iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

in pt. 2 of our series on communist ecology we brought back henry hakamaki and salvatore engel-di mauro for a wide-ranging discussion exploring how cuba is at the forefront of ecology and what this looks like in practice

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

NEXT WEEK'S PATREON cuba ep. 11: actually existing ecology w/ henry hakamaki and salvatore engel-di mauro

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

NEW EP we're joined by folk musician carsie blanton to talk about the cultural cold war and the role of folk music in revolutionary organizing

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

the only thing stronger than ruling class solidarity is working class solidarity

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

NEXT WEEK the cultural cold war: folk music and communism w/ carsie blanton

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

NEW PATREON EP we're joined by ken hammond to discuss tibet—it's history, the myths surrounding it, the "free tibet" movement, the CIA and NED, and how tibet is actually doing as part of the people's republic of china

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

in 1955 folk musician pete seeger was blacklisted for being a communist. we all love and admire him to this day. you know who we don't love, let alone even remember? the artists who snitched or who abandoned their values when giving testimony to the house unamerican activities committee

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

our ruling class has been blacklisting musicians for a century—the cultural sphere is one of the most contested terrains in the class war

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

food in the united states is poison because it's a capitalist commodity. but that's not the case in cuba, which is the world's leader in agroecology. they don't use any chemical inputs, they protect biodiversity and soil health, and farmers are scientists who oftentimes make more than doctors

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

just a reminder that we could ensure decent living standards for 8.5 billion people across the globe with just 30% of our current productive capacity

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

one of the greatest tricks the ruling class ever pulled was through the CIA's congress of cultural freedom: you don't have to ban the left, you just fund the version of it that's compatible with capitalism

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

one of my memories of 9/11 is that the ace hardware I was working at started selling t-shirts with a fighter jet and eagle with the text "now it's our turn"

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

anytime I walk into a target or walmart I feel this deep panic at how much shit is on the shelves. and how many of these stores exist across the country. tens of thousands. it really is a miracle that capitalism hasn't destroyed the earth already

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

NEXT WEEK'S PATREON china ep 11: tibet w/ ken hammond

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

NEW EP we're joined by chris gilbert and cira pascual marquina for an on-the-ground assessment of how venezuela is responding to the US regime's attempts at recolonization and why the western left gets so much wrong when they try to understand the health of Chavismo

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

just a perfectly normal oil deal between two enthusiastically consenting friends

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

the massive fight online this weekend among the western left over whether it's fascist to exercise made me think about venezuela, whose population is under direct attack by US fascist imperialism. very different experiences and very different questions being tackled. just thought it was interesting

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

not a single venezuelan commune has called delcy a traitor but sure let's listen to the 26-year-old american influencer

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

before china's communist revolution tibet was a feudal theocracy with life expectancy in the thirties. when you hear westerners say "free tibet," remember that mao already did

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

to find out, we asked a policy expert from the National Endowment for Democracy who's been funding right wing tibetan separatist groups

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

the bourgeois press is so mad they're losing the disaster porn ratings in tibet

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

the idea that "there are more of us than them" is unhelpful because it's not just a matter of numbers. billionaires own politicians, they control the repressive apparatus of the state, they control the media. numbers matter, but without organization they're meaningless

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

NEXT WEEK venezuela ep. 7: on ascending a high mountain w/ chis gilbert and cira pascual marquina

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

"ending an effect" always seems to translate to "stopping its cause." curious 🤔

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

NEW EP part 1 of a 2-part miniseries in which henry hakamaki & salvatore engel-di mauro join us for a conversation on communism as the highest stage of ecology

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

I asked google about china's ethnic unity law and clicked its AI tool out of curiosity. most info was linked back to a tibetan separatist group's document. one paragraph was sourced from the george w. bush presidential center. not one link from an official chinese government source

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

"communism is bureaucratic" meanwhile I just got transferred back and forth 8 times because my health insurance provider and healthcare provider don't communicate with each other

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

in democracy now's nepal segment amy goodman smeared china as the 2nd largest emitter of carbon, seemingly to blame them for climate change. to set the record straight, china sits in the global middle in per capita carbon emissions, and historically it's even lower

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

the "eco" in eco-socialism is redundant and fundamentally mischaracterizes the nature of communism

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

the united states calls itself a democracy because every few years its brainwashed population votes in a popularity contest between two right wing ideologues who hate them

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

"china is capitalist" ok fine I don't care, can we just try to get some of those policies here in the US? "uh no that's communism"

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

why ruin a perfectly good post by evoking feudalism when this is the most capitalist thing ever

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

where's the guardian's letter about political prisoners nicolás maduro and cilia flores

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

NEXT WEEK'S PATREON: communism, the highest stage of ecology w/ henry hakamäki and salvatore engels-di mauro

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

there's a recall for IV saline injections because they found fiberglass in them but ok

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

schroedinger's china: it's capitalist when you're discussing something positive and communist when it's something bad

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

all sovereign states that do not bend the knee are required to do this because of the constant soft and hard power threats by the US. the US is a surveillance state as well, but not because of any external threat—it does so as a necessity for unrestricted capital accumulation

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

NEW EP the one and only @abbymartin.bsky.social joins us to discuss her latest film which documents her in-depth conversation with cuban president miguel díaz-canel

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

china and the US both have planned economies. one is planned by a democratic, communist government to benefit people and the environment. the other is planned by a cohort of oligarchs to enrich themselves and consolidate their own power

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

always remember that the reason they needed to take over TikTok, the reason they needed to sue campuses for "antisemitism," the reason they need to manufacture bogus open letters in the guardian—it's because they're losing the battle of ideas very, very badly

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

I live in the freest country in the world. the fact that I have to put in my bio that my opinions are not those of my employer is irrelevant, I just don't want to get fired for expressing my beleifs and opinions. also, did you know that china is a surveillance state?

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Reposted by Robert Raymond

upstream @upstreampodcast.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

NEXT WEEK cuba ep. 10: cuba after castro w/ @abbymartin.bsky.social

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

in capitalism you get the privilege of paying for a house twice, once to the bank for interest on the loan and then again for the home itself

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

if you live in the US the median slovenian is richer than you, spends less time on the phone with a health insurance company than you (none actually), and worries less about recalled food than you

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

another chinese billionaire sentenced for corruption. in the US he'd run for president and win

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

there's about a year gap and the old list is gone but I'm restarting my book thread. "the FBI [contended] that Cuba had become the primary global inspiration of the U.S. Left...a living Third World socialist experiment, one that had persisted for a decade despite U.S. efforts to unseat it.”

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

if "china is only prosperous because the US moved its manufacturing there" then why isn't mexico, india, or thailand also experiencing similar results? the difference is the communist party and its socialist orientation

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

I recently posted about china's labor landscape in a positive way on Instagram and within minutes the comments were FLOODED with bots disparaging china and spreading imperialist talking points. thousands of bots, some crude, some more sophisticated, all obviously bots. the info war is real

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Robert Raymond @robpertray.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

that's 0.02% of his net worth. don't forget, you live under a dictatorship of capital

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