Juanita Uzoma’s Reviews > Postcapitalist Desire: The Final Lectures > Status Update
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 124 of 252
The bourgeoisie cannot have consciousness. They can't see how things really are. This is part of what I think is important about what is being said here. The proletarian does not, by virtue of their being proletarian alone, see the true nature of things. Only by virtue of what we can call consciousness raising…only by a process of consciousness raising, by a practice of consciousness raising, can they achieve that.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:46AM
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Juanita’s Previous Updates
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 173 of 252
That's what I'm suggesting, I guess, in terms of what we saw with black performers in the US. Their success preceded the actual shifts in racial dynamics in US society. Again, not that they were resolved, by any means, but culture allows this kind of performative anticipation of a radically transformed world.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:52AM
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 133 of 252
You can have this machine that is the most wondrous thing imaginable but, if you don't have the time to use it, it might as well not be there.
And that's where we are at. That's where we are in terms of what human capacities are at the moment, and what the capacities of the things produced by humans are — or let's put it that way, for the moment — and what the capacity of human agency to use those things is!
— Mar 05, 2026 07:50AM
And that's where we are at. That's where we are in terms of what human capacities are at the moment, and what the capacities of the things produced by humans are — or let's put it that way, for the moment — and what the capacity of human agency to use those things is!
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 133 of 252
[Capitalism] has to continually inhibit the capacity for consciousness, and it's done a very good job. You could say that time is fundamental to the means of production— of everything! It also seems to be, in the world today, like some sort of fairy-tale where there's some magical golden machine in a room over there that can make anything you want. It's just there, but you don't have the time to go there.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:50AM
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 133 of 252
As Marcuse said, we could all be working much less now, but that's the insanity of it — the full insanity of the capitalist system! They produce an artificial scarcity of time in order to produce a real scarcity of natural resources. That's effectively what's happening. It's the production of spurious commodities that nobody wants, like slippers with the faces of alligators…
— Mar 05, 2026 07:48AM
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 124 of 252
Capitalism, then, would be this system whereby this alienation - to use that term
— of human capacities is taken to its absolute limit. It's a monstrously, prodigiously productive system, yet it's also one which seems to — and does — exploit and oppress the majority of the population, and which even the minority have limited capacity to alter.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:45AM
— of human capacities is taken to its absolute limit. It's a monstrously, prodigiously productive system, yet it's also one which seems to — and does — exploit and oppress the majority of the population, and which even the minority have limited capacity to alter.
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 123 of 252
This is the same for the bourgeoisie.[The problem of immediacy]is why they don't know!They are the puppets of this process, you could say. From their point of view, they're putting more money in, they're making more money.From capital's point of view, they're just the means by which it grows. And this process is, in principle, infinite.And has to be — there always has to be more.This is in the nature of capitalism.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:43AM
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 108 of 252
Because living in a family is living collectively. It's just a very restricted form of it.
Isn't part of the function of the family for capitalism that it can contain the desires for collectivity that we have?
It's a desire that can only be met by collective groups that is expressed in a form that is often chauvinistic, that is competitive, that is defined by its exclusions as much by its inclusions.
— Mar 05, 2026 07:41AM
Isn't part of the function of the family for capitalism that it can contain the desires for collectivity that we have?
It's a desire that can only be met by collective groups that is expressed in a form that is often chauvinistic, that is competitive, that is defined by its exclusions as much by its inclusions.
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 96 of 252
If such a 'natural' condition, and not certain political and social institutions, provides the rationale for repression, then it has become irrational. The culture of industrial civilisation has turned the human organism into an ever more sensitive, differentiated, exchangeable instrument, and has created a social wealth sufficiently great to transform this instrument into an end in itself.
— Feb 09, 2026 01:12PM
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 96 of 252
The excuse of scarcity, which has justified
institutionalized repression since its inception, weakens as man's knowledge and control over nature enhances the means for fulfilling human needs with a minimum of toil. The still prevailing impoverishment of vast areas of the world is no longer due chiefly to the poverty of human and natural resources but to the manner in which they are distributed and utilized.
— Feb 09, 2026 01:11PM
institutionalized repression since its inception, weakens as man's knowledge and control over nature enhances the means for fulfilling human needs with a minimum of toil. The still prevailing impoverishment of vast areas of the world is no longer due chiefly to the poverty of human and natural resources but to the manner in which they are distributed and utilized.
Juanita Uzoma
is on page 57 of 252
Fearing implication with those in power, we become attached to guarding and demonstrating our purity rather than mucking around in everyday politics. Those who engage in such work may find themselves accused of betraying their values, sleeping with the enemy, bargaining with the devil - all manner of transgressions
and betrayals
— Feb 09, 2026 01:10PM
and betrayals
