Rev Left Radio - Socialism Conference '26: Labor Day Weekend in Chicago!

Episode Date: August 5, 2026

Breht gives details on his upcoming speech and Q and A at the Socialism Conference in Chicago this September, the listener meet-up afterwards, and the patreon raffle for TWO FREE TICKETS! Check out the Socialism Conference HERE Join the Patreon for a chance to win free tickets and attend the meet-up HERE Learn more, follow us, get merch, and suppport the show HERE

Hey, everybody. I just wanted to jump on really quick to tell people about my speech at the upcoming socialism conference in Chicago. It runs from, I believe, September 4th through September 7th. I will be speaking on, let's see here. I will be speaking on Saturday, the September 5th at noon p.m. Central. So noon central, September 5th, I'll be giving my speech entitled Chez's New Man and the Bodhisattva. revolutionary. There's many other speeches going on at that time. You kind of pick which one you want to go to. I'll be there with my chair and comrade Saya, handing out, hopefully we'll be able to hand out some promotional flyers at the conference looking very forward to meeting everybody. We'd love to see Rev Left listeners in particular show up to the speech, show some support. There's a small fear because I've never been to this conference that I'll be speaking in front of an empty auditorium, so I hope that's not the case, an empty room. So anybody that shows up, I would deeply appreciate, especially if you're in and around Chicago.

So, yes, the details of the speech is that it's titled Che's New Man slash New Woman and the Bodhisattva Revolutionary. It's titled under Radical History genre for the conference. And it is Saturday, September 5th at noon. The conference itself runs through that entire weekend, the fourth through Labor Day. many, many speakers, wonderful people, Saul Williams, Angela Davis, many others are going to be present. It's a great opportunity to meet other comrades and listeners or people in general that share our broad ideas, especially at this moment of a new red scare, where they're trying to silence us and push us into the darkness and make us turn on each other. Having a broad front, broad unity, making connections, creating networks of good people is always going to be to our benefit. it. So if you're interested in going, highly recommend it. You still have a month or so to buy tickets

and to plan any travel that you may have to do to get there. But I'll be there. I'll hang out after the talk at the conference, meet up, talk to, hang out with anybody that's there. And then also, we are having a Patreon-only meetup off-site after the conference that evening on Saturday. I still have to find a place. All those details will be on our Patreon. patreon.com forward slash RevLeft Radio. It will just be for patrons. I don't want to make it too public, so I don't want just any random person to fucking show up. But it's just going to be a hangout session. We're just going to go to some public place, some bar and grill, have some drinks, maybe shoot some pool, hang out, meet listeners. And, of course, I'll be there hanging out and meeting people who support the show. So there will be a Patreon-only meetup. So if you want to be eligible for that, just join the Patreon.

But anybody on the Patreon will get the details for where that meetup after the conference is going to be. and I'd love to see people and meet listeners. That will be fun. And another thing we're going to do is we're raffling off a free ticket. So the tickets to the Socialism Conference are fairly steep. They provide food. They provide free child care. They have many, many speakers.

They have to rent out the room, the conference center, et cetera. So I understand why prices might get high. But we have one of our patrons, David, who reached out to me and said that while he can't make it, He's very down to pay for somebody's ticket. And I also want to match that because, you know, somebody just going alone is one thing. But, you know, you can bring a plus one. So David will provide the cost of one ticket.

Out of pocket, I'll provide the second. So whoever wins the raffle can pick who they want to take with them. And, you know, a partner, a friend, a comrade, whoever you might want to take with you. So more details about the raffle again will be on Patreon. it is for, you know, exclusive to Patreon supporters. I'm always trying to give back to the people who actively and directly support the show. So if you're on the Patreon, you'll be invited to the meetup. And if you're on the Patreon, you'll have a chance to win two free tickets to the Socialism Conference due to the generosity of our patron, Dave.

And I will, of course, as I said, match it. So you get two tickets. And David asked me, although he says he doesn't want to come on and speak, publicly speak, he just wanted to, he has. asked me to share a quote from Eugene Debs that he's been thinking about recently, so I will do that for his generosity. The quote is, 10,000 times has the labor movement stumbled and fallen and bruised itself and risen again, been seized by the throat and choked into insensibility, enjoined by courts, assaulted by thugs, charged by the militia, shot down by regulars, introduced by the press, frowned upon by public opinion, deceived by politicians,

threatened by priests, repudiated by renegades, preyed upon by grafters, infested by spies, deserted by cowards, betrayed by traitors, bled by leeches, and sold out by leaders. But, notwithstanding all of this, and all these, it is today the most vital potential power this planet has ever known, and its historic mission of emancipating the workers of the workers of the workers, world from the thraldom of the ages is as certain of ultimate realization as the setting of the sun. So I think that's an inspirational and timely quote given the new red scare that we're being

subjected to under the fascist Trump, Rubio, Miller regime. We must march forward. We must have solidarity with one another. And I love that he offered up that quote to remind people of precisely that. So to review, I'll be speaking at the Socialism Conference in Chicago. They have the website. I'll link to it in the show notes. My speech will be Saturday, September 5th at noon central in the conference. Patreon supporters will have the details for a public meetup afterwards, just talking, just hanging out, meeting new people, et cetera. Of course, I'll be there. And then also on the Patreon in the next week or so, we will be raffling off two free tickets to the Socialism. conference. If you can't afford the $100 or so tickets, we'll provide two of them for free

for you and a plus one, basically. And the details of that raffle and how we'll give that out will be explained within a week or so on the Patreon. So join if you're so inclined. All right, really looking forward to the speech. Really looking forward to meeting everybody. And I would deeply, deeply appreciate any support by people showing up and coming to our talk. All right. See you soon. Hopefully. Love and solidarity.