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Dispatches From the Culture Wars — April 7, 2026

The age of unreason

Sir John Tenniel and Lewis Carroll
  1. Time to Tax the Rich
  2. The Most Dangerous Alliance in the Anti-Abortion Movement
  3. Faith Leaders in the Resistance
  4. Neo-Nazi Training in Virginia
  5. Why Vance is Taking On ‘Demons’
  6. Breaking ICE 
  7. Anti-Semitism in the Manosphere
  8. Brooklyn Drives Out Drone Maker
  9. Year Zero #1: The Chapo Trap House Comic Book
  10. Jill Scott’s Sonic Geography of Black Life

 

Time to Tax the Rich

By Lawrence S. Wittner, Z

Campaigns for state tax-the-rich legislation are flourishing. In Congress, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Pramila Jayapal have introduced the Ultra-Millionaire Tax Act. The proposals range from increasing the tax rate for the very highest annual income earners, to instituting an annual wealth tax on the very richest Americans, to a combination of both.

The Most Dangerous Alliance in the Anti-Abortion Movement

By Jessica Valenti and Kylie Cheung, Abortion, Every Day

The country’s largest and most powerful network of crisis pregnancy centers is publicly aligning itself with abortion ‘abolitionists’—the movement that wants to punish abortion patients with the death penalty.

Faith Leaders in the Resistance

By Ben Huelskamp, Waging Nonviolence

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Faith and the language of faith still carry extraordinary weight in American public life. To anyone who might be skeptical of people of faith, particularly clergy: You need us in this fight, and not just for our buildings or our mailing lists. You need the specifically theological, liturgical and prophetic tools that faith leaders carry. 

Neo-Nazi Training in Virginia

By Sean Craig and Wiley Cope, The Guardian

A network of militant neo-Nazi active clubs from around the US has been participating in riot-style combat  events with other white nationalist groups in Virginia as part of what their founder called a “tip-off point for a fascist cultural revolution”.

Why Vance is Taking On ‘Demons’

By Amanda Marcotte, Salon

Talking up demons on a MAGA podcast offered a good way to frame his faith not as part of the high-minded Catholicism of Pope Leo XIV, who is much-loathed by Donald Trump. It signals that Vance is more into an evangelical-flavored Catholicism that’s popular with MAGA and is centered far more on Satan and hellfire than all that “love thy neighbor” chatter.

Breaking ICE 

Antisemitism in the Manosphere

By Miriam Eve Mora, The Conversation

The manosphere is a catchall term for websites, forums, blogs and influencers promoting hypermasculinity, from the belief that women and feminism are the cause of men’s problems to calls to legalize rape. And those digital spaces are rife with antisemitism. Some prominent influencers openly deny the Holocaust, call for violence against Jews and spread global conspiracy theories.

Brooklyn Drives Out Drone Maker

By Joseph Mogul, Truthout

Easy Aerial is an AI drone manufacturer with material ties to the Department of Homeland Security and the Israeli military. In September 2024, Demilitarize Brooklyn Navy Yard launched a campaign against Easy Aerial. What started as a small group of committed organizers now involves many community members, all with different roles and levels of engagement.

Year Zero #1: The Chapo Trap House Comic Book

By Michael G. Vann, Jacobin

Year Zero #1 crystallizes a moment in the development of the left when irony, vulgarity, and genre excess fused into a coherent political sensibility. The anthology’s five comics translate it into narrative form, using horror, science fiction, folklore, and historical vignette to dramatize the core dirtbag intuition that liberal modernity is incapable of governing the forces it has unleashed.

Jill Scott’s Sonic Geography of Black Life

Da’Shaun Harrison, Scalawag

Jill Scotts multi-genre-infused sound never abandons the black sonic traditions that make R&B what it is. Instead, it demonstrates what those of us who love, study, and appreciate black music already know: Like black folks, R&B has never been a monolith; it has always been a multifaceted repository for endless exploration and growth.