Podcast Recording of “What Do We Want?: The Pleasures of Activism”

Saturday November 16th,
Doors & tea and cake 3.30pm; Podcast recording starts 4pm

As part of our Changing Hearts & Minds workshop, we're hosting the live recording of an episode of the podcast What Do We Want?, with workshop hosts Sarah Stein Lubrano and Max Haiven and guests Martha Awojobi, Sita Balani and Zrinka Bralo.

For this episode of their brand new spicy-nerdy podcast, co-hosts Max and Sarah take on their most salacious topic yet: pleasure. Should activism be fun, or is that bourgeois? Should comrades sleep with one another, or should we somehow try (and probably fail) to stop that? Will there be dancing in our revolution, and if so will we all know the steps? And what, after all, could be more fun than a five-hour meeting about group process?

We’re often told our struggles will flop if we don’t make them more joyful and pleasurable. We lose so many comrades to burnout. But is the answer to embrace pleasure activism? And what about the troubling pleasures we’re less comfortable talking about, like gossip and righteousness?

Joined by jaded special guests (who've seen it all) and prompted by anonymous confessions and questions from those in attendance (“asking for a comrade”), Sarah and Max will create a safe space for everyone but themselves.

It’ll be funny because it’s true.

What Do We Want? is a six-episode podcast about being an activist in a bonkers world, exploring the wild, wonderful, and weird stuff that draws social movements together… and drives them apart. With episodes on topics including shame, fantasy, despair, conspiracy and heartbreak, it draws on the latest research from the cognitive sciences and combines it with the theories and wisdom of radical movements.

Sarah Stein Lubrano is a public intellectual whose work focuses on what the cognitive sciences teaches us about politics and how to change it. Her book Don’t Talk About Politics (and What To Do Instead) will be in bookstores in 2025. Max Haiven is a professor and organiser specialising in the radical imagination and social movements and author of Palm Oil: The Grease of Empire. What Do We Want? is a project of Sense & Solidarity, a platform for movements to learn about what really works to change hearts and minds.

Those attending the Changing Hearts and Minds workshop can attend this event for free but booking is essential.

Please note: at this exceptional event, participants' contributions will be recorded and may be included in the podcast.

Kairos, 84 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4TG

Doors open at 3.30pm. Recording starts at 4pm.

£8 Kairos Club Member, £15 Non-member, £10 Struggling financially, £20 Supporter.
Free for those attending the Changing Hearts and Minds workshop. 

Before requesting a discounted ticket, please consider sincerely: Are you struggling to meet your basic needs? Would you have to make a genuine sacrifice to buy a full priced ticket? Do you have reduced earnings through a lifestyle choice or because you’re dedicating your time to unpaid work relating to the climate and nature crises?