Synopsis: The first part of the interview is about Haz's biography and conversion to communism, while the rest are questions about Haz's thoughts on the history of socialism in America and the contemporary political situation. He has very reactionary social views, so keep that in mind if you read this
Also he spends so much time harping about the mythical agrarian populist labor movement in America, like holy shit dude, did you actually want to be a farmer john but somehow fucked up and went to law school instead?
Also I hate-read it to the end. the dude's functionally identical to my ultra-libertarian ultra-protestant coworker, minus the glaze of red paint he coats himself with. And I mean talking point to talking point identical. An unhealthy obsession with the LGBT, emphasis on the T as well, an undialectical belief in the concept that the western capitalists are neo-malthusians with the goal to "degrowth" the "economy" by killing off humanity until there's exactly 1 billion people left in order to save the economy. Even has a bit about, in lolbertarian words, 'crony capitalist monopolies controlling everything' in the fact he talks about how - in the most ancapistani way to think of it - quote: "Capitalist competition has almost completely been destroyed. We are in the early stages of transition into a global socialist mode of production already. No major capitalist enterprises obeys any capitalistic economic laws any longer. " Ironically while we're currently seeing a possible financial collapse of the U.S day by day right now.
Throw in the screed about how he's also one of those AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 2 cranks that thinks his ideology may emerge out of the burning ashes of this country when, god forbid a likely total systemic collapse of our already shitty food and supply logistics network or whatever ficticious thing he believes - and all he needs is to have an insane rant about the evils of Catholicism and how there's a spiritual war happening right now and the satanic left transgenders are winning right now, and the dude will be quite literally my coworker but faux commie.
While it was mildly interesting to read his critique of the old party beginning to fail during the 20s and 30s for its slow disconnect to the working class and failure to reach the wider agricultural ruralists which he had to make an M Night Shyamalan twist in his conclusion because in his words he blames the fall of the CPUSA on Z Foster for coddling up to Hollywood removed and the segregationist democrats, and Stalin and the COMINTERN's fault for pushing Z Foster from making friends with farmers and instead shaking hands with FDR. Which is something I say Haz is completely wrong for asserting and be beaten like a rabid dog with a steel pipe as it was FDR's new deal, the transition to a command economy for the war, and the economic boom that came from utilizing the U.S's pristine economy to rebuild Europe's devastated economy which in conjuction to the legacy of labor rights the communist and union movement had fought for in the lead-up to the war boosted the living standards of the American working class to levels it had never experienced before, thus leading it to fall away from class consciousness and the class struggle as there was no material demand for them to fight for total liberation when they have the next best thing.
Which in turn had also lead to the doors to the working class to march towards conservativism in the successive democrat administrations promising to preserve their status quo and failing to do so as the world economy recovered, the democrats starting wars and men off to die, the civil rights era's fight to further enfranchise and integrate black Americans into the fabric of America lead to direct competition with the established working class as cheaper laborers joined the reserve army of labor and outcompete them (aka be out-exploited by the bosses) in accepting the same jobs for less pay which essentially tightened the increasingly competitive shrinking number of available jobs as national capitalists transitioned to international capitalists and begun to outsource manufacturing to cheaper locations. And the nail in the coffin was Reagan's promise to the working class that he would save them if they let him gut their guardian angels (union and labor protections) in the name of letting the wealth trickle down on their heads and as the anti-christ incarnate his presidency heralded the brainrot that would come to dominate contemporary politics in our modern era.
What a fucking clown.
I uhhh actually agree with this. Do you not? Spreading malthusian over-population thought has openly been the goal of the UK royal family and their extended network of influence at the very least. They see it as the necessary approach to the coming climate crisis and are preparing to have people just accept the death of hundreds of millions of people as a necessary and natural thing. Not so sure about the 1 billion left part, but generally speaking there's definitely reasons they're pushing it. There's a few talks with Prince Charles (now king) and Attenborough earnestly pushing it and telling others specifically to go forth and push it.
EDIT: Here's one of them, it was Philip at this one I misremembered maybe. I've linked to the Malthus part. You can skip through bits and pick out the population and climate change stuff or watch the whole thing if you like.
Listen to him in this part on what people(the elites in attendance) can do to help (about the problem): "Break the taboo in private and in public as best you can", "wherever and whenever you speak about the environment, add a few words about overpopulation". They were specifically educating and informing the rest of the elite to go out and do this. Earnestly.
I don't know what else you want to call this other than neo-malthusianism.
There's plenty of "under-population" discourse by ms neoliberals to complicate the charge of neo-malthusianism, just look at half of western commentary about Japan
These people don't have beliefs, they have toys in the form of policy proposals, neolibs are filtered out by the system and elevated precisely because they don't articulate any consistent philosophy or ideology other than advancing capital mobility and financialization
If genociding 500 million Africans advances capital mobility so be it, if forcing Japanese teenagers to marry young in a elaborate system of state brokered forced marriages secures financial flows from Japan, then that's the game plan
Even if the ritual of exploitation shifts, the worship of the market remains constant
I would say this is a very astute statement and likely close to reality
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Awoo, I've listened to both points you've cited, the space between the two, and past the second cited point up until the speaker David Attenborough cites Kerala as an example of what he's advocating for.
I do not - outside of the name dropping of Thomas Malthus and a bit about his history as a vehicle to drive the point home that without responsible population control through education, empowerment, and material aid that Malthus' vision for what will halt human population growth will be the likely future for our species - see how Attenborough is pushing for the acceptance and normalization of the death of millions due to disease, famine, and war.
But is instead, much like I've seen on hexbear numerous times whenever the topic rarely arises, that the State should impliment population control measures which in Attenborough's words, paraphrased, means working to empower women to have autonomy over their bodies, educating the population on methods of family planning and contraceptive usage, and providing either freely accessible or at-cost contraception to the population while maintaining the freedom of choice for prospective parents to choose how large they want their families to be without coercion.
In the sections you cited and a little after, Attenborough does indeed paint a bleak picture for humanity, with how the current (mis)management of resources under the status quo system will lead to human suffering as the effects of climate change, diminishing resources being locked away to the masses by their lack of wealth. He even cites warlordism over scarce resources like water as an increasing likelihood under the current trajectory of the status quo in addition to the assertion that it is absurd to warrant infinite growth on a finite planet with regards to current dynamic of aging to retiring populations needing larger younger working populations to sustain them in their golden years and the vicious cycle that in turn creates as the march of time continues. All of these have been common points brought up in discussions here as generally being in the majority supported positions. It does stand to be said that there aught be a hale and healthy amount of scepticism applied when sections of the bourgeoisie either advocate for or open the floor to discussion of something that doesn't directly benefits their class nor betrays what motive has perked their interests. Yet this skepticism shouldn't so all-consuming that we hyperfocus on singular trees that catch our interest while losing sight of the forest.
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I think it's necessary to read between the lines here. Attenborough and Phillip know that they're speaking to an audience who aren't going to welcome the "we need to kill the global south off" line. And they know that their talks are public. You can't move from the existing position to the extreme position instantly without provoking pushback or people deciding you're an awful human being, you do it in steps.
The promotion of Malthus however is the important element. Anyone that has read Malthus KNOWS that the only conclusion you can come to if you believe his drivel is that it is necessary to allow population die-off to occur in order to stabilise the economic supply. That is the crux of Malthus.
Promoting him to anyone is preparation to bring people to that conclusion all by themselves. Maybe they're not ready to kill the poor right now, but when the time comes, when resources are genuinely stretched, having Malthus as their pre-primed belief will lead them to a particular conclusion all by itself. If you go around promoting that over-population is the problem, population de-growth when shit hits the fan becomes your answer.
We are on the verge of seeing hundreds of millions of climate refugees pour into Europe. This is going to happen and there is likely nothing we can do to stop it. The bourgeoisie know this. Their answer to it is going to be fortress europe and they have been prepping the population to accept it and to see the problems as "well people just need to die because we're overpopulated". It is a part of their justification for shutting out the millions of climate refugees we are to see.
I will admit that I know very little on either Phillip's or Attenborough's stances on population control, besides this video where Attenborough's speech on the issue, and that English people for whom they are closer to home would very likely know more on the answer to the question of each individual's stances on population control may be.
I would say that for someone who may be interested in investigating their interests in the area by examining the public records for additional instances that they are pushing for normalization of acceptance of mass deaths via moving the goalposts by looking for records prior to that 12 year old video and after it as well to see whether or not their rhetoric has significantly shifted since then in addition to whether or not Malthus is used in more than a singular throwaway sentence on what future aught to be avoided.
Which brings me to a secondary point that Attenborough had, to my recollection, only mentioned Malthus once in sections you selected for - what is a rather long speech of an hour and some change - rather briefly before moving on towards highlighting his own proposals to avoid such a wretched future in his rather bland proposition of women empowerment, sexual and family planning education, and so forth.
And finally with regards to your comments with how this is all in the name of the creation of a 'Fortress Europe' I would assert that such measures aren't necessary in the first place as the European states are already quite xenophobically racist without additional input from the island of blockheads - not withstanding the fact that the American war on
brown peopleterror had been supercharging the xenophobia of the European states since 2001 - to the point that fortress Europe has already existed since the destruction of the many west Asian and north African countries by their and America's hands culminated into the refugee crisis of 2015 which as we are both aware tore off the mask of European compassion and charity.If we bring this back into relevance with England, in regards to the video, one would simply point towards the 2020 Brexit referendum as the culmination of the xenophobic reaction of the islanders towards the nasty foreigners crossing the Channel to steal their jobs - like the Poles - to come to the conclusion that even a fortress England exists as well.
Additionally I have to stress the point that western states media predispose their respective peoples to be apathetic towards the deaths of others with their yellow journalism that the death of one domestic European or white American is equally worth reporting to the death of thousands in, well, just name a non-european country. One can simply see how American media treats hurricanes that cause a handful of deaths in the southern states as tragedies that deserve to be discussed for weeks to months whereas the deaths of hundreds from the same hurricanes passing over Caribbean or Latin American countries barely get a passing mention.
I bring up already-existing fortresses Europe and Terf Island in addition to the paragraph on western media as examples that the English bourgeoisie don't need to persuade their own upper crust to be prepared to accept the deaths of millions of foreigners from climate change when their own broader society is already propagandized to do so at any particular catastrophic event.
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It becomes quite obvious when someone doesn't seriously want to engage with a user in good faith when they don't follow the chain of discussion, such reviewing citations provided by other users in discussions based off of said citations and instead reflexively coming to their own baseless conclusions based off of only knowing a portion of the information in the whole discussion.
This is to say go listen to Attenborough's speech for like 20 minutes and if, somehow, you still can't hear the answer to your question then I'll point where it's relevantly discussed, assuming you're actually asking in good faith.
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Great way to say that you proudly speak from positions of ignorance.
No investigation, no right to speak
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Haz seems to be deeply obsessed with the cottagecore aesthetic. We can add that bucolic longing to the list of things he shares with the other nazis.
Where's the part where he gets his ass clapped by tankies?
I thought 500 million was the maximum sustainable population the planet can support.
With AI and robots, why do the ruling classes even need us any more? They only kept us around because they needed our labor.
It is through human labor which can rouse inanimate objects into mighty tools that help change the world around us. "AI" and robots are complex commodities at the end of a long chain of the transformation of nature, and still illustrate that labor won't lose all of its power even in the unlikelihood the tech goblins figure out how to manufacture sentient beings out of circuitboards and double A batteries to replace themselves.