I've recently learned that American Zoomers love to learn about politics, science, and history through YouTube videos. Kurzgesagt, CGP Grey, and many other capitalist funded trash
I've told a friend about France receiving billions in payments from "former colonies" for their "independence" every year and their first instinct was to search up a YouTube video in front of me to learn more while I was trying to Google for a primary source of the hard financial data and agreements signed
People were lecturing me about how Putin thinks and will act based on videos they've seen from CGP Grey (like Rules for Rulers LOL). As if a man like Putin can be so easily understood and predicted from a dumb tech bro who watched an 8 minute cartoon yt video, especially given the context that he is the leader of such an enormous country like Russia
now imagine entire demographics that breathlessly believe everything they hear on fucking cable news and advertising :stalin-stressed:
Not just zoomers, humans and people.
This works for us as well, Second Thought has demonstrated this. The issue is that we lack people producing the content, something JT has called people to do more of.
A few others are doing good content like it, Gravel Institute's video on profit being theft is one of the best examples of this but marxist instead of liberal.
Make some fancy graphics, keep your videos short, and presenting them in a specific way reaches and convinces massively more people. Communists should learn to use this rather than just complaining about it.
If you make an edutainment video that's truly subversive it will be censored or shadowbanned as soon as it gains popularity (if it's on a major platform).
Who's JT?
JT runs Second Thought and has a pod with Hakim + Yugopnik. You're not wrong, homeland security knocked on JT's door and questioned him about his "anti-american activities" after this video.
JFC, I've never had to click through two content warnings on a youtube video before.
something JT has called people to do more of.
Ugh I really don't want to but I could probably make decent historical agitprop on TikTok. Ugggh I really don't wanna make a TikTok.
TikTok is interesting because you also need to figure out ways to abuse the algorithm which is based around how long people keep watching for, etc. Tricks that mesmerise people into watching longer than they otherwise would have seem to work really well at boosting the algo.
this is one of the few times it's acceptable to beat the shit out of your friends
At least that can be debunked in like 3 minutes by quoting hitler himself, one of the easiest things they spread to debunk imo.
The Nazis were not socialists. Their entire goal was to latch onto a popular political movement and redefine it to fit their needs(as all fascists typically do).
They did not support worker ownership of the means of production and the right for workers to work for themselves. Hitler repealed legislation that nationalized industry in Germany, and oversaw the expansion of private industry. The first modern implementation of privatization on a grand scale took place under the supervision of the Nazis. The word "privatization" was coined to describe a central tenet of Nazi economic policy. The Nazis raided and imprisoned union leaders and broke up trade unions. They repealed worker rights.
Behold Hitler's own words:
"There are only two possibilities in Germany; do not imagine that the people will forever go with the middle party, the party of compromises; one day it will turn to those who have most consistently foretold the coming ruin and have sought to dissociate themselves from it. And that party is either the Left: and then God help us! for it will lead us to complete destruction - to Bolshevism, or else it is a party of the Right which at the last, when the people is in utter despair, when it has lost all its spirit and has no longer any faith in anything, is determined for its part ruthlessly to seize the reins of power - that is the beginning of resistance of which I spoke a few minutes ago."
- Hitler explaining that he vehemently opposes the Left, and believes only Rightists like himself can make Germany great again. (Source is a speech in April 1921)
"Our adopted term 'Socialist' has nothing to do with Marxian Socialism. Marxism is anti-property; true socialism is not."
- Hitler literally admitting his "socialism" is a whole new thing and has nothing to do with the usual definition of the word. (Source is an interview Hitler gave to the Sunday Express printed on Dec 28th in 1938, you'll need to visit the library for this one)
"The ideology that dominates us is in diametrical contradiction to that of Soviet Russia. National Socialism is a doctrine that has reference exclusively to the German people. Bolshevism lays stress on international mission. We National Socialists believe a man can, in the long run, be happy only among his own people."
- Hitler trying so hard to explain that he isn't a socialist, that he opposes socialism, and that the term National Socialist is something he made up and only has meaning within the context of its own paradigm. (Speech at the Reichstag May 21 1935)
"We National Socialists see in private property a higher level of human economic development that according to the differences in performance controls the management of what has been accomplished enabling and guaranteeing the advantage of a higher standard of living for everyone. Bolshevism destroys not only private property but also private initiative and the readiness to shoulder responsibility."
- Hitler spelling it out in very clear terms that he wholeheartedly supports private ownership of property, i.e. capitalism, and opposes worker ownership of property, which he calls "Bolshevism", i.e. real, actual socialism. ( (Speech at the Reichstag May 21 1935)
"What right do these people have to demand a share of property or even in administration?... The employer who accepts the responsibility for production also gives the workpeople their means of livelihood. Our greatest industrialists are not concerned with the acquisition of wealth or with good living, but, above all else, with responsibility and power. They have worked their way to the top by their own abilities, and this proof of their capacity – a capacity only displayed by a higher race – gives them the right to lead."
- Hitler attacking the notion of worker ownership of property and licking capitalist boot. (Something he said to Max Amann, May 1930. It is from the book A history of National Socialism page 128.
"We might have called ourselves the Liberal Party. We chose to call ourselves the National Socialists. We are not internationalists" (1923 Interview With Hitler).
lmao CGP Grey. Unless he changed them retroactively, in his videos, each country/region is represented by a human figure, and it just happens that the figures for China, Hong Kong, and Macao always have the _ face, whilst all other countries have the normative dots (.) as eyes.
americans are the most heavily propagandized human beings in the history of planet earth.
I am completely serious when I say Americans are as propaganised as they think northern Koreans are
Maybe even moreso because they believe the average North Korean is held at gunpoint to accept everything. Americans will get angry if their propaganda isn't nationalistic enough.
So much of the American attitude towards NK amounts to "What if they're doing the stuff we do to our people, but they say the Atheist Communist Orientalist Thing rather than the Correct Thing."
Generational politics are dumb, and most people of every generation have terrible media literacy.
However, I stand by the statement that (among Amerikkkans at least) media literacy peaked with millennials. This is due to the specific material circumstances that shaped the US millennials' encounter with the internet.
Honestly feel that the term "google it" was an aspect of millennials being that we had the initial ability to track sources of information down quickly, now the internet is a clusterfuck demon meant to suck up your time with distraction which can be fun but also fucks with your means of having a reliable attention span.
However, I stand by the statement that (among Amerikkkans at least) media literacy peaked with millennials.
I think it was the combination of being young enough to master the internet, but also old enough that you didn't grow up with it so you had an actual attention span. Also not growing up with smartphones helped.
Not gonna toot my own horn too much but I think you're right. Between adbuster gen x and corporations taking over the internet was sort of a weak point in advertising.
The early internet was a lot less a capital wasteland and was filled with well intentioned academics and hobbyists that were in love with a new technology. A lot less motivated by profit. So the internet itself was an arguably better source of information than the modern internet in general. Zoomers will never know the ad-free, Correct the Record-free, pirating-is-easy-but-dangerous internet
media literacy peaked with millennials
I'm seeing this at schools and yeah reading comprehension is garbage compared to the decade before it.
I’ve never heard somebody shut up as fast as the coworker I asked “so which YouTube did you get that from” when they repeated anti DRPK idiocy. After reconciling a bit, the guy was a rider of rogan.
I felt bad, it was genuinely their only news source and they later become a chud. I really hope I didn’t play a role in that. Still, they deserved it even if voicing it was bad.
If they literally get their news from YouTube and find Rogan informative, it was inevitable barring major intervention. The algorithm is already pulling them right towards that swamp, and they don't seem like the most aware or savvy media consumer.
Yeah, that’s all good points. This person I particular had a fucked childhood that I only learned about later, so I just regret not being able to form a different relationship and maybe address that in a positive manner or something.
Still, probably inevitable as you said.
I've found that most young right-wingers are either rich, socialized in private schools, or had really fucked up childhoods. There is something about a trusted authority figure really abusing that trust which makes them simultaneously crave authority but despise 'big government'. They love the police but hate the government that makes them possible. Completely incoherent.
Also need to have a good speaking voice and diction. There are some people who have the looks but they aren't easy to understand or their voice sounds weird to other people and it turns them off.
It is like a thing for a lot of the gen z crowd, my sisters do it and so do their friends - except they search on tiktok not even youtube.
It does mean you can reach them by just reading off Michael Roberts' blog or one of Lenin's more pugnacious rants about some SocDem coward on one half of the screen while scooping colored sand on the other half of the screen and they'll watch it and engage with it.
It doesn't because you'll get banned from Tiktok like EddieLigerSmith did
TikTok bans feels so random compared to other social media companies.
That's because everyday :xi-gun: spins a big Wheel of Fortune and wherever it lands gets the ban.
hadn't heard, but of course MidwesternMarx got banned. he is very good at communicating theory
It's funny, he can be really studious about his sources and then in the same video just casually say that everything about your personality is decided by genetics. You can get thousands of eyes on some wild shit, so long as you keep it to a classroom-friendly tone and vocab.
Some of his worst videos were :pinker: levels of hopium huffing about how the future trajectory of the status quo is mostly fine, actually, and that a mass die off of 99% of the human race would still be humanity prevailing.
Its easy to grow up as an American in the 80s/90s and think the Long Arc Of History Bends Towards Progress, because you've never really had to taste a generational downturn. You were born into the abundance of the post-industrial age and inherited a Peace Dividend of a post-Cold War Imperial Core.
All your problems really just amounted to asking "Why is my country so rich but my neighborhood so poor?" rather than "How can we survive this killer virus?" or "When will the rain come to end this horrible drought?" or "Why must I be born into a warzone?"
CGP Gray promised people living on the edge of the technological curve a very plausible vision of techno-futurism.
One of the things I get out of various :wtyp: episodes (particularly the episodes on mass transit) is how close we actually were to a limitless utopia of surpluses and ever-escalating quality of life. Hypersonic airplanes and nuclear power and cutting edge material sciences and enormous universities churning out brilliant engineers all promised to make Star Trek prophetic.
But the other thing I get out of various :wtyp: episodes (particularly the episodes about mass transit) is how often people are willing to throw away generational social gains in exchange for instant personal profits.
So what guys like CGP Gray have ultimately delivered is a glorified speaking circuit of bullshit, where he gets paid top dollar to spout platitudes and we get sold a bill of goods that is never delivered.
People like entertainment and do their learning from entertainment. This isn't new.
My friends never talked about politics until HK protests + Uyghur genocide + Ukraine war so I actually never knew till now lol
Aside from work friends all my friends are anarchists and have been since my teens, I don't really fuck with normal people, too punk rock. I'm the weird ML in anarcho town, couldn't imagine having actual friends not being politically on level, it's something I haven't had to tolerate.
How do you cope with them mindlessly accepting propaganda? I had to cut out my only leftist friend after they brainlessly read gulag archipelago and actually believed it? Like, it took them over.
Mine are like, the kind that wouldn't get banned here and also we're trying to get day to day shit done. I doubt most of these Anarchists ever read any theory beyond punk lyrics. We're just doing mutual aide and have immediate concerns. My frustration actually comes from being in a pretty good position to take the next step beyond what amounts to charity and turn it into organization and the anarchist bent feels to me that it's wasting an opportunity to use a pretty solidly organized base around more structured and strategies actions along with taking on somewhat of a political leadership role to enact the next step instead of being stuck in a comfortable cycle where we build illegal housing and feed the ever growing homeless population instead of taking the next step with the good will we have and turning it into more permanently based actions. Individualism and decentralization by principle is leading to people freezing to death.
Edit: rant aside that acrually isn't answer things, I don't ever get counter arguments and am understoodnto really known what I'm talking about, but if someone feels a thingnisnwronf you aren't gonna be the one person to change their mind unless they're in a position to be that receptive which is rare as hell. Not gonna go full ban worthy here, but i am not concerned whatsoever by anarchist sectarianism at all.
Oh, I get you. Praxis unification theory over not being brain dead (or phrase that differently however fits being kind to people who never read anything).
It sounds y’all get shit done. Which is awesome.
I guess, I just become enraged when I encounter borderline moronic takes premised on people with no historical knowledge whatsoever criticizing AES. It forces me to avoid them or become a problem.
Yeah, tht shit sucks. It's good to have in mind, that it's a pretty hard thing to change but also you don't need people to be totally on the trolley for them to do the necessary good to end this nightmare. Most people in the imperial core fighting that imperial core will just do the same damage regardless because the average person has like, no control over foreign policy.
Sometimes being ruthless is also a ruthless acceptance of aide. Be materialist and remember your end goal and your means needed to achieve them. Be tactical, be tactful. Do what you need to do to achieve what needs to be achieved. I'll use an anarchist as much as I'd use a lib if they can serve the overall ends of achieving communism, but the anarchists will carry with us WAY further than the rest, so even if they're insufferable about it, they're still anti capitalist you gotta use every tool in the box as brutally as possible.
Sometimes being ruthless is also a ruthless acceptance of aide. Be materialist and remember your end goal and your means needed to achieve them.
Legitimately good shit right here. Perspective I needed. Too caught up in: why does the anti capitalist have bad takes. Not enough emphasis on: any one quilling to fight the imperialist state has use value regardless of overall value.
Thanks for helping me find a modicum of greater perspective.
the weird ML in anarcho town
anarcho-tankieism will win
I'm just happy to be in a town where we've gotten good enough that this is even relevant.
The popularity angle really gets me. I was trying to show some quality intellectual leftist podcasts to a supposedly ML friend of mine. It was right up his alley, really interesting stuff, and he straight up refused to look at it because it had view counts in the hundreds. He'd rather just listen to Chapo and Cumtown and lie about reading theory.
He’d rather just listen to Chapo and Cumtown and lie about reading theory
I thought that's what we're all doing here
Same until I came here and got curious, sometimes Chapo can be funny when they find a particularly good target to dunk on
Still haven't listened to Cumtown
So it's basically like the previous generations not believing you because the TV didn't say so.
Or the generation before that relying on the radio/newspaper
Or the generation before that relying on newspaper/pamphlets
Or the generation before that relying on Illuminated Manuscripts.
