Wholesale No. 39

Henry Adams defined politics as “the systematic organization of hatreds.” Behold Baffler no. 39, wherein our contributors plumb the depths of the ever-destabilizing, digitally deranged neoliberal order. Jonathon Sturgeon examines how civil wars have spread across the globe in an era many of our cultural arbiters are determined to call an unprecedented long peace. Scott Beauchamp explores how the development of video games has mirrored the imperatives—and drawn directly on the funding and expertise—of the Pentagon. Meanwhile, in the sphere of cultural confrontation, Andrew Hartman surveys the changing face of the culture wars in the political moment of #MeToo and the Parkland student protests, while Maximillian Alvarez ponders the future of generational conflict in an era of seemingly permanent austerity.