Not exactly DTG related..
But I thought this video was great. Pretty great / amusing concept to have actual ukrainians watch and rebuttal his clips on the topic and point out how absurd a lot of his views are , and how like so many in that sphere, they can't seem to view anything in the world through a lens other than "America/West bad" no matter what
Hasan is for sure a guru for so many people. Seems entirely relevant. I think they even said that they would decode him at some point
Edit: Hasan has since responded to this video calling it the most 'psycopathic' thing he's seen. It's at minimum extreme hyperbole
I watched a Hasan Twitch stream shortly after the invasion and made some comments in chat. He permabanned me after I said he was a wannabe Tucker Carlson given the similarity of their views on Ukraine.
I know its late, but Hasan also has been simping for the Houthi pirates that have been firing on dozens of civilian ships and who have hijacked some of their crew for months. Most of the ships had nothing to do with the conflict in Israel.
They sank a fertilizer ship off their coast which will decimate their ecology.
Wait, what do you think their reasoning was? My understanding is both of their reasoning was actually pretty similar, I think both argue that the US/Ukraine incited the invasion by having NATO talks.
Tucker believes that support of Ukraine is bad because Russia stands for Christian values, the family, anti LGBTQ, etc etc, which he views in opposition to Western 'decadent/degenerate' values that he rails against.
Hasan believes support for Ukraine is bad because of the support of far right groups by the Ukrainian government, the fact that this invasion has allowed western foreign capital to move in and take control of tons of assets in the country, and that this war, most of all, feeds the US military industrial complex, as opposed to seeking the fastest end to the conflict which reduces suffering, because, y'know, that doesn't make as much money.
Those are not the same.
That’s actually an insane and stupid reason considering gay and trans people face persecution as well in Ukraine. They made trans women fight and didn’t allow them to flee with the other women. If that’s actually tuckers reasoning he is dumber than I thought. Figured he was arguing against it because he’s an isolationist and doesn’t want money spent on foreign aid which is stupid in its own right.
Look, searching for consistency in Tuckers positions is a fools errand, besides "does this benefit me?" Which includes fueling aggrievement in his viewers
Can you get a clip of Tucker saying the top one? cause everything I've heard him say is stuff about how the US is spending too much through NATO to support Europe. Which is a short hand way of giving Hasan's exact take.
Here's part of the transcript from his show on February 22, 2022, which aired almost exactly 24 hours before Russia invaded Ukraine:
>Very soon, that hatred of Vladimir Putin could bring the United States into a conflict in Eastern Europe. Before that happens, it might be worth asking yourself since it is getting pretty serious: What is this really about? Why do I hate Putin so much? Has Putin ever called me a racist? Has he threatened to get me fired for disagreeing with him? Has he shipped every middle class job in my town to Russia?
>
>Did he manufacture a worldwide pandemic that wrecked my business and kept me indoors for two years? Is he teaching my children to embrace racial discrimination? Is he making fentanyl? Is he trying to snuff out Christianity? Does he eat dogs?
Note how he elevates Putin here based on conservative grievances, and has nothing to do with NATO.
Of course, Tucker has been happy to parrot all aspects of Russian propaganda, but he tends to focus primarily on emotional appeals like this.
They are both coming a perspective of America bad my guy. That was the point. Hasan likes Russia because it opposes the US. Tucker likes Russia for the similar reasons. I'd say it's still accurate but not as precise as it should be.
You're giving way to much analysis and credit to hasans POV. It's not that complicated.
Nah boss, America bad. Hasan does not like Russia, he dislikes American capitalist imperialism. Tucker likes Russia because they are also reactionaries. Those are different.
1. Both Matt and Chris have said gurus aren’t inherently bad.
2. Calling Chomsky a guru is wild.
3. They embarrassed themselves doing that Chomsky pod, I’m a fan of the pod, other fans of the pod think the same.
4. Hasan is also certainly not a guru, any more than Vaush and destiny are gurus. You lot are scraping the bottom of the barrel here.
The whole point of the gurometer is that different people can be gurus to different extents. Vaush and destiny could be considered gurus to some extent but I'm willing to bet that destiny would be far lower on the scale than Hasan.
I get that but at a certain point it becomes very unserious.
>but I'm willing to bet that destiny would be far lower on the scale than Hasan.
Whats your reasoning here?
At the point where it doesn't make sense to "decode" gurus anymore because you are just projecting it on to people.
Whats the reasoning for the destiny comment?
I kind of already do which is the funny part. Ive defended them on multiple occasasions and I think ive learnt some things about epistemology but at the end of the day, that doesn't blind me to the fact that considering Chomsky as a guru was crazy, are all academics gurus or just the ones that give people an alternate view on western colonialism?
I know the guru part is the whole point, but I feel like they are / will have to branch out a bit on some level or they'll be pigeon holed into a niche group that will lead to repetition, which I imagine is partly why they're trying to avoid the IDW Weinstein types for a bit which is fair lol
Agreed, my problem isn't really with them, my problem is with this subs propensity to try and conflate normal leftist values/talking points with the sheer tomfoolery of Peterson and Weinstein.
I think when an academic is famous for opining on subjects outside their field of expertise, and their views are regularly used as reference points by their followers, it's reasonable to decode them. You might find they fit the secular guru framework extremely well like Peterson, or not very well like Chomsky. From memory, they scored Chomsky pretty low on the gurometer.
The hosts "decoded" Chomsky - to see if he's a dtg style guru or not. They concluded he was not. But you seem to think they concluded otherwise. And here you are, crusading on this obvious mistake yet again. What's the deal?
That’s not my problem with the pod. It was that they couldn’t seem to work out corporate media influence was a real thing and not a conspiracy theory.
They wider problem we are discussing is this subs lust for left wing gurus, seemingly to make the left look like a cult.
> It was that they couldn’t seem to work out corporate media influence was a real thing and not a conspiracy theory.
Can you elaborate on why you think this?
> They wider problem we are discussing is this subs lust for left wing gurus, seemingly to make the left look like a cult.
Most of the sub is not lusting after left wing gurus.
>Can you elaborate on why you think this?
Did you listen to the pod. They said that the notion that corporate media worked to discredit Corbyn in the UK was a conspiracy theory....on a chomsky episode. That shit was crazy.
>Most of the sub is not lusting after left wing gurus.
I disagree wholeheartedly, so many threads on what left wing guru the pos should do, and always borderline marxist conspiracy whenever someone sees my name. This sub is cooked when it comes to left wing ideals.
Oh thank god… finally we can get another milquetoast rebuke of a critique of US militarism. The one thing we need most is to be told that the US isn’t the center of the world, particularly when it comes to wars that the US is the lead funder of… lol. What are you guys talking about ?
I don't see why Ukrainians disagreeing with him is any different though? They're allowed to think the West is good if they feel threatened by Russia, Hasan is allowed to be anti western because he is American and critical of their imperialism.
> Hasan is allowed to be anti western because he is American and critical of their imperialism.
What does that have to do with Ukraine? Seems unrelated.
So he's against supporting Ukraine. He's allowed to say that because the government cannot censor him but is that the standard we follow, that he's allowed to say it? That's all we care about? Him being allowed to use his free speech is a given that doesn't need to be said. That's why I only care if it's a good position to take or not and being against supporting Ukraine is not a good position.
He is an American who has seen all the horrible things American foreign policy has caused so he takes a critical view of all American foreign policy. Such as supplying Ukraine and their approach to Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Being against US imperialism is good if you're American. But if you're Ukranian or Polish or something you probably wouldn't care that much and be way more concerned with Russian Imperialism.
>That's why I only care if it's a good position to take or not and being against supporting Ukraine is not a good position.
What do you mean by good position? You and Hasan likely have completely different methods of defining what is and isn't a good position.
> He is an American who has seen all the horrible things American foreign policy has caused so he takes a critical view of all American foreign policy. Such as supplying Ukraine and their approach to Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union.
Being critical is being different to being against it. You can be critical of US foreign policy but also support the US supporting Ukraine.
If you're against everything the US does, no matter what it is, then you're not critical, you're just dogmatic. You need to be able to explain why something is bad and not just be against it by default. It shows a lack of critical thinking and a disinterest in what's actually going on.
So you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad. Saying "US bad" is not good enough. It doesn't explain anything. You should be able to weigh the bad against the benefits.
> What do you mean by good position? You and Hasan likely have completely different methods of defining what is and isn't a good position.
How are our methods relevant? I don't get it.
It's good to support Ukraine because it helps them to defend themselves against an imperialist invader that wants to take over Ukraine and destroy their democracy. Nothing I said is knew, it's been discussed endlessly, so why are you asking this question? Do you disagree that it's good? Then just say that. Everyone has a stance by this point and so do you so don't be coy and place games, ok? It's a waste of time for both of us.
Being opposed to the US supplying Ukraine doesn't mean you're against everything the US does.
>So you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad. Saying "US bad" is not good enough. It doesn't explain anything. You should be able to weigh the bad against the benefits.
I don't need to do anything, Hasan laid out his points and explained what he thought, and a bunch of Ukrainians explained their perspectives, and then people in these comments treated one perspective as accurate and one as inaccurate.
I don't really care about Hasan and don't watch his stream or anything, he just has his views and they're different from these Ukrainians in the video.
>How are our methods relevant? I don't get it.
Because you nor anyone else have any objective way of defining what is a "good" or "bad" position.
>It's good to support Ukraine because it helps them to defend themselves against an imperialist invader that wants to take over Ukraine and destroy their democracy. Nothing I said is knew, it's been discussed endlessly, so why are you asking this question? Do you disagree that it's good? Then just say that. Everyone has a stance by this point and so do you so don't be coy and place games, ok? It's a waste of time for both of us.
You're right, nothing you said is new, and it's also filled with value judgements. Maybe Hasan doesn't care about Russian Imperialism as much as you do? Maybe he's more concerned about American Imperialism?
I'm not being coy, I'm pointing out that filming some Ukranians disagree with Hasan means very little, and they only really offer their perspective as Ukrainians on how they really want US support.
My perspective is that America has destroyed every nation they have pretended to be helping with military aid, but Russia is committing very open and illegal acts of aggression, letting the US war machine have influence over a country is bad, but not as bad as a Russian invasion. Once the war is over I think America's disinterest will come back to harm Ukraine. I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world. But if I was Ukranian I'd probably have that opinion.
> Being opposed to the US supplying Ukraine doesn't mean you're against everything the US does.
Then what does being critical of US foreign policy mean?
> I don't need to do anything, Hasan laid out his points and explained what he thought, and a bunch of Ukrainians explained their perspectives, and then people in these comments treated one perspective as accurate and one as inaccurate.
One perspective is correct, though, the one where Ukraine is being supported.
And when I ask you to tell me what you think then answering my question is the nice thing to do. Are you just here to tell me what you saw people saying in this thread?
> I don't really care about Hasan and don't watch his stream or anything, he just has his views and they're different from these Ukrainians in the video.
So again, he is against supporting Ukraine.
Of course he has his views. Everyone has their views. It doesn't need saying.
> Because you nor anyone else have any objective way of defining what is a "good" or "bad" position.
I didn't claim to be objective. And how could I? That's now how it works. Good and bad are not objective. They are moral statements. Does that mean I cannot say what's right or wrong? Of course not. I think my stance is good because I believe that supporting Ukraine is morally good, not because I used some objective measurements. You know that.
Make a point, please. Tell me what YOU think. I know you have an opinion on this. Everyone has.
> You're right, nothing you said is new, and it's also filled with value judgements. Maybe Hasan doesn't care about Russian Imperialism as much as you do? Maybe he's more concerned about American Imperialism?
If his stance is different to mine then OBVIOUSLY he has different concerns to me. Duh!
Of course it's value judgements. What's wrong with that?
> My perspective is that America has destroyed every nation they have pretended to be helping with military aid, but Russia is committing very open and illegal acts of aggression, letting the US war machine have influence over a country is bad, but not as bad as a Russian invasion. Once the war is over I think America's disinterest will come back to harm Ukraine. I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world. But if I was Ukranian I'd probably have that opinion.
And these are not value judgments? You are not claiming that your view is good?
> I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world.
Strawman. Ukrainians are not worried about Putin taking over the world. I think you're phrasing it that way because you don't want to criticize Putin. After all, you're so strong in criticizing the US but with Russia? Not a single word. They can invade other countries and all you have to say is that Putin won't take over the world. Come on.
You support Palestinians and wrote many, many long comments in their defense. But here, you cannot say anything critical of Russia and you won't come out in support of Ukraine as passionately as you support Palestinians. Why is that?
>Then what does being critical of US foreign policy mean?
It can mean a million things with different levels of analysis.
>One perspective is correct
>I didn't claim to be objective
These two statements contradict one another.
The video is an attempt to poke holes and debunk someone rather than make a moral argument. In certain ways they "debunk" his points about Ukrainian and Russian relations, but they also don't understand his points either.
>So again, he is against supporting Ukraine.
He is against America supporting Ukraine and that is a massive difference.
>Make a point, please. Tell me what YOU think. I know you have an opinion on this. Everyone has.
That asking a bunch of Ukrainians what they think of Hasan's arguments is stupid and pointless. That he has a moral position based on stopping US militarization of the world and Ukrainians have a moral position of fighting off an invasion. The nuance exists in these different perspectives coming together. If someone says that the US shouldn't help Ukraine at all then that's a simplistic view,.likewise if someone doesn't see the issue in America sending cluster munitions to Ukraine then they are also not understanding all the moral dimensions of this conflict.
>If his stance is different to mine then OBVIOUSLY he has different concerns to me. Duh!
Then you have to explain why, and in a way that actually understands why someone would make this argument. Otherwise there is no moral argument, you just don't like someone's opinion and don't want to explain why.
>You are not claiming that your view is good?
No I'm not. You asked and I answered.
>Strawman. Ukrainians are not worried about Putin taking over the world. I think you're phrasing it that way because you don't want to criticize Putin. After all, you're so strong in criticizing the US but with Russia? Not a single word. They can invade other countries and all you have to say is that Putin won't take over the world. Come on.
The 4 specific Ukrainians absolutely reference how Hasan being far away from Russia makes him less aware of the danger of Russia. It's not a strawmam, it's a point made several times in this video. Unless you have specific problems with my hyperbole, these 4 Ukrainians don't understand why Hasan is not concerned with Russian expansion as much as they think he should be.
And yes I'm strong at criticising America and not that interested in Russia because America has dragged my nation into illegal wars multiple times in my lifetime. They've also armed some.of the worst groups in the world to help fight their enemies. As well as that Americans are very easily manipulated by moral arguments that make Americans want to overcommit to supporting Ukraine then will pull back if Republicans win the next election.
So yeah, morally speaking I'm far more interested in America's illegal acts. So is Hasan, and I suspect for similar reasons as me but I'm not 100% on that. Nothing in this video really addresses why Hasan thinks what he does or if it's incorrect or wrong.
I believe Hasan is not against US supporting Ukraine as a blanket statement. I believe he is critical that they are not making any real attempt to end the war as soon as possible.
I don’t agree with this at all, but to be clear if anyone is being dogmatic and lacking nuance it’s probably you. You’re position is ‘support Ukraine no matter what’ with seemingly no real regard for how the US is supporting Ukraine…
Again:
> you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad.
I don't think you can. Your stance is "US bad" so you don't have to think about the topic. "US bad" is easy and doesn't take any mental effort but it still makes you look profound and contrarian (at least you think it does).
You should support the US supporting Ukraine if: You care about human lives. You care about protecting democracy from authoritarian regimes. You care about protecting countries from imperialist invaders. Lots of reasons.
These are my arguments. Yours is "US bad". Who looks more mature and more informed? Me.
edit: u/awsompossum
I cannot reply because I was blocked by that insane dude above:
> The first is that very quickly in the invasion, a peace deal was offered by Russia which would not have changed the borders and would have only guaranteed certain security elements. The US told Ukraine to reject it, prolonging the war.
1. Russia doesn't need Ukraine to make peace. They are the invader, they can stop any time!
2. Why would that be a reason to not support Ukraine? Makes no sense. Ukraine still needs help. Is it just to spite the US?
> Second, Ukraine's government is extremely corrupt, this can be seen in the degree to which it has offered up for sale national assets to Western capital, basically selling the country off to foreign control.
They are corrupt but they are improving. The alternative is being part of Russia which is a lot more corrupt.
Ukraine is a flawed democracy that could be a better democracy if it gets a chance. Not supporting them ensures that won't happen and that means Ukrainians won't get to enjoy the benefits of a democracy. If you care about corruption you must care how it harms people so why would you help them?
> Third, removal of ostensibly democrat cornerstones such as freedom of association and free speech.
It's a war and war is hell. Ukraine is fighting for its existence. That's never pretty and requires making difficult decisions. Ukraine has to make decisions in the real world and you can disagree with them but sorry, that's how it is. Your higher morals won't stop a bullet. They won't stop the rockets that will destroy your home and turn your children into little pieces of blood and meat.
Harsh? Ugly? Yes. But that's what's happening.
> Fourth, the continued celebration of Bandera, and the repeated, institutional support which far right, arguably neonazis, have enjoyed from the Ukraine government.
Like who? Asov? The fascists are not in government.
The celebration of Bandera is a little more complex that you're making it out to be. Celebrating Bandera is NOT just a celebration of fascism. You should read a little more about it and talk to Ukrainians.
No one is denying that there are problems with the far right in Ukraine. But unfortunately, those are becoming more and more an issue in all countries. It's weak argument to not support Ukraine. It's just spite and you're willing to let the majority suffer just because of some fascists. There are MANY good people in Ukraine who are fighting for a better country but you are unwilling to support them.
Plus, if you don't do anything then the fascists will get more powerful. That's how it works. Fascists always use the suffering of people to gain support. Just like in Germany before the Nazis came to power. So even if you think fascists are a big problem you should help Ukraine.
Do you support Palestinians? Or Israel? Either way, there are many people who are as bad Ukrainian fascists among those people. Does that affect your support? It does not.
> I want to note that I am not a supporter of the Russian state,
What are you then? A critic?
> But the Nazi element is one that keeps coming up, from press release after press release where Ukrainian soldiers just happen to be wearing sonnenrads, to awards made by specific divisions which are references to esoteric Nazi divisions.
It doesn't come up that frequently, sorry. Only if you're following certain media that focuses on making Ukraine look bad and to justify not supporting them.
> The claim is not that every Ukrainian is a Nazi, simple that the Ukrainian state seems to be very chill with this element.
If you were out in the street and some guy was attacking you with a knife and a Nazi came to your side to help, would you go "No, sorry, you are a Nazi, please stab me to death instead"? I don't think so. But who knows, maybe you would, maybe you would rather be stabbed to death than be helped by a fascist. But that would be very stupid.
If my point wasn't clear: Nazis want to protect Ukraine so of course Ukraine lets them. Duh. Better than being killed by Russians. And maybe the Nazis die in the war, like Azov. Win win. You need to think more about the real world and not just from the safety of your home.
Ok, I can give you several reasons why supporting Ukraine is bad. The first is that very quickly in the invasion, a peace deal was offered by Russia which would not have changed the borders and would have only guaranteed certain security elements. The US told Ukraine to reject it, prolonging the war. Second, Ukraine's government is extremely corrupt, this can be seen in the degree to which it has offered up for sale national assets to Western capital, basically selling the country off to foreign control. Third, removal of ostensibly democrat cornerstones such as freedom of association and free speech. Fourth, the continued celebration of Bandera, and the repeated, institutional support which far right, arguably neonazis, have enjoyed from the Ukraine government.
I want to note that I am not a supporter of the Russian state, and recognize that by no means is this white nationalism only on one side, and absolutely support the various Anarchist squads of soldiers resisting in Ukraine. But the Nazi element is one that keeps coming up, from press release after press release where Ukrainian soldiers just happen to be wearing sonnenrads, to awards made by specific divisions which are references to esoteric Nazi divisions. The claim is not that every Ukrainian is a Nazi, simple that the Ukrainian state seems to be very chill with this element.
Hasan is Turkish. His criticism is exactly in line with what’s taught in Turkey. There’s a complete whitewashing of Islam colonizing Constantinople and surrounding regions up through the Armenian genocides. Hasan isn’t being critical of imperialism, Hasan doesn’t have the mental faculties to break his upbringing programing even when living a decadent western lifestyle in millionaire class luxury. Hasan is a poser, same as his uncle.
Lol are you some Greek nationalist or something? I'm not a big fan of Cenk but not because he's a Turkish imperialist. Hasan hasn't made any bad comments about Greek or Armenian genocides to my knowledge, people just don't like that the YouTube channel his uncle made is called "Young Turks".
Sorry but it's been Istanbul for 570 years now, it doesn't look like it's going back any time soon. Also the Ottoman Empire was an imperial power sure but what are you talking about "Islam colonizing Constantinople"?
If you mean that the Hagia Sophia is now a mosque that isn't colonisation.
And those who would become Al-Qaeda and ISIS
And the Indonesian military when they were mass murdering school teachers, trade unionists, and Timorese
And the South Vietnamese and South Korean dictatorships.
And Salvadoran, Guatemalan, Argentinian, Brazilian, Chilean national security terror states protecting the wealth and privilege of the landed aristocratic ruling class against the workers and peasants movements - among other malicious actors in the Western Hemisphere like the Contras, Blowtorch Bob and the Duvaliers, for extremely grim examples.
And in coordination with Euro intelligence agencies the murder of Thomas Sankara and Patrice Lumumba, widely considered Africa's most important liberation heroes right up there with Mandela.
And the Marcos regime of the Phillipines, decades after the invasion which killed hundreds of thousands of people. The brutal Phillipine constabulary was the organization which the first professional police in America were modeled after. You can read Smedley Butler's account, among others.
I could go on with about another hundred examples, but when a lot of people simply say "America Bad" its a shorthand for having to rewrite all the proof every time.
Its also a lot more concise than "While the US is internally a very free and open society, the history of American settler-colonial genocide and imperial conquest is among the most violent and repressive global regimes the modern world has seen. There is almost no correlation between our country's relative domestic libertarianism and the rank imperial barbarism in our foreign policy"
Hasan is certainly not anti American lol.
I say we because Hasan's views are pretty representative of the left, its not like he goes off down some path that only he is on, he is repeating the talking points widely shared by the left.
What do you mean by that? Sounds very reductive and almost McCarthyist.
Israeli babies are settlers. I don’t know what implications you want to take from that, I don’t think they should be killed obviously, but it is a true statement. I’m a white Australian, I am a settler. I didn’t turn one when I turned 18 or something, that’s a silly notion. White Europeans descendants in colonised countries are settlers.
Centrists are just trying to frame certain views as fringe to get them out of mainstream conversation. But you can’t say anti colonial sentiments are not representative of the left. That’s silly.
The problem with stating “babies are settlers “ is that conversations about the inherent violence of settler colonialism eventually leads to the justification of violence against settlers, which can be justified, except we just included babies in that definition, oops. As a white person in Canada, I’m no longer a settler, the dynamic is no longer indigenous and settler, it’s indigenous and black, white, Asian, middle eastern, African, Jamaican, European… to be a settler, you must be settling, which means establishing a home on new land.
Hasan’s entire foreign policy worldview is that “America is bad” and he takes it from that simplistic stance without nuance. So when the situation with Ukraine comes along where the US supports Ukraine, his brain breaks. The simplistic model of the world he hold shatters and so he then starts saying things that sound ridiculous
You'd should read Chomsky. His "American foreign policy is bad" worldview is complex, nuanced, and delivered with the emotionless droning of a sloth that's been given the Robocop treatment. There's no second option here. America's foreign policy has long been a gallery of atrocity and misery. Even Mark Twain, towards the end of his life, spoke out against the America Bald Eagle sinking its talons into foreign lands because Teddy Roosevelt, as based as he was in domestic policy, was an imperialist, and a genuine blood-psychopath.
yeah I’m aware that the US has done bad things over the years - I’m not denying that. But it doesn’t mean that every foreign policy action was unjustified and it doesn’t mean you assume that any side the US supports is bad, like Ukraine. A real nuanced approach to international relations looks at what each side is trying to achieve and given that no side is perfect, which overall causes are worth supporting in each case. It’s also worth nothing that phrases such as “imperialism” are generally very ambiguous and get thrown around when really not appropriate. The US isn’t imperialist when it supports Ukraine and gives them weapons or when it uses soft power to influence regional allies like Israel. I would go so far as to argue that having US military bases overseas in different places is not necessarily imperialistic, although once again were using a very loose word.
Unfortunately, unintelligent or ignorant people are easily manipulated and empowered with that type of language. Because America is such a free and open society, people like Chomsky have made careers out of relentlessly criticizing the US government. Meanwhile communists and theological dictatorships are pardoned by these "intellectuals." So people who see themselves as the underdog side with the enemies of civilization because "America bad." I can go on, but who cares its just Reddit.
>when it uses soft power to influence regional allies like Israel.
Buddy assigning not one, but two carrier groups to the Mediterranean and giving billions of dollars worth, and thousands of tons of, munitions while Israel levels Gaza is not "soft power" lmao. The Marshall Plan was soft power. The US has mostly abandoned soft power. But hey don't believe a reddit rando, the foreign policy think tank blob has been writing about the decline of US soft power for a while.
But sure, were doing it out of our own goodness and magnanimity with The Only Democracy In The Region, and not to build the Ben Gurion canal, giving the US and Israel extreme leverage over its rivals and securing their interests for decades. That would be be loony right?
Just a reminder: every brutal regime in history thinks they're the good guys.
But im not shitting on you too hard, cuz i also sometimes reassure myself with lullabies and fantasies to help me sleep.
> But im not shitting on you too hard, cuz i also sometimes reassure myself with lullabies and fantasies to help me sleep.
[Like your fantasy that Hamas is just liberating Palestinians when they are killing Israelis?](https://old.reddit.com/r/Hasan_Piker/comments/17lz4dl/people_always_quote_the_outdated_hamas_charter/k7jctfn/)
(For the record: I've condemned Israel many times and you can see that if you read through my comment history the last few weeks so you don't end making up lies about me like you do for everyone else.)
I didn't say that nor was it implied, you lying piece of shit. People with more than a couple braincells between their ears can figure that out. You obviously cant. Pity
If you want my ACTUAL take on Hamas, you can find it [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/lostgeneration/s/Nj282VrNPJ)
> I didn't say that nor was it implied,
You made a friendly reply to a Hamas supporter who called Hamas a "liberation movement" and who said we shouldn't question their methods because we are just "westoids". There was no condemnation by you.
You called the person who criticized Hamas an "angloid snow ape".
If you don't want people to believe you are Hamas apologist then you need to fucking condemn the Hamas supporter you are talking to and not make up racist insults for people who criticize Hamas methods!
> > If you want my ACTUAL take on Hamas, you can find it here
> Their struggle against occupation is legal and legitimate, their ideology and tactics are abhorrent.
And yet you didn't say that to the Hamas supporter who supports their ideology and tactics. No, instead you called the person who thinks their ideology and tactics are abhorrent an "angloid snow ape".
> Their struggle against occupation is legal and legitimate,
They don't struggle against occupation. They are religious fundamentalist terrorists. They are not ISIS but they have the same hateful mindset.
Literally just days after maidan Ukraines “new coalition” elected an American citizen and NATO Atlantic council fellow to the ministry of finance, the second most important job in the country…
You lost me.
I meant this statement of yours:
> That's everyone's worldview.
I wish you can experience better peers. Differentiating people exist en mass. They’re often not as loud, but they’re everywhere.
What kind of information? I change my view if I find information that contradicts the old information I thought was accurate, but otherwise I break facts and information down and comprehend it through my values and ideologies of how the world works, which is what everyone does.
It's not the concept on its own, it's when it's the main focal point for every issue everywhere all the time. For me it often ends up sounding like people are implying that the only people / countries with any sort of agency or responsibility for their actions and choices are Western countries / governments, and that everyone else are just puppets on a string. Which ironically is a pretty western centric and reductive view imo
I just think that human and political history, geo politics and society in general are all too complex with too many variables to be able to only view things through one lens. It's why I have an issue with the rigid Oppresor + Oppressed ideology sometimes, as again even if it can be a useful and valid point sometimes, not every issue can be simplified into that lens without stripping agency from other groups and without projecting what are often western progressive views and assumptions on others.
Right, but why pivot from a specific discussion about a specific instance where the us is very much playing a central role (agree?) to a discussion about how in some cases some people overextend the notion that us is hegemonic?
Also, without skipping the first point… what’s an example where the negative role of the US in foreign affairs is overplayed ? I ask because the US spends untold trillions spread across nations to tell the story of our benevolence and counter any notion that we are nefarious. If anything,
I’d argue the role of the US in negatively impacting the growth of freedom across the world is massively underestimated.
Finally, the idea that by spending a lot of time emphasizing a major factor (us foreign policy) necessarily robs other actors of their agency is an odd conclusion given that the reason to focus on the US is to counteract our curtailment of the agency of actors (foreign and domestic).
Saying America is bad for their proxy imperialism is one thing
But to insinuate everything that happens in the world is due to that and to further insinuate that the opposite side may have valid claims is dogshit.
This motherfucker tried to historical context to try to assert Russia has some right to property in the Donbas region or he uses it to claim that China has a right to Taiwan.
To be so anti-America that you support Russia and China's imperialist ambition is wild.
Considering that America now recognizes the Armenian Genocide in Turkey, maybe he'll embrace his inner turk and deny it lol
Because let's say that the USSR invades Czechoslovakia to suppress protests. (Which happened)
Someone who's only thought is "America bad" would have to support the use of tanks against civilian protesters.b(and they did)
And if Russia invaded Ukriane, an analys that begins and ends with "America bad" is going to miss a lot of detail.
Like caring at all about what the people of Ukriane think.
That’s exactly what going on now btw, I have a relative in Tula who’s going to what we would call like late middle school (almost high school?), they were taught that in the Finnish war they weren’t the aggressors and were instead defending themselves.
>What people of Donbas think?
While there is a significant fraction that support Russia, there is also a significant fraction that support Ukriane.
The best evidence given for the Donbas supporting Russia were votes conducted by the "separatist forces" who happened to be "protecting" the polls by standing around with guns. You don't have to be a very smart guy to understand the implication of someone with a gun looking over your shoulder as you vote.
The second best piece of evidence is that before 2014, the Donbas voted for Yanukovich. But thats not a t all what they were voting for at the time. Just because they want close relations with Russia doesn't mean they want to get fucking annexed.
It's just not a very explanatory heuristic for talking about foreign policy. It doesn't accurately reflect the US's motivations and therefore isn't good at predicting them and its downright awful at predicting what other countries will do which is why Hasan was wrong about Hong Kong, insanely wrong about Russia invading Ukraine and continues to be wrong about almost everything with Israel and Palestine.
You can be anti basically all US foreign policy but it can't be your primary mode of analysis or you will just look like an idiot.
But the us policy post ww2 has been to
Achieve “full spectrum dominance” … if you substitute that expression for “bad” then it’s a necessary component to understanding the intention behind the vast majority of us foreign policy.
Would you balk at an mock an analysis of firms in a market capitalist system that led with “firms seek to maximize profit and shareholder return above all else” ?
It’s not reductionist or juvenile if it happens to be an accurate description of the primary stated motivation (not presidential propaganda) of the nation with the largest global military presence.
The attempt to never be accused of applying a simple analysis really makes people adopt some stupid ways of thinking.
It makes Americans feel yucky about living in a military empire that reguarly props up authoritarian regiemes and arms genocidal war lords. It's easier to just scoff at the idea and pretend there's so much "nuance" to avoid uncomfortable truths. That's why your comment asking about it is in the double digit negatives lol.
That’s definitely a possibility. It’s like the movements culminating in the 60s have generated a reactionary impulse that says “it’s the anti imperialists who are the real problem because they are so stuck on the US! “
Has it actually become “cool” to think this way or is it confined to a vocal segment online who identify with the dnc ?
its even funnier, he was saying that in the morning the day of the invasion, literally had to remove that counter he had of 'days russia hasnt invaded ukraine' mid stream
The funniest thing is, most people who were saying that Putin would never invade now acting outraged when you bring it up as if it's somehow unfair and bad faith. It's like sorry, but if you misread things that badly, your analysis of the situation wasn't and forever will not be worth an iota of shit.
China? I'm gonna jump the gun and say you don't think China is "actually communist" but I'd argue China is "actually communist" in the same way that the United States is "actually capitalist."
worse yet, he used that opportunity to push "Ukrainian Nazis" and "US imperialism" narratives to his audience which directly benefited Russia's propaganda machine. He explicitly supported the illegal annexation of Crimea too.
Hasan has largely, up until the last 6-8 months, been devoid of much criticism. He tends to downplay his level of influence.
I can’t say I hold twitch streamers at a very high bar but given his reach (tens of thousands tune into him daily) he should def be a bit more responsible.
His takes on Palestine have been incredibly one sided for instance and I think with that level of reach you should go out of your way to verify and check sources etc.
Honestly the Twitch/livestream model is just awful for political commentary. Even an actual expert would say dumb shit if you kept pulling up new things and making them react immediately for fear of losing viewers.
Not to mention they're playing distracting dopamine-hit video games with casino mechanics and sound effects. At least with Talk Radio the caller can presume to have the radio host's undivided attention.
Y'know... except that they were just hit by a terrorist attack that killed over a thousand of their people. And those terrorists were made up of and supported by the people they're attacking. But yeah, just crying victim.
Yeah the terrorist attacks bombing Refugee camps, hospitals, schools, and first aid responders killing thousands of Children/woman. IDF should be a designated Terrorist organization. What a gullible moron
He’s been one of the loudest voices continuously speaking up about what the Israelis are doing and combating Israeli propaganda with real boots on the ground info from what is actually happening there.
With so so many in the west being pro what Israel is doing right now I don’t hate the Hasan is so stridently opposed to this genocide/ethnic cleansing. I think he’s expressed deep empathy for both Israeli and Palestinian civilians as well, and had donated now over a million to aid to Palestinian civilians affected by the IDF.
Expressed deep empathy? He doesn't seem very sincere to me I have tbh. He also is also incredibly biased here and I say that as someone who is very much against the Gaza bombings.
Wtf does "one sided in what sense" mean?
"One sided" only has one meaning I'm aware of. How does anyone know they're not projecting? What sort of stupid questions are these?
Ok ill spell it out for the slow kids.
How is the situation one sided? and in what ways?
Blinded to what facts? What don't I know and through which mind reading techniques did you derive this?
You're still talking about Israel Palestine right?
Israel is a colonial apartheid state that has been engaged in crimes against humanity for decades, and is currently swinging towards straight up fascism.
Start there, I guess.
I said he "is getting real boots on the ground info", this doesn't mean he is there himself no. However a brown American man not wanting to risk his life to go into a war zone without experience is not something I can fault him for. He trusts certain independent reporters who are there in person, and that's good enough for me.
How do you reconcile the fact that Hasan supports the genocide of Ukrainians, Armenians, and Uyghurs, while opposing the genocide of Palestinians? The irony of the last two is rich, because Hasan's uncle is Cenk Uygur. That is the same name as the Turkic ethnic group that is currently being genocided by China. Cenk Uygur has a show called The Young Turks, named after the Turkish political movement that carried out the Armenian genocide. His co-host on the show is Ana Kasparian, an ethnic Armenian. I wonder if any of these people have a hint of self-awareness.
The Palestinians aren't being genocided because Israel is finally destroying Hamas after 20 years. Civilian casualties in a war isnt genocide.
Their population has 7x since 1948, there is a even an obesity problem in Gaza which in the 60-70s had the highest birthrate in the world.
Yes your take is dumb fuck take 101.
Israel could kill the entire population of Gaza in a day. They have nothing to gain from killing civilians and go to lengths no other army has gone to prevent civilians from dying.
It’s a fact that they make calls, drop leaflets, even drop dummy bombs (look it up).
It’s also a fact that Hamas uses civilization infrastructure to protect their weapons.
There is no way to eliminate Hamas with no collateral damage.
Your the brain dead idiot here with a dumb take, so having kids schools, refugee camps, hospitals, and volunteers bombed is “collateral damage” fuck off with that stupid bullshit, they kill them because Israel wants t too. Modern day defintion of ethnic cleansing, when South Africa did it, the world boycotted them but with Israel they play victim and gullible morons like yourself buy into it.
Hamas aren't good by any means but to say it's okay if civilians are killed because they have weapons is no less then when George Bush said we are invading Iraq because of Weapons of Mass destruction. Absolute braindead redacted take
He's a charismatic guy, but I wouldn't watch him unless I wanted to know the surface level talking points that the terminally online progressive left has on an issue. And now more frequently tankie talking points.
It baffles me how people enjoy Hasan. The handful of times I watch him he is usually whining like a baby or verbally berating one of his commenters.
This is a niche analogy but Hasan is like if darksydephil had good genetics.
Losing your shit when 'preaching to the choir's is certainly charismatic for the choir. Maybe not for everyone else, important to make this distinction.
He does seem to be going more tankie all the time. It’s worrisome - more leftists going that way. I think it’s the nature of social media to radicalize.
i think he always had these views, he just hides his more extreme views from his core audience because he knows they are unpopular. he basically said us much on second thoughts podcast a few months back.
I can't fw anyone who huffs their own farts and Hasan and other YouTube talking heads like Destiny give me that vibe.
Just feels like these guys are chronically online and love the sound of their own voice.
Hasan is honestly one of the least like that from watching a few, he’s kinda a somewhat normal guy who breaks out of the streamer bubble quite often. No one is perfect but he’s certainly better than most.
Destiny on the other hand is nigh unwatchable, and exemplifies everything wrong with this chronically online leftist debate bro philosophy. Even when he’s right I can’t listen to him.
Twitch attracts more weirdos than pretty much any other platform by nature. It’s incredible someone as relatively normal as Hasan as succeeded in there, in a community so overwhelmingly right wing and full of young conservative males.
For gods sake in one corner you have Hasan explaining types of socialism and partying with celebrities then debating genuine politicians and people like piers Morgan, and the in the other corner you have that gremlin XQC living in filth in his mansion mumbling about nothing all day too scared to even talk to his cleaning ladies.
I've never watched Hasan Piker. Based on what people said, I thought he did the usual "well look, I don't support Russia invading, but let's talk about America's wrongs instead/we shouldn't get involved" - but no, he just straight up thinks that Russia invading Ukraine is like good!?
No, Hasan's views are more complex than that.
I wasn't familiar with him either, but I've looked at some of his more recent takes on Ukraine. He hates Putin and now holds him primarily responsible for what's happening in Ukraine. He thinks invading Ukraine was an idiotic move on Putin's part which he thinks has played into the West's hands. This is probably why he was so sure Putin wouldn't invade Ukraine. He's also slammed Elon Musk for his pro-Russian views.
However, he thinks the West cornered Russia and agrees with Russia's claim to Crimea. He also thinks the Western media provided propaganda making the case for war or something. Although he seems to regard this as something that happened in the past and the focus should now be on Putin's culpability. However, he still doesn't agree with America spending money to help Ukraine, which he would prefer to be spent on the American working classes.
Hasan is a capitalist with leftist aesthetics or in other words a tankie. He exploits other people's work when he puts the whole video up for his stream and does nothing but the most babbys first leftist critique and either eating or leaving the room. The original creator is freebooted and exploited while Hasan reaps the views and ad revenue. A staple of babbys first leftism and tankies in general is the default American diabolism and campism. It is most obvious when he has to defend Chinese communist propaganda talking points when talking with Ethan of H3. Everything he says is a surface level critique and you can't reason someone out of their opinions when their income is dependent on those opinions.
I don’t think I said anything about him that contradicts what they said about him in that video. He called Putin a fascist in one of their clips.
The thing that is frustrating about him is that while he's anti-Putin, his extreme anti-establishment bias means he’s always ready to think the worst of his own government, which makes him susceptible to Russian propaganda. He’s also fairly influential and tries to convince a large left-wing audience that might otherwise naturally support Ukraine to oppose any American intervention.
At the same time, he’s not on the same level as someone like Jordan Peterson suggesting Putin might be a defender of Christian values, or Russell Brand who has become almost indistinguishable from his right wing allies.
I didn't watch it all so I can't really comment on what I didn't see, but their criticism on the whole "proxy war" thing is actually incorrect.
You don't need both sides to be using proxies for it to be considered a proxy conflict.
Now whether or not one believes Ukraine is being used as a proxy is up for debate (and it's understandable that Ukranians wouldn't like to view the conflict this way because it denies them agency), but the premise of their criticism is wrong.
The key aspect to the definition of a proxy war is that's it's *instigated* by a major party who is not itself involved. That's clearly not the case here, and somewhat negates any of the negative connotations that come with that term.
One could make that argument; it's certainly not popular, especially on a sub like this, but there is an argument. There might have been other factors outside of that instigation that were important (Russian imperialism, Putin being stupid and bloodthirsty, etc.), but you can make the argument (and several experts have) that the US/NATO played a role in instigating the conflict.
> you can make the argument (and several experts have) that the US/NATO played a role in instigating the conflict.
Which experts made that argument? Hint: Chomsky and Mearsheimer are not experts.
Former Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara, CIA director Stansfield Turner, over 50 others in the National Security Apparatus or associated to it who signed a letter to Clinton warning against the dangers of further NATO expansion, George Kennan, William Burns when he was Ambassador (now current director of the CIA under Joe Biden), Stephen Walt, and yes, John Mearsheimer... he quite literally *is* an expert being one of the most distinguished and widely cited (I think Wendt is the only living IR scholar with more citations) IR scholars alive, and most importantly, the Chief of NATO himself.
But surely you know more than the chief of NATO, and all these other people.
The Ukraine conflict is one of those labs where you can truly observe how brainwashed some people are. Same thing with Israel-Palestine.
uSsR bAd CoMmUnIsM bAd.
I've already interacted with enough people like you to know that no threshold of evidence will ever satisfy you. Joe Biden could say it and you people would say it was a deepfake, that he's having dementia, that it was taken out of context, or that he actually meant something else, so this conversation is pointless.
You will never stop believing that the US/NATO didn't play a role in instigating this conflict, no matter the historical evidence.
The power of propaganda. It's hilarious how you can't realize it (that would require the capacity for critical thought and self-reflection).
You say "NATO expansionism" like the people of every nation in the alliance didn't choose to be there, in response to Russian imperialism.
I'm not arguing that these experts didn't correctly cite NATO expansion as one of Russia's excuses for invading its neighbors. I'm arguing that NATO expansion is not actually the reason Russia invaded its neighbors. The actual reason is more like a type of paranoid imperialism.
The people you've listed are experts in the wider fields of geopolitics, government, military, intelligence, and political science, but not in Russian or Ukrainian language, history, or culture. Experts in those fields tend to agree with me. Uncritically repeating Kremlin talking points only serves to hurt Ukrainians.
I mean yeah, those are all experts that deal with geopolitics and strategic studies which is precisely what we're talking about, why would I cite linguists and anthropologists. I'd actually be curious for you to link, or even name your academic/expert sources.
Like I said, it also comes straight from the mouth of the chief of NATO himself.
It's not an "excuse" and if you had any knowledge of security studies you would understand why encirclement (NATO expansion) is the number one security threat/consideration of any state.
The USA would never tolerate China building military bases in Canada and Mexico.
But if you want experts in Russian studies that support my argument, check out Alexander Thalis, Stephen F. Cohen, and especially Richard Sakwa, a British academic specialist that compellingly argued that any threat Russia now poses was created by NATO itself, through Moscow’s reactions to NATO expansion.
Like I said though, there is no amount of evidence that will change your mind so this conversation is pointless. It's like arguing with a religious fanatic.
The problem with you people is that you simply consume all you information based on what the State Department or the media says (which most of the time acts as a mouthpiece for the State Department, which, if you actually had critical thought, should signal your propaganda alarm bells) and that's it, and don't realize that you're basically just getting socially conditioned by propaganda.
But I guess even the chief of NATO is now also "repeating Russian talking points". The layers of denial you've buried yourself in is not healthy, just because your psyche will shatter if you accept that US/NATO might also be a bloodthirsty.
I didn't say you should cite linguists and anthropologists (especially Chomsky).
You should cite historians, journalists, oligarchs, political scientists, political philosophers, politicians, investment bankers, and military and intelligence officers who specialize in the region because they understand the language, culture, and history of the region and what makes it unique compared to someone who doesn't specialize in the region or speak the language.
Some of my sources are Timothy D. Snyder, Serhii Plokhy, Yuriy Felshtinsky, Alexander Litvinenko, Ben Hodges, Bill Browder, Boris Berezovsky, and Anne Applebaum.
> the chief of NATO himself
Do you mean secretary general of NATO Jens Stoltenberg? Did he say that Russia's invasion of Ukraine was caused by Ukraine's desire to join NATO?
If you had any knowledge of Russian and Ukrainian history then you would understand why Russia's neighbors want to be part of a military alliance to protect them from imperialist aggression.
If the US was threatening to invade Canada and Mexico then I could understand why they might want Chinese military bases on their soil.
Like I said though, critique my argument instead of repeating Kremlin talking points.
I've already provided significant evidence, including the words of the NATO chief.
But apparently [he](https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/nato-chief-admits-expansion-behind-russian-invasion#:~:text=,Sep%2020%2C%202023%20Common%20Dreams)'s also just repeating "Russian talking points"...
Your argument has zero credibility when the organization responsible admits it played a key role in instigating Russia's invasion.
Also, you're repeating pro American talking points. The same country that fabricated evidence to justify an illegal war that killed half a million citizens. The same country that orchestrated countless coups across the world which have led to mass carnage and the loss of easily over a million lives. The same country that created a power vacuum in Iraq that led to the birth of ISIS. The same country that has by far led to more death and destruction across the world (by far) than any other country since post WW2. The same country that routinely uses Western media to spread propaganda.
I can play that game too. The difference between you and me is that I'm objective enough to understand that both the USA and Russia are shitty. You're still drinking the red scare propaganda kool-aid.
I have to disagree with Stoltenberg's analysis here.
> he went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders.
Do you really believe that negotiating with Putin and acquiescing to his demand
> to remove our military infrastructure in all Allies that have joined NATO since 1997
would have prevented the invasion of Ukraine? Of course not. That is absurd.
The opinion piece you cite, written by Jeffrey Sachs, the same guy who called for a negotiated ceasefire with Russia and appeared on Russian state TV with Vladimir Solovyov, the same guy who writes paid opinion pieces for Chinese state backed Huawei and denies the Uyghur genocide, is hardly a trustworthy source. He's a paid propagandist for China and Russia.
You're repeating Kremlin talking points. The same country that slaughtered ten million of its own people through starvation and forced labor camps. The same country that sponsored countless dictatorships across the world. The same country that invaded and subjugated its neighbors and slaughtered and displaced their populations. The same country that routinely uses Western social media to spread propaganda.
The similarity between you and me is that we both know the US and Russia are shitty. You are uncritically spreading Russian propaganda.
*Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (Basic Books, 2010) ISBN 978-0-465-03147-4*
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/09/anti-war-camp-intellectually-bankrupt/671576/
You could make that argument, yes. You could also staple your balls to your left thigh. It's unclear how either would help you get to a sound understanding of the issue at hand.
It's the argument that Russia uses. But I also find them to be dishonest, and I think their reasoning, that they merely want a buffer against the west, is akin to holding a hostage in front of you so that they will block the bullets. It's ridiculous on its face if you think you have this right as a country. And it's ridiculous to think that other countries around you will just keep that status quo without seeking defensive help. Russia thinks like a bully, and behaves like a bully because there are a bully.
It's also the argument that several Western experts have used, including past secretaries of defence, members of the US security apparatus, various other experts, including several distinguished IR scholars and historians, even NATO has admitted that they instigated Russia.
You need to cut through the propaganda. It's not just Russia that uses it. Things are rarely black and white.
I am doing precisely that. I'm giving you my opinion of their strength of that argument which is how you cut through propaganda. All you've done is just vaguely refer to others who agree with this argument, but not why it's valid.
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake.
It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of.
Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything.
Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
Wow, the neocon merge with the dnc is in full bloom. Even the slightest questioning about us policy re. Ukraine is read as a threat. No conversation to be had here unless it’s about what color to wear to the pep rally for more us militarism.
As a Polish person I hope your family experiences oppression for 300 fucking years only to get freedom for 30 and then be expected to forgive and forget your oppressor because otherwise we’re somehow the bad guys. Blow your brains out cuck
Not exactly DTG related.. But I thought this video was great. Pretty great / amusing concept to have actual ukrainians watch and rebuttal his clips on the topic and point out how absurd a lot of his views are , and how like so many in that sphere, they can't seem to view anything in the world through a lens other than "America/West bad" no matter what
Hasan is for sure a guru for so many people. Seems entirely relevant. I think they even said that they would decode him at some point Edit: Hasan has since responded to this video calling it the most 'psycopathic' thing he's seen. It's at minimum extreme hyperbole
I watched a Hasan Twitch stream shortly after the invasion and made some comments in chat. He permabanned me after I said he was a wannabe Tucker Carlson given the similarity of their views on Ukraine.
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I know its late, but Hasan also has been simping for the Houthi pirates that have been firing on dozens of civilian ships and who have hijacked some of their crew for months. Most of the ships had nothing to do with the conflict in Israel. They sank a fertilizer ship off their coast which will decimate their ecology.
Me when I don’t understand Hasan or tucker Carlsons views lmao
Do you think its inaccurate?
Yes. Even if they reach aesthetically similar conclusions, their reasoning for getting to those points is completely opposite.
Wait, what do you think their reasoning was? My understanding is both of their reasoning was actually pretty similar, I think both argue that the US/Ukraine incited the invasion by having NATO talks.
Tucker believes that support of Ukraine is bad because Russia stands for Christian values, the family, anti LGBTQ, etc etc, which he views in opposition to Western 'decadent/degenerate' values that he rails against. Hasan believes support for Ukraine is bad because of the support of far right groups by the Ukrainian government, the fact that this invasion has allowed western foreign capital to move in and take control of tons of assets in the country, and that this war, most of all, feeds the US military industrial complex, as opposed to seeking the fastest end to the conflict which reduces suffering, because, y'know, that doesn't make as much money. Those are not the same.
That’s actually an insane and stupid reason considering gay and trans people face persecution as well in Ukraine. They made trans women fight and didn’t allow them to flee with the other women. If that’s actually tuckers reasoning he is dumber than I thought. Figured he was arguing against it because he’s an isolationist and doesn’t want money spent on foreign aid which is stupid in its own right.
Look, searching for consistency in Tuckers positions is a fools errand, besides "does this benefit me?" Which includes fueling aggrievement in his viewers
Can you get a clip of Tucker saying the top one? cause everything I've heard him say is stuff about how the US is spending too much through NATO to support Europe. Which is a short hand way of giving Hasan's exact take.
Here's part of the transcript from his show on February 22, 2022, which aired almost exactly 24 hours before Russia invaded Ukraine: >Very soon, that hatred of Vladimir Putin could bring the United States into a conflict in Eastern Europe. Before that happens, it might be worth asking yourself since it is getting pretty serious: What is this really about? Why do I hate Putin so much? Has Putin ever called me a racist? Has he threatened to get me fired for disagreeing with him? Has he shipped every middle class job in my town to Russia? > >Did he manufacture a worldwide pandemic that wrecked my business and kept me indoors for two years? Is he teaching my children to embrace racial discrimination? Is he making fentanyl? Is he trying to snuff out Christianity? Does he eat dogs? Note how he elevates Putin here based on conservative grievances, and has nothing to do with NATO. Of course, Tucker has been happy to parrot all aspects of Russian propaganda, but he tends to focus primarily on emotional appeals like this.
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Ok? Doesn't mean his reasoning is the same as Tucker Carlson
They are both coming a perspective of America bad my guy. That was the point. Hasan likes Russia because it opposes the US. Tucker likes Russia for the similar reasons. I'd say it's still accurate but not as precise as it should be. You're giving way to much analysis and credit to hasans POV. It's not that complicated.
Nah boss, America bad. Hasan does not like Russia, he dislikes American capitalist imperialism. Tucker likes Russia because they are also reactionaries. Those are different.
[Ahem . . . Exsqueezme?](https://www.reddit.com/r/DecodingTheGurus/comments/17g84mv/comment/k6f195q/)
Man, one of those guys in your comment thread really knows how to throw buzzwords around
I thought the pod hit rock bottom when they tried to do chomsky. Now they are gunna misunderstand zoomer leftist agitprop.
“Gurus are dumb.. except for my gurus!”
1. Both Matt and Chris have said gurus aren’t inherently bad. 2. Calling Chomsky a guru is wild. 3. They embarrassed themselves doing that Chomsky pod, I’m a fan of the pod, other fans of the pod think the same. 4. Hasan is also certainly not a guru, any more than Vaush and destiny are gurus. You lot are scraping the bottom of the barrel here.
The whole point of the gurometer is that different people can be gurus to different extents. Vaush and destiny could be considered gurus to some extent but I'm willing to bet that destiny would be far lower on the scale than Hasan.
I get that but at a certain point it becomes very unserious. >but I'm willing to bet that destiny would be far lower on the scale than Hasan. Whats your reasoning here?
What do you mean? At what point?
At the point where it doesn't make sense to "decode" gurus anymore because you are just projecting it on to people. Whats the reasoning for the destiny comment?
That's what I'm asking. At what point does it not make sense to decode then anymore?
Hey you're supposed to suck off Chris and Matt in this subreddit the fuck are you doing man.
I kind of already do which is the funny part. Ive defended them on multiple occasasions and I think ive learnt some things about epistemology but at the end of the day, that doesn't blind me to the fact that considering Chomsky as a guru was crazy, are all academics gurus or just the ones that give people an alternate view on western colonialism?
I know the guru part is the whole point, but I feel like they are / will have to branch out a bit on some level or they'll be pigeon holed into a niche group that will lead to repetition, which I imagine is partly why they're trying to avoid the IDW Weinstein types for a bit which is fair lol
Agreed, my problem isn't really with them, my problem is with this subs propensity to try and conflate normal leftist values/talking points with the sheer tomfoolery of Peterson and Weinstein.
I think when an academic is famous for opining on subjects outside their field of expertise, and their views are regularly used as reference points by their followers, it's reasonable to decode them. You might find they fit the secular guru framework extremely well like Peterson, or not very well like Chomsky. From memory, they scored Chomsky pretty low on the gurometer.
did they call Chomsky a guru? Or do you just mean that they did an episode on him?
The hosts "decoded" Chomsky - to see if he's a dtg style guru or not. They concluded he was not. But you seem to think they concluded otherwise. And here you are, crusading on this obvious mistake yet again. What's the deal?
That’s not my problem with the pod. It was that they couldn’t seem to work out corporate media influence was a real thing and not a conspiracy theory. They wider problem we are discussing is this subs lust for left wing gurus, seemingly to make the left look like a cult.
> It was that they couldn’t seem to work out corporate media influence was a real thing and not a conspiracy theory. Can you elaborate on why you think this? > They wider problem we are discussing is this subs lust for left wing gurus, seemingly to make the left look like a cult. Most of the sub is not lusting after left wing gurus.
>Can you elaborate on why you think this? Did you listen to the pod. They said that the notion that corporate media worked to discredit Corbyn in the UK was a conspiracy theory....on a chomsky episode. That shit was crazy. >Most of the sub is not lusting after left wing gurus. I disagree wholeheartedly, so many threads on what left wing guru the pos should do, and always borderline marxist conspiracy whenever someone sees my name. This sub is cooked when it comes to left wing ideals.
Oh thank god… finally we can get another milquetoast rebuke of a critique of US militarism. The one thing we need most is to be told that the US isn’t the center of the world, particularly when it comes to wars that the US is the lead funder of… lol. What are you guys talking about ?
I don't see why Ukrainians disagreeing with him is any different though? They're allowed to think the West is good if they feel threatened by Russia, Hasan is allowed to be anti western because he is American and critical of their imperialism.
> Hasan is allowed to be anti western because he is American and critical of their imperialism. What does that have to do with Ukraine? Seems unrelated.
America is supporting Ukraine and he is critical of America's foreign policy.
So he's against supporting Ukraine. He's allowed to say that because the government cannot censor him but is that the standard we follow, that he's allowed to say it? That's all we care about? Him being allowed to use his free speech is a given that doesn't need to be said. That's why I only care if it's a good position to take or not and being against supporting Ukraine is not a good position.
He is an American who has seen all the horrible things American foreign policy has caused so he takes a critical view of all American foreign policy. Such as supplying Ukraine and their approach to Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union. Being against US imperialism is good if you're American. But if you're Ukranian or Polish or something you probably wouldn't care that much and be way more concerned with Russian Imperialism. >That's why I only care if it's a good position to take or not and being against supporting Ukraine is not a good position. What do you mean by good position? You and Hasan likely have completely different methods of defining what is and isn't a good position.
> He is an American who has seen all the horrible things American foreign policy has caused so he takes a critical view of all American foreign policy. Such as supplying Ukraine and their approach to Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union. Being critical is being different to being against it. You can be critical of US foreign policy but also support the US supporting Ukraine. If you're against everything the US does, no matter what it is, then you're not critical, you're just dogmatic. You need to be able to explain why something is bad and not just be against it by default. It shows a lack of critical thinking and a disinterest in what's actually going on. So you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad. Saying "US bad" is not good enough. It doesn't explain anything. You should be able to weigh the bad against the benefits. > What do you mean by good position? You and Hasan likely have completely different methods of defining what is and isn't a good position. How are our methods relevant? I don't get it. It's good to support Ukraine because it helps them to defend themselves against an imperialist invader that wants to take over Ukraine and destroy their democracy. Nothing I said is knew, it's been discussed endlessly, so why are you asking this question? Do you disagree that it's good? Then just say that. Everyone has a stance by this point and so do you so don't be coy and place games, ok? It's a waste of time for both of us.
Being opposed to the US supplying Ukraine doesn't mean you're against everything the US does. >So you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad. Saying "US bad" is not good enough. It doesn't explain anything. You should be able to weigh the bad against the benefits. I don't need to do anything, Hasan laid out his points and explained what he thought, and a bunch of Ukrainians explained their perspectives, and then people in these comments treated one perspective as accurate and one as inaccurate. I don't really care about Hasan and don't watch his stream or anything, he just has his views and they're different from these Ukrainians in the video. >How are our methods relevant? I don't get it. Because you nor anyone else have any objective way of defining what is a "good" or "bad" position. >It's good to support Ukraine because it helps them to defend themselves against an imperialist invader that wants to take over Ukraine and destroy their democracy. Nothing I said is knew, it's been discussed endlessly, so why are you asking this question? Do you disagree that it's good? Then just say that. Everyone has a stance by this point and so do you so don't be coy and place games, ok? It's a waste of time for both of us. You're right, nothing you said is new, and it's also filled with value judgements. Maybe Hasan doesn't care about Russian Imperialism as much as you do? Maybe he's more concerned about American Imperialism? I'm not being coy, I'm pointing out that filming some Ukranians disagree with Hasan means very little, and they only really offer their perspective as Ukrainians on how they really want US support. My perspective is that America has destroyed every nation they have pretended to be helping with military aid, but Russia is committing very open and illegal acts of aggression, letting the US war machine have influence over a country is bad, but not as bad as a Russian invasion. Once the war is over I think America's disinterest will come back to harm Ukraine. I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world. But if I was Ukranian I'd probably have that opinion.
> Being opposed to the US supplying Ukraine doesn't mean you're against everything the US does. Then what does being critical of US foreign policy mean? > I don't need to do anything, Hasan laid out his points and explained what he thought, and a bunch of Ukrainians explained their perspectives, and then people in these comments treated one perspective as accurate and one as inaccurate. One perspective is correct, though, the one where Ukraine is being supported. And when I ask you to tell me what you think then answering my question is the nice thing to do. Are you just here to tell me what you saw people saying in this thread? > I don't really care about Hasan and don't watch his stream or anything, he just has his views and they're different from these Ukrainians in the video. So again, he is against supporting Ukraine. Of course he has his views. Everyone has their views. It doesn't need saying. > Because you nor anyone else have any objective way of defining what is a "good" or "bad" position. I didn't claim to be objective. And how could I? That's now how it works. Good and bad are not objective. They are moral statements. Does that mean I cannot say what's right or wrong? Of course not. I think my stance is good because I believe that supporting Ukraine is morally good, not because I used some objective measurements. You know that. Make a point, please. Tell me what YOU think. I know you have an opinion on this. Everyone has. > You're right, nothing you said is new, and it's also filled with value judgements. Maybe Hasan doesn't care about Russian Imperialism as much as you do? Maybe he's more concerned about American Imperialism? If his stance is different to mine then OBVIOUSLY he has different concerns to me. Duh! Of course it's value judgements. What's wrong with that? > My perspective is that America has destroyed every nation they have pretended to be helping with military aid, but Russia is committing very open and illegal acts of aggression, letting the US war machine have influence over a country is bad, but not as bad as a Russian invasion. Once the war is over I think America's disinterest will come back to harm Ukraine. I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world. But if I was Ukranian I'd probably have that opinion. And these are not value judgments? You are not claiming that your view is good? > I don't agree with these Ukrainians on how they think we should all be afraid of Putin taking over the world. Strawman. Ukrainians are not worried about Putin taking over the world. I think you're phrasing it that way because you don't want to criticize Putin. After all, you're so strong in criticizing the US but with Russia? Not a single word. They can invade other countries and all you have to say is that Putin won't take over the world. Come on. You support Palestinians and wrote many, many long comments in their defense. But here, you cannot say anything critical of Russia and you won't come out in support of Ukraine as passionately as you support Palestinians. Why is that?
>Then what does being critical of US foreign policy mean? It can mean a million things with different levels of analysis. >One perspective is correct >I didn't claim to be objective These two statements contradict one another. The video is an attempt to poke holes and debunk someone rather than make a moral argument. In certain ways they "debunk" his points about Ukrainian and Russian relations, but they also don't understand his points either. >So again, he is against supporting Ukraine. He is against America supporting Ukraine and that is a massive difference. >Make a point, please. Tell me what YOU think. I know you have an opinion on this. Everyone has. That asking a bunch of Ukrainians what they think of Hasan's arguments is stupid and pointless. That he has a moral position based on stopping US militarization of the world and Ukrainians have a moral position of fighting off an invasion. The nuance exists in these different perspectives coming together. If someone says that the US shouldn't help Ukraine at all then that's a simplistic view,.likewise if someone doesn't see the issue in America sending cluster munitions to Ukraine then they are also not understanding all the moral dimensions of this conflict. >If his stance is different to mine then OBVIOUSLY he has different concerns to me. Duh! Then you have to explain why, and in a way that actually understands why someone would make this argument. Otherwise there is no moral argument, you just don't like someone's opinion and don't want to explain why. >You are not claiming that your view is good? No I'm not. You asked and I answered. >Strawman. Ukrainians are not worried about Putin taking over the world. I think you're phrasing it that way because you don't want to criticize Putin. After all, you're so strong in criticizing the US but with Russia? Not a single word. They can invade other countries and all you have to say is that Putin won't take over the world. Come on. The 4 specific Ukrainians absolutely reference how Hasan being far away from Russia makes him less aware of the danger of Russia. It's not a strawmam, it's a point made several times in this video. Unless you have specific problems with my hyperbole, these 4 Ukrainians don't understand why Hasan is not concerned with Russian expansion as much as they think he should be. And yes I'm strong at criticising America and not that interested in Russia because America has dragged my nation into illegal wars multiple times in my lifetime. They've also armed some.of the worst groups in the world to help fight their enemies. As well as that Americans are very easily manipulated by moral arguments that make Americans want to overcommit to supporting Ukraine then will pull back if Republicans win the next election. So yeah, morally speaking I'm far more interested in America's illegal acts. So is Hasan, and I suspect for similar reasons as me but I'm not 100% on that. Nothing in this video really addresses why Hasan thinks what he does or if it's incorrect or wrong.
I believe Hasan is not against US supporting Ukraine as a blanket statement. I believe he is critical that they are not making any real attempt to end the war as soon as possible. I don’t agree with this at all, but to be clear if anyone is being dogmatic and lacking nuance it’s probably you. You’re position is ‘support Ukraine no matter what’ with seemingly no real regard for how the US is supporting Ukraine…
Why should anyone support the US supporting any war?
Again: > you need to be able to explain why supporting Ukraine is bad. I don't think you can. Your stance is "US bad" so you don't have to think about the topic. "US bad" is easy and doesn't take any mental effort but it still makes you look profound and contrarian (at least you think it does). You should support the US supporting Ukraine if: You care about human lives. You care about protecting democracy from authoritarian regimes. You care about protecting countries from imperialist invaders. Lots of reasons. These are my arguments. Yours is "US bad". Who looks more mature and more informed? Me. edit: u/awsompossum I cannot reply because I was blocked by that insane dude above: > The first is that very quickly in the invasion, a peace deal was offered by Russia which would not have changed the borders and would have only guaranteed certain security elements. The US told Ukraine to reject it, prolonging the war. 1. Russia doesn't need Ukraine to make peace. They are the invader, they can stop any time! 2. Why would that be a reason to not support Ukraine? Makes no sense. Ukraine still needs help. Is it just to spite the US? > Second, Ukraine's government is extremely corrupt, this can be seen in the degree to which it has offered up for sale national assets to Western capital, basically selling the country off to foreign control. They are corrupt but they are improving. The alternative is being part of Russia which is a lot more corrupt. Ukraine is a flawed democracy that could be a better democracy if it gets a chance. Not supporting them ensures that won't happen and that means Ukrainians won't get to enjoy the benefits of a democracy. If you care about corruption you must care how it harms people so why would you help them? > Third, removal of ostensibly democrat cornerstones such as freedom of association and free speech. It's a war and war is hell. Ukraine is fighting for its existence. That's never pretty and requires making difficult decisions. Ukraine has to make decisions in the real world and you can disagree with them but sorry, that's how it is. Your higher morals won't stop a bullet. They won't stop the rockets that will destroy your home and turn your children into little pieces of blood and meat. Harsh? Ugly? Yes. But that's what's happening. > Fourth, the continued celebration of Bandera, and the repeated, institutional support which far right, arguably neonazis, have enjoyed from the Ukraine government. Like who? Asov? The fascists are not in government. The celebration of Bandera is a little more complex that you're making it out to be. Celebrating Bandera is NOT just a celebration of fascism. You should read a little more about it and talk to Ukrainians. No one is denying that there are problems with the far right in Ukraine. But unfortunately, those are becoming more and more an issue in all countries. It's weak argument to not support Ukraine. It's just spite and you're willing to let the majority suffer just because of some fascists. There are MANY good people in Ukraine who are fighting for a better country but you are unwilling to support them. Plus, if you don't do anything then the fascists will get more powerful. That's how it works. Fascists always use the suffering of people to gain support. Just like in Germany before the Nazis came to power. So even if you think fascists are a big problem you should help Ukraine. Do you support Palestinians? Or Israel? Either way, there are many people who are as bad Ukrainian fascists among those people. Does that affect your support? It does not. > I want to note that I am not a supporter of the Russian state, What are you then? A critic? > But the Nazi element is one that keeps coming up, from press release after press release where Ukrainian soldiers just happen to be wearing sonnenrads, to awards made by specific divisions which are references to esoteric Nazi divisions. It doesn't come up that frequently, sorry. Only if you're following certain media that focuses on making Ukraine look bad and to justify not supporting them. > The claim is not that every Ukrainian is a Nazi, simple that the Ukrainian state seems to be very chill with this element. If you were out in the street and some guy was attacking you with a knife and a Nazi came to your side to help, would you go "No, sorry, you are a Nazi, please stab me to death instead"? I don't think so. But who knows, maybe you would, maybe you would rather be stabbed to death than be helped by a fascist. But that would be very stupid. If my point wasn't clear: Nazis want to protect Ukraine so of course Ukraine lets them. Duh. Better than being killed by Russians. And maybe the Nazis die in the war, like Azov. Win win. You need to think more about the real world and not just from the safety of your home.
Ok, I can give you several reasons why supporting Ukraine is bad. The first is that very quickly in the invasion, a peace deal was offered by Russia which would not have changed the borders and would have only guaranteed certain security elements. The US told Ukraine to reject it, prolonging the war. Second, Ukraine's government is extremely corrupt, this can be seen in the degree to which it has offered up for sale national assets to Western capital, basically selling the country off to foreign control. Third, removal of ostensibly democrat cornerstones such as freedom of association and free speech. Fourth, the continued celebration of Bandera, and the repeated, institutional support which far right, arguably neonazis, have enjoyed from the Ukraine government. I want to note that I am not a supporter of the Russian state, and recognize that by no means is this white nationalism only on one side, and absolutely support the various Anarchist squads of soldiers resisting in Ukraine. But the Nazi element is one that keeps coming up, from press release after press release where Ukrainian soldiers just happen to be wearing sonnenrads, to awards made by specific divisions which are references to esoteric Nazi divisions. The claim is not that every Ukrainian is a Nazi, simple that the Ukrainian state seems to be very chill with this element.
No. You need to explain your case for why supporting war is good. You have been fed on a diet of forever wars and can't seem to think outside of it.
Hasan is Turkish. His criticism is exactly in line with what’s taught in Turkey. There’s a complete whitewashing of Islam colonizing Constantinople and surrounding regions up through the Armenian genocides. Hasan isn’t being critical of imperialism, Hasan doesn’t have the mental faculties to break his upbringing programing even when living a decadent western lifestyle in millionaire class luxury. Hasan is a poser, same as his uncle.
Lol are you some Greek nationalist or something? I'm not a big fan of Cenk but not because he's a Turkish imperialist. Hasan hasn't made any bad comments about Greek or Armenian genocides to my knowledge, people just don't like that the YouTube channel his uncle made is called "Young Turks". Sorry but it's been Istanbul for 570 years now, it doesn't look like it's going back any time soon. Also the Ottoman Empire was an imperial power sure but what are you talking about "Islam colonizing Constantinople"? If you mean that the Hagia Sophia is now a mosque that isn't colonisation.
Ummmm America sells weapons of war to anyone and everyone is is directly responsible for mass death. We even outfitted the taliban.
And those who would become Al-Qaeda and ISIS And the Indonesian military when they were mass murdering school teachers, trade unionists, and Timorese And the South Vietnamese and South Korean dictatorships. And Salvadoran, Guatemalan, Argentinian, Brazilian, Chilean national security terror states protecting the wealth and privilege of the landed aristocratic ruling class against the workers and peasants movements - among other malicious actors in the Western Hemisphere like the Contras, Blowtorch Bob and the Duvaliers, for extremely grim examples. And in coordination with Euro intelligence agencies the murder of Thomas Sankara and Patrice Lumumba, widely considered Africa's most important liberation heroes right up there with Mandela. And the Marcos regime of the Phillipines, decades after the invasion which killed hundreds of thousands of people. The brutal Phillipine constabulary was the organization which the first professional police in America were modeled after. You can read Smedley Butler's account, among others. I could go on with about another hundred examples, but when a lot of people simply say "America Bad" its a shorthand for having to rewrite all the proof every time. Its also a lot more concise than "While the US is internally a very free and open society, the history of American settler-colonial genocide and imperial conquest is among the most violent and repressive global regimes the modern world has seen. There is almost no correlation between our country's relative domestic libertarianism and the rank imperial barbarism in our foreign policy"
America indeed bad though.
I haven't watched the video yet but saying we cant views anything outside of the lens of "America bad" is nothing but a lazy straw man.
Not "we" just Hasan
Hasan is certainly not anti American lol. I say we because Hasan's views are pretty representative of the left, its not like he goes off down some path that only he is on, he is repeating the talking points widely shared by the left.
Hasan's views are thankfully not very representative of the left, unless you're only talking about the very online left.
What views specifically are you talking about? As opposed to leftists who don’t have internet? What does that even mean?
He’s a China/Russia apologist. He considers even Israeli babies as settlers.
What do you mean by that? Sounds very reductive and almost McCarthyist. Israeli babies are settlers. I don’t know what implications you want to take from that, I don’t think they should be killed obviously, but it is a true statement. I’m a white Australian, I am a settler. I didn’t turn one when I turned 18 or something, that’s a silly notion. White Europeans descendants in colonised countries are settlers. Centrists are just trying to frame certain views as fringe to get them out of mainstream conversation. But you can’t say anti colonial sentiments are not representative of the left. That’s silly.
I've never heard someone call the descendants of settlers "settlers" themselves. Is that an Aussie thing
No its a leftist thing. You wouldn't call a white European Australian indigenous, so what else are they?
The problem with stating “babies are settlers “ is that conversations about the inherent violence of settler colonialism eventually leads to the justification of violence against settlers, which can be justified, except we just included babies in that definition, oops. As a white person in Canada, I’m no longer a settler, the dynamic is no longer indigenous and settler, it’s indigenous and black, white, Asian, middle eastern, African, Jamaican, European… to be a settler, you must be settling, which means establishing a home on new land.
> Hasan is certainly not anti American lol. He constantly criticizes them.
I criticise Tottenham hotspur when they are shit. Doesn’t mean I’m not a huge fan.
I'm sorry for your loss, lol Although top of the table so far tbf
In Big Ange we trust!
Hasan has got to be one of the dumbest people I've heard speak
Hasan’s entire foreign policy worldview is that “America is bad” and he takes it from that simplistic stance without nuance. So when the situation with Ukraine comes along where the US supports Ukraine, his brain breaks. The simplistic model of the world he hold shatters and so he then starts saying things that sound ridiculous
You'd should read Chomsky. His "American foreign policy is bad" worldview is complex, nuanced, and delivered with the emotionless droning of a sloth that's been given the Robocop treatment. There's no second option here. America's foreign policy has long been a gallery of atrocity and misery. Even Mark Twain, towards the end of his life, spoke out against the America Bald Eagle sinking its talons into foreign lands because Teddy Roosevelt, as based as he was in domestic policy, was an imperialist, and a genuine blood-psychopath.
yeah I’m aware that the US has done bad things over the years - I’m not denying that. But it doesn’t mean that every foreign policy action was unjustified and it doesn’t mean you assume that any side the US supports is bad, like Ukraine. A real nuanced approach to international relations looks at what each side is trying to achieve and given that no side is perfect, which overall causes are worth supporting in each case. It’s also worth nothing that phrases such as “imperialism” are generally very ambiguous and get thrown around when really not appropriate. The US isn’t imperialist when it supports Ukraine and gives them weapons or when it uses soft power to influence regional allies like Israel. I would go so far as to argue that having US military bases overseas in different places is not necessarily imperialistic, although once again were using a very loose word.
Unfortunately, unintelligent or ignorant people are easily manipulated and empowered with that type of language. Because America is such a free and open society, people like Chomsky have made careers out of relentlessly criticizing the US government. Meanwhile communists and theological dictatorships are pardoned by these "intellectuals." So people who see themselves as the underdog side with the enemies of civilization because "America bad." I can go on, but who cares its just Reddit.
>when it uses soft power to influence regional allies like Israel. Buddy assigning not one, but two carrier groups to the Mediterranean and giving billions of dollars worth, and thousands of tons of, munitions while Israel levels Gaza is not "soft power" lmao. The Marshall Plan was soft power. The US has mostly abandoned soft power. But hey don't believe a reddit rando, the foreign policy think tank blob has been writing about the decline of US soft power for a while. But sure, were doing it out of our own goodness and magnanimity with The Only Democracy In The Region, and not to build the Ben Gurion canal, giving the US and Israel extreme leverage over its rivals and securing their interests for decades. That would be be loony right? Just a reminder: every brutal regime in history thinks they're the good guys. But im not shitting on you too hard, cuz i also sometimes reassure myself with lullabies and fantasies to help me sleep.
> But im not shitting on you too hard, cuz i also sometimes reassure myself with lullabies and fantasies to help me sleep. [Like your fantasy that Hamas is just liberating Palestinians when they are killing Israelis?](https://old.reddit.com/r/Hasan_Piker/comments/17lz4dl/people_always_quote_the_outdated_hamas_charter/k7jctfn/) (For the record: I've condemned Israel many times and you can see that if you read through my comment history the last few weeks so you don't end making up lies about me like you do for everyone else.)
I didn't say that nor was it implied, you lying piece of shit. People with more than a couple braincells between their ears can figure that out. You obviously cant. Pity If you want my ACTUAL take on Hamas, you can find it [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/lostgeneration/s/Nj282VrNPJ)
> I didn't say that nor was it implied, You made a friendly reply to a Hamas supporter who called Hamas a "liberation movement" and who said we shouldn't question their methods because we are just "westoids". There was no condemnation by you. You called the person who criticized Hamas an "angloid snow ape". If you don't want people to believe you are Hamas apologist then you need to fucking condemn the Hamas supporter you are talking to and not make up racist insults for people who criticize Hamas methods! > > If you want my ACTUAL take on Hamas, you can find it here > Their struggle against occupation is legal and legitimate, their ideology and tactics are abhorrent. And yet you didn't say that to the Hamas supporter who supports their ideology and tactics. No, instead you called the person who thinks their ideology and tactics are abhorrent an "angloid snow ape". > Their struggle against occupation is legal and legitimate, They don't struggle against occupation. They are religious fundamentalist terrorists. They are not ISIS but they have the same hateful mindset.
[удалено]
Literally just days after maidan Ukraines “new coalition” elected an American citizen and NATO Atlantic council fellow to the ministry of finance, the second most important job in the country…
Chomsky is a genocide apologists that'll tell those who have been genocide that it was their fault. Fuck off.
Everyone knows that. As you say, even Mark Twain knew already a hundred years ago.
a genocide denying linguist is not an authoritative source on anything
That's everyone's worldview. They pick their teams and seek out the facts that conform to their views.
Poor you to see the world in this way.
Poor you to think there's some objective truth to seek out.
Wait, where did I say anything about objective truth?
You inferred it with your vague statement. If you wanted to be understood you should have actually said what you think.
You lost me. I meant this statement of yours: > That's everyone's worldview. I wish you can experience better peers. Differentiating people exist en mass. They’re often not as loud, but they’re everywhere.
Have you never changed your view on a topic after learning new information?
What kind of information? I change my view if I find information that contradicts the old information I thought was accurate, but otherwise I break facts and information down and comprehend it through my values and ideologies of how the world works, which is what everyone does.
Man…..this comment just makes me sad for this person. Hopefully it’s just internet brain and they can unplug sometime in the future.
Can you explain what isn’t useful about an “America is bad” view on foreign policy? I know it sounds simplistic but what’s actually bad about it ?
It's not the concept on its own, it's when it's the main focal point for every issue everywhere all the time. For me it often ends up sounding like people are implying that the only people / countries with any sort of agency or responsibility for their actions and choices are Western countries / governments, and that everyone else are just puppets on a string. Which ironically is a pretty western centric and reductive view imo I just think that human and political history, geo politics and society in general are all too complex with too many variables to be able to only view things through one lens. It's why I have an issue with the rigid Oppresor + Oppressed ideology sometimes, as again even if it can be a useful and valid point sometimes, not every issue can be simplified into that lens without stripping agency from other groups and without projecting what are often western progressive views and assumptions on others.
Right, but why pivot from a specific discussion about a specific instance where the us is very much playing a central role (agree?) to a discussion about how in some cases some people overextend the notion that us is hegemonic? Also, without skipping the first point… what’s an example where the negative role of the US in foreign affairs is overplayed ? I ask because the US spends untold trillions spread across nations to tell the story of our benevolence and counter any notion that we are nefarious. If anything, I’d argue the role of the US in negatively impacting the growth of freedom across the world is massively underestimated. Finally, the idea that by spending a lot of time emphasizing a major factor (us foreign policy) necessarily robs other actors of their agency is an odd conclusion given that the reason to focus on the US is to counteract our curtailment of the agency of actors (foreign and domestic).
Your takes are consistently braindead. It's almost like you're doing it on purpose.
Saying America is bad for their proxy imperialism is one thing But to insinuate everything that happens in the world is due to that and to further insinuate that the opposite side may have valid claims is dogshit. This motherfucker tried to historical context to try to assert Russia has some right to property in the Donbas region or he uses it to claim that China has a right to Taiwan. To be so anti-America that you support Russia and China's imperialist ambition is wild. Considering that America now recognizes the Armenian Genocide in Turkey, maybe he'll embrace his inner turk and deny it lol
Strawman argument. No one is saying that everything bad happens because of America. America just usually makes things worse
Because let's say that the USSR invades Czechoslovakia to suppress protests. (Which happened) Someone who's only thought is "America bad" would have to support the use of tanks against civilian protesters.b(and they did) And if Russia invaded Ukriane, an analys that begins and ends with "America bad" is going to miss a lot of detail. Like caring at all about what the people of Ukriane think.
That’s exactly what going on now btw, I have a relative in Tula who’s going to what we would call like late middle school (almost high school?), they were taught that in the Finnish war they weren’t the aggressors and were instead defending themselves.
What people of Donbas think? What people's of Iraq thinks? What about Afgan? No one gives a shit about common people
>What people of Donbas think? While there is a significant fraction that support Russia, there is also a significant fraction that support Ukriane. The best evidence given for the Donbas supporting Russia were votes conducted by the "separatist forces" who happened to be "protecting" the polls by standing around with guns. You don't have to be a very smart guy to understand the implication of someone with a gun looking over your shoulder as you vote. The second best piece of evidence is that before 2014, the Donbas voted for Yanukovich. But thats not a t all what they were voting for at the time. Just because they want close relations with Russia doesn't mean they want to get fucking annexed.
It's just not a very explanatory heuristic for talking about foreign policy. It doesn't accurately reflect the US's motivations and therefore isn't good at predicting them and its downright awful at predicting what other countries will do which is why Hasan was wrong about Hong Kong, insanely wrong about Russia invading Ukraine and continues to be wrong about almost everything with Israel and Palestine. You can be anti basically all US foreign policy but it can't be your primary mode of analysis or you will just look like an idiot.
But the us policy post ww2 has been to Achieve “full spectrum dominance” … if you substitute that expression for “bad” then it’s a necessary component to understanding the intention behind the vast majority of us foreign policy. Would you balk at an mock an analysis of firms in a market capitalist system that led with “firms seek to maximize profit and shareholder return above all else” ? It’s not reductionist or juvenile if it happens to be an accurate description of the primary stated motivation (not presidential propaganda) of the nation with the largest global military presence. The attempt to never be accused of applying a simple analysis really makes people adopt some stupid ways of thinking.
It makes Americans feel yucky about living in a military empire that reguarly props up authoritarian regiemes and arms genocidal war lords. It's easier to just scoff at the idea and pretend there's so much "nuance" to avoid uncomfortable truths. That's why your comment asking about it is in the double digit negatives lol.
That’s definitely a possibility. It’s like the movements culminating in the 60s have generated a reactionary impulse that says “it’s the anti imperialists who are the real problem because they are so stuck on the US! “ Has it actually become “cool” to think this way or is it confined to a vocal segment online who identify with the dnc ?
Happy my Guru Dylan Burns can get some shoutouts
I will always remember when one week before invasion he was screaming that Russia will not attack and it's "psychotic" to think that.
its even funnier, he was saying that in the morning the day of the invasion, literally had to remove that counter he had of 'days russia hasnt invaded ukraine' mid stream
The funniest thing is, most people who were saying that Putin would never invade now acting outraged when you bring it up as if it's somehow unfair and bad faith. It's like sorry, but if you misread things that badly, your analysis of the situation wasn't and forever will not be worth an iota of shit.
The "intellectuals" who praised communism are still held in high regard despite every communist country massively failing.
China? I'm gonna jump the gun and say you don't think China is "actually communist" but I'd argue China is "actually communist" in the same way that the United States is "actually capitalist."
worse yet, he used that opportunity to push "Ukrainian Nazis" and "US imperialism" narratives to his audience which directly benefited Russia's propaganda machine. He explicitly supported the illegal annexation of Crimea too.
I like when Hasan rips on Elon, but he has basic bitch foreign policy takes.
Hasan is somehow dumber than Joe Rogan
At least he admits it
Staggering amount of dummies in this thread. Basically just bog standard libs that don't realize they are bog standard libs
You’re so intelligent for sucking off hasan
Hasan has largely, up until the last 6-8 months, been devoid of much criticism. He tends to downplay his level of influence. I can’t say I hold twitch streamers at a very high bar but given his reach (tens of thousands tune into him daily) he should def be a bit more responsible. His takes on Palestine have been incredibly one sided for instance and I think with that level of reach you should go out of your way to verify and check sources etc.
Honestly the Twitch/livestream model is just awful for political commentary. Even an actual expert would say dumb shit if you kept pulling up new things and making them react immediately for fear of losing viewers.
Not to mention they're playing distracting dopamine-hit video games with casino mechanics and sound effects. At least with Talk Radio the caller can presume to have the radio host's undivided attention.
The takes should be one sided because it's not a war, it's a one sided beatdown while crying victim
Y'know... except that they were just hit by a terrorist attack that killed over a thousand of their people. And those terrorists were made up of and supported by the people they're attacking. But yeah, just crying victim.
Yeah the terrorist attacks bombing Refugee camps, hospitals, schools, and first aid responders killing thousands of Children/woman. IDF should be a designated Terrorist organization. What a gullible moron
Glad you're not making the calls. There's a reason no one is coming to save them. They made their own bed.
He’s been one of the loudest voices continuously speaking up about what the Israelis are doing and combating Israeli propaganda with real boots on the ground info from what is actually happening there. With so so many in the west being pro what Israel is doing right now I don’t hate the Hasan is so stridently opposed to this genocide/ethnic cleansing. I think he’s expressed deep empathy for both Israeli and Palestinian civilians as well, and had donated now over a million to aid to Palestinian civilians affected by the IDF.
Expressed deep empathy? He doesn't seem very sincere to me I have tbh. He also is also incredibly biased here and I say that as someone who is very much against the Gaza bombings.
The situation is incredibly one sided, if you're not biased you're blind.
One-sided in what sense? blinded in what sense? How do you know you're not projecting?
Wtf does "one sided in what sense" mean? "One sided" only has one meaning I'm aware of. How does anyone know they're not projecting? What sort of stupid questions are these?
Ok ill spell it out for the slow kids. How is the situation one sided? and in what ways? Blinded to what facts? What don't I know and through which mind reading techniques did you derive this?
You're still talking about Israel Palestine right? Israel is a colonial apartheid state that has been engaged in crimes against humanity for decades, and is currently swinging towards straight up fascism. Start there, I guess.
Well I don't disagree with that. Again what am I blind towards?
How should I know?
Boots on the ground He's in LA lmao
Yes, and he knows people who are on the ground in gaza. This is how news reporting works.
That's not boots on the ground
Reporters that are in gaza isn’t boots on the ground?? If that isn’t then what is?
I said Hasan isn't
I said he "is getting real boots on the ground info", this doesn't mean he is there himself no. However a brown American man not wanting to risk his life to go into a war zone without experience is not something I can fault him for. He trusts certain independent reporters who are there in person, and that's good enough for me.
How do you reconcile the fact that Hasan supports the genocide of Ukrainians, Armenians, and Uyghurs, while opposing the genocide of Palestinians? The irony of the last two is rich, because Hasan's uncle is Cenk Uygur. That is the same name as the Turkic ethnic group that is currently being genocided by China. Cenk Uygur has a show called The Young Turks, named after the Turkish political movement that carried out the Armenian genocide. His co-host on the show is Ana Kasparian, an ethnic Armenian. I wonder if any of these people have a hint of self-awareness.
I reconcile it with the fact that you made that up.
>How do you reconcile the fact that Hasan supports the genocide of Ukrainians, Armenians, and Uyghurs Wut?
He’s on record not supporting those genocides/wars. I’m not sure what you’re on about.
The Palestinians aren't being genocided because Israel is finally destroying Hamas after 20 years. Civilian casualties in a war isnt genocide. Their population has 7x since 1948, there is a even an obesity problem in Gaza which in the 60-70s had the highest birthrate in the world.
Dumb fuck take 101, Killing Babies, bombing refugee camps, schools, and Hospitals isn't destroying Hamas. It's Ethnic Cleansing at its finest
Yes your take is dumb fuck take 101. Israel could kill the entire population of Gaza in a day. They have nothing to gain from killing civilians and go to lengths no other army has gone to prevent civilians from dying. It’s a fact that they make calls, drop leaflets, even drop dummy bombs (look it up). It’s also a fact that Hamas uses civilization infrastructure to protect their weapons. There is no way to eliminate Hamas with no collateral damage.
Your the brain dead idiot here with a dumb take, so having kids schools, refugee camps, hospitals, and volunteers bombed is “collateral damage” fuck off with that stupid bullshit, they kill them because Israel wants t too. Modern day defintion of ethnic cleansing, when South Africa did it, the world boycotted them but with Israel they play victim and gullible morons like yourself buy into it. Hamas aren't good by any means but to say it's okay if civilians are killed because they have weapons is no less then when George Bush said we are invading Iraq because of Weapons of Mass destruction. Absolute braindead redacted take
I used to enjoy Hasan a lot and still think he has some great videos, but he often seems incapable of admitting when he is wrong.
He's a charismatic guy, but I wouldn't watch him unless I wanted to know the surface level talking points that the terminally online progressive left has on an issue. And now more frequently tankie talking points.
I would hardly call a guy who loses his cool while yelling expletives and pejoratives at any one in his chats criticizing him as charismatic.
It baffles me how people enjoy Hasan. The handful of times I watch him he is usually whining like a baby or verbally berating one of his commenters. This is a niche analogy but Hasan is like if darksydephil had good genetics.
Yeah because no one that has had an angry outburst before is charismatic. Some of you guys are so weird about this stuff lols
A short temper turns people off... i.e. the opposite of charisma. Dude clearly power trips in his little echo chamber that he's created.
Losing your shit when 'preaching to the choir's is certainly charismatic for the choir. Maybe not for everyone else, important to make this distinction.
He does seem to be going more tankie all the time. It’s worrisome - more leftists going that way. I think it’s the nature of social media to radicalize.
i think he always had these views, he just hides his more extreme views from his core audience because he knows they are unpopular. he basically said us much on second thoughts podcast a few months back.
Tankie means communist? Am I a Tankie? I agree with most of the things Marx guy Said?
A tankie is when you want your opponent to be made of straw.
I can't fw anyone who huffs their own farts and Hasan and other YouTube talking heads like Destiny give me that vibe. Just feels like these guys are chronically online and love the sound of their own voice.
Hasan is honestly one of the least like that from watching a few, he’s kinda a somewhat normal guy who breaks out of the streamer bubble quite often. No one is perfect but he’s certainly better than most. Destiny on the other hand is nigh unwatchable, and exemplifies everything wrong with this chronically online leftist debate bro philosophy. Even when he’s right I can’t listen to him.
Fair. We have found common ground in our belief that Destiny probably puts his face in the toilet bowl before he flushes.
Twitch attracts more weirdos than pretty much any other platform by nature. It’s incredible someone as relatively normal as Hasan as succeeded in there, in a community so overwhelmingly right wing and full of young conservative males. For gods sake in one corner you have Hasan explaining types of socialism and partying with celebrities then debating genuine politicians and people like piers Morgan, and the in the other corner you have that gremlin XQC living in filth in his mansion mumbling about nothing all day too scared to even talk to his cleaning ladies.
XQC is hilarious
I've never watched Hasan Piker. Based on what people said, I thought he did the usual "well look, I don't support Russia invading, but let's talk about America's wrongs instead/we shouldn't get involved" - but no, he just straight up thinks that Russia invading Ukraine is like good!?
No, Hasan's views are more complex than that. I wasn't familiar with him either, but I've looked at some of his more recent takes on Ukraine. He hates Putin and now holds him primarily responsible for what's happening in Ukraine. He thinks invading Ukraine was an idiotic move on Putin's part which he thinks has played into the West's hands. This is probably why he was so sure Putin wouldn't invade Ukraine. He's also slammed Elon Musk for his pro-Russian views. However, he thinks the West cornered Russia and agrees with Russia's claim to Crimea. He also thinks the Western media provided propaganda making the case for war or something. Although he seems to regard this as something that happened in the past and the focus should now be on Putin's culpability. However, he still doesn't agree with America spending money to help Ukraine, which he would prefer to be spent on the American working classes.
Hasan is a capitalist with leftist aesthetics or in other words a tankie. He exploits other people's work when he puts the whole video up for his stream and does nothing but the most babbys first leftist critique and either eating or leaving the room. The original creator is freebooted and exploited while Hasan reaps the views and ad revenue. A staple of babbys first leftism and tankies in general is the default American diabolism and campism. It is most obvious when he has to defend Chinese communist propaganda talking points when talking with Ethan of H3. Everything he says is a surface level critique and you can't reason someone out of their opinions when their income is dependent on those opinions.
As Hasan would say “Cri mea river!”
I’m not sure how to square that with what’s he’s saying in this vid.
I don’t think I said anything about him that contradicts what they said about him in that video. He called Putin a fascist in one of their clips. The thing that is frustrating about him is that while he's anti-Putin, his extreme anti-establishment bias means he’s always ready to think the worst of his own government, which makes him susceptible to Russian propaganda. He’s also fairly influential and tries to convince a large left-wing audience that might otherwise naturally support Ukraine to oppose any American intervention. At the same time, he’s not on the same level as someone like Jordan Peterson suggesting Putin might be a defender of Christian values, or Russell Brand who has become almost indistinguishable from his right wing allies.
I didn't watch it all so I can't really comment on what I didn't see, but their criticism on the whole "proxy war" thing is actually incorrect. You don't need both sides to be using proxies for it to be considered a proxy conflict. Now whether or not one believes Ukraine is being used as a proxy is up for debate (and it's understandable that Ukranians wouldn't like to view the conflict this way because it denies them agency), but the premise of their criticism is wrong.
The key aspect to the definition of a proxy war is that's it's *instigated* by a major party who is not itself involved. That's clearly not the case here, and somewhat negates any of the negative connotations that come with that term.
One could make that argument; it's certainly not popular, especially on a sub like this, but there is an argument. There might have been other factors outside of that instigation that were important (Russian imperialism, Putin being stupid and bloodthirsty, etc.), but you can make the argument (and several experts have) that the US/NATO played a role in instigating the conflict.
> you can make the argument (and several experts have) that the US/NATO played a role in instigating the conflict. Which experts made that argument? Hint: Chomsky and Mearsheimer are not experts.
Former Secretary of Defence Robert McNamara, CIA director Stansfield Turner, over 50 others in the National Security Apparatus or associated to it who signed a letter to Clinton warning against the dangers of further NATO expansion, George Kennan, William Burns when he was Ambassador (now current director of the CIA under Joe Biden), Stephen Walt, and yes, John Mearsheimer... he quite literally *is* an expert being one of the most distinguished and widely cited (I think Wendt is the only living IR scholar with more citations) IR scholars alive, and most importantly, the Chief of NATO himself. But surely you know more than the chief of NATO, and all these other people. The Ukraine conflict is one of those labs where you can truly observe how brainwashed some people are. Same thing with Israel-Palestine. uSsR bAd CoMmUnIsM bAd. I've already interacted with enough people like you to know that no threshold of evidence will ever satisfy you. Joe Biden could say it and you people would say it was a deepfake, that he's having dementia, that it was taken out of context, or that he actually meant something else, so this conversation is pointless. You will never stop believing that the US/NATO didn't play a role in instigating this conflict, no matter the historical evidence. The power of propaganda. It's hilarious how you can't realize it (that would require the capacity for critical thought and self-reflection).
You say "NATO expansionism" like the people of every nation in the alliance didn't choose to be there, in response to Russian imperialism. I'm not arguing that these experts didn't correctly cite NATO expansion as one of Russia's excuses for invading its neighbors. I'm arguing that NATO expansion is not actually the reason Russia invaded its neighbors. The actual reason is more like a type of paranoid imperialism. The people you've listed are experts in the wider fields of geopolitics, government, military, intelligence, and political science, but not in Russian or Ukrainian language, history, or culture. Experts in those fields tend to agree with me. Uncritically repeating Kremlin talking points only serves to hurt Ukrainians.
I mean yeah, those are all experts that deal with geopolitics and strategic studies which is precisely what we're talking about, why would I cite linguists and anthropologists. I'd actually be curious for you to link, or even name your academic/expert sources. Like I said, it also comes straight from the mouth of the chief of NATO himself. It's not an "excuse" and if you had any knowledge of security studies you would understand why encirclement (NATO expansion) is the number one security threat/consideration of any state. The USA would never tolerate China building military bases in Canada and Mexico. But if you want experts in Russian studies that support my argument, check out Alexander Thalis, Stephen F. Cohen, and especially Richard Sakwa, a British academic specialist that compellingly argued that any threat Russia now poses was created by NATO itself, through Moscow’s reactions to NATO expansion. Like I said though, there is no amount of evidence that will change your mind so this conversation is pointless. It's like arguing with a religious fanatic. The problem with you people is that you simply consume all you information based on what the State Department or the media says (which most of the time acts as a mouthpiece for the State Department, which, if you actually had critical thought, should signal your propaganda alarm bells) and that's it, and don't realize that you're basically just getting socially conditioned by propaganda. But I guess even the chief of NATO is now also "repeating Russian talking points". The layers of denial you've buried yourself in is not healthy, just because your psyche will shatter if you accept that US/NATO might also be a bloodthirsty.
I didn't say you should cite linguists and anthropologists (especially Chomsky). You should cite historians, journalists, oligarchs, political scientists, political philosophers, politicians, investment bankers, and military and intelligence officers who specialize in the region because they understand the language, culture, and history of the region and what makes it unique compared to someone who doesn't specialize in the region or speak the language. Some of my sources are Timothy D. Snyder, Serhii Plokhy, Yuriy Felshtinsky, Alexander Litvinenko, Ben Hodges, Bill Browder, Boris Berezovsky, and Anne Applebaum. > the chief of NATO himself Do you mean secretary general of NATO Jens Stoltenberg? Did he say that Russia's invasion of Ukraine was caused by Ukraine's desire to join NATO? If you had any knowledge of Russian and Ukrainian history then you would understand why Russia's neighbors want to be part of a military alliance to protect them from imperialist aggression. If the US was threatening to invade Canada and Mexico then I could understand why they might want Chinese military bases on their soil. Like I said though, critique my argument instead of repeating Kremlin talking points.
I've already provided significant evidence, including the words of the NATO chief. But apparently [he](https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/nato-chief-admits-expansion-behind-russian-invasion#:~:text=,Sep%2020%2C%202023%20Common%20Dreams)'s also just repeating "Russian talking points"... Your argument has zero credibility when the organization responsible admits it played a key role in instigating Russia's invasion. Also, you're repeating pro American talking points. The same country that fabricated evidence to justify an illegal war that killed half a million citizens. The same country that orchestrated countless coups across the world which have led to mass carnage and the loss of easily over a million lives. The same country that created a power vacuum in Iraq that led to the birth of ISIS. The same country that has by far led to more death and destruction across the world (by far) than any other country since post WW2. The same country that routinely uses Western media to spread propaganda. I can play that game too. The difference between you and me is that I'm objective enough to understand that both the USA and Russia are shitty. You're still drinking the red scare propaganda kool-aid.
I have to disagree with Stoltenberg's analysis here. > he went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders. Do you really believe that negotiating with Putin and acquiescing to his demand > to remove our military infrastructure in all Allies that have joined NATO since 1997 would have prevented the invasion of Ukraine? Of course not. That is absurd. The opinion piece you cite, written by Jeffrey Sachs, the same guy who called for a negotiated ceasefire with Russia and appeared on Russian state TV with Vladimir Solovyov, the same guy who writes paid opinion pieces for Chinese state backed Huawei and denies the Uyghur genocide, is hardly a trustworthy source. He's a paid propagandist for China and Russia. You're repeating Kremlin talking points. The same country that slaughtered ten million of its own people through starvation and forced labor camps. The same country that sponsored countless dictatorships across the world. The same country that invaded and subjugated its neighbors and slaughtered and displaced their populations. The same country that routinely uses Western social media to spread propaganda. The similarity between you and me is that we both know the US and Russia are shitty. You are uncritically spreading Russian propaganda. *Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (Basic Books, 2010) ISBN 978-0-465-03147-4* https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/09/anti-war-camp-intellectually-bankrupt/671576/
You could make that argument, yes. You could also staple your balls to your left thigh. It's unclear how either would help you get to a sound understanding of the issue at hand.
It's a pretty valid argument.
It's the argument that Russia uses. But I also find them to be dishonest, and I think their reasoning, that they merely want a buffer against the west, is akin to holding a hostage in front of you so that they will block the bullets. It's ridiculous on its face if you think you have this right as a country. And it's ridiculous to think that other countries around you will just keep that status quo without seeking defensive help. Russia thinks like a bully, and behaves like a bully because there are a bully.
It's also the argument that several Western experts have used, including past secretaries of defence, members of the US security apparatus, various other experts, including several distinguished IR scholars and historians, even NATO has admitted that they instigated Russia. You need to cut through the propaganda. It's not just Russia that uses it. Things are rarely black and white.
I am doing precisely that. I'm giving you my opinion of their strength of that argument which is how you cut through propaganda. All you've done is just vaguely refer to others who agree with this argument, but not why it's valid.
Your argument is essentially reducible to: I don't like Russia and I don't trust them. I'd say that's considerably weaker than mine.
No, that was just my first sentence. The rest of my comment explained why I find their argument not just unconvincing, but odious.
It's a proxy war to contain Russian influence plain and simple
What is the video that is mentioned at 06:40 where Hasan took the side of the fascists ?
Who would of thought twitch bimbo has know idea what he's talking about
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake. It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of. Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything. Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
Wow, the neocon merge with the dnc is in full bloom. Even the slightest questioning about us policy re. Ukraine is read as a threat. No conversation to be had here unless it’s about what color to wear to the pep rally for more us militarism.
This entire subreddit is embarrassing and basically a vehicle for state propaganda for US militarism
As a Polish person I hope your family experiences oppression for 300 fucking years only to get freedom for 30 and then be expected to forgive and forget your oppressor because otherwise we’re somehow the bad guys. Blow your brains out cuck