I refuse to discount Bernie (and to a lesser degree AOC) on one major thing, Bernie has been a “gateway drug” for many actual leftists, myself included… even if he himself is a mushy socdem.
this post was submitted on 07 May 2025
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You guys, gals and theys need to work on your reading comprehension. I didn’t say I refuse to discount Bernie broadly (I do), however he has fed many into a communist pipeline (even if that isn’t his intention) and that should be recognized.
Work on your nuance, please. Thank you.
Same. I also still have my placenta and even though my umbilical cord has long ago withered and fallen off, I keep it with me just in case.
I don't see how you can't discount Bernie. Bernie was my gateway into socialism/leftism/eventual communism as well, but he isn't the be-all-end-all figure, and you lose nothing by discounting him. It's like training wheels on a bike. Eventually, you have to let go, because you don't need them or they become a hindrance.
I used to think Bernie was awesome, but that's because he is a capitalist stooge and a horrible fucking racist prick. He MIGHT have been good up until the 1990's, but it's not the 90's anymore.
Yeah Parenti was right to end their friendship when Bernie voted to bomb Yugoslavia.
Yeah, that would have been it for me, too.
I love BE, I'm in that sweet spot of having never engaged with his online presence but occasionally watched his scripted videos. It makes everyone seem absolutely unhinged when they auto-nope out of any conversation involving him, when the takes usually in question is something like 'genocide bad'
Heard his video on Xinjiang though?
I have. I gave a mild criticism of it and got called a tankie by BE and his shills…how ironic.
I'm usually the kind of person who cares about someone's arguments, way more than their presentation or attitude, and I like some aspects of Bad Empanada, and how he makes liberals frothing-at-the-mouth bad for his surprisingly reserved takes.
But he is way too soft on lots of things, for me, and he often seems to care more about being a troll, than anything substantive. Which is his right, but regardless.
Its what drives engagement.
Also why its best just to ignore this entire circus and just go outside and start causing trouble.
I do agree, intolerance against Zionists is a must.
It’s a good thing that I’ve never watched Hasan Piker, because that clip of him doing the mental gymnastics meme was so much worse than I imagined: The reason it's antisemitic to oppose Jews for holding [Zionist] opinions is because those opinions are […] inextricably linked to their Jewishness.
That wasn't Hasan in the clip. Idk who that was cause i don't follow any of this streamer shit. Hasan shills for AOC and Bernie though who are both in the "Israel has a right to defend itself from the barbaric Hamas terrorists" camp. He also did a podcast together with the now very vocally Zionist Ethan Klein who is married to an IDF war criminal.
He also did a podcast together with the now very vocally Zionist Ethan Klein who is married to an IDF war criminal.
This is kind of an unfair "bad by association" thing. I'm not sure why Hasan would carry water for AOC or Bernie at this point, but from things I have heard, he is very clear on it being a genocide and had a very public falling out with Ethan Klein as a result of them differing so strongly on that issue after the October 7th stuff happened. Actually, falling out is an understatement, as it has become this whole thing where Ethan is spiraling in a victim complex, lashing out at anyone and everyone, and behaving like a pathological liar, as zionists tend to do.
At a distance, it probably looks like internet spat nonsense (and to a large extent, I think it is, in the sense that it doesn't materially matter much other than hearts and minds of some impressionable podcast and streamer viewership). But Ethan and Hasan are two pretty different people. Ethan has turned into a raging black hole of zionism and dishonesty. And my impression of Hasan is that he's at worst an anti-imperialist whose left tendencies can sometimes sound a bit hazy in that realm of anti-state / anarchist / ultra-left something or other. But I'm not sure it'd be possible for him to be a principled marxist-leninist, for example, and have the streaming size that he does in the west. So these things go hand in hand to an extent. I could also be misunderstanding how he navigates it and underestimating the extent to which he supports AES states. I mainly learned more recently due to the drama spiral going on, I am not a "fan" of any of these people.
Oh, you’re right, that was Ethan Klein in the clip. He has two passports. You’ll never guess which 😐 Supposedly he and his wife are sitting on USD ~20M.
It's not Ethan Klein, it's lonerbox, a "leftist" streamer that's just a frothing zionist and sex pest who BE has previously challenged to debates on the issue but he'd been too afraid to take him up on it.
I'd love to be able to scam Ethan Kkklein out of his and his zionist wife's money, and maybe then I could afford to retire early in China.
I found a YouTube link in your post. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy: