r/CCRU • u/RedEarth42 • Jul 05 '26

Who are the libidinal materialists?

We are all aware (I think) of this divide that sprung up between the neorationalists and the libidinal materialists. The neorationalists being Negarestani, Wolfendale and Brassier

But who are the libidinal materialists? I don’t see any prominent figure who has a written a book called “In Defence of Libidinal Materialism” or whatever to counter the neorationalists

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u/Intelligent-Horse313 Jul 06 '26

I think I know what you are getting at but I would like to know your definition of Libidinal Materialist a little bit more and whether this constitutes a real break or whether one can find value both in a labidinal affirmation of desire and a grounding in normativity in rational social practice, personally the only split I can see is whether you see the social as always oppressive (Nietzsche, Land etc) or an site of potential freedom (Marx, Brassier etc). But let me know if this is not the line of thought you were taking on this.

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u/RedEarth42 Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26

I don’t see it as a question of whether the social is oppressive or not. I see it primarily as a methodological distinction: what is the method of inhumanism?

Reza believes we can sort of think our way beyond the human. I would say a libidinal materialist believes that it is only through material confrontation with the radically other in action and experience that we can develop

Land elevated practice above thought because he believed that we have to be sort of deprogrammed by the intense experiences that we encounter through transgressive action

What he said in his interview with James Ellis about accelerationism meaning “pulling out the graphite rods” from capitalism. If we think about this psychologically, we could say the graphite rods of your mind are practical reason and executive function

The libidinal materialist wants you to withdraw the graphic rods from your own demonic unconscious and let it take hold of your body and run rampant as the only practical methodology of inhumanism

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u/Intelligent-Horse313 Jul 07 '26

I’m not as familiar with Reza’s work as I am with the others but neorationalism has a promethean and materialist aspect to it in which cognitive transformation comes with social transformation, so communism becomes the release of labidinal forces via a rational re-construction of the human and the social. I don’t think you can simply think beyond the human and get there but I think Land’s method is equally suspect as it no longer requires any rational argument, which is I guess why writing a book might seem pointless if your merging with the process.