This Has Always Been a War

• This Has Always Been a War is a provocative essay collection that views the forces of capitalism and patriarchy through a genderqueer lens. Specifically it focuses on the way capitalism infiltrates every aspect of our personal, social, economic and sexual lives. By examining the politics of gender, environment and sexuality, we can see the ways straight, cis, white and especially male upper class people control and subvert the other -- queer, non-binary, BIPOC, working class and female bodies -- for what are ultimately socio-economic power benefits.
• Like Ivan Coyote, Lori Fox is a queer writer whose work is informed by their location in Whitehorse, Yukon in Canada’s North. But Lori’s work combines the experiential writing of Coyote and andrea bennett (Like a Boy But Not a Boy) with the expansive and socially engaged writing of Sarah Schulman.
• In the title essay, Lori writes about working the vineyards in affluent wine country where the line drawn between classes was exceedingly clear; they ask: is non-violent reform of the upper classes even possible, when improving the daily lives of the working classes would require not only fundamentally altering the lives of the wealthy, but the way they think? “After the Hungry Days” highlights the link between poverty and mental health; and “The Lame One” documents Lori’s nervous breakdown resulting from homelessness and trauma, exploring the ways in which the capitalist patriarchy not only contributes to but benefits from traumatizing and damaging working class bodies and minds, especially female ones.
• In Lori’s own words: “I think there’s a lot wrong with the way we live and the way we work and the way we treat each other, and I think the primary cause of that is capitalism. The people who benefit from capitalism -- upper and middle class, largely white men and their cis-heterosexual spouses and children -- benefit from keeping the lower working classes divided and under the belief that this is not only the only way our society can work, but that it’s the way it should work. I want to try to expose that by examining critically the situations I found myself in throughout my life.”
• Will appeal to LGBTQ+ readers as well as those interested in gender, social justice, and socio-economic issues.