I have yet to meet a single pro-Russian leftist in my country. Or a tankie. Sure, shit like lemmygrad, r/communism, etc. exists, but you have to go digging pretty deep to find those people.
Most leftists I know, even those who identify as socialists are pretty much in the "yeah, fuck Russia" camp. To the point that they openly advocate financing Ukraine.
This video is blatant propaganda piece, and not even truthful at what it tries to be.
I don't know which country you live in but I know podcasters and other influencers in Germany and sadly also met their kind in person and passed by a protest. It is real.
Finland. Living next to Russian border might bring some reality checks here.
And yea, I can imagine you could dig some nutjob podcaster here too, but can't imagine finding those people walking around IRL.
But the thing I'm most against is "western left", which is the point where I call out the BS. Vice seat of our right-wing party literally went to a Putin propaganda camp in Russia in around 2015 (by his own admission, no less), yet it is somehow "western left" that gets the blame for few tankies who are nowhere to be found.
biggest success of pro-russian tankies in my country is single fb page with 2k likes. socdem party that has actual MPs advocated for sending weapons to Ukraine on second day o war and it's only because they don't have single leader (there's collective leadership instead)
I have never met one in person either. I've met countless on the internet. It's as if it was a manufactured outrage instigated by a genocidal regime. It worth addressing talking points distributed among that group.
There's a certain kind of reactionary-left personality that I think is more common in parts of the west that used to be colonial powers, where if you're far enough along the political spectrum that the mainstream parties all look like different variations on corporatist-fascists, you're particularly vulnerable to messaging from geopolitical enemies of your own country for the simple reason that they're opposed to the political structure you're also opposed to. Here in the US I've run into a few such people, and it's also clear that Russia's soft-power operations have made efforts to cultivate relationships with the American left wing (people like Jill Stein and others in the Green Party). It's pretty obvious, though, that they've had less success than they have on the right. It takes a particular kind of useful idiot to think, as a anti-colonial socialist or communist, that an oligarchic and socially-repressive right-wing autocracy is actually in your political corner.
There’s a certain kind of reactionary-left personality that I think is more common in parts of the west that used to be colonial powers, where if you’re far enough along the political spectrum that the mainstream parties all look like different variations on corporatist-fascists, you’re particularly vulnerable to messaging from geopolitical enemies of your own country for the simple reason that they’re opposed to the political structure you’re also opposed to.
Makes a lot of sense to me.
Here in the US I’ve run into a few such people, and it’s also clear that Russia’s soft-power operations have made efforts to cultivate relationships with the American left wing (people like Jill Stein and others in the Green Party). It’s pretty obvious, though, that they’ve had less success than they have on the right. It takes a particular kind of useful idiot to think, as a anti-colonial socialist or communist, that an oligarchic and socially-repressive right-wing autocracy is actually in your political corner.
I have to admit I know very little about the US politics. I'm fairly certain Russia tries that here in Finland as well, but well, our communist party is pretty much dead (and good riddance). Aside from the usual far-right wackos, their best bet here is probably to try to affect the peace movement people. Though even most of those I've talked with, with some exceptions, know that aggressors in wars should not be rewarded in order to keep the peace.
I have to say that Russian soft-power ops are scary. A lot of people here think that they are just the few wackos who everybody laughs at, and then think that when a certain popular right-wing party repeats Russian talking points they are completely unaffected by all that.
Have you watched any of the Hassans takes on Ukraine? I only watched clips, which I assume are out of context. In those he was advocating for Ukraine surrender and to stop sending aid. Is that true? Sorry for asking you about it, I just cant stand listening to the guy, so I hope someone who does can offer some insight.
Sorry. I'm not American and I don't know anything about that except what quick google search told me.
The video certainly paints with an overly-broad brush. The effects he describe do exist with people on the left who hate America more than they are willing to engage their brain and consider evidence. People who say they hate imperialism, but justify imperialism when it isn't coming from America (or The West in general). The guy is talking about tankies.
What?
This makes no sense.
The left doesn't love Russian. That's the right.
Source: I actually live here.
In Germany, the far left and the far right are most definitely pro-russia, each for their own reasons. The far right loves a Führer-like figure and that "minorities" are being actively discriminated in Russia, the left still considers Russia as being "anti-imperialist" even though Russia is definititely acting imperialistic af. And they are anti NATO. Russia considers both the german far left and far right as useful anti-NATO and anti-EU idiots, which aligns with their intentions. Thus they provide funding and relevance to them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OG0s3KANCY&pp=ygURd2FnZW5rbmVjaHQgcHV0aW4%3D
However, left/right moderates and liberals are pro Ukraine and they are the majority.
I guess it depends. I'll bring my country as an example, Italy. Here we have Right parties that are pro-Russia but at the same time our president is from a far-Right party and openly against Russia. On the other side, we have many left parties that are pro-Russia, mainly because they are anti-NATO. They hate America so much they choose to side with the child abducter Putin.
He uses some famous examples of American leftist intellectuals (to some extent) siding with Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Unfortunately, it is a thing.
Tankies loves him, but in most European countries they constitute a tiny minority of the left. So yeah, definitely an incredibly misleading title for the video.
I assume that's intentional at this point...
There's a constant push of some big "both sides"-narratives, trying to equate a minority of (or even singular) tankies inside an already left-wing minority as totally equal to far-rights getting massively funded by Russia.
It's what tears the German party The Left apart. One wing supports Russia, the other doesn't. Source: I live there
I havent paid too much attention to the us politics, but since you did and you live there what do you think on Hassans stand on it? I dont watch the guy, I just saw portions of his stance on it, which may be out of context. But he seemed to be anti ukraine in those clips, saying that Ukraine should surrender and US should stop helping Ukraine. Do you know anything about it? Can you please offer some insight?
There is a big misconception, and a lot of hypocrisy.
Far right is pro-puttin because they love all dictators who fight in the Middle-East.
Left is against the US because they are imperialist and treat Europe as vassals through unfair trade agreements and nato blackmailing. This lead to a strategy to balance international relationships by cooperating more with Russia and China, among others.
There is a big hypocrisy, because liberals don't care about dealing with dictators or not. They would mercilessly destroy a democracy if it was not capitalist and open to their national companies, and they happily deal with all dictators of the middle east and africa as long as they can get oil and other resources.
Puttin is not worse than Erdoğan, the only difference is that erdogan is supposedly in nato. Many countries in middle east are not better than Russia or China. The biggest problem with Russia is that it thought it could be a major power and made a stupid attempt to stay relevant, which propelled it into third world category with nukes.
All in all, Russia is not worse than the US. And no one in the European left support Russia since the beginning of Thame war. No one in the left actually supported puttin, even before that. That's lies, propaganda and disinformation. Love for USA is still strong with the liberals though. An unconditional love that is very much not returned.
You know, I don't like Erdogan at all. That being said, Putin is really worse than him. Like 1000x. Also, Russia is worse than the US, like 10000x. You just have absolutely no idea how much worse it is until you actually experience it.
Ok, now I'm not talking about local politics. The difference is indeed immense. I'm talking about international politics. And on this matter, USA is as bad the other 2.
Especially, USA is very bad even with its allies. As a European, I cannot ignore this.
And then there are all the islamist shit in the middle east that we gladly cooperate with simply because they have money and oil. We don't talk about it in France because they are as bas as putin or erdogan but they have oil and money, and we want that.
From the france point of view it's even worse because USA blackmails its otan allies to take US weapons instead of anything else, which cripples French defense industry. Talk about an ally... That's why people would like to cooperate with USA enemies: to humble the USA, because in geopolitics, that's the only way you do that. It's a power game.
