A 20 year period. And the forthcoming book about fascism which concludes with the essay the pandemic is the portal which is the conversation today and haymarket publishes critical radical thinkers such as angela davis and so many others. In this moment in this crisis with deep injustice it is especially important to support Freedom Fighters and part of that task i encourage you to buy books from haymarket book club and inviting people to make donations and there will be information on how you can do so. And to be recorded on haymarket books Youtube Channel you are invited to subscribe and on that channel you can see a number of different events that have taken place and there will be a special program on may day 5 00 oclock p. M. Discussion between a workingclass vision for the future and at 7 00 p. M. May 1st to host a special may day Poetry Reading online. So now little more housekeeping. Was so many people joining the call today we may need your forbearance if we have technical issues if your stream gets choppy i would suggest reduce your image quality and note the instructions on how to do so in the chat. Post questions on the live video feed youtube, facebook and also respond to the video if you have any questions. Now its my pleasure to bring in our guest joining us from new delhi as with so many people around the world so with that critical work and integrity to be deeply inspired me as she moves me over and over if theres something that she has written with that transformative work. Welcome. Thank you. Good to see you again. And during these troubled times. Host i want to begin with the word portal and for so many people it resonated deeply as an architectural in the way it is a metaphor that we are co creators in this moment of the way forward. Can you Say Something about that choice for you and for us . It has to do and i was thinking that we have no present there is a past and the future and with those echoes of the past and the premonition of the future so with my previous level of thinking and there is a moment for people to come and go just as the world has been frozen and then in isolation. But those wounds inflicted by the human race. But just the complete opposite and then preparing to move through this and then to inflict more and more. And then to decide if we want to drag the carcasses. And with those ideas there is such a huge conflict so even the people who use this moment to think. And what you just said because of the conundrum of this moment. The virus itself betrays the rules of borders that was so powerful because it reaches beyond the boundaries of human creation. And then to allow for the creation full of protection for others so with this moment of contemplation how do we get to the point to reckon with the Human Connection but that collective humanity and that is not affecting everyone the same way. With that has done and it looks like on society and the virus seems to pray on people with that morbidity. To expand and amplify all the injustices and for the example the us and the uk how that affects the africanamerican community. And those that has happened and then hasnt manifested yet and trust the numbers. And its very symptomatic. Some people suggest that then to the handling a crisis and that crisis has affected the were unimaginably so in both cases. With the disproportionately and with those of the virus. Talk about how that manifests in india with the response to the virus itself. And then the first case in january to mid march and there are other things to do. And with the crisis in india. And then with massive protests. Mostly by muslim women because suddenly you have people so with that diversity but this moment and then backed by the attack in the muslim areas because people were prepared so then its already making its wa way. But then but on the 24th of march the Prime Minister the country of one. 38 billion people and then for a lockdown so the next day and that was a chemical experiment. But those that were working in the construction industry. So by the 24th of the month they did not get through. And those that come to work in the city to document the income so then they began the trek back home. And with that political exodus of people that they were walking 100 kilometers. And walked to the border but then there were so many videos to be brutalized but then some people would be walking for days. And that situation remains as such you have a hunger crisis and in this community but this was huge countries and actually ordered the lockdown. That which is hard to come out. And so the last thing to have 25 percent but then 400 people die in the literature but then they die of dehydration. And then to be privatized. And with a massive crisis ever been put on hold . One of the things i so appreciated is the manner in which the us has been revealed and that description is that thread of connection for working people all over the globe the way the virus is stacking upon them. After one of the things nationally here in the states but also internationally even as that is happening and with this idolatry of markets and the economy and the institutions and to have this relationship that and the majority of people around the world. And then that requirement so where to place and then it is a moment of contemplation also here is this urgency and if its a push poll for the moment how you distribute your attention and is so isolated with that transformation to deal with the immediacy and the daily suffering. And a dangerous position and the daily suffering and why it is happening with the hunger. So when the lockdown is upon us the reason why the lockdown all the people that saw the protest with those outlandish things. But no matter what you say i find myself wondering to wonder about this. That uses that. So what you are doing is about saving people. And less than society that idea and that idea of the Nuclear Weapons program the chemical Weapons Program, biological Weapons Program and with the full population and then to extract the capital. So we already know. And thats ancient in iraq and that was considered a fine strategy. And with this pandemic. For anything they are doing. But that is prepared to acclimate crisis that makes the corona crisis look benign and with that human beings and then to walk and to be destroyed because its not going to give to us we have to fight for it. And at the policy level. And at that policy level. How do we make that happen . That the plans to do otherwise but right now its happening with that International Disaster and then they are preparing. If corporate globalization and then moved to even more advanced and then with those massive profits. So if you were sleepwalking. For me there is that related to what you are saying that there is such an extension and submission. And then to protect ourselves and also the earth as a whole. The shared space so we agreed in every possible way so this is the crap from the Prime Minister the fastest downloaded app in the world. That you next with the use of language that those that can go to that. And with the lockdown and then to have them prosecuted. And those who are asymptomatic they have no idea. And then they say those who are walking home but if they do not have the virus and those that were allowed to open in this to be put into place. And then to be outlandish and then to embrace them. So with that incarceration. It is fascinating to me on the one hand of technology and so in philadelphia not wearing a mask was arrested. By Police Officers which is exactly the opposite. And then i would legitimate policing. So we have this technological forms of surveillance and those forms of brutality and domination. One of the questions that came in i wanted to modify it was the metaphor of traveling light. And light luggage. If you read about the long march and to grow up with the Indigenous People with that more recent history and also the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the partition and to move people about and just the question of how you subvert that with traveling with a different kind of movement. And that is the metaphor because and you look at the traveling that is to and fantastic. It was metaphorical of the ability of the ideas. And then we said a few years ago and with the infrastructure companies. They have been handled and of course but of the things that i learned was the mountain because it is usually a that is on top of the mountain and actually looks like a water tank. In the mountains basically and then the imagination but you have to take it out of the mountain. And this is how you make aluminum. And that is from the side of the mountain. If you have the box site and the mountain with staff intelligence that we can come to that. And that is a bad word to use. That could you leave that out on the mountain. Can we change the order . That is so incredibly profound especially now that weve witnessed that healing itself and that the industries has slowed down you begin to see the regeneration and Coastal Louisiana is an area referred to as cancer alley the highest rate of death because of the consequences of the environmental destruction with the bp oil spill , extractive technology can we continue on the imagination . To many of the people are writing with questions and asking a related question how do we imagine people working together abound the boundaries with specific events in times and places and the lessons that they teach all across the globe. Its very difficult because it has jumped and then to jump over borders. And then to keep undermining. So in a way it is strengthening nationalism. What is happening in america is happening in the world. And then me break it arundhati of what they have done, i suppose the known supply chain. People are now wanting to have more sufficient, nationstate. But in this country, like in europe, really continent in another country. I imagine the people with these entered particular workers for example, treat us like property. So valley. Maybe they have to come back and read enter the same machinery that has happened. But on the other hand, for the last 20 years, i have been writing about the fight that pushing things into the city. Where you can control them. And monitor them. In fact, the countryside, has risen. Can we actually use or reconnect the land because this is a very important question. What is happened with the market is that you have disregarded that lines, writing the desert. You take the water there in any of the desert. Your people, but theyre not going through there. Theres so much, some nutrition. Thats what the market was for. I think, this journey should make us ask all of these questions. For 20 years, i have been writing this. So when someone asked you so what is the other thing. You do not ask that because millions of literatures. For each, and the other solutions. Imani the point about the land is so profound to me. Those who are intellectuals and creative largest politically waged people, that the imagine imagination is not material but in fact, it has to be material. So what is the main to imagine a more kind of harmonious relationship to the earth around us just extractive next qualitative. Arundhati for me, perhaps because i grew up in a very small village on the river. I knew every flower and every detail. To me that made me want to write about it. In about the landscape. Even here right now, you know the knockdown, lock down. Its beautiful in some ways but also in the city that we depend on human beings. Shells and monkeys and all of these animals. Imani want to read a couple of questions. I want to also turn to people who want to post their questions and share them. In one of the questions of which i think is so profound, heather asked, can you talk about your process of writing when and grace. And watching people suffer and feeling intense emotion and observation. How do we cope with that channel that while you write. Arundhati i actually, there was a sortable lock down, a few years before the Big International art and i felt, here was something that when we know you know we dont know anything about this virus. And i thought this was the time to sit down to really know that this virus perhaps will never return. And then when the big lockdown was announced in the beginning, i just really lost my peace of mind. I went out and i was like this haunted person. But it was wanting or wondering about is that i never shied away from communities. I just dive into it. Im grateful. I think the worst thing to happen is when you stop feeling. I live in this World Without the protection except for my own skin. Is my separation between mean the world and thats really important. I feel so many things that have have been done to people. So many debates that happened in the world. Debates that people have put themselves into silos and then somehow underlined also solidarity. In a walkthrough is now more than ever. And how we think and protect the people. Imani absolutely anything part of what i feel when i read your work and for me, is also part of when i try to live. Is the writing itself, is in a sense with grief. And with the help. It is part of that encounter of what it means to exist. Its just not a matter of sort of a productivity at has suffered from that. Arundhati in fact for me, writing is painting. I write and think. His little product. Its almost like talking to myself and trying to structure myself. And the only way i can do that is when i write. Sometimes thats the only reason i write is its not to lose my sanity. What i be. Imani absolutely. Another question that came in, is can you elaborate about that intersection of the pandemic with military occupation. And kashmir and palestine. Arundhati thats another very important subject. In kashmir, they know how to do lockdowns. The special status was advocated and lockdown, with the military lockdown. And it was for months. They had just began to use lockdown. And now its a military lockdown and political lockdown. I think militarily, the armies, were pretty unprepared for this virus. Now to deal with it. Honey fight wars the social distancing. But the kashmir people, are probably, they look for probably more they know how to do it better than we do. But, the pandemic and where the lockdown and social distancing that physical. Yet the slums which have about a Million People crammed into compression. 200 people to a toilet. So what about the lockdown, the classes are socially distancing. Communities that practice the social distancing. In summer locked in the rooms. They are physically compressed. Theres no. In ways in which most places, theres just not very much space. Has to be an incredibly confusing time for them. Because maybe this is the lockdown but not so much because it is the basic is kind of has committed time with a of standby when a sense of them. Just like what is happening in the rest of the world the machinery, the occupation in the machinery of putting in place the sort of digesting of the community into the body meant. There is no stop to that. Thousands of them are still incarcerated. All of that is going on there. Imani it is interesting that the point you made about physical compression made me think about the present situation in the United States. The most incarcerated populati n with africanamerican sprain dissolutions are either while the reality is the compression for the virus is circulating with virtually no medical care. Our total lockdown itself. Where people are isolated in a way thats literally destructive of ones psychological or emotional wellbeing. And in that point was made that you think about one of the questions acumen, sort of differently. The question is how do we safely protest against this wave of fascism. In this moment of authoritarianism. Maybe one can do it safely. The safety cannot be the imperative but i do wonder about how one witnesses and participates in protests in this moment across the differences and with all of the boundaries there imposed by the lockdown or the physical distancing or the other things. Arundhati i think that the thing that you mentioned that prison. When we think about u. S. Prisons and who is in them. Its unbelievable. The prisons are jampacked. And really just bursting at the seams. And more more people are being incarcerated. Hadley protest. Will i think what theyre doing now is important. Is to understand what is being done to us. That is the most foundational fundamental first step. The other thing is i think this is becoming so true of the United States and also, we can begin to think what you and i are ready to do. What a lot of people think that democracy includes elections. And this is the stupidest thing that is happening. Elections is only one part of it. One has to look at it. Which enemy would you want to have. Some person you like. But the rest of the time, what do we spend our time doing. I think its a very difficult thing now about how to protect at this point in time. It isnt going to last. We will be in lockdown forever. In this virus around forever. It will go away. That is when you have to understand the business of digital surveillance. I find it incredible that this moment when the crisis of covid came to the United States, there was some of these who had been talking about this. Imani right right. Arundhati and so, what is it about us that im sure that the situation is much worse because we have been through some terrible decisions by the communist that really harmed people. And what is it about the psychology of people that wants them to bow down to the source of the tribulation. Imani that is an incredibly profound question. It seems to be sort of unnecessary steps towards transformation. Walking through the portal. The attachment need to those who dominate. I wonder, why would any woman in the United States vote for donald trump. After all that he has done. Imani there is this tension, on the one hand there are those commitments and then in the last couple of weeks, in the states and i think in the uk as well, people are changing pretty rapidly politically. For example medicare for all is now seems i think, very critical of it in the public arena rated nesting to embrace it. Its almost, has triggered at this moment, i guess the question is sort of how to expand beyond the immediacy. This virus wont last forever. Two in allowing people to being a kind of learning through which to look prospectively. I dont know how that happens. But it seems to me, to be part of the idea of the portal. Another question that was asked, many of us want to seek all of the an