Counter-Revolutionary Book Club

Karlyn Borysenko

The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist deep dive into the radical left's playbook. What's worse than 1984? Dive into the most dystopian texts you’ve ever encountered...except these aren’t sci-fi nightmares. They’re straight from real life. From queer Marxism to gender abolition, from anarcho-communism to abolishing the nuclear family, you'll explore the most dystopian ideas being pushed by real far-left activists in the United States today. These ideologies don’t just challenge societal norms—they aim to dismantle them entirely, creating chaos under the guise of liberation. This isn’t just a book club—it’s intellectual resistance against the bizarre, the radical, and the authoritarian. Read. Decode. Resist. karlyn.substack.com

  1. Ep 14. Antifa Proposal For How To Build An Insurgency To Overthrow The United States Government

    12/19/2025

    Ep 14. Antifa Proposal For How To Build An Insurgency To Overthrow The United States Government

    The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left’s most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section, where intellectual resistance begins. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reading: The Enemy Doesn’t Know How Many We Are: A Proposal for InsurgencyAuthor: Sofia ValenciaSource: The Anarchist Library In this episode of the Counter-Revolutionary Book Club, I walk through one of the most explicit revolutionary documents circulating on the far left right now. The Enemy Doesn’t Know How Many We Are is not theory in the abstract. It is a tactical blueprint for insurgency in the United States, written by a self-described communist and anarchist, and recently published to the Anarchist Library. This text lays out, in plain language, what “winning” means to the revolutionary left. It defines victory as the destruction of the state, the abolition of capitalism, and the replacement of existing social structures with collectivized governance, defense militias, and revolutionary administration. The document is clear that reform is a dead end, that electoral politics are irrelevant, and that an insurgency must make the country ungovernable through coordinated political, social, and armed action. Throughout this episode, I break down how the document frames the United States as an occupying force, how it justifies violence as defensive and inevitable, and how it draws lessons from past uprisings, including the Arab Spring, revolutionary Spain, Chile, and modern guerrilla warfare. We examine its emphasis on propaganda, zines, community organizing, and parallel institutions, as well as its explicit call to neutralize “reactionaries” and remove them from liberated territories. This is not speculation about what the far left believes. This is their own writing, their own strategy, and their own definition of revolution. My role here is simple. I read the primary source, document it, and explain what it actually says, so you don’t have to rely on slogans, media framing, or wishful thinking. If you want to understand how revolutionary movements think about power, legitimacy, violence, and social control, this episode lays it out in unmistakable terms. Primary sources matter. That’s what this project is about. Decode The Left with Karlyn Borysenko is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 19m
  2. 12/11/2025

    Ep 13. How Liberal Identity Politics Paved The Way For Fascism

    The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left’s most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section, where intellectual resistance begins. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reading: How Liberal Identity Politics Paved the Way for Fascism Author: NIHILISTIC VIOLENT EXTREMISTS of anomie pressSupplemental Texts Discussed:— Be Queer, Do Terrorism manifesto— “Another Word for White Ally is Coward” (BLM-era essay)— “Giving Thanks” (NVEP blog post) Link to full text: Find the full text of How Liberal Identity Politics Paved The Way For Fascism here. In this episode, we analyzed the brand-new follow-up publication from the same queer-nihilist collective behind the Be Queer, Do Terrorism manifesto. If the first document was an explicit declaration of violent queer insurgency, this one is a systematic teardown of liberal identity politics — portraying it as the primary barrier to revolutionary violence and, in their words, the mechanism through which “fascism” consolidates power. The authors argue that identity categories themselves are capitalist inventions designed to maintain hierarchy, obedience, and the cultural conditions that reproduce capitalism. Because of that, any movement that uses identity politics — liberals, progressives, activists who defer to “marginalized groups,” NGOs, Democratic politicians — is, by their definition, aiding fascism. This essay is not just theory. It’s a case study in movement fracture, showing how queer nihilists openly attack anarchists, Antifa, liberals, and progressive organizers for refusing to use violence. 🧠 Key Concepts 🔹 Identity Politics as a Capitalist Weapon The collective asserts that identity categories (race, gender, sexuality, indigeneity) are artificially constructed by capitalism.If identity exists, capitalism survives; therefore identity must be abolished. They claim liberals uphold these categories, making liberalism and fascism two ends of the same oppressive system. 🔹 Liberals as the Enemy of Insurrection Queer nihilists see liberal nonviolence, deference to marginalized groups, and protest-based activism as obstacles to revolution.Their argument:Liberal “respectability” prevents sabotage, destruction, and violent action — and therefore directly strengthens “fascism.” 🔹 The Alligator Alcatraz Case Study Their central example: the alleged construction of a “concentration camp” in the Florida Everglades (Alligator Alcatraz).They claim: * Anarchists refused sabotage because they didn’t want to offend Indigenous organizers. * Liberals insisted on protest, petitions, and social media instead of action. * As a result, the facility was built and opened. The takeaway: identity politics protects oppressors by blocking violence. 🔹 Mocking Liberal Intersectionality Throughout the essay they ridicule: * “White ally” obligations * The idea that straight white men must step back * Identity-based leadership (“the Black community™”) * Feminist critiques of “manarchists” * BLM organizers who restrained rioters in 2020 To them, these norms weaken movements by preserving capitalist moral order. 🔹 Violence as the Only Effective Strategy Reiterating themes from Be Queer, Do Terrorism, they argue: * Nonviolence is useless. * Property destruction, sabotage, and direct action are necessary. * Anyone who discourages such tactics is “functionally fascist.” ⚠️ Significance This document reveals several critical ideological developments: * A direct call to purge liberals from anarchist and queer activist spaces * A fully articulated rejection of intersectionality * A claim that identity politics actively protects state power * A renewed endorsement of sabotage and terrorism as legitimate political tools * A growing intra-left conflict between queer nihilists and traditional anarchists This isn’t fringe chatter — these texts are circulating through the same channels as their earlier manifesto and are being read, shared, and endorsed within militant queer networks. The worldview is clear:Liberals are the problem.Identity is the cage.Nonviolence is collaboration.Revolution requires destruction. 💬 Selected Quotes “Radical queer militants hate liberals.”“Identity categories are socially constructed by capitalism.”“Liberals defended the oppressor by stopping direct action.”“Nonviolent tactics accomplished nothing.”“Anyone promoting identity politics is on the fascist side, whether they know it or not.” 🎯 Why It Matters This essay lays bare the strategic logic behind emerging queer-nihilist organizing: * They view identity politics not as progressive, but as a capitalist trap. * They treat liberals as enemies, not allies. * They see sabotage and violence as required for “liberation.” * They are escalating beyond rhetoric into justification for domestic political violence. * Their internal critique of the left reveals fractures conservatives never see. If you want to understand where the queer-extremist wing of the far left is heading, this text is indispensable.It shows a movement not interested in reform, recognition, or inclusion — but in replacing all social norms with revolutionary nihilism. Decode The Left with Karlyn Borysenko is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    33 min
  3. 12/11/2025

    Ep 12. Be Queer, Do Terrorism Manifesto

    The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left’s most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section, where intellectual resistance begins. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reading: Be Queer, Do Terrorism Author: NIHILISTIC VIOLENT EXTREMISTS of anomie pressSections Covered: Full manifesto as read live on streamLink to full text: Find it here. (Backup here) This week, we relaunched the Counter-Revolutionary Book Club with one of the most explicit and unfiltered queer-nihilist manifestos circulating in today’s activist ecosystem. This is not theory dressed up as metaphor or academic abstraction. It is a direct call for civilizational negation — the destruction of capitalism, the family, identity, gender, religion, and every stabilizing norm of the modern world. Throughout the stream, we broke down how the manifesto positions “queer” not as an identity but as an insurgent posture: violent, defiant, anti-civilizational, and proudly extremist. The authors don’t hide their goals. They state openly that queerness is synonymous with nihilism, that anything short of extremism is insufficient, and that queer liberation requires the abolition of all social order. This isn’t fringe zine culture anymore. These ideas are being produced, printed, and distributed at anarchist book fairs, embedded in pedagogy, and echoed across radical queer organizing spaces. 🧠 Key Concepts 🔹 Queer Nihilism as Political Identity The manifesto defines “queer” as a rejection of all imposed structure — gender, morality, family, psychiatry, capitalism, and the state.Anything normalized is to be destroyed. Anything valued by society must be negated. 🔹 Civilization = Capitalism The authors collapse the concepts entirely.“Civilized” = “capitalist.”To abolish capitalism, one must abolish civilization itself — returning to a pre-social, pre-structured existence modeled on an imagined indigenous past. 🔹 Gender as a Spook Referencing Stirner, gender is framed as a hallucination enforced by capitalism to divide labor and reproduce the nuclear family.To be queer is to wage war on the categories “man” and “woman” as tools of domination. 🔹 Violence as Virtue The manifesto claims openly:“Queers are nihilists. We are violent.”Anything insufficiently extreme is, by their definition, not queer.They frame violence as necessary revolutionary praxis. 🔹 Psychiatry as Capitalist Enforcement The authors argue psychiatry exists to maintain social norms that protect capitalism.Removing homosexuality and trans identity from the DSM is described not as liberation but as co-option — an attempt to neutralize queer extremism. 🔹 Global Struggle Framed as One Battle The text fuses queer, anti-racist, and anti-ICE activism into a unified anti-capitalist project, asserting that all border enforcement is inherently capitalist violence. ⚠️ Significance This manifesto is the ideological backbone of: * Abolish-the-family campaigns * School-based queer pedagogy that rejects the gender binary * The framing of public sex, cruising, and polyamory as political acts * The rise of queer nihilism as a social identity * Direct-action networks inspired by Bash Back! and Baden * “Be gay, do crime” rhetoric escalating into explicit calls for terroristic action The authors are blunt:They are not seeking rights.They are not seeking inclusion.They are seeking collapse. This is the worldview shaping a growing faction of radical queer organizing — one that delights in the accusation of extremism because it validates their strategy. 💬 Selected Quotes “Queers are nihilists. We are violent.”“Anything that wouldn’t be regarded as extremist isn’t queer enough.”“We despise capitalism and religion and the society they created.”“If you’re reading this and you’re not queer, change that. Shed your genders, your morals, your inhibitions.”“We are terrorists out to destroy society.” (Yes — those are direct statements from the document.) 🎯 Why It Matters If you want to understand the direction of contemporary queer-radical organizing, look here. This manifesto is not an outlier; it’s a blueprint. These ideas are being taught, printed, distributed, and infused into activist culture with zero dilution. The project isn’t societal participation.It’s societal erasure. Not a reformed capitalism.Not a kinder patriarchy.Not a broadened spectrum of gender. A total undoing of civilization itself. This episode breaks down exactly how they justify it, how they teach it, and how they intend to operationalize it. Decode The Left with Karlyn Borysenko is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 51m
  4. 04/20/2025

    Ep. 11: Queering Anarchism, Part 3: Queer Theory, New Hierarchies, and the Internal Cops We Create

    The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left's most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section, where intellectual resistance begins. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reading: Queering Anarchism Edited by: C.B. Daring, J. Rogue, Deric Shannon, Abbey VolcanoSections Covered: * “Police at the Borders by Abbey Volcano * Gender Sabotage by Stacy aka Sallydarity * Link to full text: Queering Anarchism This week, we covered two of the most foundational texts in queer anarchist theory. Together, they form a blueprint for dismantling all social structure—not just the state or capitalism, but identity, gender, sexuality, and even the self. Abbey Volcano’s Police at the Borders critiques how radical queer spaces construct new hierarchies under the illusion of liberation, replacing the old order with a new one governed by aesthetic rebellion and behavioral conformity. Meanwhile, Stacy’s Gender Sabotage takes it further, arguing that gender itself is a colonial, capitalist technology that must be abolished in its entirety—not expanded, not diversified, but destroyed. These essays aren’t about inclusion. They’re about obliteration. This is the ideological core of the queer Marxist project. 🧠 Key Concepts 🔹 Police at the Borders – Abbey Volcano * Queer as Hierarchy: Radical queer spaces often enforce a new orthodoxy—polyamory, kink, gender fluidity—as the price of admission. Anyone too monogamous, too binary, or too private becomes suspect. * Oppression Olympics: Power is redistributed by victim status. “The most marginalized in the room” becomes the unquestioned authority, and disagreement is framed as violence. * Inverted Policing: Rather than abolish the moral order, they reverse it. “Queer” becomes a gatekeeping identity—and those who fail to perform it correctly are policed just as harshly as they were by the systems they left behind. * Queer as Context, Not Essence: Volcano pushes back on using “queer” as a fixed label. Instead, it should describe a relationship to power and normativity—not a new static identity enforced from the margins. 🔹 Gender Sabotage – Stacy aka Sallydarity * Gender as Colonial Tool: The gender binary was constructed through capitalism and colonialism to control labor, family structure, and sexuality. The witch hunts, Christian morality, and racial slavery all played a role in producing “woman” as a subordinate class. * Masculinity as Training for Violence: Patriarchy doesn’t just exploit women—it programs men. From boyhood, they’re taught to dominate, suppress emotion, and weaponize rage. But Stacy argues this training can be undone. * Feminism Must Abolish Gender: Identity is a false refuge. The goal isn’t to expand gender categories—it’s to dismantle the binary altogether. Gender stratum (the hierarchical division of sex roles) must be destroyed, not diversified. * Intersectional Coercion: Gender oppression is inextricably tied to race, class, and colonization. The political construction of difference is what naturalizes domination—and it must be unraveled systemically. ⚠️ Significance These essays form the intellectual infrastructure behind: * Abolish-the-family rhetoric * Radical queer pedagogy in schools * Normalization of public sex, polyamory, and sex work as political acts * The rise of “queer” as a performative litmus test * The rejection of biological sex in favor of infinite identities This isn’t about protecting the marginalized. It’s about eliminating the concept of normal—and punishing anyone who insists on boundaries, privacy, or tradition. Volcano and Stacy aren’t fringe voices. They’re canonical in the spaces where these ideas are taught, trained, and exported into policy, education, and activism. 💬 Selected Quotes “We’re anarchists because we want to get rid of cops—not be them.”— Abbey Volcano “We are imprisoned by a gender binary… If we don’t behave appropriately, there are plenty of prison guards to put us in our place.”— Stacy aka Sallydarity “If the ‘opposite’ is liberating, then we are still being defined by the original form.”— Abbey Volcano “The witch hunts, which involved the torture and murder of hundreds of thousands of women, occurred in conjunction with the transition to capitalism and the colonization of the Americas.”— Stacy aka Sallydarity 🎯 Why It Matters If you want to understand the real goals of queer Marxist movements, read these essays. The project isn’t to be accepted into society—it’s to dismantle society itself. This ideology doesn’t liberate—it reorganizes control through cultural coercion, moral shaming, and identity-based hierarchy. They aren’t abolishing borders. They’re policing them differently. Video Of The Live Recording Decode The Left with Karlyn Borysenko is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left's most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section—where intellectual resistance begins. If you value my work, consider supporting it for just $8/month or $80/year. Your support is the lifeline of this project—I’m 100% funded by readers like you. Without it, this analysis wouldn’t be possible. Your support makes this work possible. Learn how to help here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 7m
  5. 04/19/2025

    Ep. 10: Queering Anarchism, Part 2: Marriage Is Violence, Gender Is a Weapon

    Queering Anarchism: Marriage Is Violence, Gender Is a Weapon This episode of the Counter-Revolutionary Book Club takes a blowtorch to Queering Anarchism, a radical anthology blending queer theory with anarchist politics. We cover: Ryan Conrad’s unhinged attack on gay marriage as a neoliberal trap J. Rogue’s call to dismantle feminist universals through transfeminism A bonus dive into The Transfeminist Manifesto—where gender is endlessly constructed and categories are the enemy Key claims include: Equality is oppression Marriage is property Gender must be abolished, not reformed Transfeminism is the future of revolution These aren’t fringe ideas—they’re shaping how the radical left organizes, agitates, and indoctrinates. Tune in for the breakdown.The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left's most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section, where intellectual resistance begins. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. If you value my work, consider supporting it for just $8/month or $80/year. Your support is the lifeline of this project—I’m 100% funded by readers like you. Without it, this analysis wouldn’t be possible. Your support makes this work possible. Learn how to help here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 37m
  6. 04/10/2025

    Ep. 9: Queering Anarchism, Part 1. Introduction.

    Reading: Queering Anarchism, edited by C.B. Daring, J. Rogue, Deric Shannon, and Abbey Volcano Sections Covered: Preface by Martha Ackelsberg + Editors’ Introduction 🔥 What We Read This episode kicks off our series on Queering Anarchism—an anthology that merges radical queer theory with anarchist politics. We covered the Preface by Martha Ackelsberg and the editors’ Introduction. Ackelsberg sets the tone: “We have only just begun to understand the many possibilities offered by a queered anarchism.” She praises the collection for challenging binaries, rejecting academic elitism, and showing how queer theory and anarchist praxis can create new worlds—not just critique the old ones. The editors then lay out the foundation: * Anarchism = the destruction of domination (capitalism, the state, hierarchy) and the creation of new, egalitarian social relations. * Queer = not a fixed identity, but a positionality—a challenge to norms, assimilation, and state-sanctioned respectability. * To “queer” something means to destabilize it, break it open, and rebuild it free from enforced boundaries. They’re not trying to write for academics. They’re building a toolkit for radicals who live at the intersection of anarchist revolt and queer resistance. 🧨 Key Concepts * Anarchism is not chaos. It’s a revolt against institutional power—capitalism, state control, and social hierarchy. * Queer is not just gay. It’s a rejection of normalization and assimilation—especially through identity categories, marriage, and state-sanctioned visibility. * Destruction is generative. Anarchists don’t just tear things down—they create new systems rooted in mutual aid and direct democracy. * Positionality over identity. Queerness is defined by its opposition to the norm, not by any one set of behaviors or labels. * The enemy is the state. Both anarchists and queers are crushed by the state’s enforcement of order, categories, and hierarchy. ⚒️ Why It Matters This book is about merging theory with lived struggle. It’s not just about who you are—it’s about how you live, how you resist, and what you're willing to destroy to build something better. The revolution won’t be normalized. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    1h 14m
  7. 04/01/2025

    Ep. 8: The Gender Accelerationist Manifesto

    “Death to gender. Freedom to the queers.” That’s how this one starts—and it only gets more extreme from there. In this episode of the Counter-Revolutionary Book Club, we dive into the Gender Accelerationist Manifesto, a modern queer Marxist war plan calling for the total abolition of gender, capitalism, the nuclear family, and even queerness itself. We break down their logic, their tactics, and their endgame: violent revolution, queer militias, and the “dictatorship of the queer.” This isn’t theory—it’s a cultural insurgency already in motion. 🎧 Full episode + links: https://karlyn.substack.com/s/counter-revolutionary-book-club📖 Read the manifesto: theanarchistlibrary.org/library/vikky-storm-the-gender-accelerationist-manifesto The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left's most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section—where intellectual resistance begins. If you value my work, consider supporting it for just $8/month or $80/year. Your support is the lifeline of this project—I’m 100% funded by readers like you. Without it, this analysis wouldn’t be possible. Your support makes this work possible. Learn how to help here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 5m
  8. 03/21/2025

    Ep 7. Against the Gendered Nightmare (Part 4)

    We’re tackling Part 4 of Baedan: Against the Gendered Nightmare, the anarchist manifesto that gleefully dismantles the binary, while weaving its vision of a queer utopia through the threads of anti-civilizational chaos. It’s a love letter to erasing boundaries and torching the structures of the world as we know it—so naturally, we’re here to deconstruct their deconstruction. In this episode, we’ll cover Section XV - X, where the authors continue to discuss the complete abolition of gender and the undermining fo the nuclear family. Get ready to roll up your sleeves and dive into the contradictions, hypocrisies, and dangerous fantasies in Against The Gendered Nightmare. Let’s expose the nightmare and prepare for the counter-revolution. Let’s begin. Follow along with the text here. Watch the video of the live recording of this episode on the substack. The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist series dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the far left's most audacious texts and ideas. Explore a curated collection of documents and podcasts in the Book Club section—where intellectual resistance begins. If you value my work, consider supporting it for just $8/month or $80/year. Your support is the lifeline of this project—I’m 100% funded by readers like you. Without it, this analysis wouldn’t be possible. Your support makes this work possible. Learn how to help here. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit karlyn.substack.com/subscribe

    2h 14m

Ratings & Reviews

4.3
out of 5
6 Ratings

About

The Counter-Revolutionary Book Club is a defiantly anti-communist deep dive into the radical left's playbook. What's worse than 1984? Dive into the most dystopian texts you’ve ever encountered...except these aren’t sci-fi nightmares. They’re straight from real life. From queer Marxism to gender abolition, from anarcho-communism to abolishing the nuclear family, you'll explore the most dystopian ideas being pushed by real far-left activists in the United States today. These ideologies don’t just challenge societal norms—they aim to dismantle them entirely, creating chaos under the guise of liberation. This isn’t just a book club—it’s intellectual resistance against the bizarre, the radical, and the authoritarian. Read. Decode. Resist. karlyn.substack.com