i think hasan is… mostly ok. i appreciate that he doesn’t left punch very much outside of responding to criticism’s from his left, and even then he never stoops to truly stupid stuff like calling people “red fash tankies”. I generally like there is a “left-leaning” commentator near the top of twitch. For someone with such an anti-imperialist worldview he is too eager to accept US narratives about western enemies at times, i think maybe out of trying to triangulate a position that wont scare too much of his lib audience away. I think most of his bad takes about electoralism and what not come from a place of despair/doomerism ironically. He doesn’t see a pathway to revolution and thus has resigned himself to milquetoast dem entryism and reform. I think he is probably being somewhat serious in this tweet that if he actually thought he saw a vanguard party with a clear path to victory he would throw his weight behind them. It is a big failing as a self proclaimed communist to give into that despair though.
all this to say, title is funny but i think it’s not fair to compare him to contrapoints. Hasan’s views really haven’t changed that much even since he first started streaming, and if anything he is more “left” than before, he never used to defend china to the extent he does now, even if he tends to do unnecessary hedges with it still.
The thing I don’t understand about Hasan’s electoral politics is why he only talks to DSA people instead of third party local politicians. Even if he personally thinks DSA has a higher chance of success of instilling class consciousness among the masses, I had hoped he would still also report on other orgs who try that such as PSL. Maybe PSL is super tiny compared to DSA? IDK I’m not from the US so I probably shouldn’t even involve myself in this discussion
PSL is super tiny compared to the DSA, yes. Now, it’s not easy to tell the exact size difference since think since PSL doesnt really accept you if you’re not willing to devote a huge portion of your life to it while all it takes to be in dsa is either pay like 10 bucks a month or write a fee waiver application*, so you cant even really go based off of DSA having 100k paper members, but based off of my experience DSA still has way more organizers than PSL.
and it’s not “DSA having a higher chance of success of instilling class consciousness”, it’s that DSA runs candidates pretty much exclusively through the democratic party ticket and thus can actually win elections and thus can actually win credibility among workers by excercisng power, and that spending time on local third party politicians is both 1) a waste of time and 2) actively harming his own credibility, because the average person will think you’re kind of a crank for even talking to a 3rd party person let alone acting like they can win
*this fee waiver is something you can 1000% bs your way through, my local dsa chapter when i was organizing flat out told us to lie and get the waiver even if we could affort because they really didnt like national and didnt want us giving them money directly lmao
![Finally, a second cointelpoints [cw:hasan]](https://hexbear.net/pictrs/image/79a52618-3c2c-40cb-b40d-843dbe22b1ce.png){kind=link}
i think hasan is… mostly ok. i appreciate that he doesn’t left punch very much outside of responding to criticism’s from his left, and even then he never stoops to truly stupid stuff like calling people “red fash tankies”. I generally like there is a “left-leaning” commentator near the top of twitch. For someone with such an anti-imperialist worldview he is too eager to accept US narratives about western enemies at times, i think maybe out of trying to triangulate a position that wont scare too much of his lib audience away. I think most of his bad takes about electoralism and what not come from a place of despair/doomerism ironically. He doesn’t see a pathway to revolution and thus has resigned himself to milquetoast dem entryism and reform. I think he is probably being somewhat serious in this tweet that if he actually thought he saw a vanguard party with a clear path to victory he would throw his weight behind them. It is a big failing as a self proclaimed communist to give into that despair though.
all this to say, title is funny but i think it’s not fair to compare him to contrapoints. Hasan’s views really haven’t changed that much even since he first started streaming, and if anything he is more “left” than before, he never used to defend china to the extent he does now, even if he tends to do unnecessary hedges with it still.
The thing I don’t understand about Hasan’s electoral politics is why he only talks to DSA people instead of third party local politicians. Even if he personally thinks DSA has a higher chance of success of instilling class consciousness among the masses, I had hoped he would still also report on other orgs who try that such as PSL. Maybe PSL is super tiny compared to DSA? IDK I’m not from the US so I probably shouldn’t even involve myself in this discussion
PSL is super tiny compared to the DSA, yes. Now, it’s not easy to tell the exact size difference since think since PSL doesnt really accept you if you’re not willing to devote a huge portion of your life to it while all it takes to be in dsa is either pay like 10 bucks a month or write a fee waiver application*, so you cant even really go based off of DSA having 100k paper members, but based off of my experience DSA still has way more organizers than PSL.
and it’s not “DSA having a higher chance of success of instilling class consciousness”, it’s that DSA runs candidates pretty much exclusively through the democratic party ticket and thus can actually win elections and thus can actually win credibility among workers by excercisng power, and that spending time on local third party politicians is both 1) a waste of time and 2) actively harming his own credibility, because the average person will think you’re kind of a crank for even talking to a 3rd party person let alone acting like they can win
*this fee waiver is something you can 1000% bs your way through, my local dsa chapter when i was organizing flat out told us to lie and get the waiver even if we could affort because they really didnt like national and didnt want us giving them money directly lmao