Juanita Uzoma’s Reviews > Postcapitalist Desire: The Final Lectures > Status Update

consciousness of one's material existence is, despite itself, not immediately self-evident. Instead, consciousness of one's place within a structure of inequality - be that capitalism, patriarchy or white supremacy - must be constructed; it is never given. The best way to construct such a consciousness is with the participation of others who share a similar material existence.

Marx's Spinozist adage, once again, that we must not settle for interpreting the world but instead strive to change it. This is not to set interpretation and manifestation in opposition, however - rather, the former must always strive to become the latter.

The first and most overriding drive of any entity, Spinoza says, is its will to persist in its own being. When an entity starts to act against its own best interests, to destroy itself - as, sadly, Spinoza observes, humans are wont to do — it has been taken over by external forces. To be free and happy entails exorcising these invaders and acting in accordance with reason.