1990s, Myst and Doom fought a war for the soul of video games. Myst sold almost twice as many copies. Within ten years, the entire industry had…
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Cerebus: Misogyny and Madness
For 30 years, Dave Sim engaged in one of the most remarkable ongoing artistic endeavors ever while he gradually lost his mind. Bibliography and Further Reading…
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Pink Floyd's The Wall and the Rise of the Alt-Right
How the worms ate into my brain, what I did and did not understand about The Wall, and what it tells us about the rise of the Alt-Right. Follow me on Twitter…
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Superheroes and the Police
What do you do when the authorities have been compromised? If you enjoyed this please tell someone about it, word of mouth is how projects like this grow…
Literate MachineHow Can I Save You?
Let's go back in time, to before the Pandemic, and see if we can change anything. You can support my Patreon for as little as $1 an episode…
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There is No Alternative: Doctor Who, "Kerblam!", and the Specter of Technological Unemployment
In the 2018 Doctor Who episode "Kerblam!", something is killing workers off at a far future Amazon analogue. Is it Capitalism? Or is the system not the…
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A Mind Forever Voyaging into Neoliberalism
In 1984, Ronald Reagan won reelection in a landslide and one man responded the only way he knew how: by channeling his horror into a video game. My favorite…
Literate MachineVintage Season
In the premiere episode of Literate Machine, a look at the so-called "Golden Age" of Science Fiction through the lens of one of its finest practitioners, C. L…