Chavista Club World • Page 25

"It’s certainly true that Sanders is to the left of most Democrats. But contrary to how he’s often portrayed in the media, he is not a doctrinaire leftist. His principal benefit to the left has been to mainstream certain beliefs—namely, that access to health care, education, and living wages are rights, not luxuries. But Sanders is not a revolutionary. His views aren’t even entirely consistent with democratic socialism, the political tradition he claims. It’s one thing to call for breaking up the big banks, and quite another to call for the nationalization of private industries.

Sanders isn’t just to the right of the average American socialist; he’s to the right of Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the U.K.’s Labour Party. While nationalization is a key pillar of the party’s platform, it is ground politicians in the United States still fear to tread. In similar fashion, Sanders has yet to put forward a coherent leftist vision for foreign policy, a needless failure considering socialism’s historical commitment to the prosperity of working people around the world."

Bernie Sanders Is Not the Left

 

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09669582.2016.1159214

V good read

 

What do the leftists here think of Chapo Trap House? I ran across some of their clips and thought they were humorous (and occasionally insightful).

 

Yeah, its pretty good and funny. Sometimes they make jokes I wouldn't but less so lately, I feel like. Funny show

 

don't like em, amber in particular has behaved it seems real shitty to me what with doubling down on ableist organizing problems and saying that disabled comrades calling her out were bad actors and cops, but they mobilize real well? idk i don't blame folks for liking them as long as they're not part of the real toxic "super online" style, but idk how much i can fuck with a socialist podcast that makes 100k a month

 

Does anyone even know what they do with the money? Like I’m sure they live pretty comfortable lives but it’s not like they’re making it off of the backs of anyone else and we have no idea if they use it to support actual orgs

 

their analysis of punditry is generally the best part of the show. i don't feel like caping for Felix or Amber, but i think Virgil and Matt are typically hilarious and have really good insight on culture.

 

yeah the only topic i know they are going to be dead on with every time is when theyre attacking some NYT or National Review sycophant

 

Matt used to be my favorite but he’s been repeating the same shit over and over for the past year for each thing they talk about. It’s not entertaining and it’s almost like he consciously tries to be the most domineering on a show full of domineering people lol

Felix doesn’t do it on regular episodes but whenever he does or is on for interviews he does actual, serious analysis and he’s lowkey incredibly insightful

 

I think their ultimate utility is in blowing up the Sorkin-ite, above-the-fray view of politics that a lot of people have (speaking from my own organizing experiences, i think lanyard types truly do see themselves that way) as completely useless and actually counterproductive.

I prefer the personalities on podcasts like Trillbilly Worker’s Party and Delete Your Account, but those and most shows spend more time talking with actual organizers and interviewing folks in a formal way, so they aren’t completely analogous to CTH, which is almost solely focused criticism of, when it’s good, elites.

 

I second Trillbilly, but with Delete Your Account they may talk to interesting people but the hosts and show itself are soooo fucking boring, Kumars especially is like a charisma black hole. Can't listen to a whole episode. I typically dislike more "traditional" radio shows and I think a big reason I like Chapo, especially when they first became big, was that they felt more like it was simply a recording of a group of friends talking *to* each other, not talking *at* the audience. So when shows do that and the hosts actually have good chemistry and a relatively fast pace it's like a breath of fresh air. But when they don't have good chemistry - like with DYA - it's the biggest fucking slog to get through

Also anyone wanting a good podcast about legal/judicial stuff should listen to Mic Dicta. Also a good example of hosts having good chemistry despite what is objectively a dull topic of discussion

Also there are sooooo many dull lefty podcasts now that add fucking nothing to the conversation. Like a lot of them are basically just random twitter people or leftist writers who talk about the same big news topics as everyone else on any given week but don't have any particular area of expertise or spin to approach the topic from.

podcast rant done

 

I also like boonta vista socialist club even though I know nothing about Australia @OdranWaldo

 

exact same

 

seconded on mic dicta too btw

 

I’ve been noticing this disturbing trend on Facebook from these small Leftist pages that I follow...that they are defending/minimizing bad stuff happening in Venezuela, DPRK, China and even Burma as if we are now the only country that country that is committing atrocities.

 

Haven’t seen Dom on the threads in awhile. Hope he’s doing alright.

 

I noticed that a while ago and then went to see if his twitter (@FanonsDream) was still up and found this...

 

ya it was discussed a while back in general pol and gets shouted down pretty quick since Dom was relatively well liked. That said, when I found out what happened, I asked myself how Dom would respond to this and all I can muster is to support the victim and hope Dom gets everything coming to him.

 

And, speaking of this incident, I'm always curious about the hypocricies within leftists and Allies. From the grapevine I've heard of several people in left media and left Twitter that have really bad sides to them.

Like, any time I see a cis male in our DSA's feminism group I have this concern that it's just not their place.

 

Though I personally think it’s pretty weird that that person says he’s a misogynist and that he was gaslighting them. Like, essentially cheating on two people doesn’t really add up to either of those things

 

How active are they in the group? Like, I don’t think it’s at all weird for them to participate for the sake of learning / engaging / helping. Isolating the group like that would make it seem more like a women’s book club or something rather than a branch of a political group trying to organize action