attentive to the deceitful machinations of those who fancy themselves the self-appointed stewards of humanity.

Rather than serving as engines of inequality, could we imagine schools that incubate a better world in the minds and hearts of young people? For many, the idea that we can defy politics as usual and channel human ingenuity toward more egalitarian forms of social organization is utterly far-fetched! Instead, our collective imagination tends to

As Brazier documents, city housing authorities and real-estate developers collude to interrupt Black childhood by designing spaces and building barriers within and around neighborhoods that make it hard to play freely. “Black children’s physical and creative movements threaten the hierarchical social order that requires passivity and resignation,”

the designers refuse to acknowledge that the epithets, stereotypes, and abuse of some groups inside virtual worlds are buttressed, underwritten, and cosigned by policies and practices outside the game. Most importantly, the white masculine subjectivity is one that erases its own existence: “Going after everyone equally erases white masculinity’s

the spiked bench—designed by German artist Fabian Brunsing—which required payment before the spikes would retract into the bench’s surface. The latter’s design invites us to think critically about the metering of social life, where only those who can pay are allowed to rest (or play). The spiked bench also highlights the eugenic imagination and all

There exists a multibillion-dollar Soft Power (Dream) Industry, which is in the business of crafting and selling powerful myths that lull us into various states of zombielike consumerism—swiping, subscribing, and submitting to its narrow vision of belonging.

these communities are also amputated from the collective imagination of the nation.

Meanwhile, the majority of “normals” (to borrow a term from the sci-fi film Gattaca) are expected to take orders, complete tasks, stand in line, clock in and out . . . punctually, obediently, subserviently. No dancing in the halls, and certainly no daydreaming about a world put together differently.

why on earth would we believe that a colonizing impulse would magically lead to universal prosperity this time around?