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Heart Reacts

Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the feels.


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  • 11. Episode 11: The Ways We Ought To Live

    01:11:29||Season 1, Ep. 11
    Welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. We talk up front about Trump winning again, and then advise a listener who is worried that all the good politics in the world don’t change society's perception of them. And of course, we have another installment in the Polyamory Chronicles.Stuff We Talk About:Hamilton Nolan, The HammerWoman behind 'incel' says angry men hijacked her word 'as a weapon of war'Dropkick Murphys, "Boys on the Docks"Moo DengCraig, "I remember MSN"Rosa Luxemburg's LettersBig Mood, Little Mood, "Compassion Fatigue"We are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.Buy Craig's Book: CyberbossBuy Sarah's Book: From the AshesYou can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.

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  • 10. Episode 10: Hope Is Not a Strategy

    01:08:57||Season 1, Ep. 10
    Welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. This week, we answer a question about despair, and solidarity with the people of Palestine, and consider the limitations of hope. Then we switch gears and muse on the issue of parenting while polyamorous, and whether people on the left should have more kids.Stuff We Talk About:Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of EnlightenmentGaza: Poetry after Auschwitz, Hamid DabashiRodrigo Nunes, Neither Vertical Nor HorizontalStuart Hall Doing ChildcareSarah, Family PlanningWe are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.Buy Craig's Book: CyberbossBuy Sarah's Book: From the AshesYou can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.
  • 9. Episode 9: Is Non-Monogamy Bourgeois?

    01:01:14||Season 1, Ep. 9
    Welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. This week, we take on a question on "polyamory? in this economy?" We muse about hierarchies within and around relationship styles, love when the rent is too damn high, and what it means to think politically around sex and gender and the economy. And then we look at a question that Sarah's been getting asked a lot on book tour: how do you grieve when the thing you're grieving isn't over, or never ends?Stuff We Mention:Ordinary Unhappiness Podcast, featuring Sabrina Strings on The End of LoveNatasha Lennard, The Uses and Abuses of Politics for SexChal Ravens, Monogamy is Cool, ActuallySarah, Beyond the Nuclear FamilyCara Daggett, Petro-Masculinity and the Politics of Climate RefusalWe are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.You can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.
  • 8. Episode 8: Advice is a Way we Love Each Other, with Brandy Jensen

    59:42||Season 1, Ep. 8
    Welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. We are back and we have a special guest with us! This week, in lieu of giving YOU advice, we asked one of our favorite advice-givers, Brandy Jensen, writer, editor, and "Ask a Fuck-Up" columnist, to talk to us about the whole business of advising strangers. We discuss being a romantic in 2024, how to tell when you're in love, the current media fascination with polyamory, and some of Emma Goldman's best takes.Stuff we mention in this episode:Brandy Jensen on Twitter and her Substack advice column.Brandy at the Yale Review: The PolycrisisEmma Goldman, Jealousy: Causes and a Possible CureEmma Goldman, Marriage and LoveToni Morrison, JazzBefore SunsetWe are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.You can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.
  • 7. Episode 7: Obligations of Care

    58:28||Season 1, Ep. 7
    Hello and welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. This week, we're talking about what we owe each other as friends, as partners, as family, and as therapists. (We're still not therapists.) Our first question asks how to maintain close friendships when you're becoming a parent, and the second wonders if someone is using therapy to justify bad behavior.Stuff we mention in this episode: Power of Self Care parody instagramEva Kittay, Love's LaborHannah Proctor, Burnout: The Emotional Experience of Political DefeatDavid Graeber, Debt: The First 5000 YearsJonah Hill and Sarah Brady's Relationship Sparks Conversation About How to Set BoundariesWe are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.You can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠.This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.
  • 6. Episode 6: To What End?

    50:01||Season 1, Ep. 6
    Hello and welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. On this episode, we dive into the world of work, and talk about when and how to unionize your workplace to manage your bad boss. And then we dig into the thorniest of questions (particularly in an election year): when and how to have conversations with relatives, friends, acquaintances, neighbors who hold political views you just can't countenance. When is it worth it, and when is it time to walk away? We have thoughts.Referenced in this episode: British Trades Union Congress Find a Union page.AFL-CIO Form a Union page.We are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.You can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.
  • 5. Episode 5: Bandwidth is a Bad Metaphor

    48:46||Season 1, Ep. 5
    Hello and welcome to HEART REACTS, an advice podcast for all of us trying to remain emotionally functional through the collapse of late capitalism. This week, we tackle two questions about difficult conversations and decide that talking about "having the bandwidth" for friends, lovers, difficulties, and all the rest of the struggles of life is a lousy metaphor. We suggest some other ways to imagine ourselves in community.Mentioned in this episode:Lily Scherlis, Boundary Issues. Note that this article is mentioned in the episode as being published in the Guardian, but that was actually a reprint and it was originally from our friends at Parapraxis Magazine.Hannah Proctor, Burnout: The Emotional Experience of Political Defeat. And if you're getting this on the day it goes out, you can attend a live virtual event with Sarah discussing the book with Hannah.Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost FuturesDavid Graeber, Debt: The First 5000 Years.We are Craig Gent, a writer and researcher living in Leeds, and ⁠Sarah Jaffe⁠, a journalist and author based in New Orleans.You can send us your questions at ⁠www.askmeanything.cc/heartreacts⁠. This episode was produced by, well, us! We apologize for any inconsistencies in audio quality. If you liked it and want to help keep us going, and help us improve our recording process, you can support us at ⁠patreon.com/HeartReacts⁠. You can subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts, and please do rate us on those podcast apps!Our music comes from “Casual Outrage” by New Orleans-based Basher, featured on their new album May Day, coming May 31, 2024 to Sinking City Records. For more about the band, visit⁠ byronasher.com/basher⁠.