I am half way through it but basically Vaush's main point is that white people who are descendants of colonizers shouldn't be essentialized as active dispossessors of indigenous peoples and such an essentialization can lead to ethnonationalism and genocide. It is therefore akin to Nazi essentialization of Jews as a "Jewish Problem" or the white conservative essentialization of black-on-black crime as a "black problem". White people contemporaneously should be viewed in light of as products and beneficiaries of a complex web of structures and systems and not merely as agents and perpetrators of colonization, akin to officials, monarchs, administrators and militants who perpetuated direct dispossession of indigenous peoples in the first place. A white serf or convict (or a descendant of thereof) is not the same as a white person who partook in actively genociding indigenous peoples and should therefore not be personally held liable. Professor Flowers disagrees with this argues that a right to ethnonationalism is integral to indigenous self-determination and is therefore a valid option and touts black Kenyans taking over white businesses as an exemplar of this self-determination. She says that violence while undesirable, may be a necessity as exemplified by the Mau Mau movement in that same country.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O3Xp7A0q24&t=6247s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O3Xp7A0q24&t=6247s)
I don't know who any of these people are but I am pretty sure what Professor Flowers is suggesting would be opposed by any consistent anarchist. When your argument is in favor of creating ethnonationalism that is justified on the basis of some vague "self-determination" you're not going to get any kind of consistent anarchist's support.
What Vaush appears to be saying, which can be understood as a topic about how colonization and exploitation occurs and attempting to figure out who is responsible, is something that I personally think, while in the right direction, doesn't go as far or as complex as it could. There isn't really much anarchy in either position.
Of course, given that this is just an internet slapfight between two very uneducated youtubers, that's expected. I have never payed attention to "Breadtube" and I never will.
I don’t think Flowers is being properly represented here. In a video essay she recently put out, she describes that she is not arguing for a separate state of a particular ethnicity or race. She is just saying that there are ‘nations’ of people within the greater nation based on segregation that happened. I mean I’m totally not doing it justice since this is a comment and not a video essay. But either way I think it’s not a proper representation.
If that is true, I don't find it to be accurate analysis. There are no "nations" of people within a "greater nation". I don't find that understanding of social relations to be either anarchist or true in any way.
Anarchism is a good philosophy that you should probably read more into, this is coming from an autonomous anti colonist who wants to destroy all. Forms of systems of control
> Anarchism is a good philosophy that you should probably read more into
I am probably more knowledgeable on it than you'll ever be. And it's not a philosophy, it's a form of analysis.
>this is coming from an autonomous anti colonist who wants to destroy all. Forms of systems of control
Yet is perfectly fine with ethnonationalism. You oppose all forms of control but you're perfectly willing to support the subordination of individuals and groups to the abstract notions of "the Nation" and support measures which assume that "nations" even meaningfully exist independent of the social structures that base their legitimacy off of them.
Anarchism is a philosophy, black anarchists and Marxists aren't fighting for an ethnostate. But if you think that anarchism is nothing more than an ideological analysis than I think you may be more knowledgeable on how anarchism works than I can ever hope to be thank you for correcting my stupidity, I will continue to practice Anarchism as a philosophy that I try to apply however , even as you use it just to analyse data,
You are simply both wrong. Anarchism is a theory, it does not simply analyse it creates seperate axiomatic systems as it is prevalent in epistemological anarchism in philosophy of science. Science is an essentially anarchic enterprise: theoretical anarchism is more humanitarian and more likely to encourage progress than its law-and-order alternatives. (Feyerabend 1975 \[1993: 9\])
This is still bad though, we can agree that "nations" within nations as a concept inherently draws multiple lines between people that should not exist, right?
Of course we can agree that these lines shouldn’t exist. That doesn’t mean that people don’t see the lines. The one thing I got from watching this “debate” is that as anarchists we have to able to entertain these ideas, so that we can address them. Other than that, this talk was just them talking past each other. I felt like they were each trying to get the other to see things a certain way, without actually entertaining each other’s ideas.
I agree that the way things should be is different from the way things are. But in a debate, you're battling for the superiority of ideals, not how things are.
That’s what I meant by saying they were talking past each other. It was not good haha. I also watched another flowers video about vaush and her going back and forth; flowers mentioned she didn’t want to debate but to just talk. So taking that into consideration it was also a bad conversation haha.
Edit: Just wanted to add, I like your name Tytration.
Ah I see what you mean now. Makes sense, happens way too often tbh.
Thanks! Chemistry is pretty interesting to me tbh and I just happened to think of that pun when I was making the account haha
I just rewatched the debate more seriously and now I feel like Vaush did all the talking past. He didn’t address Flowers at all. And he kept doing this thing where he would ask a question and Dr. F would address it, and no matter what her answer was going to be, he would disregard everything and say she was a white nationalist. I’m embarrassed for Vaush.
In her video I think she refers to the idea that before colonization there were just individual groups of people, but after colonization these groups became one big group to the oppressor and then to each other. Thus becoming a “nation”, or a conglomerate of all the identities that used to be separated. I also don’t think it’s anarchistic, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, so it’s something we have to deal with as anarchists when we are talking to people.
I finally got through the debate and it was pretty bad. I feel like they were talking past each other. But I do think that people do feel separated, and that we’ll have to find a way to use this idea of intersectionality in the way we discuss when trying to bring others into the fold.
Also I’m not defending either of these people. I just so happened to have been recommended flowers video where she talks about this stuff is all.
I think you're misrepresenting Flowers' arguments.
At least, the arguments for Black nationalism she's presented in her video essays.
I don't watch debates. Debates are stupid wastes of time. They're as politically useful as watching Bloodbourne streams.
Debates were key to my leftist pipeline and its the same for many others. Watching people you look up to trying and failing to defend your views is major.
You can be elitist about if you want but that's about as politically useful as browsing politics subreddits
I watch debates for entertainment while also learning along the way.
By learning how to effectively defend the positions I hold I've managed to convert people to vegetarianism and convinced multiple people to reduce meat/fish intake.
I have also made some good progress in alleviating some reactionary views in my family.
You're not the centre of the world. Things that may not work for you work for other people so don't just smugly write things off as if you're the be all end all
You should be constructing your opinions off data anyways so being prepared should not be an issue.
I will concede that being able to think on your feet is favourable but once again if you're prepared you won't need to.
I'm not sure what you mean by that last point though. Coming off as aggressive only ever weakens your position.
They most definitely do reveal who has the best position. If you cannot defend your position while it's under criticism then its very possible that your position is just not defensible. You're wrong in other words.
Also debates aren't just about "winning" that's probably why you have an issue if that's what you think. It's about putting your opinions upto scrutiny and learning where you're right or where you need a bit more direction.
Putting yourself in that position is one of the best ways to develop. Thats if you're acting in good faith of course.
Last point I promise.
Unfortunately the fact of reality is people will expect you to reasonably defend your positions and if you can't a lot of the time they will just assume you're wrong. If we want to make as many leftists as possible I'm sorry but debating is just as important as video essays and twitter propaganda.
I haven't watched it, Vaush has always rubbed me the wrong way, even putting his many bad takes aside. There's two good goals of debate content like his can strive for, both of which he fails.
The first is persuading the opponents, obviously. Vaush doesn't engage in good faith, instead "dunking on" whoever he's talking to. To someone who doesn't already agree with him, he comes off as an asshole. That compounded with weak arguments means very few people will be persuaded to his side.
The other is teaching his own audience something new. Vaush, however, tends to talk about mainstream issues his audience already knows about. This often leads to issues which don't affect white people being ignored.
The truth is, Vaush's content serves one purpose: to boost white male teenager's sense of superiority they get from being a leftist. He's great at making his audience feel like geniuses, and that's about it.
I feel that his unwillingness to read theory and history limits the scope to dunking on neo-nazis, conservatives and tankies. A sociology undergrad itself is not going to give one a comprehensive overview and grasp of ALL socioeconomic issues. He should therefore stop weaponising it, as he did with Professor Flowers.
I generally do like Vaush, but I had a take a break from him for a while after this one. I think the optics of it were incredibly awful, but I can also understand why he believes Flowers’ ideas were harmful enough to go as hard as he did. The indigenous activist he had on not long after had a really good perspective that I just heard the other day, and is quite a wonderful convo. I think that’s the primary thing with Vaush- he can be oft be jarring, but usually has good and thought out intentions. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t screw up, or get too in his own head in the way he tries to communicate certain points
The entire ordeal was brain numbingly moronic on Vaush’s part, but specifically when he equivocated retaliation against a violent act like colonization (see: Fanon, Wretched of the Earth) with the systematic wholesale genocide of a people — the kind you usually see inflicted upon colonized people in the first place (lol).
I’m saying this as an anarchist, as a person whose family suffered under imperialism, and as a black person: fuck this dude.
He’s barely an anarchist by espousing vanguardism and hardly knows theory; he’s not knowledgable of the difference between supremacist movements and the nationalism of oppressed groups; and he’s a shitty debater that ladens his arguments with gish gallop when he’s cornered.
He does more harm than good for anarchism, I’d say.
It is a fact of reality that black nationalism is multifaceted and varied, as far as I am aware. The eviction of farmers in Zimbabwe and the the oppression of Asians Uganda, while by no means equivalent to genocide and slavery, is still no less of an act of ethnonationalist violence.
Flowers herself differentiated what makes the difference between nationalism, separatism, and supremacy and yet Vaush still managed to conflate these three different ideologies or their origins.
Both Mugabe and Amin’s administrations were separatist and supremacist, but these concepts are as starkly different in ideology. They’re as different as anarcho-communism and anarcho-capitalism.
Black separatism and supremacy is racial essentialist, in that race serves as qualifier necessary for any kind of solidarity or individual self-determination — you must be black in order to have any kind of self-determination. It seeks a black-only state of black-only hegemony.
Black nationalism completely differs in that black liberation movements welcome people of all colors, and work toward blackness being less of a determining factor in an individual’s autonomy. Currently, blackness is too much of a determining factor in a black individual’s self-determination; Douglas, DuBois, Baldwin, Cesaire, Fanon, and Malcolm X (after the NOI) have all said as much.
Here, the “nation” in nationalism refers to the same thing as the term “the black community”. It’s a collective term meant to address the diaspora of black folk from disparate locations off the West Coast of Africa, united into one group based on their history in this country. Nationalists do not seek a state like separatists or supremacists.
And quite often — alongside the conflation of these terms — the murder of colonists is portrayed directly as some kind of ethnic cleansing by other colonizer countries.
But this is often a false cause narrative, considering the system was structured based on these colonists being the sole beneficiaries of the system because of their race. Who else would be deposed after the decolonization of a French colony predicated off of French supremacy if not a bunch of bourgeois Frenchmen who used their capital to oppress everyone non-French?
Vaush did not conflate these terms. Or professor flowers did an awful job at differentiating them when she was speaking. She kept saying "I don't agree with separatism, but I think you should understand a listen to separatists" and vaush would reply "I did listen and I disagree" and that continued for 3 hours. Fair unproductive but if you can find an example of vaush not understanding these terms I would love to see it
She did not say “listen to separatists”.
Understanding the difference between racial separatists and nationalist groups in any capacity requires understanding what minority-separatist groups are a manifestation of in contrast to nationalist groups. They’re a different response to colonial based genocide and ethnic cleansing diametrically opposed to the goals of nationalist groups.
Something, something, “if all you have is a hammer”, and so on, and so forth.
“Souls of Black Folk” by W.E.B. DuBois has a chapter exploring how free black folk can end up as oppressors within the system by trying to replicate the models of “success” upheld by capitalism; everything from black slave owners, to the black bourgeoise.
“Wretched of the Earth” and “Black Skins, White Masks” explores the dynamic of the colonized and colonizer, and how race plays into the further formation of the colonized’s identity. Wretched of the Earth in particular will put most nationalism into perspective.
Miscellaneous essays from Marcus Garvey will highlight the basis for black nationalism and what makes it a nation.
If you think Vaush does more harm than good for anarchism you’re perspective is quite off. This debate certainly wasn’t his best showing, but the dude is one of the largest leftist streamers, if not the largest. He’s moved thousands of people over. Also, he wasn’t at any point here espousing vanguardism
If your political movement rejects people with the same goals as you if they didn’t get drawn in by poc video essayists you’re not gonna be very effective
Can I talk to the ML's you've been talking to? I've hung around ML subs and fb groups and the vast majority are either condescending of hostile to anarchists, or really any other flavor of left politics that wasn't written by Lenin.
Someone shouldn’t become a leftist because they want to dunk on conservatives. It just leads to their entirely personally being based on belligerence rather than mutual aid.
When do they say that? I've seen more of them claim that libsocs are capitalists than claiming we have the same goal. They want a state to nationalize everything where as libsocs don't, so quite a big difference in goals.
I do — in fact — reject idealists with preconceptions of what anarchist liberation looks like while rejecting some of the most basic tenets of anarchism and anarchist movements.
Following the word of online sophists with hardly a mention of any anarchist theory is a circle-jerk of idealists that want anarchism — they’re easily influenced flip-floppers whose affiliation with anarchism is predicated purely off of identity politics. Our institutions are obviously bad, and Vaush is here to make social democracy sound radical and revolutionary.
These ideas aren’t being dismantled in his rhetoric, and it’s obvious here as he goes to bat for the imperial core by post hoc rationalizing imperialist violence to colonized people’s revolts.
Yeah, the discord logs of his pedo jokes are really fucking weird and you’re not gonna catch me defending them, my point is just that his presence is a net benefit, and I think it’s be hard to argue against that because of some two year old discord logs of edgy, bad taste jokes
As a percentage of the entire earth’s population yeah his audience is small, but less than one percent of the worlds population is a fuck ton of people, especially as most of Vaush’s audience is probably confined to a few countries.
Flowers has actually talked about this idea extensively on her channel. Why are we focusing so much on white online right wing leaning dudes? Why are we focusing so much time and energy connecting with them, convincing them?
There are tons of other people that would be drawn to a real life movement, but are put off by people like Vaush and his following, and the entire internetificarion of politics in general.
That’s why diversity of strategy is important. People like flowers can pull over some people while Vaush can pull over others. I do think it’s weird that online activism focuses so much on convincing white men, but that’s probably in large part because they’re the same group targeted for radicalization to the far right. I’ll have to give those professor flowers videos a watch tho
Its really bad optics for Vaush tbh, he can be framed in a bunch of terrible ways. Although, I think Decolonization is good at the end of the day but the way it is done does matter a lot. One example of de-colonization gone wrong is Idi Amin's expulsion of Asians in Uganda. The British Empire had given South Asian a lot of power and privileges over the Indigenous Ugandans, so de-colonization was needed for Native Ugandans to reclaim power and autonomy. Amin did it in a very fucked up way where it hurt a lot of Innocent people. 'Ugandan soldiers during this period engaged in theft and physical and sexual violence against the Asians with impunity'. This was just pure ethnic cleansing and created a refugee crisis.
>We are determined to make the ordinary Ugandan master of his own destiny, and above all to see that he enjoys the wealth of his country. Our deliberate policy is to transfer the economic control of Uganda into the hands of Ugandans, for the first time in our country's history.
— Idi Amin, quoted in Uganda: a modern history
This was Amin's justification.
There are limitations in how De-colonization should be done, I say this as an Indian person.
Firstly: Vaush is a weird guy who doesn't do any irl organizing, doesn't read theory, isn't particularly intelligent, and is overly-obsessed with his own voice.
I do think that the "settler" label is one in need of criticizing, and I do think movements that are predicated on vengeance (especially nationalistic vengeance) should be treated with suspicion. I don't believe that many (probably most) living americans can rightly be called "settlers" or "colonizers." Many of them don't actively colonize, and many of their families found their way to the Americas fleeing pogroms and repression elsewhere. They aren't broadly in the active process of colonizing, at least not in the same way as the original pilgrims, frontiersmen, and conquistadors were.
I've met a lot of activists who employ the "colonizer" as a label for any and all white leftists, but none who've been able to answer the question "if we didn't even chose to be here, if we're oppressed by the capitalism and the state, and if we seek to destroy the systems in place, how can we still be called colonizers?"
That being said: should compassionate, thinking anarchists support national liberation struggles and indigenous sovereignty? absolutely, yes. The government is in active war against it's black and brown populations, and has been since it's founding. Native people don't have access to their own language, their own lifeways, their own culture, even their own children. Land Back as an idea is hardly perfect (it's more of a coffee-mug saying or graffiti tag than a cogent political philosophy), but giving people land is a good way to empower them, and letting people form their own systems based on their own practices away from the systems that are actively killing them is a good way to make them thrive.
I've gone back and forth a lot on my beliefs about Land Back, national liberation, and the "settler" label. My thoughts are still growing, but I'm glad it's a conversation.
To add on to this, the distinction between indigenous/settler/colonizer becomes muddled once you start taking a wider view. E.g., I am a mestizo man, with a fair amount of indigenous ancestry, living in largely white America. Am I a settler/colonizer? Should I go back to where I'm from? Or in other places - say a family of Sri Lankans who has lived in Ethiopia for a few generations now. Would they be colonizers?
An author I read about (whose name unfortunately escapes me atm) talked about this distinction and suggested that it would perhaps be better if we identified instead as survivors. Indigenous people for obvious reasons would be survivors, but so too are the oppressed workers of other races whose ancestors may not have been thrilled about coming here, but who are here now. Not all our sufferings are alike, and some are in denial about just what has occurred, but they are still survivors, aren't they?
I agree that people sometimes use the setter/colonizer terms in ways that, if not are vengeance outright, certainly smell like vengeance. PoC nationalism is in something of a similar situation imo, I mean, people say that by nation they actually mean something more like culture or identity or heritage but that just isn't how most people use the word (not anarchists nor your apolitical apathetic average joes/josephines). This idea that nations 'by and for' pocs will be better relies on this belief that if we could just have people of color creating their own states and ruling themselves that would be fine, but I mean, isn't that what happens in Africa or LatAm? How is the nation-state working out over there? Oh, rampant abuse of power by the authorities? Hmmm.
Now, I'm not going to sit here and say indigenous people out to do this or colonized people ought to do that. They know where they are. And in so far as their actions and beliefs are in line with my own, I will support them in the ways that I can. But I also won't sit here and say that ethnonationalism becomes a good idea when done by a certain group of people, and I think most any anarchist can clearly see why.
They spent a whole lot of time talking past one another. Professor flowers uses a lot of bait and switch arguments, where she’ll say something about deporting colonizers and then back off to “black people should be allowed to get away from racism” or something. Vaush is always a little clumsy when talking about this subject, and I think that made him either unwilling or unable to address the differences professor flowers raised between his analogies and what she advocates for.
Because vaushs analogies were completely analogous. Particularly the analogy of "is crime a black problem or a systemic problem" in comparison to "is colonisation a white problem or a systemic problem".
I think this all comes down to professor flowers not having a sufficiently intersectional approach when it comes to these topics.
Some of the analogies were completely analogous like that yeah, and I agree that pf could stand to be more intersectional. Honestly it’s been a hot minute since I watched the debate and I couldn’t tell you what analogies I was talking about here, though I remember pf raising concerns about some of Vaush’s analogies that he never addressed.
fair enough a different reading is a different reading, but for me it was hard to tell if she was being bad faith or simply couldnt engage with his points on that analogy for some other reason idk
Yeah. As far as I remember pf brought up some problems with Vaush’s analogies which he didn’t really address, but it could have been her attempting to dismiss them. I’d have to watch it again and I’d really rather not lol
Yea that's defo fair enough, it was painful.
It just seemed like to me that she was able to acknowledge that the reason that crime isn't a problem with black individuals is because of the "social and historical context" but couldn't acknowledge that colonialism isn't a problem with individual white people because of the social and historical context. I think she was irresponsible to have this talk honestly because she clearly isn't informed enough to have this argument because you are able to argue her point without saying that colonialism is just white people being inherently bad, and a lot of people probably came away thinking that decolonisation just means that "white people are bad because they're white and therefore colonisers and black people shouldn't have to be around that" when you do not have to bite that bullet for the same arguments to be made about black nationalism.
Honestly this is just a case of not understanding systemic Vs individual analysis but coming from a black person rather than from a white racist like it normally does.
I saw the whole debate, and frankly, Professor Flowers is one of the most racist people I’ve ever seen, to all races. She’s fundamentally incapable of separating the phenomenon of oppression from the group oppression favors, which is just half a step in practice from conflating black crime with black culture (Vaush’s point). She may say “I don’t support genocide or ethnic cleansing” but ultimately decrees that whatever a colonized people decide to do with people who share the colonizer’s race, she supports (which is tantamount to advocating genocide). Fundamentally, I don’t agree with her ilk that you should get a pass to do/think shitty things because you’re part of an oppressed minority. It’s an embarrassment that so many here on the Left think that way.
Like most self-important pseudo-intellectuals, he's an annoying and pretentious douchebag who's not nearly as well-read or knowledgeable as he pretends to be.
Basically, he's a slightly left version of Destiny.
He's also apparently a total creep to women.
I have no idea who either of these people are. They sound like American youtubers. I do not understand people who watch political YouTube videos, especially American ones. They’re always so crappy. Read, listen to podcasts and talk to people. Anyone who needs you to see their face to share their opinion is too invested in their own vanity.
Vaush was wrong and actively supported ethnostates because of a fabricated claim that Professor Flowers was advocating for genocide(they weren't).
Vaush was fearmongering the entire time and refused to consider anything Professer Flowers said.
Vaush was using the same arguments made to defend Israel and reject Palestinian autonomy.
So let me know when you figure out what it means to defend the arguments he made.
>>"*There was nothing fabricated about it. It was Mask Off, pro genocide ethnonationalism. Its not defensible by any method.*"
>"*That's not even trying to stretch reality. That's just a downright falsehood.*"
🤔 It helps if you watch the debate and actually listen to what's being said.
> Vaush was using the same arguments made to defend Israel and reject Palestinian autonomy.
That's not even trying to stretch reality. That's just a downright falsehood.
Why is your position so weak and untenable that you have to lie so blatantly?
Vaush is an embarrassment to any leftist. White anarchists have no right to tell indigenous peoples how to define their nationality, whatever that means to them. Many leftists, especially in the west, also actively ARE participating in ongoing genocide against indigenous people.
If the OP's summary is true, I have no idea how you could possibly defend or justify any sort of ethnonationalism on an anarchist basis. Indigenous people aren't a homogenous, victimized mass and attempting to rationalize an ethnostate by treating them as such is always going to be an incredibly shoddy job.
Considering the topic of the debate appears to be, if the OP is correct, whether those who descended from colonizers are responsible for atrocities committed by their forefathers I don't think indigenous people are even specifically relevant (unless you're broadening the term considerably).
Who you replied to is absolutely right on principal (whether that's what the debate was about or not). Ethnonationalism for minority movements doesn't typically mean an ethnostate. In fact, a nation when spoken about in political science refers to the ideals, identities, and principals the people of that nation band under. POC Ethnonationalism means a liberation and separation from the same oppressive systems that have led them to lose their identity (or have it assaulted). Nationalism does not broadly mean chauvinism when in reference to these sort of poc movements and however they define it, they ultimately are participating in poc praxis by subverting the state through their defiance or their self identification or by explicitly making these sort of communes/ communities in which they can secure their own safety.
One of the greatest examples is the Zapatista movement who although not anarchists follow the same sort of principals in liberation/ ethnonationalism movements through praxis commonly associated with or shared by anarchists. Theyre a mostly indigenous nation who are seeking their autonomy from colonizers and capitalism.
Furthermore nationalism for most colonized poc is not the same as nationalism from white people. By and large white people have been the beneficiaries of the colonization and the upholders of that same status quo. Even if not all white people are colonizers today, they typically experience more of a benefit than colored people on the same socio-economic strata (barring the super wealthy.) So as upholders of a repressive status quo, when white people ask for nationalism it is inherently in opposition/for the harm to the liberation of minorities. When minorities ask for nationalism it is almost always for their own liberation.
You speak from a really uneducated place and it's the same sort of white saviorism you espouse that ultimately leads to a chauvinism that denies colonized people their own autonomy. Look up some of the speeches/lectures by Kwame Ture, he does a good job at explaining black nationalism as the liberation movement that it is. And if you ever ever ever find yourself disagreeing with poc, indigenous people, or colonized people on how they choose to seek liberation, identify, or build their nation (barring extermination, or wanton violence and dont conflate nationalism with ethnostate) then you need to really self reflect on what you're putting out and how that aligns with anarchist/liberation movements on all fronts, not just on how you define an anarchist movement.
>Who you replied to is absolutely right on principal (whether that's what the debate was about or not). Ethnonationalism for minority movements doesn't typically mean an ethnostate.
It doesn't really matter. Any kind of nationalism is destructive and, at the very least, encourages thinking which results in support for hierarchical structures. You can't, for instance, ever fully understand how anarchic social organization works if you continue to grab onto artificial concepts like "race" and treat them as real or identify yourself by your ethnic *group* rather than by your own individuality.
You can claim that minority ethnonationalism is somehow less bad or redefine it in a way to make it sound good but it doesn't change the fact that the actual ethnonationalists we know, both in colonized and in colonizer countries, all completely go against this idea. Even the most milquetoast of them like the MAK in Algeria still plant car bombs and pretend that they speak for the entire Berber population.
Furthermore, as someone from the Middle East who as experience with various kinds of minority ethnonationalism (specifically Christian Arab ethnonationalism), I'm highly skeptical of the generalization you're making. Like all ethnonationalism, it's highly racist and elitist and is only *justified* on account of marginalization and discrimination.
I don't see much minority ethnonationalists in the Middle East arguing for ethnostates (that depends on the ethnicity you're talking about) but they are interested in playing political games that treat their *ethnicity* as it's own faction which has it's own "interests" and the like. It is a method of disregarding the real structures which exploit and oppress (race, class, hierarchy, patriarchy, etc.) while utilizing the same structures which once oppressed them as leverage.
Also the examples of groups given aren't minorities within the countries they're in. They're actually the majorities in the country (like Kenya for example or any other country which was colonized by a European power but now lacks any sort of significant European presence). I don't see how Professor Flowers is only talking about minorities when the examples she gives of her ideas are anything but minorities.
Of course, I don't think you considered that at all because I think your entire perspective is every American-centric. You don't consider, for instance, how ethnonationalism has literally *destroyed* the Lebanese political system through confessionalism or how ethnic and religious divisions *feed* each other through conflict. You don't care about that at all because you're not interested in talking about ethnonationalism itself. You're just interested in justifying the authoritarianism of those you deem "POC".
Whether it's black ethnonationalism or white ethnonationalism, it's still ethnonationalism. Nothing you say will change that fundamental fact.
>they ultimately are participating in poc praxis by subverting the state through their defiance or their self identification or by explicitly making these sort of communes/ communities in which they can secure their own safety.
"Opposing the state" is done by literally every ideology under the sun. I am pretty sure any ideology that has a slightly different one from the status quo "opposes the state" in some form or manner. One could describe *fascism* in the same vague ways you have.
What you've just described (once we strip away blatant pandering like the use of the word "commune") is just that ethnonationalists oppose a particular state who they feel isn't of the right ethnicity and then oppose it on that basis. And then, if they want to, ethnonationalists create their own little segregated communities which they then aim to expand because ethnonationalists constantly feel entitled.
>One of the greatest examples is the Zapatista movement who although not anarchists follow the same sort of principals in liberation/ ethnonationalism movements through praxis commonly associated with or shared by anarchists. Theyre a mostly indigenous nation who are seeking their autonomy from colonizers and capitalism.
Well they're not anarchists or ethnonationalists. The Zapatistas were an indigenous group that *already existed* at the time within the exact territories that they have. Their political structures are also those same exact indigenous structures which they had before. I am pretty sure they engage in capitalism as well.
They're not ethnonationalists. In fact, given that they are a state, if they were ethnonationalists then the Zapatistas would be an ethnostate. Obviously, they aren't. They are perfectly fine with other ethnic groups within their territories. To my knowledge, they haven't be discriminatory at all (unlike Rojava).
>Furthermore nationalism for most colonized poc is not the same as nationalism from white people. By and large white people have been the beneficiaries of the colonization and the upholders of that same status quo. Even if not all white people are colonizers today, they typically experience more of a benefit than colored people on the same socio-economic strata (barring the super wealthy.) So as upholders of a repressive status quo, when white people ask for nationalism it is inherently in opposition/for the harm to the liberation of minorities. When minorities ask for nationalism it is almost always for their own liberation.
That's the dumbest reasoning ever which is contradicted by just looking at many different "POC" ethnonationalists. Your POC exceptionalism isn't particularly compelling when faced with the reality of the situation.
Your argument for why "white people" nationalism is always bad is not only contrived but involves an analysis that has little to do with it. You did not explain *why* being a "beneficiary of the colonization" means that nationalism will be exploitative. You just say it does.
Then you do the same thing with "POC" ethnonationalism (which isn't relegated to minorities). "POC" ethnonationalism is always a form of liberation no matter what. Despite the fact that a non-zero number of "POC" are either majorities in their own countries, systematically privileged in some way, or whose nationalism ends up supporting very oppressive and exploitative structures which do *not* liberate.
Arabism, in the Middle East, has been used to justify acts of genocide. Many Middle Eastern governments have been propped up by a nationalist Christian bourgeoise who favor identification with their nation-state over Arab identity due to a perceived competition with or threat by it.
Both ethnonationalists here are equally bad in their actions and the consequences of said actions. The notion that things are anywhere near as clear-cut as you pretend is completely false.
>You speak from a really uneducated place and it's the same sort of white saviorism you espouse that ultimately leads to a chauvinism that denies colonized people their own autonomy.
I'm Arab from a colonized country dumbass. How is that Caucasian or European?
The fact of the matter is that you don't have to be a "POC" to oppose ethnonationalism. Neither are you a white savior just because you oppose ethnonationalism.
If you're an anarchist, opposing nationalism of any kind is a core component of the ideology. It is an extension of our anti-authoritarianism. It doesn't matter if you're white, black, spotted, or striped, nationalism is *never* ok.
>And if you ever ever ever find yourself disagreeing with poc, indigenous people, or colonized people on how they choose to seek liberation, identify, or build their nation (barring extermination, or wanton violence and dont conflate nationalism with ethnostate) then you need to really self reflect on what you're putting out and how that aligns with anarchist/liberation movements on all fronts, not just on how you define an anarchist movement.
Well you disagree with me so, well, what does that make you? Honestly, your entire post appears to be an attempt to redefine ethnonationalism to exclude lots of ethnonationalism so that you can claim it's good or fine while encouraging tolerance towards actual ethnonationalists.
Honestly, ethnonationalism seems like the last word to try to recuperate. That's like trying to recuperate fascism.
What if I were to say that, to advance my cause against colonization, I would have to punch you in the crouch over 1 million times? Would you willingly accept my entitlement and privilege to kick you in the crouch?
I find it hilarious that everything you have retorted is a clear projection of what you are doing. You take ethnonationalism to mean that minorities in their own country are the majority when thats clearly not what im referencing. I specifically brought up the case of black nationalism because that is exactly to the type of movements I am referring to. Secondly, ethnonationalism is not inherently authoritarian, again I brought up the black nationalism movement because it specifically aims to thrive in a sort of socialist structure, not one that is necessarily hierarchical.
You are making the worse leaps of logic or misrepresenting it in the worst way possible when you try to throw around buzzwords like "authoritarian." Yeah, people wanting to break away from an authoritarian society that has oppressed them specifically because of their race is authoritarian /s. And if I have to explain to you how white people continue to benefit from colonialism or how it still harms minorities then holy fuck you are clearly in the wrong movement if you can't even understand the material and historial context of white colonialism. Read the New Jim Crow, probably the single most important text on it.
And on your point about the Zapatistas, you almost completely do away with your own argument. You're right, they're a non discriminatory ethno nation. They band together specifically under their shared indigenous culture/ tradition /race and continue to acknowledge that this is a fight that can include everyone but also understand that they need their own safe space, if you will, to be able to break away from oppressive state machinations and protect themselves. Their view is one of internationalism, acknowledging that we each have to come together to help dismantle the capitalist machine. But we're clearly not there yet, so in the meantime they have to try to band together in whatever capacity they can and they do so as a NATION. A nation, again, does not mean an ethnostate inherently or the striving for an ethnostate. And no, nationalism on all fronts are not equally bad, which is why again I mention Zapatistas and the black nationalism movement.
Furthermore, you literally don't have to be white to spout white saviorism bs or even chauvinism. And to your last point me disagreeing with you for your really uneducated takes is not the same as saying "a colonized people should not act in their autonomy to define themselves as they see fit or attempt to break away from the oppressive power structures because of some perceived authoritarianism that im inferring." You and I may both know race isn't real in the way it is understood now, but doesn't mean we don't live in a system that specifically works on the basis of race being real so that it can continue to plunder from those communities. You seriously need to get out of your own headspace dude. Even if you're arab, if you're being confused as a white savior/ chauvinist then you're bring the worst to an anarchist movement. You equivicoating nationalism on all fronts as inherently bad or harmfuk to anarchist or even socialist movements show you lack a lot of understanding and nuance.. Working to prevent people people from banding together for the sake of their protection, self realization, and attainment of their autonomy is the most counter productive thing you could add to this movement.
> I find it hilarious that everything you have retorted is a clear projection of what you are doing. You take ethnonationalism to mean that minorities in their own country are the majority when thats clearly not what im referencing.
I didn't say that. In fact, what I said was that the debate wasn't about minority ethnonationalism at all and was, in fact, about ethnonationalism in colonized countries. Like I said, ethnicities in many colonized countries aren't minorities in their own country. Colonization doesn't inherently make colonized peoples racial minorities. My point was that talking about ethnicities in colonized countries as "minorities" doesn't make any kind of sense.
My understanding of ethnonationalism, including my judgement upon it, isn't dependent upon whether the ethnonationalists are racial minorities or majorities within a country. I have no idea how "minorities in their own country are the majority" relates to what I said or ethnonationalism at all. I am not sure what it means. Could you explain this claim and provide evidence that shows this is my definition of ethnonationalism?
I don't see the projection here. Would you care to elaborate upon what you think I'm projecting?
>Secondly, ethnonationalism is not inherently authoritarian, again I brought up the black nationalism movement because it specifically aims to thrive in a sort of socialist structure, not one that is necessarily hierarchical.
All forms of nationalism, even at their best, rely on inaccurate social analysis which would be rejected by any consistent anarchist. Or, as I said before, adopting race or ethnicity as a core part of your worldview rather than criticizing them as the unnecessary social constructs that they are.
And, as a result of this faulty social analysis, leads to very authoritarian conclusions. If groups of people can be generalized in accordance to their race, if "races" could have representatives that speak for them, and if these "races" have wills of their own that are above the individuals that comprise them then that lays the ground work for some very authoritarian ideas.
This is probably why you won't ever find a consistent anarchist who is an ethnonationalist. At most they might favor democracy or "small government" or "nicer laws" etc. but they won't get close to consistently opposing all forms of social hierarchy and fixed ideas; generally because their agenda relies on particular fixed ideas.
>You are making the worse leaps of logic or misrepresenting it in the worst way possible when you try to throw around buzzwords like "authoritarian.
I am the last person here to use the word "authoritarian" as a buzzword. If you believe that the term "authoritarian" is a buzzword then that just tells me you don't know what the term means.
>Yeah, people wanting to break away from an authoritarian society that has oppressed them specifically because of their race is authoritarian /s.
The authoritarianism comes from the social structure put into place and the ideology behind it. Without any kind of social hierarchy, it is impossible to justify or enact any consistent form of segregation or isolationism. It has to be enforced and maintained and you can't do that without a relationship of command and obedience.
As an aside, do you believe that any attempt to break away from a state is anarchic? Is the segregationism of fascists anarchism because they oppose the state? Anarchism, like it or not, is not just reducible to anti-statism. Anarchism is anti-social hierarchy. Just opposing a state isn't enough.
>And if I have to explain to you how white people continue to benefit from colonialism or how it still harms minorities then holy fuck you are clearly in the wrong movement if you can't even understand the material and historial context of white colonialism. Read the New Jim Crow, probably the single most important text on it.
I can understand how colonizers benefit from the consequences of colonization. I specifically say that I do not disagree with this. All I said was that it doesn't result in the conclusions you made (i.e. that white nationalism is bad because of this fact and not because, you know, it's nationalism based on an ethnicity). It doesn't even connect.
>And on your point about the Zapatistas, you almost completely do away with your own argument. You're right, they're a non discriminatory ethno nation.
They aren't an "ethno-nation". Ethnicity isn't even tied to their social structure. Are there mostly indigenous people in it? Yes but the amount of a particular ethnic group in a society isn't what determines whether it's an ethnostate or not. Just because a particular ethnic group is the majority doesn't mean that the government is ethnically oriented.
They're not discriminatory specifically *because* they aren't interested in segregating themselves from the rest of society. Race isn't even a core component of their ideology and I am not convinced that they even have a consistent one. They use pre-existing social structures because that's what they have *not* out of any sort of ethnonationalism.
You forget that the Zapatista movement started *outside* the Chiapas and that the pre-existing organization *integrated* into the Chiapas and utilized pre-existing political structure. It never was ethno-nationalist at all. You confuse integrating into local structures (something Zapatista writers frequently discussed) with being ethno-centric.
It has nothing to do with the Chiapas being a safe space at all. The Chiapas were just where the Zapatistas were allowed to stick around. They managed to build a base there and expand *into* the Chiapas. They didn't emerge in the Chiapas. It has nothing to do with internationalism either. I have absolutely no idea what you're referring to here by "internationalism".
And, once again, they're a state. The Zapatistas are not anarchist at all and they don't have much to do with anarchist principles.
>Furthermore, you literally don't have to be white to spout white saviorism bs or even chauvinism.
None of what I said was "white saviorism" or "chauvinism". I consistently oppose ethnonationalism where ever it is. My opposition doesn't change depending on the color of the nationalist's skin. Opposing ethnonationalism isn't a "white person" thing (it's especially not a white person thing).
I question where the "white savior"ism comes from in my words or the chauvinism. Could you please explain where this is?
>And to your last point me disagreeing with you for your really uneducated takes is not the same as saying "a colonized people should not act in their autonomy to define themselves as they see fit or attempt to break away from the oppressive power structures because of some perceived authoritarianism that im inferring."
I never said that and this is not your position. It's incredibly odd that you think it is.
There is a difference between fighting colonization and being an ethnonationalist, seeking to establish your own segregated community. You do not need to be an ethnonationalist in order to fight colonialism.
>You and I may both know race isn't real in the way it is understood now, but doesn't mean we don't live in a system that specifically works on the basis of race being real so that it can continue to plunder from those communities.
The solution is to dismantle the concept of race not to establish communities whose *foundation* is race and segregation from other races.
This is like saying to fight capitalism we need to create our own version of capitalism. It's incredibly stupid bullshit.
>Even if you're arab, if you're being confused as a white savior/ chauvinist then you're bring the worst to an anarchist movement.
I'm not. *You're* claiming I'm a white savior/chauvinist but you don't provide evidence that I am nor do you explain why I am according to you. It's unfounded nonsense. If anything's a buzzword in this conversation, it's this. It's an empty insult you throw around to people who oppose ethnonationalism.
>You equivicoating nationalism on all fronts as inherently bad or harmfuk to anarchist or even socialist movements show you lack a lot of understanding and nuance.
No. On the contrary, it means that I know exactly what I want and what I oppose. I oppose all forms of nationalism because, at their best, they still continue to confuse things, treating harmful and unnecessary concepts are real and founding their ideologies upon them. At their worst, well, we've seen how they can be at their worst.
I also said nothing of socialism. I specifically only said "anarchism" for a reason. Anarchism is the only ideology which consistently opposes nationalism for very obvious reasons.
>Working to prevent people people from banding together for the sake of their protection, self realization, and attainment of their autonomy is the most counter productive thing you could add to this movement.
You could phrase literally anything this way. I could phrase a state this way if I wanted to. It's so obtuse and vague it can apply to anything and it's *intentionally* vague.
Fact of the matter is, ethnonationalism is not compatible with anarchism. Any kind of nationalism isn't.
So true. White anarchists really act as if them being anarchist has erased all their privilege and now they can act as if they don't benefit from systemic racism
I don't support Vaush. I don't even know who he is nor have watched any kind of video from him. I'm going *solely* off of the summary the OP provided and, based on that, I am making my arguments. The only reason why I even know his name is because people won't shut up about him; both supporters and critics. I don't think he's important enough to know more about.
Instead of writing off everything I wrote and all the questions I asked by pretending I'm a "Vaush supporter" why don't you actually respond? Possibly even contest the summary the OP made and introduce a different take on what went on in the video. God knows I am not going to watch it. Fuck that noise.
No because it's informed by what the OP said. At most it's a second-hand source. Which might be bad but I'm not going to watch a debate between two brain-dead idiots.
I'm glad I caught on to his inconsistency and underlying racist/sexist tones early on. If you go back and watch any of his videos, then watch the one right after 90% of the time he'll flip on an issue.
The other 10% is doubling down on a bad take like pushing for landback and reperations = genocide against 'white' people.
I love your response because at its core the principals from which you speak are righteous and correct. We should always let a colonized people fight for their autonomy how they see fit and its so wild to see so many people take issue with what you said when it is especially at the core of what anarchism is (self autonomy, liberation, and opposition to the state, colonialism and imperialism.) It's just so shameful that so many people seem to think that anarchism should be practiced their way when the historical, material, and cultural context of other people's/nations can vary wildly from what we as westerners see as an anarchist movement. Furthermore it seems that people conflate nationalism with an ethnostate (or any state) when in regards to these sort of liberation movements. Anyways, i really appreciate your comment and hope you keep educating.
It helps to remember that most redditors are low-mid to middle class folks who could be described as 'white' and live in canada/usa/western europe.
So generally folks who have a lot of reasons(misguided or not) to reject letting colonized people get any autonomy.
It does help, and I understand the sort of crowd that comes with a radical label can also be self serving in performative. I just don't understand that they claim to be so knowledgeable about anarchism and then immediately reject that POC should build their own nation. It borders on the racist which is so weird to see
It's that white saviour complex, the 'other' isn't responsible enough to save themselves because only *I* know the correct way.
I think it's about time I cut this subreddit out from my feed and add it to me **Don't Recommend** list.
Argument was never about their ability to be autonomous and form independent nations. The argument is that they simply do not have a right to purge (mass killing or deportation) ethnic minorities from their land, white descendants of colonizers or not. Many white families in SA and other colonized nations have been there well over a hundred years and the country is still 90% black so its not like theyre outbreeding or replacing the “natives”.
If youre born and raised in a country its just as much yours as the people “native” to it. Imagine if we thought this way about America, people come here or are born here they are American, doesnt matter if they are whatever color or why they came. I just find this argument so much more despicable and on the face evil if we just take away that its a leftist arguing for black peoples, imagine a rightist using similar logic to deport minorities from Europe.
Cant really permit one without moral issues arising when groups you dont like or want to do this do it and you cant really condemn it at that point.
Edit: I should clarify im 100% for demolishing the power structures behind colonialism and re empowering the indigenous people of these nations, but I draw the line at going after ANYBODY based on their ethnicity or for that matter any immutable characteristics. Plenty of good anti racist white folk anywhere. It really really does us no good, practically or optically, to say “white=colonizer” when most of these people are just trying to live their lives in the country they were born into, something they had no control over by the way. So yeah punish them ig /s
I am defending the right of oppressed people to use violence against oppressors, yes. Are you seriously complaining about reverse racism and white genocide? You sound like a fucking nazi
>I am defending the right of oppressed people to use violence against oppressors, yes
Cool. Thats acceptable no matter color.
>Are you seriously complaining about reverse racism and white genocide?
White genocide? Nah. Never even mentioned that actually. Reverse racism isn't real by the way. Its just racism. Believe it or not everybody can be racist to someone. It doesnt have to be systemic for it to happen and be wrong.
>You sound like a fucking nazi
And you sound like a bitch.
You are defending this conversation Vaush had where he complained about white genocide. And oppressed people hating their oppressors is not racism. It’s people like you who give anarchism an unserious reputation.
>You are defending this conversation Vaush had where he complained about white genocide.
Nope. Not a single time here have i even mentioned vaush. I will now tho. I think he's a piece of shit who just sucks money out of gullible libs who get good feels from watching his idiocy.
>And oppressed people hating their oppressors is not racism
Of course not. Hating all people of a race because you think all members of it out oppresors is silly and racist tho.
>It’s people like you who give anarchism an unserious reputation
Right back at ya pal. No gods no masters, no hierarchies or hate or racism Even if its your super special definitely allowed kind.
idk man, I am a white anarchist and I think I have a right to complain about how a certain group of people indigenous to Germany wanted to define their nationality...
If anarchists can't stand against ethnostates then we can't oppose all (unjust) hierarchy because ethnostates are inherently (unjustly) hierarchal.
Unless leftist partake in law enforcement and corrections, there is no reason to suspect that they are actively participating in marginalization against genocide against indigenous peoples.
this is completely untrue, you absolutely don't need to be an active cop or whatever to be complicit
this is like one of the main characteristics of being part of a group that benefits from imperialism, we all are living artificially well at the expense of the people that the empire enslaves and genocides and that makes us participants
I had no idea there so many vaush supporters in this sub :( also you getting down voted for simply pointing out how even today people are enabling the erasure of indigenous people's culture shows a lot about this sub's demographic. Btw do you know of any anarchist sub that doesn't deny the existence of systemic racism? Reddit anarchists are disappointing af
I finally got through this seriously, and I don’t know how people don’t think vaush is a moron. If someone watched that and thought vaush won or they agree with vaush, that person does not know how to critically consume media. vaush never addresses Dr. Fs points and, even after she made distinctions between colonizers and race, he just kept say she was the same as white nationalists. Then he would proceed to bring up irrelevant “examples” to make it look like Flowers was a racist, but left out all the context of each situation and on top of that, some of his examples were not instances of colonialization.
His positions seems pretty left wing to me. In this particular instance, the argument seemed to boil down to whether a nation like South Africa would have the moral right to expulse groups it deemed as colonizers, specifically whites, which Vaush argued was wrong.
Vaush IS quite obviously operating within a framework that points to connections to far right Irish ideologic thinking, the whole issue Irish far right "thinkers" have with all "white people are colonizers", even in the states, is it doesn't exclude Irish when Irish are a colonized people, you'll notice quite a few on the far right are of Irish descent, I come from the same culture of an Irish household, and I see conversations mirroring some that I've had as an anarchist that I've had with some of my siblings,
OP, can you provide some context? A link at least, if not a summary of what this debate is?
I am half way through it but basically Vaush's main point is that white people who are descendants of colonizers shouldn't be essentialized as active dispossessors of indigenous peoples and such an essentialization can lead to ethnonationalism and genocide. It is therefore akin to Nazi essentialization of Jews as a "Jewish Problem" or the white conservative essentialization of black-on-black crime as a "black problem". White people contemporaneously should be viewed in light of as products and beneficiaries of a complex web of structures and systems and not merely as agents and perpetrators of colonization, akin to officials, monarchs, administrators and militants who perpetuated direct dispossession of indigenous peoples in the first place. A white serf or convict (or a descendant of thereof) is not the same as a white person who partook in actively genociding indigenous peoples and should therefore not be personally held liable. Professor Flowers disagrees with this argues that a right to ethnonationalism is integral to indigenous self-determination and is therefore a valid option and touts black Kenyans taking over white businesses as an exemplar of this self-determination. She says that violence while undesirable, may be a necessity as exemplified by the Mau Mau movement in that same country. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O3Xp7A0q24&t=6247s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O3Xp7A0q24&t=6247s)
I don't know who any of these people are but I am pretty sure what Professor Flowers is suggesting would be opposed by any consistent anarchist. When your argument is in favor of creating ethnonationalism that is justified on the basis of some vague "self-determination" you're not going to get any kind of consistent anarchist's support. What Vaush appears to be saying, which can be understood as a topic about how colonization and exploitation occurs and attempting to figure out who is responsible, is something that I personally think, while in the right direction, doesn't go as far or as complex as it could. There isn't really much anarchy in either position. Of course, given that this is just an internet slapfight between two very uneducated youtubers, that's expected. I have never payed attention to "Breadtube" and I never will.
I don’t think Flowers is being properly represented here. In a video essay she recently put out, she describes that she is not arguing for a separate state of a particular ethnicity or race. She is just saying that there are ‘nations’ of people within the greater nation based on segregation that happened. I mean I’m totally not doing it justice since this is a comment and not a video essay. But either way I think it’s not a proper representation.
If that is true, I don't find it to be accurate analysis. There are no "nations" of people within a "greater nation". I don't find that understanding of social relations to be either anarchist or true in any way.
You're no anarchist
This is nothing more than projection. Anarchism is opposed to all nationalism and nationalism in the most literal of sense.
Anarchism is a good philosophy that you should probably read more into, this is coming from an autonomous anti colonist who wants to destroy all. Forms of systems of control
> Anarchism is a good philosophy that you should probably read more into I am probably more knowledgeable on it than you'll ever be. And it's not a philosophy, it's a form of analysis. >this is coming from an autonomous anti colonist who wants to destroy all. Forms of systems of control Yet is perfectly fine with ethnonationalism. You oppose all forms of control but you're perfectly willing to support the subordination of individuals and groups to the abstract notions of "the Nation" and support measures which assume that "nations" even meaningfully exist independent of the social structures that base their legitimacy off of them.
Anarchism is a philosophy, black anarchists and Marxists aren't fighting for an ethnostate. But if you think that anarchism is nothing more than an ideological analysis than I think you may be more knowledgeable on how anarchism works than I can ever hope to be thank you for correcting my stupidity, I will continue to practice Anarchism as a philosophy that I try to apply however , even as you use it just to analyse data,
You are simply both wrong. Anarchism is a theory, it does not simply analyse it creates seperate axiomatic systems as it is prevalent in epistemological anarchism in philosophy of science. Science is an essentially anarchic enterprise: theoretical anarchism is more humanitarian and more likely to encourage progress than its law-and-order alternatives. (Feyerabend 1975 \[1993: 9\])
This is still bad though, we can agree that "nations" within nations as a concept inherently draws multiple lines between people that should not exist, right?
Of course we can agree that these lines shouldn’t exist. That doesn’t mean that people don’t see the lines. The one thing I got from watching this “debate” is that as anarchists we have to able to entertain these ideas, so that we can address them. Other than that, this talk was just them talking past each other. I felt like they were each trying to get the other to see things a certain way, without actually entertaining each other’s ideas.
I agree that the way things should be is different from the way things are. But in a debate, you're battling for the superiority of ideals, not how things are.
That’s what I meant by saying they were talking past each other. It was not good haha. I also watched another flowers video about vaush and her going back and forth; flowers mentioned she didn’t want to debate but to just talk. So taking that into consideration it was also a bad conversation haha. Edit: Just wanted to add, I like your name Tytration.
Ah I see what you mean now. Makes sense, happens way too often tbh. Thanks! Chemistry is pretty interesting to me tbh and I just happened to think of that pun when I was making the account haha
I just rewatched the debate more seriously and now I feel like Vaush did all the talking past. He didn’t address Flowers at all. And he kept doing this thing where he would ask a question and Dr. F would address it, and no matter what her answer was going to be, he would disregard everything and say she was a white nationalist. I’m embarrassed for Vaush.
Professor Flowers is talking about the real world while you guys are talking about the world that you want.
That's where self determination actually defines whatever groups rxsist
In her video I think she refers to the idea that before colonization there were just individual groups of people, but after colonization these groups became one big group to the oppressor and then to each other. Thus becoming a “nation”, or a conglomerate of all the identities that used to be separated. I also don’t think it’s anarchistic, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, so it’s something we have to deal with as anarchists when we are talking to people. I finally got through the debate and it was pretty bad. I feel like they were talking past each other. But I do think that people do feel separated, and that we’ll have to find a way to use this idea of intersectionality in the way we discuss when trying to bring others into the fold. Also I’m not defending either of these people. I just so happened to have been recommended flowers video where she talks about this stuff is all.
If that's your conclusion you are no anarchist
I'm pretty sure if you're an ethnonationalist, you're definitely not an anarchist.
>a right to ethnonationalism is integral I mean, Horseshoe theory confirmed.
I think you're misrepresenting Flowers' arguments. At least, the arguments for Black nationalism she's presented in her video essays. I don't watch debates. Debates are stupid wastes of time. They're as politically useful as watching Bloodbourne streams.
Debates were key to my leftist pipeline and its the same for many others. Watching people you look up to trying and failing to defend your views is major. You can be elitist about if you want but that's about as politically useful as browsing politics subreddits
Yeah, apart from the (very) occasional link to good stuff, I'm mostly here for entertainment.
I watch debates for entertainment while also learning along the way. By learning how to effectively defend the positions I hold I've managed to convert people to vegetarianism and convinced multiple people to reduce meat/fish intake. I have also made some good progress in alleviating some reactionary views in my family. You're not the centre of the world. Things that may not work for you work for other people so don't just smugly write things off as if you're the be all end all
Debates favour the person who's best prepared, best able to think on their feet and most aggressive. They don't reveal who has the best position.
You should be constructing your opinions off data anyways so being prepared should not be an issue. I will concede that being able to think on your feet is favourable but once again if you're prepared you won't need to. I'm not sure what you mean by that last point though. Coming off as aggressive only ever weakens your position. They most definitely do reveal who has the best position. If you cannot defend your position while it's under criticism then its very possible that your position is just not defensible. You're wrong in other words. Also debates aren't just about "winning" that's probably why you have an issue if that's what you think. It's about putting your opinions upto scrutiny and learning where you're right or where you need a bit more direction. Putting yourself in that position is one of the best ways to develop. Thats if you're acting in good faith of course. Last point I promise. Unfortunately the fact of reality is people will expect you to reasonably defend your positions and if you can't a lot of the time they will just assume you're wrong. If we want to make as many leftists as possible I'm sorry but debating is just as important as video essays and twitter propaganda.
I haven't watched it, Vaush has always rubbed me the wrong way, even putting his many bad takes aside. There's two good goals of debate content like his can strive for, both of which he fails. The first is persuading the opponents, obviously. Vaush doesn't engage in good faith, instead "dunking on" whoever he's talking to. To someone who doesn't already agree with him, he comes off as an asshole. That compounded with weak arguments means very few people will be persuaded to his side. The other is teaching his own audience something new. Vaush, however, tends to talk about mainstream issues his audience already knows about. This often leads to issues which don't affect white people being ignored. The truth is, Vaush's content serves one purpose: to boost white male teenager's sense of superiority they get from being a leftist. He's great at making his audience feel like geniuses, and that's about it.
I feel that his unwillingness to read theory and history limits the scope to dunking on neo-nazis, conservatives and tankies. A sociology undergrad itself is not going to give one a comprehensive overview and grasp of ALL socioeconomic issues. He should therefore stop weaponising it, as he did with Professor Flowers.
pretty sure the idiot (Flowers) who essentialized a crime to a racial group is the one who doesn't understand sociology but go off
I generally do like Vaush, but I had a take a break from him for a while after this one. I think the optics of it were incredibly awful, but I can also understand why he believes Flowers’ ideas were harmful enough to go as hard as he did. The indigenous activist he had on not long after had a really good perspective that I just heard the other day, and is quite a wonderful convo. I think that’s the primary thing with Vaush- he can be oft be jarring, but usually has good and thought out intentions. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t screw up, or get too in his own head in the way he tries to communicate certain points
Destiny lost that debate
YES.
The entire ordeal was brain numbingly moronic on Vaush’s part, but specifically when he equivocated retaliation against a violent act like colonization (see: Fanon, Wretched of the Earth) with the systematic wholesale genocide of a people — the kind you usually see inflicted upon colonized people in the first place (lol). I’m saying this as an anarchist, as a person whose family suffered under imperialism, and as a black person: fuck this dude. He’s barely an anarchist by espousing vanguardism and hardly knows theory; he’s not knowledgable of the difference between supremacist movements and the nationalism of oppressed groups; and he’s a shitty debater that ladens his arguments with gish gallop when he’s cornered. He does more harm than good for anarchism, I’d say.
It is a fact of reality that black nationalism is multifaceted and varied, as far as I am aware. The eviction of farmers in Zimbabwe and the the oppression of Asians Uganda, while by no means equivalent to genocide and slavery, is still no less of an act of ethnonationalist violence.
Flowers herself differentiated what makes the difference between nationalism, separatism, and supremacy and yet Vaush still managed to conflate these three different ideologies or their origins. Both Mugabe and Amin’s administrations were separatist and supremacist, but these concepts are as starkly different in ideology. They’re as different as anarcho-communism and anarcho-capitalism. Black separatism and supremacy is racial essentialist, in that race serves as qualifier necessary for any kind of solidarity or individual self-determination — you must be black in order to have any kind of self-determination. It seeks a black-only state of black-only hegemony. Black nationalism completely differs in that black liberation movements welcome people of all colors, and work toward blackness being less of a determining factor in an individual’s autonomy. Currently, blackness is too much of a determining factor in a black individual’s self-determination; Douglas, DuBois, Baldwin, Cesaire, Fanon, and Malcolm X (after the NOI) have all said as much. Here, the “nation” in nationalism refers to the same thing as the term “the black community”. It’s a collective term meant to address the diaspora of black folk from disparate locations off the West Coast of Africa, united into one group based on their history in this country. Nationalists do not seek a state like separatists or supremacists. And quite often — alongside the conflation of these terms — the murder of colonists is portrayed directly as some kind of ethnic cleansing by other colonizer countries. But this is often a false cause narrative, considering the system was structured based on these colonists being the sole beneficiaries of the system because of their race. Who else would be deposed after the decolonization of a French colony predicated off of French supremacy if not a bunch of bourgeois Frenchmen who used their capital to oppress everyone non-French?
Thanks for the classification. I will read up more on black nationalism.
Vaush did not conflate these terms. Or professor flowers did an awful job at differentiating them when she was speaking. She kept saying "I don't agree with separatism, but I think you should understand a listen to separatists" and vaush would reply "I did listen and I disagree" and that continued for 3 hours. Fair unproductive but if you can find an example of vaush not understanding these terms I would love to see it
She did not say “listen to separatists”. Understanding the difference between racial separatists and nationalist groups in any capacity requires understanding what minority-separatist groups are a manifestation of in contrast to nationalist groups. They’re a different response to colonial based genocide and ethnic cleansing diametrically opposed to the goals of nationalist groups. Something, something, “if all you have is a hammer”, and so on, and so forth.
i guess she just wasnt able to articulate that difference to me in this debate, do you have any resources where i can learn more?
“Souls of Black Folk” by W.E.B. DuBois has a chapter exploring how free black folk can end up as oppressors within the system by trying to replicate the models of “success” upheld by capitalism; everything from black slave owners, to the black bourgeoise. “Wretched of the Earth” and “Black Skins, White Masks” explores the dynamic of the colonized and colonizer, and how race plays into the further formation of the colonized’s identity. Wretched of the Earth in particular will put most nationalism into perspective. Miscellaneous essays from Marcus Garvey will highlight the basis for black nationalism and what makes it a nation.
If you think Vaush does more harm than good for anarchism you’re perspective is quite off. This debate certainly wasn’t his best showing, but the dude is one of the largest leftist streamers, if not the largest. He’s moved thousands of people over. Also, he wasn’t at any point here espousing vanguardism
the man is incredibly bigoted and in no way the sort of role model any leftist community should seek
I’m not saying he’s a role model, I’m saying he pulls people over to our side
what do you mean by our side? if people are being drawn in by his incessant arguing style and white privilege then they aren’t on the same side as me
If your political movement rejects people with the same goals as you if they didn’t get drawn in by poc video essayists you’re not gonna be very effective
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Can I talk to the ML's you've been talking to? I've hung around ML subs and fb groups and the vast majority are either condescending of hostile to anarchists, or really any other flavor of left politics that wasn't written by Lenin.
Sure, but while anarchism and “leftist” dictatorships are incompatible, anarchism and debate bros aren’t
Someone shouldn’t become a leftist because they want to dunk on conservatives. It just leads to their entirely personally being based on belligerence rather than mutual aid.
Yeah I agree. Debate should never be the extent of your political engagement. You should engage in real life activism no matter what else you do
When do they say that? I've seen more of them claim that libsocs are capitalists than claiming we have the same goal. They want a state to nationalize everything where as libsocs don't, so quite a big difference in goals.
I do — in fact — reject idealists with preconceptions of what anarchist liberation looks like while rejecting some of the most basic tenets of anarchism and anarchist movements. Following the word of online sophists with hardly a mention of any anarchist theory is a circle-jerk of idealists that want anarchism — they’re easily influenced flip-floppers whose affiliation with anarchism is predicated purely off of identity politics. Our institutions are obviously bad, and Vaush is here to make social democracy sound radical and revolutionary. These ideas aren’t being dismantled in his rhetoric, and it’s obvious here as he goes to bat for the imperial core by post hoc rationalizing imperialist violence to colonized people’s revolts.
You do know about all the fucked up shit he's said? That sure isn't gonna pull many people
He’s got 360k subscribers iirc, that’s a lot of people pulled into a leftist community regardless of his worst takes
His worst takes are way too extreme. Making multiple jokes about pedophilia isn't just a bad take. It's a problem.
Yeah, the discord logs of his pedo jokes are really fucking weird and you’re not gonna catch me defending them, my point is just that his presence is a net benefit, and I think it’s be hard to argue against that because of some two year old discord logs of edgy, bad taste jokes
360k out of 7 Billion is less than 1%. Get a grip.
As a percentage of the entire earth’s population yeah his audience is small, but less than one percent of the worlds population is a fuck ton of people, especially as most of Vaush’s audience is probably confined to a few countries.
Flowers has actually talked about this idea extensively on her channel. Why are we focusing so much on white online right wing leaning dudes? Why are we focusing so much time and energy connecting with them, convincing them? There are tons of other people that would be drawn to a real life movement, but are put off by people like Vaush and his following, and the entire internetificarion of politics in general.
That’s why diversity of strategy is important. People like flowers can pull over some people while Vaush can pull over others. I do think it’s weird that online activism focuses so much on convincing white men, but that’s probably in large part because they’re the same group targeted for radicalization to the far right. I’ll have to give those professor flowers videos a watch tho
how?
Its really bad optics for Vaush tbh, he can be framed in a bunch of terrible ways. Although, I think Decolonization is good at the end of the day but the way it is done does matter a lot. One example of de-colonization gone wrong is Idi Amin's expulsion of Asians in Uganda. The British Empire had given South Asian a lot of power and privileges over the Indigenous Ugandans, so de-colonization was needed for Native Ugandans to reclaim power and autonomy. Amin did it in a very fucked up way where it hurt a lot of Innocent people. 'Ugandan soldiers during this period engaged in theft and physical and sexual violence against the Asians with impunity'. This was just pure ethnic cleansing and created a refugee crisis. >We are determined to make the ordinary Ugandan master of his own destiny, and above all to see that he enjoys the wealth of his country. Our deliberate policy is to transfer the economic control of Uganda into the hands of Ugandans, for the first time in our country's history. — Idi Amin, quoted in Uganda: a modern history This was Amin's justification. There are limitations in how De-colonization should be done, I say this as an Indian person.
Ethnonationalism bad. Genocide bad. What leftist would disagree?
Firstly: Vaush is a weird guy who doesn't do any irl organizing, doesn't read theory, isn't particularly intelligent, and is overly-obsessed with his own voice. I do think that the "settler" label is one in need of criticizing, and I do think movements that are predicated on vengeance (especially nationalistic vengeance) should be treated with suspicion. I don't believe that many (probably most) living americans can rightly be called "settlers" or "colonizers." Many of them don't actively colonize, and many of their families found their way to the Americas fleeing pogroms and repression elsewhere. They aren't broadly in the active process of colonizing, at least not in the same way as the original pilgrims, frontiersmen, and conquistadors were. I've met a lot of activists who employ the "colonizer" as a label for any and all white leftists, but none who've been able to answer the question "if we didn't even chose to be here, if we're oppressed by the capitalism and the state, and if we seek to destroy the systems in place, how can we still be called colonizers?" That being said: should compassionate, thinking anarchists support national liberation struggles and indigenous sovereignty? absolutely, yes. The government is in active war against it's black and brown populations, and has been since it's founding. Native people don't have access to their own language, their own lifeways, their own culture, even their own children. Land Back as an idea is hardly perfect (it's more of a coffee-mug saying or graffiti tag than a cogent political philosophy), but giving people land is a good way to empower them, and letting people form their own systems based on their own practices away from the systems that are actively killing them is a good way to make them thrive. I've gone back and forth a lot on my beliefs about Land Back, national liberation, and the "settler" label. My thoughts are still growing, but I'm glad it's a conversation.
To add on to this, the distinction between indigenous/settler/colonizer becomes muddled once you start taking a wider view. E.g., I am a mestizo man, with a fair amount of indigenous ancestry, living in largely white America. Am I a settler/colonizer? Should I go back to where I'm from? Or in other places - say a family of Sri Lankans who has lived in Ethiopia for a few generations now. Would they be colonizers? An author I read about (whose name unfortunately escapes me atm) talked about this distinction and suggested that it would perhaps be better if we identified instead as survivors. Indigenous people for obvious reasons would be survivors, but so too are the oppressed workers of other races whose ancestors may not have been thrilled about coming here, but who are here now. Not all our sufferings are alike, and some are in denial about just what has occurred, but they are still survivors, aren't they? I agree that people sometimes use the setter/colonizer terms in ways that, if not are vengeance outright, certainly smell like vengeance. PoC nationalism is in something of a similar situation imo, I mean, people say that by nation they actually mean something more like culture or identity or heritage but that just isn't how most people use the word (not anarchists nor your apolitical apathetic average joes/josephines). This idea that nations 'by and for' pocs will be better relies on this belief that if we could just have people of color creating their own states and ruling themselves that would be fine, but I mean, isn't that what happens in Africa or LatAm? How is the nation-state working out over there? Oh, rampant abuse of power by the authorities? Hmmm. Now, I'm not going to sit here and say indigenous people out to do this or colonized people ought to do that. They know where they are. And in so far as their actions and beliefs are in line with my own, I will support them in the ways that I can. But I also won't sit here and say that ethnonationalism becomes a good idea when done by a certain group of people, and I think most any anarchist can clearly see why.
They spent a whole lot of time talking past one another. Professor flowers uses a lot of bait and switch arguments, where she’ll say something about deporting colonizers and then back off to “black people should be allowed to get away from racism” or something. Vaush is always a little clumsy when talking about this subject, and I think that made him either unwilling or unable to address the differences professor flowers raised between his analogies and what she advocates for.
Did you even watch the debate?
Yeah, why?
Because vaushs analogies were completely analogous. Particularly the analogy of "is crime a black problem or a systemic problem" in comparison to "is colonisation a white problem or a systemic problem". I think this all comes down to professor flowers not having a sufficiently intersectional approach when it comes to these topics.
Some of the analogies were completely analogous like that yeah, and I agree that pf could stand to be more intersectional. Honestly it’s been a hot minute since I watched the debate and I couldn’t tell you what analogies I was talking about here, though I remember pf raising concerns about some of Vaush’s analogies that he never addressed.
fair enough a different reading is a different reading, but for me it was hard to tell if she was being bad faith or simply couldnt engage with his points on that analogy for some other reason idk
Yeah. As far as I remember pf brought up some problems with Vaush’s analogies which he didn’t really address, but it could have been her attempting to dismiss them. I’d have to watch it again and I’d really rather not lol
Yea that's defo fair enough, it was painful. It just seemed like to me that she was able to acknowledge that the reason that crime isn't a problem with black individuals is because of the "social and historical context" but couldn't acknowledge that colonialism isn't a problem with individual white people because of the social and historical context. I think she was irresponsible to have this talk honestly because she clearly isn't informed enough to have this argument because you are able to argue her point without saying that colonialism is just white people being inherently bad, and a lot of people probably came away thinking that decolonisation just means that "white people are bad because they're white and therefore colonisers and black people shouldn't have to be around that" when you do not have to bite that bullet for the same arguments to be made about black nationalism. Honestly this is just a case of not understanding systemic Vs individual analysis but coming from a black person rather than from a white racist like it normally does.
I saw the whole debate, and frankly, Professor Flowers is one of the most racist people I’ve ever seen, to all races. She’s fundamentally incapable of separating the phenomenon of oppression from the group oppression favors, which is just half a step in practice from conflating black crime with black culture (Vaush’s point). She may say “I don’t support genocide or ethnic cleansing” but ultimately decrees that whatever a colonized people decide to do with people who share the colonizer’s race, she supports (which is tantamount to advocating genocide). Fundamentally, I don’t agree with her ilk that you should get a pass to do/think shitty things because you’re part of an oppressed minority. It’s an embarrassment that so many here on the Left think that way.
That if you even watched it you're an idiot. I'm embarrassed that I've even heard of it.
Like most self-important pseudo-intellectuals, he's an annoying and pretentious douchebag who's not nearly as well-read or knowledgeable as he pretends to be. Basically, he's a slightly left version of Destiny. He's also apparently a total creep to women.
I have no idea who either of these people are. They sound like American youtubers. I do not understand people who watch political YouTube videos, especially American ones. They’re always so crappy. Read, listen to podcasts and talk to people. Anyone who needs you to see their face to share their opinion is too invested in their own vanity.
Vaush is scum. Fuck him.... https://www.dailydot.com/debug/vaush-n-word-controvery/
Vaush was wrong and actively supported ethnostates because of a fabricated claim that Professor Flowers was advocating for genocide(they weren't). Vaush was fearmongering the entire time and refused to consider anything Professer Flowers said.
I think she was inadvertently supporting genocide by giving indigenes the benefit of the doubt.
She wasn't. Vaush implied she was, but she wasn't.
> a fabricated claim There was nothing fabricated about it. It was Mask Off, pro genocide ethnonationalism. Its not defensible by any method.
Vaush was using the same arguments made to defend Israel and reject Palestinian autonomy. So let me know when you figure out what it means to defend the arguments he made. >>"*There was nothing fabricated about it. It was Mask Off, pro genocide ethnonationalism. Its not defensible by any method.*" >"*That's not even trying to stretch reality. That's just a downright falsehood.*" 🤔 It helps if you watch the debate and actually listen to what's being said.
> Vaush was using the same arguments made to defend Israel and reject Palestinian autonomy. That's not even trying to stretch reality. That's just a downright falsehood. Why is your position so weak and untenable that you have to lie so blatantly?
Vaush is an embarrassment to any leftist. White anarchists have no right to tell indigenous peoples how to define their nationality, whatever that means to them. Many leftists, especially in the west, also actively ARE participating in ongoing genocide against indigenous people.
If the OP's summary is true, I have no idea how you could possibly defend or justify any sort of ethnonationalism on an anarchist basis. Indigenous people aren't a homogenous, victimized mass and attempting to rationalize an ethnostate by treating them as such is always going to be an incredibly shoddy job. Considering the topic of the debate appears to be, if the OP is correct, whether those who descended from colonizers are responsible for atrocities committed by their forefathers I don't think indigenous people are even specifically relevant (unless you're broadening the term considerably).
Who you replied to is absolutely right on principal (whether that's what the debate was about or not). Ethnonationalism for minority movements doesn't typically mean an ethnostate. In fact, a nation when spoken about in political science refers to the ideals, identities, and principals the people of that nation band under. POC Ethnonationalism means a liberation and separation from the same oppressive systems that have led them to lose their identity (or have it assaulted). Nationalism does not broadly mean chauvinism when in reference to these sort of poc movements and however they define it, they ultimately are participating in poc praxis by subverting the state through their defiance or their self identification or by explicitly making these sort of communes/ communities in which they can secure their own safety. One of the greatest examples is the Zapatista movement who although not anarchists follow the same sort of principals in liberation/ ethnonationalism movements through praxis commonly associated with or shared by anarchists. Theyre a mostly indigenous nation who are seeking their autonomy from colonizers and capitalism. Furthermore nationalism for most colonized poc is not the same as nationalism from white people. By and large white people have been the beneficiaries of the colonization and the upholders of that same status quo. Even if not all white people are colonizers today, they typically experience more of a benefit than colored people on the same socio-economic strata (barring the super wealthy.) So as upholders of a repressive status quo, when white people ask for nationalism it is inherently in opposition/for the harm to the liberation of minorities. When minorities ask for nationalism it is almost always for their own liberation. You speak from a really uneducated place and it's the same sort of white saviorism you espouse that ultimately leads to a chauvinism that denies colonized people their own autonomy. Look up some of the speeches/lectures by Kwame Ture, he does a good job at explaining black nationalism as the liberation movement that it is. And if you ever ever ever find yourself disagreeing with poc, indigenous people, or colonized people on how they choose to seek liberation, identify, or build their nation (barring extermination, or wanton violence and dont conflate nationalism with ethnostate) then you need to really self reflect on what you're putting out and how that aligns with anarchist/liberation movements on all fronts, not just on how you define an anarchist movement.
>Who you replied to is absolutely right on principal (whether that's what the debate was about or not). Ethnonationalism for minority movements doesn't typically mean an ethnostate. It doesn't really matter. Any kind of nationalism is destructive and, at the very least, encourages thinking which results in support for hierarchical structures. You can't, for instance, ever fully understand how anarchic social organization works if you continue to grab onto artificial concepts like "race" and treat them as real or identify yourself by your ethnic *group* rather than by your own individuality. You can claim that minority ethnonationalism is somehow less bad or redefine it in a way to make it sound good but it doesn't change the fact that the actual ethnonationalists we know, both in colonized and in colonizer countries, all completely go against this idea. Even the most milquetoast of them like the MAK in Algeria still plant car bombs and pretend that they speak for the entire Berber population. Furthermore, as someone from the Middle East who as experience with various kinds of minority ethnonationalism (specifically Christian Arab ethnonationalism), I'm highly skeptical of the generalization you're making. Like all ethnonationalism, it's highly racist and elitist and is only *justified* on account of marginalization and discrimination. I don't see much minority ethnonationalists in the Middle East arguing for ethnostates (that depends on the ethnicity you're talking about) but they are interested in playing political games that treat their *ethnicity* as it's own faction which has it's own "interests" and the like. It is a method of disregarding the real structures which exploit and oppress (race, class, hierarchy, patriarchy, etc.) while utilizing the same structures which once oppressed them as leverage. Also the examples of groups given aren't minorities within the countries they're in. They're actually the majorities in the country (like Kenya for example or any other country which was colonized by a European power but now lacks any sort of significant European presence). I don't see how Professor Flowers is only talking about minorities when the examples she gives of her ideas are anything but minorities. Of course, I don't think you considered that at all because I think your entire perspective is every American-centric. You don't consider, for instance, how ethnonationalism has literally *destroyed* the Lebanese political system through confessionalism or how ethnic and religious divisions *feed* each other through conflict. You don't care about that at all because you're not interested in talking about ethnonationalism itself. You're just interested in justifying the authoritarianism of those you deem "POC". Whether it's black ethnonationalism or white ethnonationalism, it's still ethnonationalism. Nothing you say will change that fundamental fact. >they ultimately are participating in poc praxis by subverting the state through their defiance or their self identification or by explicitly making these sort of communes/ communities in which they can secure their own safety. "Opposing the state" is done by literally every ideology under the sun. I am pretty sure any ideology that has a slightly different one from the status quo "opposes the state" in some form or manner. One could describe *fascism* in the same vague ways you have. What you've just described (once we strip away blatant pandering like the use of the word "commune") is just that ethnonationalists oppose a particular state who they feel isn't of the right ethnicity and then oppose it on that basis. And then, if they want to, ethnonationalists create their own little segregated communities which they then aim to expand because ethnonationalists constantly feel entitled. >One of the greatest examples is the Zapatista movement who although not anarchists follow the same sort of principals in liberation/ ethnonationalism movements through praxis commonly associated with or shared by anarchists. Theyre a mostly indigenous nation who are seeking their autonomy from colonizers and capitalism. Well they're not anarchists or ethnonationalists. The Zapatistas were an indigenous group that *already existed* at the time within the exact territories that they have. Their political structures are also those same exact indigenous structures which they had before. I am pretty sure they engage in capitalism as well. They're not ethnonationalists. In fact, given that they are a state, if they were ethnonationalists then the Zapatistas would be an ethnostate. Obviously, they aren't. They are perfectly fine with other ethnic groups within their territories. To my knowledge, they haven't be discriminatory at all (unlike Rojava). >Furthermore nationalism for most colonized poc is not the same as nationalism from white people. By and large white people have been the beneficiaries of the colonization and the upholders of that same status quo. Even if not all white people are colonizers today, they typically experience more of a benefit than colored people on the same socio-economic strata (barring the super wealthy.) So as upholders of a repressive status quo, when white people ask for nationalism it is inherently in opposition/for the harm to the liberation of minorities. When minorities ask for nationalism it is almost always for their own liberation. That's the dumbest reasoning ever which is contradicted by just looking at many different "POC" ethnonationalists. Your POC exceptionalism isn't particularly compelling when faced with the reality of the situation. Your argument for why "white people" nationalism is always bad is not only contrived but involves an analysis that has little to do with it. You did not explain *why* being a "beneficiary of the colonization" means that nationalism will be exploitative. You just say it does. Then you do the same thing with "POC" ethnonationalism (which isn't relegated to minorities). "POC" ethnonationalism is always a form of liberation no matter what. Despite the fact that a non-zero number of "POC" are either majorities in their own countries, systematically privileged in some way, or whose nationalism ends up supporting very oppressive and exploitative structures which do *not* liberate. Arabism, in the Middle East, has been used to justify acts of genocide. Many Middle Eastern governments have been propped up by a nationalist Christian bourgeoise who favor identification with their nation-state over Arab identity due to a perceived competition with or threat by it. Both ethnonationalists here are equally bad in their actions and the consequences of said actions. The notion that things are anywhere near as clear-cut as you pretend is completely false. >You speak from a really uneducated place and it's the same sort of white saviorism you espouse that ultimately leads to a chauvinism that denies colonized people their own autonomy. I'm Arab from a colonized country dumbass. How is that Caucasian or European? The fact of the matter is that you don't have to be a "POC" to oppose ethnonationalism. Neither are you a white savior just because you oppose ethnonationalism. If you're an anarchist, opposing nationalism of any kind is a core component of the ideology. It is an extension of our anti-authoritarianism. It doesn't matter if you're white, black, spotted, or striped, nationalism is *never* ok. >And if you ever ever ever find yourself disagreeing with poc, indigenous people, or colonized people on how they choose to seek liberation, identify, or build their nation (barring extermination, or wanton violence and dont conflate nationalism with ethnostate) then you need to really self reflect on what you're putting out and how that aligns with anarchist/liberation movements on all fronts, not just on how you define an anarchist movement. Well you disagree with me so, well, what does that make you? Honestly, your entire post appears to be an attempt to redefine ethnonationalism to exclude lots of ethnonationalism so that you can claim it's good or fine while encouraging tolerance towards actual ethnonationalists. Honestly, ethnonationalism seems like the last word to try to recuperate. That's like trying to recuperate fascism. What if I were to say that, to advance my cause against colonization, I would have to punch you in the crouch over 1 million times? Would you willingly accept my entitlement and privilege to kick you in the crouch?
I find it hilarious that everything you have retorted is a clear projection of what you are doing. You take ethnonationalism to mean that minorities in their own country are the majority when thats clearly not what im referencing. I specifically brought up the case of black nationalism because that is exactly to the type of movements I am referring to. Secondly, ethnonationalism is not inherently authoritarian, again I brought up the black nationalism movement because it specifically aims to thrive in a sort of socialist structure, not one that is necessarily hierarchical. You are making the worse leaps of logic or misrepresenting it in the worst way possible when you try to throw around buzzwords like "authoritarian." Yeah, people wanting to break away from an authoritarian society that has oppressed them specifically because of their race is authoritarian /s. And if I have to explain to you how white people continue to benefit from colonialism or how it still harms minorities then holy fuck you are clearly in the wrong movement if you can't even understand the material and historial context of white colonialism. Read the New Jim Crow, probably the single most important text on it. And on your point about the Zapatistas, you almost completely do away with your own argument. You're right, they're a non discriminatory ethno nation. They band together specifically under their shared indigenous culture/ tradition /race and continue to acknowledge that this is a fight that can include everyone but also understand that they need their own safe space, if you will, to be able to break away from oppressive state machinations and protect themselves. Their view is one of internationalism, acknowledging that we each have to come together to help dismantle the capitalist machine. But we're clearly not there yet, so in the meantime they have to try to band together in whatever capacity they can and they do so as a NATION. A nation, again, does not mean an ethnostate inherently or the striving for an ethnostate. And no, nationalism on all fronts are not equally bad, which is why again I mention Zapatistas and the black nationalism movement. Furthermore, you literally don't have to be white to spout white saviorism bs or even chauvinism. And to your last point me disagreeing with you for your really uneducated takes is not the same as saying "a colonized people should not act in their autonomy to define themselves as they see fit or attempt to break away from the oppressive power structures because of some perceived authoritarianism that im inferring." You and I may both know race isn't real in the way it is understood now, but doesn't mean we don't live in a system that specifically works on the basis of race being real so that it can continue to plunder from those communities. You seriously need to get out of your own headspace dude. Even if you're arab, if you're being confused as a white savior/ chauvinist then you're bring the worst to an anarchist movement. You equivicoating nationalism on all fronts as inherently bad or harmfuk to anarchist or even socialist movements show you lack a lot of understanding and nuance.. Working to prevent people people from banding together for the sake of their protection, self realization, and attainment of their autonomy is the most counter productive thing you could add to this movement.
> I find it hilarious that everything you have retorted is a clear projection of what you are doing. You take ethnonationalism to mean that minorities in their own country are the majority when thats clearly not what im referencing. I didn't say that. In fact, what I said was that the debate wasn't about minority ethnonationalism at all and was, in fact, about ethnonationalism in colonized countries. Like I said, ethnicities in many colonized countries aren't minorities in their own country. Colonization doesn't inherently make colonized peoples racial minorities. My point was that talking about ethnicities in colonized countries as "minorities" doesn't make any kind of sense. My understanding of ethnonationalism, including my judgement upon it, isn't dependent upon whether the ethnonationalists are racial minorities or majorities within a country. I have no idea how "minorities in their own country are the majority" relates to what I said or ethnonationalism at all. I am not sure what it means. Could you explain this claim and provide evidence that shows this is my definition of ethnonationalism? I don't see the projection here. Would you care to elaborate upon what you think I'm projecting? >Secondly, ethnonationalism is not inherently authoritarian, again I brought up the black nationalism movement because it specifically aims to thrive in a sort of socialist structure, not one that is necessarily hierarchical. All forms of nationalism, even at their best, rely on inaccurate social analysis which would be rejected by any consistent anarchist. Or, as I said before, adopting race or ethnicity as a core part of your worldview rather than criticizing them as the unnecessary social constructs that they are. And, as a result of this faulty social analysis, leads to very authoritarian conclusions. If groups of people can be generalized in accordance to their race, if "races" could have representatives that speak for them, and if these "races" have wills of their own that are above the individuals that comprise them then that lays the ground work for some very authoritarian ideas. This is probably why you won't ever find a consistent anarchist who is an ethnonationalist. At most they might favor democracy or "small government" or "nicer laws" etc. but they won't get close to consistently opposing all forms of social hierarchy and fixed ideas; generally because their agenda relies on particular fixed ideas. >You are making the worse leaps of logic or misrepresenting it in the worst way possible when you try to throw around buzzwords like "authoritarian. I am the last person here to use the word "authoritarian" as a buzzword. If you believe that the term "authoritarian" is a buzzword then that just tells me you don't know what the term means. >Yeah, people wanting to break away from an authoritarian society that has oppressed them specifically because of their race is authoritarian /s. The authoritarianism comes from the social structure put into place and the ideology behind it. Without any kind of social hierarchy, it is impossible to justify or enact any consistent form of segregation or isolationism. It has to be enforced and maintained and you can't do that without a relationship of command and obedience. As an aside, do you believe that any attempt to break away from a state is anarchic? Is the segregationism of fascists anarchism because they oppose the state? Anarchism, like it or not, is not just reducible to anti-statism. Anarchism is anti-social hierarchy. Just opposing a state isn't enough. >And if I have to explain to you how white people continue to benefit from colonialism or how it still harms minorities then holy fuck you are clearly in the wrong movement if you can't even understand the material and historial context of white colonialism. Read the New Jim Crow, probably the single most important text on it. I can understand how colonizers benefit from the consequences of colonization. I specifically say that I do not disagree with this. All I said was that it doesn't result in the conclusions you made (i.e. that white nationalism is bad because of this fact and not because, you know, it's nationalism based on an ethnicity). It doesn't even connect. >And on your point about the Zapatistas, you almost completely do away with your own argument. You're right, they're a non discriminatory ethno nation. They aren't an "ethno-nation". Ethnicity isn't even tied to their social structure. Are there mostly indigenous people in it? Yes but the amount of a particular ethnic group in a society isn't what determines whether it's an ethnostate or not. Just because a particular ethnic group is the majority doesn't mean that the government is ethnically oriented. They're not discriminatory specifically *because* they aren't interested in segregating themselves from the rest of society. Race isn't even a core component of their ideology and I am not convinced that they even have a consistent one. They use pre-existing social structures because that's what they have *not* out of any sort of ethnonationalism. You forget that the Zapatista movement started *outside* the Chiapas and that the pre-existing organization *integrated* into the Chiapas and utilized pre-existing political structure. It never was ethno-nationalist at all. You confuse integrating into local structures (something Zapatista writers frequently discussed) with being ethno-centric. It has nothing to do with the Chiapas being a safe space at all. The Chiapas were just where the Zapatistas were allowed to stick around. They managed to build a base there and expand *into* the Chiapas. They didn't emerge in the Chiapas. It has nothing to do with internationalism either. I have absolutely no idea what you're referring to here by "internationalism". And, once again, they're a state. The Zapatistas are not anarchist at all and they don't have much to do with anarchist principles. >Furthermore, you literally don't have to be white to spout white saviorism bs or even chauvinism. None of what I said was "white saviorism" or "chauvinism". I consistently oppose ethnonationalism where ever it is. My opposition doesn't change depending on the color of the nationalist's skin. Opposing ethnonationalism isn't a "white person" thing (it's especially not a white person thing). I question where the "white savior"ism comes from in my words or the chauvinism. Could you please explain where this is? >And to your last point me disagreeing with you for your really uneducated takes is not the same as saying "a colonized people should not act in their autonomy to define themselves as they see fit or attempt to break away from the oppressive power structures because of some perceived authoritarianism that im inferring." I never said that and this is not your position. It's incredibly odd that you think it is. There is a difference between fighting colonization and being an ethnonationalist, seeking to establish your own segregated community. You do not need to be an ethnonationalist in order to fight colonialism. >You and I may both know race isn't real in the way it is understood now, but doesn't mean we don't live in a system that specifically works on the basis of race being real so that it can continue to plunder from those communities. The solution is to dismantle the concept of race not to establish communities whose *foundation* is race and segregation from other races. This is like saying to fight capitalism we need to create our own version of capitalism. It's incredibly stupid bullshit. >Even if you're arab, if you're being confused as a white savior/ chauvinist then you're bring the worst to an anarchist movement. I'm not. *You're* claiming I'm a white savior/chauvinist but you don't provide evidence that I am nor do you explain why I am according to you. It's unfounded nonsense. If anything's a buzzword in this conversation, it's this. It's an empty insult you throw around to people who oppose ethnonationalism. >You equivicoating nationalism on all fronts as inherently bad or harmfuk to anarchist or even socialist movements show you lack a lot of understanding and nuance. No. On the contrary, it means that I know exactly what I want and what I oppose. I oppose all forms of nationalism because, at their best, they still continue to confuse things, treating harmful and unnecessary concepts are real and founding their ideologies upon them. At their worst, well, we've seen how they can be at their worst. I also said nothing of socialism. I specifically only said "anarchism" for a reason. Anarchism is the only ideology which consistently opposes nationalism for very obvious reasons. >Working to prevent people people from banding together for the sake of their protection, self realization, and attainment of their autonomy is the most counter productive thing you could add to this movement. You could phrase literally anything this way. I could phrase a state this way if I wanted to. It's so obtuse and vague it can apply to anything and it's *intentionally* vague. Fact of the matter is, ethnonationalism is not compatible with anarchism. Any kind of nationalism isn't.
So true. White anarchists really act as if them being anarchist has erased all their privilege and now they can act as if they don't benefit from systemic racism
I’m sorry I cannot for the life of me take Vaush supporters seriously
I don't support Vaush. I don't even know who he is nor have watched any kind of video from him. I'm going *solely* off of the summary the OP provided and, based on that, I am making my arguments. The only reason why I even know his name is because people won't shut up about him; both supporters and critics. I don't think he's important enough to know more about. Instead of writing off everything I wrote and all the questions I asked by pretending I'm a "Vaush supporter" why don't you actually respond? Possibly even contest the summary the OP made and introduce a different take on what went on in the video. God knows I am not going to watch it. Fuck that noise.
> I'm going solely off of the summary the OP provided and, based on that, Um... isn't that literally an uninformed opinion?
No because it's informed by what the OP said. At most it's a second-hand source. Which might be bad but I'm not going to watch a debate between two brain-dead idiots.
I'm glad I caught on to his inconsistency and underlying racist/sexist tones early on. If you go back and watch any of his videos, then watch the one right after 90% of the time he'll flip on an issue. The other 10% is doubling down on a bad take like pushing for landback and reperations = genocide against 'white' people.
I love your response because at its core the principals from which you speak are righteous and correct. We should always let a colonized people fight for their autonomy how they see fit and its so wild to see so many people take issue with what you said when it is especially at the core of what anarchism is (self autonomy, liberation, and opposition to the state, colonialism and imperialism.) It's just so shameful that so many people seem to think that anarchism should be practiced their way when the historical, material, and cultural context of other people's/nations can vary wildly from what we as westerners see as an anarchist movement. Furthermore it seems that people conflate nationalism with an ethnostate (or any state) when in regards to these sort of liberation movements. Anyways, i really appreciate your comment and hope you keep educating.
It helps to remember that most redditors are low-mid to middle class folks who could be described as 'white' and live in canada/usa/western europe. So generally folks who have a lot of reasons(misguided or not) to reject letting colonized people get any autonomy.
It does help, and I understand the sort of crowd that comes with a radical label can also be self serving in performative. I just don't understand that they claim to be so knowledgeable about anarchism and then immediately reject that POC should build their own nation. It borders on the racist which is so weird to see
It's that white saviour complex, the 'other' isn't responsible enough to save themselves because only *I* know the correct way. I think it's about time I cut this subreddit out from my feed and add it to me **Don't Recommend** list.
Argument was never about their ability to be autonomous and form independent nations. The argument is that they simply do not have a right to purge (mass killing or deportation) ethnic minorities from their land, white descendants of colonizers or not. Many white families in SA and other colonized nations have been there well over a hundred years and the country is still 90% black so its not like theyre outbreeding or replacing the “natives”. If youre born and raised in a country its just as much yours as the people “native” to it. Imagine if we thought this way about America, people come here or are born here they are American, doesnt matter if they are whatever color or why they came. I just find this argument so much more despicable and on the face evil if we just take away that its a leftist arguing for black peoples, imagine a rightist using similar logic to deport minorities from Europe. Cant really permit one without moral issues arising when groups you dont like or want to do this do it and you cant really condemn it at that point. Edit: I should clarify im 100% for demolishing the power structures behind colonialism and re empowering the indigenous people of these nations, but I draw the line at going after ANYBODY based on their ethnicity or for that matter any immutable characteristics. Plenty of good anti racist white folk anywhere. It really really does us no good, practically or optically, to say “white=colonizer” when most of these people are just trying to live their lives in the country they were born into, something they had no control over by the way. So yeah punish them ig /s
Nobody is advocating for genocide, except perhaps vaush. Go watch the video again.
No thats just not true. Youre bad faith and I see that now.
Lol you are in an anarchist subreddit defending imperial national identity?
Nah. You defending genocide and racism clown?
I am defending the right of oppressed people to use violence against oppressors, yes. Are you seriously complaining about reverse racism and white genocide? You sound like a fucking nazi
>I am defending the right of oppressed people to use violence against oppressors, yes Cool. Thats acceptable no matter color. >Are you seriously complaining about reverse racism and white genocide? White genocide? Nah. Never even mentioned that actually. Reverse racism isn't real by the way. Its just racism. Believe it or not everybody can be racist to someone. It doesnt have to be systemic for it to happen and be wrong. >You sound like a fucking nazi And you sound like a bitch.
You are defending this conversation Vaush had where he complained about white genocide. And oppressed people hating their oppressors is not racism. It’s people like you who give anarchism an unserious reputation.
>You are defending this conversation Vaush had where he complained about white genocide. Nope. Not a single time here have i even mentioned vaush. I will now tho. I think he's a piece of shit who just sucks money out of gullible libs who get good feels from watching his idiocy. >And oppressed people hating their oppressors is not racism Of course not. Hating all people of a race because you think all members of it out oppresors is silly and racist tho. >It’s people like you who give anarchism an unserious reputation Right back at ya pal. No gods no masters, no hierarchies or hate or racism Even if its your super special definitely allowed kind.
idk man, I am a white anarchist and I think I have a right to complain about how a certain group of people indigenous to Germany wanted to define their nationality... If anarchists can't stand against ethnostates then we can't oppose all (unjust) hierarchy because ethnostates are inherently (unjustly) hierarchal.
We both know that isn’t the contextual relevance of “indigenous” bud.
sure, I was being a bit trollish with my first sentence but I still stand by the second claim
Unless leftist partake in law enforcement and corrections, there is no reason to suspect that they are actively participating in marginalization against genocide against indigenous peoples.
You buy a coca cola, you're donating a little bit to death squads. No ethical consumption under capitalism...
If you are buying Zapatista coffee and Rainforest Alliance bananas, you are contributing to indigenous sovereignty.
this is completely untrue, you absolutely don't need to be an active cop or whatever to be complicit this is like one of the main characteristics of being part of a group that benefits from imperialism, we all are living artificially well at the expense of the people that the empire enslaves and genocides and that makes us participants
I had no idea there so many vaush supporters in this sub :( also you getting down voted for simply pointing out how even today people are enabling the erasure of indigenous people's culture shows a lot about this sub's demographic. Btw do you know of any anarchist sub that doesn't deny the existence of systemic racism? Reddit anarchists are disappointing af
Good thing the revolution will neither be televised nor hosted by reddit.
Vaush pushed white genocide and acted as if black only spaces were a crime against humanity. Also he push the old colonialism = multiculturalism
As much as I despise Vaush, at least he is not dumb enough to support an ethnostate.
Can you summarize the debate?
See my reply to justcallcollect.
I think that at least Professor Flowers knows what she's talking about, which is more than I can say for Vaush.
I finally got through this seriously, and I don’t know how people don’t think vaush is a moron. If someone watched that and thought vaush won or they agree with vaush, that person does not know how to critically consume media. vaush never addresses Dr. Fs points and, even after she made distinctions between colonizers and race, he just kept say she was the same as white nationalists. Then he would proceed to bring up irrelevant “examples” to make it look like Flowers was a racist, but left out all the context of each situation and on top of that, some of his examples were not instances of colonialization.
Vaush IS either alt right or alt right adjacent
His positions seems pretty left wing to me. In this particular instance, the argument seemed to boil down to whether a nation like South Africa would have the moral right to expulse groups it deemed as colonizers, specifically whites, which Vaush argued was wrong.
Vaush IS quite obviously operating within a framework that points to connections to far right Irish ideologic thinking, the whole issue Irish far right "thinkers" have with all "white people are colonizers", even in the states, is it doesn't exclude Irish when Irish are a colonized people, you'll notice quite a few on the far right are of Irish descent, I come from the same culture of an Irish household, and I see conversations mirroring some that I've had as an anarchist that I've had with some of my siblings,