I think everyone who has been paying attention saw this coming. Now so-called "socialist" Hasan Piker is putting out CNN level liberal propaganda. Even western polling had to admit that Putin enjoyed an approval rating above 80% just prior to the election, but of course when you have demonized Russia to this degree you have to resort to reality denial to explain what you see.
We need to start using the term "red liberal" to describe these "leftist" political streamers and YouTubers who mimick the aesthetics and language of leftism while feeding into imperialist dogma and liberal assumptions about the world. Hasan also continues to deny the Donbass genocide that had been taking place since 2014 before Russia finally intervened, refuses to accept that Russia had legitimate reason to take action to stop NATO eastward expansion, and downplays the Nazi nature of the Kiev regime.
Now after he made fun of all the dumbass chuds who insisted in 2020 that the US election was stolen and made up all kinds of conspiracy theories to try and justify it, Hasan himself engages in the same kind of behavior when it comes to Russian elections. This is the kind of "socialist" who will act like they are not Democrat shills by superficially criticizing Genocide Joe yet continue to advocate that you vote for Democrats as the "lesser evil".
It is good though that since 2022 all of these sheepdogs for liberal imperialism have been exposing themselves. Now we know where the lines are drawn. Once again Lenin's words ring true:
"We are marching in a compact group along a precipitous and difficult path, firmly holding each other by the hand. We are surrounded on all sides by enemies, and we have to advance almost constantly under their fire. We have combined, by a freely adopted decision, for the purpose of fighting the enemy, and not of retreating into the neighbouring marsh, the inhabitants of which, from the very outset, have reproached us with having separated ourselves into an exclusive group and with having chosen the path of struggle instead of the path of conciliation. And now some among us begin to cry out: Let us go into the marsh! And when we begin to shame them, they retort: What backward people you are! Are you not ashamed to deny us the liberty to invite you to take a better road! Oh, yes, gentlemen! You are free not only to invite us, but to go yourselves wherever you will, even into the marsh. In fact, we think that the marsh is your proper place, and we are prepared to render you every assistance to get there. Only let go of our hands, don't clutch at us and don't besmirch the grand word freedom, for we too are "free" to go where we please, free to fight not only against the marsh, but also against those who are turning towards the marsh!"
Let's not exaggerate, the US isn't yet on the same level as Germany. There are plenty of people in the US in alternative media who have a much less anti-Russian stance than Hasan, some are even openly pro-Russian. They get harassed yes, but generally if you are a big enough public personality there is not much that will happen to you. Hasan himself even got away with telling the truth about 9/11.
This is more accurate. He has a vested financial interest in continuing to toe the liberal pro-imperialist line. He would indeed lose a good chunk of his audience and perhaps advertiser contracts if he did not go along with the anti-Russia talking points. This just indicates that he is a self-interested coward who is more worried about keeping the millions flowing in from subscriptions and advertisements than in actually using his platform responsibly and bringing (unpopular) truth to his massive audience.
I'm sorry but when you have a platform you also have a responsibility. He is not some working class regular Joe who out of self-preservation needs to shut up or else fear losing his job and his home. He has made a choice to support the propaganda narrative that is leading us down an ever more slippery slope of escalating war with Russia. "Putin is a tyrannical dictator", "China is genociding Uyghurs", "Saddam Hussein has WMDs", these are the kinds of lies that lay the groundwork for wars.
In addition to serving the pro-war neocon agenda this kind of rhetoric is also putting Russians living in the West in physical danger just as anti-China propaganda puts Chinese people at risk. Already there have been people who have been fired from their jobs for admitting that they voted for Putin. In other countries people have been investigated by police and even arrested just for posting "pro-Russian" opinions online.
Hasan has both the money and the clout to be able to safely speak out against this atmosphere of paranoia and persecution but chooses to feed into it instead.
He is easily the most influential leftist figure, maybe it's just me but if i was in his shoes i would be very careful with my words because the US does have an history of minecrafting dissident figures. Another point, his audience is mainly baby leftists filled with liberal propaganda, if i was in his shoes i'd take it step by step, avoid talking about some topics while focusing on others that might be more important like China.
We definitely should call out the liberal propaganda he spews, so people ready to outgrow him can find the criticisms, but lets pump up the brakes a bit with calling him a sellout, he is doing this 24/7 and is bound to eventually say stupid shit, IMO he is a very important part of the communist pipeline.
Well then Hasan is perfectly safe. You're not much of a dissident when you repeat state department talking points about the US's geopolitical enemies.
He is part of a pipeline alright, i'm just not sure it's a communist pipeline. More like a pipeline leading baby leftists away from anti-imperialism and back into system-compatible radical liberalism.
This argument would make sense if he was actually avoiding talking about it. He could have kept his mouth shut about the Russian election if he didn't want to be accused of legitimizing Putin, but instead he chose to speak on it and basically call it rigged. And again, i have to stress it's not that i am against saying that an election under a liberal democratic political system is, in a certain sense, illegitimate. It's that he doesn't ever say the same thing about elections in the US and Europe. He would never speak about Western elections in the same condescending, dismissive tone.
You don't have to like Putin (i certainly don't, and i am reminded of that every time he shittalks Lenin) to acknowledge the reality that he is just more popular in his own country than any Western politician has been in theirs in a long time. An ostensibly leftist political commentator like Hasan could choose to have a productive discussion with their audience about why that is and try and understand the political dynamics inside Russia from a materialist perspective and gain some actual insights. But instead, like liberals typically do, he refuses to even entertain the idea that another country's leader that he doesn't like can actually enjoy a considerable degree of support from the people of that country.
Liberals project their own likes and dislikes onto the rest of the world and assume everyone secretly thinks like them and just needs to be "liberated" by the enlightened West. Here is where that condescension and dismissiveness of other people's cultures and political systems comes in. This same applies not just to Russia but to other countries whose leaders are demonized by the West and labeled as "autocrats" or "dictators" even when they win elections and available evidence shows that they have a pretty good approval rating.
I might be biased and have a soft spot for him because i used to watch him religiously. But to raise another point, does it really matter if liberals demonize Russia?
Don't you think that its in our best interests that the west focuses its attention on Russia, an ideologically aligned state, than in China?
It matters when so-called "leftists" participate in and encourage that demonization. It matters when it is done against any country that the neocon psychopaths have set as a target for their destabilization and warmongering efforts. It matters when it is done to Syria, it matters when it is done to Iran, it matters when it is done to the DPRK, and it matters when it is done to Russia.
This kind of rhetoric is not harmless, it is the kind of rhetoric that lays the groundwork for wars and murderous sanctions. The same kinds of lies that were used to justify the invasion of Iraq, the bombing of Libya, the bombing of Yugoslavia, the dirty war on Syria, etc. Each time they claimed that the leader of the country was a tyrannical despot who needed to be deposed, and each time a certain section of complicit "leftists" helped them to solidify and legitimize their narrative.
What did Hasan say about 9/11?
He said that amerikkka deserved it, which is the truth.
The truth.