Anti-Capitalist Parenting: A Dialectical Perspective w/ Breht O'Shea (Upstream Podcast)
Release Date: 06/25/2025
They Called Her Rebel: Speculative Fiction, Revolutionary Art, and the Politics of Imagination
Rev Left Radio
In this episode, Breht speaks with Jacob Dallas-Main, co-host of and author of ; a dazzling fusion of fantasy, class struggle, and storytelling set in a world of debtors’ camps, collapsing empires, and revolutionary possibility. The two discuss how speculative fiction can illuminate political struggle, not merely as metaphor but as a call to break the boundary between audience and participant. They explore what makes a work of art revolutionary rather than consumable, the dangers of reactionary storytelling in popular culture, declining literacy in the U.S., the threats posed by AI, the...
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UNLOCKED: Mamdani, Marijuana Dependency, and Unconditional Life Acceptance
Rev Left Radio
This is an unlocked patreon episode. To support the show and get access to monthly bonus episodes like this one, join our patreon: In this unlocked Patreon episode, Breht reads and responds to an article in the Tehran Times on the NYC mayoral race and left strategy around Palestine, then he plays and analyzes a in your 20s and 30s, and finally Breht discusses his ongoing grieving process surrounding his Dad's death and the life lessons he's learned in the wake of it. In the process, he articulates what we need in left leaders, cultivating psychological resilience, the importance of sobriety...
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Heidegger in Ruins: Philosophy, Fascism, and the Politics of Being
Rev Left Radio
In this episode, Breht speaks with , author of , about the dark entanglement between Martin Heidegger’s philosophy and his lifelong commitment to National Socialism. Heidegger is often hailed as the most important philosopher of the 20th century, yet his work was deeply shaped by the reactionary politics of his time. Wolin explains how Heidegger’s central ideas -- Being, Dasein, authenticity, rootedness, and the “decline of the West” -- became intertwined with fascist notions of destiny, hierarchy, and belonging. They discuss the long history of attempts to sanitize Heidegger’s...
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From Reagan to Trump: Neoliberalism, Class War, and American Decadence
Rev Left Radio
In this episode, public school history teacher Gianni Paul joins Breht to trace the historical roots of our current crisis — stagnant wages, mass homelessness, collapsing infrastructure, rising fascism, Gilded Age inequality, and a beaten down working class — back to Reagan’s counter-revolution against the New Deal and the forty-year neoliberal project that followed. Together, they explore how neoliberalism emerged out of the crises of the 1970s, Carter’s role in laying the groundwork before Reagan, the destruction of unions and working-class power, the ideological weaponization of...
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Union Organizing, Islamic Faith, and the Collective Vision of Socialism
Rev Left Radio
In this episode, Breht speaks with Aminah Sheikh -- Vice President of the Canadian Freelance Union, member of the Twin Cities DSA Steering Committee, and longtime labor organizer -- about the intersection of Islamic faith, union organizing, and the collective vision of socialism. Aminah shares her journey from growing up in a devout religious household to discovering belonging and political consciousness through the labor movement. She reflects on how organizing gave her safety and solidarity as a Muslim born in the West, and how faith, class struggle, and proletarian internationalism can...
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On Fatherhood: Parenting and Marriage in an Era of Uncertainty
Rev Left Radio
Breht is joined by Nick from and JT from and , to have an unstructured conversation about fatherhood, parenting, role modeling, masculinity, marriage, children, and much more! ---------------------------------------------------- Support Rev Left and get access to bonus episodes: Make a one-time donation to Rev Left at Follow, Subscribe, & Learn more about Rev Left Radio Outro Beat Prod. by
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Ceasefire in Gaza, The Monroe Doctrine Under Trump, and a US Economy on the Brink of Collapse
Rev Left Radio
Alyson and Breht analyze current events, including the ceasefire in Gaza and its implications, the newest round of US imperialist aggression against Venezuela, Regime Change aspirations in Iran and Venezuela, the absolutely horrific state of the American economy, the AI bubble, Free Speech, ICE raids, and more. ---------------------------------------------------- Support Rev Left and get access to bonus episodes: Make a one-time donation to Rev Left at Follow, Subscribe, & Learn more about Rev Left Radio
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Discussing Popular Education and Social Movement Work (w/ Ultra-Red)
Rev Left Radio
In this episode, Alyson joins members of the Ultra-Red collective to discuss their recent trip to Central America where they learned first hand about popular education movements of the past and present. The discussion gets into the history of popular education, existing social movements in Central America today, and what we can learn from these movements in our organizing work. The journal of Ultra-Red can be found here: ---------------------------------------------------- Learn more about, follow, and support Rev Left and Red Menace here:
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The State of the American Left (w/ How The Red Was Won)
Rev Left Radio
Breht went on to talk about the current state of the left, the contradictions of American trade unions, American geopolitics, and much more! From the original description: You know him. You love him. It's everyone's favorite Breht O'Shea from such fine podcasts as RevLeft Radio, The Red Menace, Shoeless in South Dakota, and more! We talk about what organizing in the USA looks like 2025 - from unions to the socialist orgs, mutual aid, resisting fascism, and raising anti-fascist kids.Part 2 here:
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Menace of our Time: The Long War Against American Communism
Rev Left Radio
For over a century, the U.S. ruling class has waged war on communists, anarchists, and radicals. From the Palmer Raids of 1919 to McCarthyism in the 1950s, from COINTELPRO in the Cold War to today’s MAGA rhetoric about “woke communists" and his crackdown on "Antifa Radicals", state repression has always sought to crush revolutionary politics before they could take root; especially in times of capitalist crisis. In this episode, historian joins us to discuss his new book Menace of Our Time: The Long War Against American Communism. We trace how the U.S. developed its arsenal of...
info_outlineOne of the most radical things you can do is live your life in direct opposition to the forces that control our society. Not just fighting for policies or organizing your community, although those are certainly important parts of it, but also living with values that oppose the values of our dominant society. And even more importantly, raising the next generation to embody those values—not in a coercive way, but through organic parenting and role modeling that make radicalism irresistible. This is how we raise revolutionaries: instilling community, love, egalitarianism, and a need for justice into children. And this is just what our guest in today's episode has devoted himself to doing.
Breht O’Shea is an activist, organizer, political educator, and host of the podcast Revolutionary Left Radio and co-host of the podcasts Red Menace and Shoeless in South Dakota. He is a father of three based out of Omaha Nebraska.
In this conversation, Part 3 of our Post Capitalist Parenting series, Breht shares with us insights about parenting that he's learned over the years as a father of three and what Marxism teaches us about parenting. We discuss the classic text by Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, which is a dialectical materialist analysis of patriarchy and the family, tracing the emergence of the patriarchal family and it took through various iterations of class society but also exploring what families have looked like under actually-existing socialism and also what it might look like under communism. We also explore the anti-natalist position which attempts to argue that having children is immoral, why this perspective is deeply flawed, what Buddhism can teach us about parenting, and much, much more.
Support Breht and Rev Left Radio, and join their community HERE
Further Resources
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The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, Freidrich Engels
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Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism: And Other Arguments for Economic Independence, by Kristen Ghodsee
Related Episodes:
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Post Capitalist Parenting Pt. 1: Parenting Under Capitalism w/ Toi Smith
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Post Capitalist Parenting Pt. 2: Reimagining the Family w/ Kristen Ghodsee
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Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism w/ Breht O'Shea and Alyson Escalante
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Red Menace: "The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and The State" by Friedrich Engels (Pt. 1)
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Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism w/ Kristen Ghodsee
Intermission music: "Cool 4 U" by Club Cafe
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