How the Left Destroyed Itself (w/ Yanis Varoufakis)
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 10 фев 2025
- Full episode: • Technofeudalism: What ...
Support my independent journalism at Substack: chrishedges.su...
Follow me on social media: linktr.ee/chri...
Photo in thumbnail:
'Days Of Rage' In Chicago
Leaders of the radical American student organization the Weathermen, an offshoot of the SDS, (left to right) Peter Clapp, John Jacobs, and Terry Robbins (1946 - 1970), march at the van of a crowd of demonstrators during the 'Days of Rage' actions organized by the Weathermen to protest the Chicago Seven trial and to 'bring the war home,' Chicago, October 11, 1969. (Photo by David Fenton/Getty Images)
Yanis Varoufakis (Image by: Olaf Kosinsky (kosinsky.eu) | Wikimedia Commons commons.wikime...
Until you take the $$$ out of Politics, the public’s interest will never be front and center.
No. People are just apathetic. And, upper class radicals don't like to work or compromise.
Not going to happen unfortunately barring an actual revolution.
@@ozzyhouston2535 That too!
This was one thing that I liked from Andrew Yang's campaign:
Democracy Dollars, which would provide citizens with a budget to donate to poliitical candidates in order to balance the corporate bribery.
In the 21st Century how would you, how could you, bring about a radical, fundamental change capable of transforming our society? We would have to change our very nature or what our nature has become through centuries of adapting to our survival instincts. Is it possible to bring about such a change? Yes! Not only is it possible but for our continued survival it is imperative that we adapt and evolve to the only revolution that has the prerequisites to our continued survival. The revolution is vegan.🌱☮️🌱
Always great to hear you two.
What's so special about a lying POS who shoved the genocide aside in order to steal the spotlight and made up false claims in order to sell his shitty books full of nazi shit?
Spot on, as usual!
Two informed minds. Thanks for the insights.
Varoufakis is a greedy con artist spreading misinformation and lies.
It’s possible to be pro civil rights (freedom) AND pro economic liberation. It’s weird to suggest we couldn’t gain populist economic policy because we were too focused on the Civil Rights Movement. First wave of Women’s Liberation knew that women couldn’t gain their freedom unless there was economic justice for all.
The first wave of feminism was bourgeois (most of the suffragettes were liberal). I also think that what Varoufakis said may have been misinterpreted; he does not ignore the importance of civil rights. He points out that little by little the left was promoting paternalistic policies that did not contribute to the emancipation of the working class and placed an unjustified focus on equality (and not on equity) or on social justice. If you look, you will find that Varoufakis is a progressive in favor of gender equality, abortion, LGBT rights, and he is precisely the founder of the progressive international
@@lautarodorelo5903 The beginning of the Women’s Liberation Movement in the early 1960s began with economic justice FOR ALL as the anchor for women’s rights…in alignment with MLK Jr’s Poor Peoples Coalition. When CIA agent Gloria Steinem got involved in late 60s/70s it became centered on gender because CIA did not want it to expand into class movement. Civil Rights go hand in hand with economic justice. The leftists I know have been very active in pro labor, anti class war for decades. Perhaps YV was referring to the Democratic Party as a whole, not actual leftists.
@@lautarodorelo5903 he’s from Europe. They have a different experience to your American nonsense. Remember the Americans did not come up with women’s liberation. It’s something that existed worldwide.
I think you slightly missed the point. The reason he is putting Civil rights in contradiction to liberation is because of the FORM civil rights have taken in modern society, which is they focus on equality of outcomes. But in order to achieve equality of outcomes, you still need a central committee that has absolute power and decides who gets what. He argues that this is no different than capitalism, you just trade one boss for another. True liberation means that workers decide their own fate. That would NECESARILY mean that there will be imbalances of outcome, because different workers will make different decisions, but that is totally fine as long as the workers ended up there as a result of their own free will, with no coercion.
@ sounds like some libertarian BS that never actually creates a functioning society.
There's sometimes a tension between freedom and equality but it's wrong to throw the equality baby out with the bathwater. All of us (apart from hermit off-gridders) live utterly interdependent lives. What does 'freedom' even mean when we all depend on others, who also depend on us?
I call it the post-solidarity left (it calls itself the post-woke left I guess).
The idea is that the real threat to the left is protecting too many groups from too many oppressive forces at the same time. As if capitalism will end tomorrow if we help everybody get free healthcare but a black person still needs a college degree to compete against a white college dropout for the same job or is less likely to be hired than a white felon while a black felon won't get considered.
What form of socialism leaves white men on top at every single step of fighting in the movement and then ends with them still on top? 😂 Simply choosing not to talk about the data or the consequences is rhetoric, not reality.
Trans people will still be kept out of jobs. And black folks sill still be getting killed by cops protecting capital. And women will still be SA'd by their husbands and have their abortion rights taken away forced to sacrifice careers and futures. And immigrants are still going to be locked in cages.
I think part of it comes from the academic left's preponderance of upper-hierarchy intellectuals who grew up at the top of one or more hierarchies, talk only to people in that cross-section of upper hierarchies, and therefore only internalize empathy rather than sympatjy for those suffering the least under the array of brutal hierarchies we all have.
Then again, I'm an anarchist, so I think a lot more about this stuff than typical communists. 😂
I do not think Varoufakis is throwing anything. If I am not mistaken he leads a progressive European party (Diem25). I think he is talking about narrative. We have allowed the Right to become, at the eyes of most people, the defenders of freedom, while they oppress everyone. And meanwhile we are not messaging correctly that we are the defenders of actual freedom.
It's a question of economics. Equal opportunity (not outcome) is crucial to a strong economy as it seeks to maximise access to human capital. This is a sure fire way of maximising productivity. But in places like America, where access to education is based on wealth (these days), the society works against access to human capital, creating a poorly educated underclass that cannot reach its potential, and becomes a burden on the economy. Not a great plan.
@andrewthomas695 equality of opportunity is only possible where outcomes are not too unequal. Imagine the human capital that could be released if all billionaires donated all their wealth over £100m to education programmes. Instead, it's all gonna go to a few thousand nepo babies regardless of ability or effort
Most American suburbanites believe their self sufficiency is on par with those off-the-grid hermits. This despite being the same people who panic buy toilet paper.
Thanks!
Really good analysis.
'Equality' has never been a good political argument. To my limited knowledge, it was all about class mobility and workers gaining control, or some democratic representation in the workplace.
Nowhere in that well-worn and often forgotten trope: 'workers control of production', is there any mention of 'state' control of production, or 'shareholders' control of production.
And it's frustrating to see how everything they bled and died for in the streets, mining camps and factories a hundred years ago, get kicked to the curb over the past fifty-plus years.
When anyone refers to the Democratic Party as 'Left-wing', it's hard to take them seriously anymore.
There is no legitimate Left 'left' in America anymore. Not in any politically represented way, except by a rare few individuals.
Agreed! The Democrats are a business party. They're just not as ruthless as MAGA/GOP. But certainly not a labor party.
@@reidwhitton6248 Not as ruthless? You must be kidding. forcing people to take an unprooved vaccine or lose their jobs? Use the right pronouns at work or lose your job? Believe in god - out you go.
True JFK liberals no longer recognize the dictatorial party only interested in the elite rulers, celebrities and billionaires.
@@reidwhitton6248VERY true.
Definitely no Left in America!
Equality by its definition is a cornerstone in political circles, but has never been actually transferable to real life situations because humans are fallible, naive, and greedy. It's good to strive for equality, but also good to realize that it is unobtainable.
I think he's wrong. I think freedom as top priority is meaningless.
Freedom means freedom to and freedom from.
Smoking is freedom to, non smoking areas is freedom from. Both freedoms despite being opposite.
This concentration on freedom has allowed billionaires to get away with whatever they want because the public are so afraid of "authoritarianism" despite rich people controlling the major political parties in the West.
Thats precisely how you end up in a Gulag
Great point. Many do not consider this distinction between freedom to / from, and the default state (at least in America) is always “freedom to” taking priority over “freedom from”.
@@FC-fs7zp You end up with a gulag by believing that the power of the rich people to put anyone in gulag must be preserved at all costs.
The world wants "freedom" from 🇺🇲 egocentricity & god-complex self-righteousness
🤔🤔🤔
Freedom is pointless without bread, shelter, and fuel. Trumpism did not get back in because it emphasized freedom, it won this time simply because it had a clearer and simpler (hollow as it is) message around bread, shelter, and fuel. Hierarchy of needs
Well, Varoufakis forgets there was a terrible civil war and military from 14 different foreign states had entered the country. Varoufakis looks at the Soviet Union as it was isolated and Lenin was making decisions on the abstract. We can't understand nothing about any country if we don't think about the Empire.
Exactly, the Bolsheviks were responding to the material conditions. That's why siege socialism became a thing - because of external opposition and capitalist hegemony. The actual bureaucratic counterrevolution happened later as a consequence of the centralisation of power, as it always has going back to Caesar, but the centralisation occurred in response to a real threat. The white and green armies, the foreign invasion during the civil war, even the right SRs turning their backs on socialism. O
@@alexjeffrey3981 , you explained much better than I did. My English is not so good. Thanks.
@@veramarquesalves7744 you said it well yourself.
Varoufakis is such a fraud.
@@ChrisCasseroles People like you who come with an insult having nothing to say are like dust in the wind.
I didn't realize there was actually a left to destroy...
Exactly. The US has never had a sizeable left and has never had a party of the working class.
The US' Overton window doesn't allow for true leftists
The “left” in America went from any who were not Republican to anyone (including Republicans) who are not in lock step with the Dear Leader.
This is great. Thank you
The idea of a central committee for national planning based on cybernetic principles is something that will interest any scientist or professional.
But at the end of the day this is not so different from how things work it is just private. But the economic superstructure is there. The question is just who profits of it, who shapes them, who falls victim to it.
This was also something marx saw. It was clear in the 19th century that capitalism will spread all over the world growing off of colonialist mercantilism.
This is a dynamical economic net and if you factor in psychology it is not rationally predictable.
I fear the biggest problem with this economic superstructure today is that it contradicts nature, because nature has its own pristine balance
Growth at all costs, just like cancer. Even conventional economics is being tossed out with things like corporate bailouts and “drill, drill, drilll.”
I’m relatively new to the theories of Marx, and I’m sure that I don’t fully understand it yet, but for a while there, it seemed that the use of the word, liberal had been changing. I remember when Nancy Pilosi said: “we’re all liberals now”.
Thanks to Yanis, R. Wolff, and M. Hudson, I finally understand how the brilliant ideas of the left are being appropriated by conservatives. That’s because they have nothing new to say.
"Liberal" is a word used differently by different people so you need to define precisely what you mean by the word if you are going to use it.
"Liberal" in the classical economic sense means merely "free-market capitalist." In the 19th-century struggle against the traditional ruling aristocracies of Europe, the free-market capitalist position happened to coincide with the broader movements to free society from the restrictions of a sclerotic feudal order, and the bourgeoisie was the most powerful force in overturning that order. And so, at that point, the meaning of "liberal" as open and tolerant and supporting freedom of the individual coincided with allowing free rein to capital. As the capitalist system gained more and more power and used this to exploit and oppress its necessary work-force, in the English-speaking world the word "liberal," in common parlance, came to represent those forces in favor of preserving individual liberty as well as promoting economic fairness in the face of more conservative forces whose main interest was to preserve the profitable economic arrangement as it stood. But on the European continent, "liberal" kept its original classical-economic meaning as "free-market capitalist," while calling "social democrat" what the UK and US called "liberal." Nowadays, with the collapse of the traditional labor-driven left in Europe and the dismantling of social-democratic guarantees against the predations of capitalism all across the West, and with the heirs to what used to be "left-liberalism" in the US-UK abandoning practically all of their prior economic demands in favor of identity-based top-down demands for representation in the power hierarchy, without simultaneously questioning that hierarchy, the word "liberal," even in the Anglosphere, has come to regain its original pro-capitalist meaning, especially in the historically recent new formulation as "neo-liberal," which specifically implies the reprivatization of many interests and sectors that had been made public in the era of social democracy while brandishing the banners of identity politics as a poor substitute for universal liberation.
This is an excellent summary. I am going to screenshot it to send to people who need to read it. USAmericans have a difficult time understanding the ideological colours that, as you so well described, have become attached to the term 'liberal' in the US. Usually I distinguish the different senses by predicating the word with either 'political-philosophical' liberal or 'cultural' liberal. But your mini genealogy is much easier to explain to people.
@@thomasobscure4978 thanks!
Stop taking the theories of Marx seriously while you still can. Don't end up like these men, at the end of your life still talking about what Marxists "achieved for three years" while still failing to understand the hard realities behind why those "achievements" amounted not even to *nothing*, but to *something horrific*. Leave these foolish theories on paper, where they belong. There's nothing there to understand.
such a great conversation
Yugoslavia had worker councils.
That is because tito used the west versus the east. And that is why jugoslavija does not exist.
@AlbinStegne well that, and starting the non-aligned movement to decolonize the global south.
@@AlbinStegneit doesn't exist because Serbians attempted to turn it into "Greater Serbia" and Croatians said "Never again".
Then Serbians tried again in Bosnia... And the mass Graves of Bosniaks are opened to this day.
And the Serbian tanks and APCs were lining up in Kosovo where German general literal gave them 30 minutes to get away - with him saying he won't have Albanian mass Graves on his conscience.
Serbia destroyed Yugoslavia by attempting to impose Serbian rule on non-Serbians.
@@Paerigos thats only half the truth though. There were many Serbians in Croatia and Bosnia, who would be under the terror of the armed ustace fascists and islamic mujahideens respectively. You make it sound as if there were only serbian nationalists and fascists in Yugoslavia, which isn't true.
@arismaiden6457 again... Jugoslavia had only one chance of survival. For it to remain Jugoslavia in which NEITHER nation would gain prominence of any kind over others.
In essence that's how Tito (Josif Broz) kept it together.
Equal terror to all, no prominent possition of any nation of any kind.
Btw he even suggested that Belgrade should not be capital and completely new city should he built several times. On territory that could be plausibly neutral.
Chris’ interviews are my favorite and are my compass for the crazy world we’re living in
Liberty and justice for all!
I don't know guys. I'm sure you've studied this more than me, but I don't see equality as antithetical to freedom. That's if equality means not singling out other groups in your society for abuse. We are all humans worthy of equal treatment. I'm not sure what the Democrats in this country are ding though except engaging in group think until they've lost contact with reality. That and enriching themselves.
Varoufakis is not saying that they are opposites, quite the contrary in fact. There is a line on The Internationale which I have always liked: "Freedom is merely privilege extended unless enjoyed by one and all".
Varoufakis is (I think) mostly centered on the political narrative around freedom. People believe the US is pro-freedom while they organize coups in other countries. That democrats or republicans are pro-freedom while the average American cannot afford many things. The left's messaging is about a more fair world and it would probably be more beneficial to talk about a more free world, where you can actually afford to go on vacation, or are not forced to go into work sick, ...
I don't understand why wokism is considered 'left'. I identify as progressive and don't recognize it as something I should prioritize. I view wokism (and identity politics more broadly) as a Liberal priority precisely because it does not demand a change in the political-economic status quo, something a true leftist would demand.
I'll explain as a black anarchist.
First, "wokism" isn't a thing. Sometimes white progressives and leftists tend not to interact with other races outside their own, so they filter their discourse through white conservatives before non-white leftists. They end up with ridiculous non-definitions they don't understand.
As coined by a black socialist United Mine Worker in the 1920's, to be "woke" is to see injustice. All the injustice. Anti-blackness, capitalism, imperialism, homophobia.
This phrase was very popular among white people in the beatnik movement of the 1950's as leftism was deeply integrated in black cultural movements. After the academic uplift of white academia and the pro-capitalist identification of white westerners during the Cold War, whiteness separated from black leftism.
Black folks in the long tradition still tend to be woke across multiple areas of injustice. It's why they poll as the most concerned about women's rights, immigrant rights, socialism, and trans rights out of all groups.
"Identity politics," as coined by the queer socialist Latina and black enclave the Combahee River Collective, focuses on the origins of true solidarity building.
White socialists in the South kicked out black members and wanted to keep them out of economic competition while fighting for more white rights as a vanguard.
White women fought for a feminism that prioritized marriage equality but ignored racial inequality and that black and Latina women were more likely to work jobs than them and more likely to want economic inequality.
Black men fought for racial equality under the promise of paternalistically uplifting the black household for black women.
The CRC then experienced waves of helping movements that abandoned them immediately. What they realized is that you can't build a hierarchical solidarity.
A race-blind socialism is white socialism. A race-blind feminism is white-feminism. And everyone is homophobic
So, they developed the "identity politics" of reciprocal solidarity. Protecting those suffering most forces people suffering least to stick around longer. In turn, those suffering the most are now in solidarity with others.
Furthermore, resolving homophobia helps gay men, lesbians, amd bisexuals. Resolving white supremacy helps Latinos, Asians, Native Americans, and black folks. Resolving a thing builds solidarity around the fight against that thing.
And I suspect the reason identity politics frustrates people is because they don't want to stay around once THEIR thing is resolved. They want minorities to uplift THEM so they can find liberation.
I see wokism as mostly being a product of consumerism and protestantism.
It might be on purpose. If you notice the liberals are constantly blaming “the left” for all their losses even thought liberals control the Democratic Party and have purged any economic left out of it. It’s a useful tool to always equate economic left issues with the least popular parts of the liberal agenda. Could also be just that media and pundits are generally dumb so they can’t understand that every issue doesn’t fall on spectrum together. Take Hillary Clinton who is probably seen as a centrist. Extreme on being a war maniac, extreme on identity politics, extreme on girl boss feminism, extreme on pro-corporate policy, maybe a little centrist on maintaining the welfare state as is. Some how that adds up to centrist? A real person could be very pro union, anti-gun control, anti war and anti free trade. Are those items all supposed to slide together on the left/right slider?
wokism is considered left because critizes power structure but not economical. Identity politics critizes and emerge as a point of view from what it's considered vulnerable... the reality is that every single "cultural war" was in fact a way to dismantle the left. Posmodernism as a philosophy it's not only stupid but also inaccurate with reality which make it as profitable asf... give the false sense of liberation and so on. Also was S0r0s.... and 0S... anyways...
It argues revolution over reforms, and it argues equality over superiority.
7:19 " it is the freedom of the capital that is identified with the freedom of humanity.." True, but so unfair to a human being and his potential.
It is also a message that, in the US, is racially coded. Non-whites are FAR more socialist than whites. They are also more feminist, more concerned about hate crimes against other minorities, and the least likely to commit hate crimes per capita based on religion and sexuality and ethnicity. Because whiteness and capital are entwined in the US. Socialism and anti-racism and feminism are seen as interreliant threats to the economic hierarchy.
A class-focused reading fails a caste-based society. There's a reason socialist labor unions in the South failed when black folks were recruited. It's not the tyranny of woke-scolding that scares off white solidarity. It's a threat to white hierarchy that even socialists are capable of being intimidated by.
Do they bail at free college and then maintain wealth inequality? Do they bail at free healthcare and then entrench generational wealth? Who is actually being appealed to, and for what clear goal?
It's a bit of fantasism to imagine an untapped endless supply of willing leftist recruits that won't include those who immediately demand a hierarchy of race and gender be built within that movement.
We know this because it happens right now. 😂
Yes and that is why Yanis calls this a distortion immediately after. Anyone reading this without watching would get the wrong idea.
Under socialism there is NO freedom or fairness.
Well put
Not dead yet. Far from it. This dreadful moment in American politics will not stand.
The traditional American left died in World War II. The attempted revival of it in the 60s and 70s was squashed, often violently, by the state. We have been left chasing red herrings ever since.
How middle class and boring,
@selfpreservationsociety How doomsday prepper and hilarious.
You are a fool. The J-double-u's got Trump elected. Academia turned on the aforementioned group - labeling them as white oppressors. They have now emptied the coffers of the left and are funding pro-white causes. Why? Because you have (rightfully) classified them as white. Israel is scared for its existence at the moment and see's promoting white-Christian nationalism in the west as its best bet for long term survival. This carnival just got in town. It is not going anywhere soon. The J-people only sided with minorities because they were not accepted by whites, because Christianity had a different flavor sixty years ago. The J-people spent billions changing Christian values to Judeo-Christian values and promoting Zionism in American churches.
You have no idea WTF is going on - no one on the left does. This is a Nazi tier blitzkrieg campaign being run by Elon. He's about to import all the whites from SA, his home country here to replace the migrant farm workers being deported, but only temporarily until they can be absorbed into positions of power. This is literally the rebirth of Nazism, only this time it's Judeo-Aryan. The only way the left can win would be to deport millions of Jews to Israel - literally. I don't think you are willing to do that - so you lose. To many dual-citizens what have dual-allegiances.
The left cannot understand that certain ethnic groups work as a monolith - Jews being one. Whites in the USA are the only group that has been oppressed in deprived of this in modern history - and they have woken up to this and realize it. We are living in a very dangerous time. White men are unparalleled at war.
-Political Analyst
The left is facing an existential crisis.
Can it answer the question of why does the left even exist? Do they even have a purpose. If they can't answer this question then the left will cease to exist.
For those wondering about the picture. That's the Weather Underground. The guy on the right is Terry Robbins who accidentally blew himself up while plotting an attack.
Yanis in such a mess here with muddling up liberation and liberty and tossing out equality. Equality has to mean equality of decision making power (which is the most natural definition from the history of leftist thought anyway) and then it's the perfect defining principle of being left. It's really not that complicated, it's just constantly mystified.
I think Yanis doesn't talk to the left as an equal as much as he conceptualizes us as an idea. 😂
How can he not know a trans or black person kept out of work benefits from free healthcare but is still going to starve to death.
Devah Pager has the research going back 15 years. Black folks reach equality of education and are then less likely than white felons to be hired.
If your economic opportunities are to be literally BORN A FELON UNDER WHITE SUPREMACY then liberation is dismantling that, not letting it persist.
you think every member of society should have equality of decision making power? We came closer to this than usual with the EU referendum and look at the mess that left us in.
Maybe YOU are talking about "equality of decision making", but if you did a poll of leftists the vast majority would want equality of outcome. End that's why leftism is doomed.
In the opening quote by Yanis Varoufakis the line "[...] liberty was left to its enemies [...]"" has a dual and very ominous alternate meaning. The USS Liberty, a lightly armed reconnaissance vessel, monitoring the 6 Day War in international waters was relentlessly and savagely attacked by Israel who some have always beleived and now many more believe to be the true enemy of Western liberty
Socialist=National Socialist focusing on 0.1% of the land area of the world. Another reason you deranged misfits are losing.
This has got nothing whatsoever to do with this topic.
yup. and we did NOTHING about it. no repercussions. US sailors died and we let it happen
@@salmiak-salmiak Bad things happen when you start a War...
@@mikeoglen6848 Nothing whatsoever??? The US government sends a US naval vessel into what became harm's way and then buries the incident in the archives of historical denial, as if it never happened. There was still the remnants of a Left then. What other country would be allowed to suffer no repercussions for such an offensive act? Only Israel, because by then, they had already begun the process of commandeering all American and western institutions and enterprises to satisfy their post war declaration: "never again". Only the command and control of the sole remaining superpower (then) could guarantee that...and so they did, and so it has been using the US and its western vassals to fund and fight its paranoid laundry list of enemies past, present, and future until it own or destroys the world. Which ever comes first.
What Yanis, Chris and Noam mean by Liberation is, unfortunately, only meaningful in Advanced Capitalist countries. To the "rest of the World", Liberation means something very different. For example, for Indian unorganized working class, liberation means getting the daily wage next day (even if it means working in sub-human condition) so he/she can sustain his/her family. Yanis mistake Russia of 1917 with US or Britain. To Bolsheviks (Lenin, Stalin) or Chinese communists (Mao) the top priority was to rebuild a country devastated by civil war, provide jobs, education and healthcare to men and women, protect their country from Imperialist powers (throughout 1917-1945). That was their Liberation Project. Problem with Western Left is they read Marx in letters but not in spirit. For them Marx once said: If anything is certain I am not a Marxist.
You misquoted AND took Marx's quote out of context, he was saying it in reference to a certain group of Marxists he thought did not understand his teaching, saying he is not the same as them.
@@Harrier_DuBoisBecause they're Yanis. 😂
Is it any wonder this highly scrupulous, theory-heavy iteration of the left in the US and western Europe, which cannot get over 1914, 1918, and Rosa Luxemburg, is the iteration that has yet to have achieved any meaningful wins
No the main project was agricultural revolution and rebuild infrastructure using a command structure
Ironically, saying that the top priority of the Bolsheviks was to provide jobs, education, and health care is an extremely Western Left thing to say. Their top priority was industrialization, partly for practical and partly for ideological reasons. Well-being of the population was very low on the list of priorities.
Thank you, Chris hedges and Yanis Varoufakis
Well said.
You cant defeat the castle by taking over the castle...
The problem with the original soviets (councils) was that, just as Lenin correctly predicted, the imperialists (remember that in Marxism, Imperialism is Peak Capitalism) would never allow a truly Socialist State to exist -- and Stalin believed that, too; correctly, as it urned out -- but the people would have never understood all the geopolitics and class theory involved...they would have worked out a gloriously perfect but short-lived Utopia when the outside world came crashing in.
That's what makes it all a huge tragedy; if left alone in peace to develop, the Soviet Union would have actually achieved "gay space communism" but the real world is full of pirates...you cannot build a proper socialist state without a state to begin with and given the prevailing conditions then the least-bad option is the one undertaken, insane as Stalin & Co. were nonetheless....
I love these guys but this is a wee bit inaccurate. The period between the February and October 1917 revolutions in Russia is known as the period of dual power, when the old regime was still in place but weak, and workers were taking over factories and setting up coordination of production between workplaces. The Bolsheviks believed in centralised control, and crushed any attempt to organise production on a spontaneous basis. This is well documented in "The Bolsheviks and Workers Control" by Maurice Brinton, available online.
That's exactly what they said
Yes It is a great book
Thank you from Türkiye.
@BluberryYumYum I don't understand
You are not liberated if you are unable to live in society freely. That is what the “equality and equity” movements were about.
Bullshit. It's all communist double speak. They can't reject the idea until they've made the whole world equally poor.
I grew up in the poorest part of my city and clawed my way out. There are a great many people who can't seem to face that it's not the system. They had bad parents.
All animals die if they don't support themselves.
Varoufakis should try reading his Lenin and actually familiarizing himself with the history of the Russian Revolution. From the very start the Russian Revolution was conceptualiezd as the first in a series of revolutions worldwide that would connect the bread basket of the Soviet Union with the advanced capitalist economies of places like Germany, France, Britain, etc. Unfortunately, it was exactly the reformist degeneration of the social-democrats that prevented the working class from taking power in Germany in 1918-1923, effectively isolating the Soviet Union (a country with something like 90% illiteracy and an industrial base that was shattered by World War 1 and the invasion of 21 foreign armies). In that context, the standard of living couldn't get much better, the working day couldn't be shorter, the soviets (the workers councils) emptied out and many former state bureaucrats congealed into a consciously counterrevolutionary force around Stalin which deliberately carried out policies to isolate the revolution and smother workers democracy. Why? To maintain their privileges relative to the rest of the population. Varoufakis is right, and Marx even makes note of this dynamic which Lenin later expanded on, capitalism leads towards monopolization (like Amazon). We can use all that technology to plan a future socialist economy, but we'll never get there if we draw out all the wrong lessons from history and effectively repeat the mistakes of the social-democrats. What is to Be Done is as relevant as it ever was.
I'm sure you are better read than he is bro.
@@a_kazakis I suspect he's never actually read Lenin and to the extent that he read Marx, I suspect he never took him very seriously. It's pretty typical in academia to read just a handful of chapters of Capital and call it a day. Yes, even at the PhD level.
Never count your chickens before they hatch.
Time for Keir Starmer to step down and make way for this man.
He seems to forget that racism and sexism are oppressive forces that were fought by these liberatory movements. He forgets that Lenin identified the conflicting national and special interests with, as he said, economic class as the "common language" of diverse liberatory movements fighting oppression, not the end goal itself. Liberation means an end to oppression, not simply greater access to the tools of oppression.
There's an amnesia on the post-solidarity left that fascism is more than an economic enterprise. It is pure hierarchy, entwined and entangled and attacking from all sides. The left didn't lose by fighting more wars. The left lost by ceding power to the liberal center and its primacy of capital.
The reason it is difficult to get the petit bourgoisie to support socialism is the same reason it's difficult to get them to support anti-racism and anti-sexism. Because it is a tool that reinforces their hierarchies.
I point back to the collapse of American unions in the South. Socialism didn't overcome racism, racism destroyed socialism. Ceding racism to the white supremacist socialist in 2025 isn't a cure, it's a record skip.
Varoufakis doesn't 'forget' any of this , he consciously reinfornces dominant ideology everytime he opens his mouth with his quasi-Marxist / pseudo Postmodernist obscurantist middle-class defeatist , ahistorical , decontextusalised ,evidence-free verbiage. He's literally an opponent of the Left and yet everyone just laps it up.
Thank you Yanis!
Such a pity that Yannis was praising Macron before his presidency
Having watched a ridiculous DiEM25 debate on pronouns and inclusivity, I'm really wondering about Varoufakis' motivations for commenting on this
The CIA don't need plants in the workers movement when they have Yanis Varoufakis.
@James-os9ku It certainly makes you wonder
@@James-os9kuGlad to see some sanity in here.
Kamala Harris got more white votes than any Democrat in history, she got more upper class votes too. She lost young people and women of color to the couch.
Many of these leftists were ready with the post-woke diatribes free of any actual data or reflection and were ready to collaborate with the reactionary right and haven't pivoted to the reality of what is dictating these elections.
They're blaming pronouns when anti-trans obsession cost Trump three elections in a row. They haven't even bothered dragging out the polling showing Americans fully support even government-paid trans healthcare. They're ignoring that the overwhelming majority of Americans polled in Pew research in 2023 thought the word "woke" is a positive thing (78% of Democrats, 60% of moderates, 36% of Republicans).
They're blaming DEI when Affirmative Action is an almost universally popular policy in polling outside of specifically white conservatives. Even Asians, who benefited the least, had a 77% support for it and no one could find a single witness for the Supreme Court case.
They ignore that minorities universally support BLM, feminism, trans rights, gay rights, and are more socialist than the white majority in the US (more socialist than they are capitalist).
They want white reactionary thought to be the shibboleth of our discourse when almost no one actually agrees with it but Fox News and CNN.
Transgender, pronouns and inclusivity is a complete non issue, side issue, distraction from core Marxist ideals and to keep pushing this at the expense of socialist ideals is childish. Why would you vote for children?
Why are you people so scared of the English language? Common decency and basic civility?
As long as theres people willing to buy into the false dichotomy of left/right I dont see it dying anytime soon rest assured👍🏻
"The strong rule the weak, and the clever rule the strong." B. Rice
The evil figure out how to rule because they have no conscience to limit their evil. Maybe that is what this quite describes as "strength?" They hire "the clever" who also have limitations of conscience.
"all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others"
Imagine believing that liberty and social justice weren't necessary conditions for each other
I agree 100% !!
Algorithms have replaced common-sense.
"Common sense" a term that has a different context throughout the ages. Actually fascism can be attached to it.
"Optimise his Cloud Rent" now what does that mean, Yanis? Cothuld you define what you mean by the "Left" and perhaps how it differs from your definition of "Right", and would you say that there is an objective definition of "Left" and "Right" and has it changed over time? Did Marx have a definition of "Left" and "Right", if so, can you point my nose in the "right" direction? Or am I getting it "Left" or do I mean "Wrong". Without a proper explanation of those terms...to me...your whole argument...just falls apart!!! I hit the same sort of problem with Liberalism and Socialism and Capitalism and post Darwinism. Was Hitler a fascist and a man of the "Right" and was Stalin a Communist and a man of the "Left"?
This is all new to ne. Would love to hear more
Freedom 'from' or freedom 'to'? Freedom 'from' points to liberation. Freedom 'to' points to the machinations of Power. When has power not been hierarchical? Egalitarianism is meant to act as a counter-weight ie the greatest good for the greatest number. Who decides what this should look like?
Freedom from the cold, freedom from hunger, freedom from preventable death.
This is a talk by Varoufakis that is most disappointing. Marx absolutely was about equality and delivering goods and services on need, not greed. That is not just a story of liberation, it is a story of liberation from capitalism AND equality. Trying to complicate the discussion by talking about hiring quotas and trans rights completely loses the argument. But he gains the argument back by suggesting that Amazon's algorithms work, just for the wrong cause (profit and greed, specifically for Bezos). That level of production planning could be put to use for the good of society as a whole, and that is the point I would make. And I do not believe we can eradicate capitalism without this technology working for society as a whole, with a state acting as a catalyst. You simply aren't going to have a ton of small independent worker cooperatives that take over capitalism. It's going to have to be like what happened in 1917 again, or what happened in 1959 in Cuba reproduced in other countries. Then add in the better planning we can have today to get goods and services and light consumer items produced for everyone.
Nah, the most disappointing was when he liecd about being banned from entering Germany. Second most disappointing was his drivel on techno feudalism which is nazi shit.
I mean, what is wrong with automating production and producing according to the needs of the people? How is that not liberation? Hell, we have the technology today to be able to price goods more accurately according to the cost of production. If we simply applied the technology without the purpose of profit generation we could easily have a sustainable production model - We could also have workers councils as well for the work that cannot (or should not) be automated. The USSR was actually on the right path with its cybernetic production model, but money was instead poured into maintaining the military.
Society cannot survive or evolve if they there are no incentives for creativity, improvements, invention, évolution, révolution,...This world, you advocate for, is stale and unable to adapt, it will freeze and die and in the process try to preserve itself through dictatorship. Freedom has to be the base.
Your last sentence explains the inherent problem.
If the state is corrupt, and it is the sole entity that decides how to allocate the benefits of automation, it will do so in a corrupt manner.
@@Durgenheim Are there governments that are corruption-free? That is the failure of all political systems: Humans are greedy and power-hungry. This whole divide-the-world-according-to-politics idea was flawed from the start. Politics is just a population management device that is haplessly unobtainable because of human error based on weaknesses inherent to existence. In other words, politics suck, yet it is how we divide up the world. See the problem? It's all based on a flawed ideal...
Because in your world there is no liberation. There is still an absolute power that dictates what goes where. You just trade one boss for another. How can you not see that? The worker will still be enslaved.
While I admire and respect both Yanis Varoufakis and Chris Hedges, they both still suffer from the infantile disorder known as anti-communism. A condition they both seem to share with the neoliberals they frequently condemn and mock.
Both gentlemen will look at recent and past historical events in the WEST through a brilliantly nuanced dialectical materialist lens. Yet, when it comes to the socialism of the EAST, or the communism of "The Orient" all of a sudden they focus on the mistakes and shortcomings that were made with zero context of how or why they happen and they mention none of its triumphs or achievements (of which there were and still are many).
For instance... there is never any mention of the fact that many of the greater democratic freedoms of Nations such as the Soviet Union weren't fully realized because they were forced into a Perpetual state of War and under constant threat of annihilation (both economically and existentially) by the Capitalist West!!
They never mention the fact that the Soviets lifted a greater percentage of their population out of poverty and peonage than the capitalist West ever did. And they did have functioning workers councils (or Soviets) Across their Nation and across the satellite states but power always had to remain centralized and those entities could never exercise the amount of democratic power they were intended to have because of the reasons mentioned above.
They never mention the fact the Soviet Union had racial and gender equality more than a half century before the United States.
It's harder to make social progress when you're always playing defense against an enemy who has far greater wealth and resources.
I could go on and on but this post is already getting far too long...😅
Thank you comrade!
His point is FREEDOM. How is their record on freedom. Very poor, no?
It seems to me that both your opinion and the gentlemen’s opinions above can coexist.
Appreciate your critiques. As someone who’s not as knowledgable yet, I felt iffy while still appreciating most of his analysis.
I'm libertarian socialist/communist aka anarchist and I agree with Emma Goldman that the Bolshevik coup was a counter-revolution. On the other hand I would be a dishonest idiot if I tried to refute the achievements of the authoritarian communist party of China. Chinese cultural traditions of authoritarian governance within bounds of the consent of the governed are different from Western and many indigenous traditions.
The situation where a long term process oriented (patiently dialectical) communist party is in control the world's dominant economic power in trade volumes and technological superiority is... interesting.
Yanis have you lost the plot? Liberation was all about fairness and control. Re read Karl Marx das capital vol1-3 you are way off base mate
We have always lurched back and forth from left to right without finding the middle way. History repeats.
Equality of opportunity beats equality of results.
A very interesting perspective here from Yanis.
Liberation, or Moksha (Sanskrit) coming from the yogic and Buddhist traditions means emancipation or release from the cycle of birth and death. A person goes through a series of practices towards purification and goodness to reach this final freedom. Even Christ came to liberate us. A personal quest, encouraging others to do the same, would do wonders for the world!
It is surprises me how a smart man like Yanis can say so much stuff about the USSR at the same time he leaves out ALL THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT of the early 20th century in Europe. He also absolutely ignores novel historical research on policy in the USSR.
What research do you have in mind? Where can we read it?
Did you ever go to the ussr?
Haha, "novel research". Showing what? That the SU was a workers' paradise? That the hundreds of GULAG slave camps were really summer camps for the happy proletariat? That Solzhenitsyn or Aleksander Wat were just "neo-liberal" propagandists? Please enlighten us.
Why don't you google "Misha Shamonin" instead of talking nonsense?
What about, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" implies that everyone will have the same abilities or needs?
We need to legalize real democracy, where the people have the legalized right to introduce and vote on government bills using smart technology. Rule by the people. This is how we control the corrupt politicians. This is how we make a fair tax system. This is how we get better health care. This is how we get a better environment. This is how we reduce the cost of inflation and so much more.
There is a big difference between equality of opportunity and equality of outcomes.
With "els" o lobbies LIKE YOU, BAROUF, in the "left" who tf needs "right"... .!.
@@vasilykatuma5689 what?
Consumerism fuels apathy.
Yes, but so does complexity and propaganda.
@@BadAssElf810 Not to mention misinformation and saturation of it by large media platforms.
I love listening to Yanis Varoufakis even though I feel confident that if I met him in person he would think I am a dumb idiot and hate my guts
I have no respect for people who don't respect themselves, you need a bare knuckle fight to wake up you will be reborn
In my opinion, culture is dynamic. And culture is the framework that people use to interpret the world and make their decisions.
Humans have the heuristic characteristic of assigning a probability of certainty to what the majority thinks.
Groups with a lot of wealth take advantage of technological developments to achieve consensus and support for goals that are contrary to the well-being of the majority.
This is not related to notions of social justice or limits to economic prosperity.
This is the unhealthy evolution of agents seeking absolute power and wealth.
Let's not forget that the dollar sign was created by the interpolation of the letters U and S
In my country, even some supporters of Varoufakis, think that communism is a society where everbody will be middle class.
I just wish we would stop using the word left which goes against us , the correct term is progressive .
My take is Progressive parties in Europe have failed because of lack of unity .
I will give two examples , Yanis own country of Greece which is governed by conservative new democracy party .
At the last election new democracy had the most seats , however the next four parties down the list were all progressive parties who stood independently .
Had these four parties stood United as a grand coalition they would've won the election easily .
The UK is another example , we've just had 14.5 years of conservative rule which has damaged our country beyond repair .
If all the progressive parties in the UK United into one party the Tories would never ever win an election .
I see your point. However, except for the few invisible 'third-party' contenders, we have no proportional representation in America. There's one party of the Right and one of the so-called 'Left'. Whether you consolidate all the individual parties within your style of governance, or have one big 'Democratic Party', the only difference is in how easy it is to infect one large body, as opposed to infecting several over time.
Let's face it. Until we all get big business and money out of politics, the song will always wind up the same, eventually.
Progressives are just Rainbow Fascists. Social Democrats are as well but Progressives don't even deliver on the domestic promises that Social Democrats uphold by enforcing a monstrous foreign policy. The West is so against change that even our "left wing" parties are Far Right Nazi Supporters. They literally support Banderists in Ukraine.
No, progressives have a bad ring for the reasons mentioned in this video. American progressive Democrats became tyrants trying to make everyone equal and the same and they lost the election because of that. They are still doing it, thinking by screaming louder this time it will change things.
That's why I voted Independent - Left and Right are both tyrannical, but progressives adn MAGA do not see it that way.
How about stopping the use of labels altogether? That word is even worse
@underside483 To your comment:
"The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can 'throw the rascals out' at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy."
Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time
Those mass-produced shoes aren’t made to fit your feet, just approximately, and could be designed better. If people made their own, plus clothes, etc we would have fewer goods but better. Planet earth would thank us…. we’d use fewer resources. Was it William Morris who said: ‘factory work is dehumanising’ ? Making for oneself is a pleasure. Less money, more life!
...the Left must be about freedom from capitalism....from monetization of our rights, from debt, from useless consumerism...
Actually it's the rights use of social media that did the damage. Over analysis is just avoiding the facts to appear smart
The Democrats are right wing, and the Republicans are extreme right wing. Where is this left you speak of?
When the left abandoned liberty, love, and compassion, and embraced authoritarianism, they abandoned me.
When the Greens embraced war and Malthusian Misanthropy with a passion, they abandoned me.
I haven't moved to the right, I have been abandoned by both the Left and the Greens.
My beliefs are as they have always been, that we use resources responsibly, that we mitigate pollution, that, we don't try to suffocate freedom, that individual expression is a dynamic force and helps us adapt to the instabilities of life, that uniformity and conformity lead to the stagnation of the collective whole as well as the individual soul, that equity ( of opportunity )should be the result and goal of expanding prosperity, not reductionist austerity.
Technology can and has freed us from drudgery, but is it really freedom if it creates a void filled only by distraction and unthinking indulgence ? When machines do all that we did with our hands, what then for those hands ? Hands that can be used to create, creation that enriches the soul, look around at all that our ancestors did, the great art, architecture, music, philosophy etc, etc, and now we let it fall into decay, or be destroyed on the numerous battlefields created by hypocritical folly, as we prevaricate and procrastinate through our posturing pronouncements, having wars for oil while impoverishing all for mythical NetZero goals.
We're all being played, by players who are playing each other ! Scratch the surface of the Left, or the Right and can we tell the one from the other ? The Left rose as a reaction to the indulgence of the right, and frustrated we followed, but only the names and titles changed, the game remained the same. And now the Right claim to be the new saviours, and the frustrated are riding that wave, it only takes time, but soon they'll soon realise that nothing has changed, only the titles and names, the game remains the same !
So why do I repeat it “ the game remains the same ? ” Is it tedious to read this again and again ? Well if it's tedious in words, how is it in life ? I’ll leave it here now for those who ponder to claim.
Two of the smartest people
We know how. The puzzling part is why? Stupidity is a mysterious phenomenon!
Hedges is a hack and I lost all respect for him when he did the hit piece on the black bloc during occupy. Yanis just trying to plug his book here and any time these straight white men attack anything trans then u can see they never actually supported trans people to begin with. Capitulating to the right. Why even bring that issue up? We don’t need to throw marginalized people under the bus while fighting for liberation. U can attack corporate and state monopoly fascist power without playing their game of scapegoating their current targets. Smh
Very well put
"straight white men". Sexist and racist then. Do you people really think that it's only "straight white men" who hold these beliefs? You think blacks are widely pro trans? Chinese? Japanese? Women are really pro trans are they?
Programmatic Leftist bigotry.
political equality, Yanis. Liberty was the cry in the colonies, late 18th c , a common widely shared call to action and aim during the Revolution and the Founding era that was in essence under the law political equality.
Sorry but I got zero out of this--all over the place.
The tldr imo is: "Fairness" when it comes to outcome is not only an illusion, but it's antithetical to what the left SHOULD be trying to achieve. Fairness implies that there is central planning, an absolute authority that decides who gets what. His argument is that this is the same as capitalism, you just trade one master for another. What leftism should try to achieve is liberation, meaning the people are free to rules themselves. In such a system there would still be imbalances of outcome and that's perfectly fine, as long as the people got there without coercion.
Beat me to it. Pretty much a mess.
Hedges, you helped destroy our country. You're a big part of the movement that there is little difference between the two parties. We are learning now that there is a big difference. Take a bow, son.
Individualism vs mutuality would seem to me to have different social and economic trajectories.
What kind of a freedom, Yanis?
It’s was illegal- a. Rime to be poor in the Uk and those days will be coming back sooner than expected
The left should look for ways to be useful, which they haven't been since forever.
Different parts of US have different notions of what Freedom means.
This is all about European left, indeed.
The USSR never called their system anything but Socialism. It was the US (who thought it was a filthy word) who called them Communists. No country thus far has given over its power to the workers. None are Communist or Marxist.
Go tell the Cubans you know more than them.
@Praisethesunson Communism has a real definition. Hitler called himself a Socialist. Was he?
@@vivalaleta You'll invoke him before you talk to Cubans. Typical westiod behavior
@@Praisethesunson what a great argument you make there lol
@@vivalaleta Figures you know more about Hitler than a non Western nation.
It's hard to understand where the left would pitch a reinvigorated campaign for "freedom" when the direction of travel for everyone is ever increasing capture and control by digital technological systems of all our needs and interactions. It seems already too late to back out from a system which is under the power of a very few over a mass of the many which, convince me otherwise, has signed up to a state of impotence.
Speaking from Greece I could hardly stop laughing at the title of this video . Although I don't have the stomach to actually listen to Varoufakis, I would say whilsts showing enormous naivete re a man whose party cannot poll 3% to enter parliament, Chris, you couldn't have picked a better person to discuss the destruction of the left with, the darling of European book clubs and self aggrandisement.
Rubbish. He is excellent. Which party in Greece do you support? Don't be shy in explaining where you are on the political spectrum.
Rather than being shy I am proud to say at 75 years old I have been a consistent socialist. Sadly I cannot see any party in Greece to support but feel warmth to the sadly ossified KKE (communist party) as it espouse at least intertnaitionalist and working person values. Yes Varoufakis is excellent as you say along with liberals in the west but at least consider why in Greece where he was a leading minister he the Greek (left leaning) population will not give him and his party even 3%. I have not been shy, hopefully you will respond in kind - your answer would honestly interest me.
@@segovia5758 I appreciate your fair and reasoned answer. I am in the UK so cannot claim first hand knowledge of the situation in Greece. I wrongly assumed your response was coming from the right as there is a bias towards this in many of the comments on You Tube. I will endeavour to read more about Greek politics as I ought to know far more. I have always found Varoufakis accurate in his analyis of world politics, including the UK. He writes in The Guardian sometimes. I am a lifelong socialist but here the left has been purged by the neoliberals in charge of the Labour Party, which means there is no prospect of the necessary reversal of Thatcherism to correct the fault lines in UK society and the errors of successive governments since 1979 on so many levels. Most voters are obsessed with immigration and there is a lot of ugly racism openly expressed in the country which is deeply concerning. It is in danger of turning even more to the right as working people put their faith in the very policies that have ruined their lives believing that more of the wrong medicine is the solution. I do not think there is any way of reasoning with people any longer, especially in the post truth age of lies and misinformation fuelled by extremists like Trump and the pernicious role of social media in shaping what passes for debate. I wish you well.
Thank you for this response- interesting and left me thinking how we can basically share values but seemingly differ.
With hindsight the iissue lies with me. I saw Varoufakis feted by honest and respected Chris Hedges and basically voiced my (rightful) contempt for Varoufakis. For the 97% of Greeks who also showed their contempt for Varoufakis in parliamentary elections, having spent years watching his lies, betrayals and narcissim, my short barb made sense albeit indulgent.
For non-Greeks who see him doing the rounds of chat shows, book fairs, Guardian interviews ad nauseum echoing the mood of the time, I would seem to fit into his narrative of being the honest progressive hated by state and 'far right', something totally belied by hiis past and his SYRIZA party during period Greece accepted total subervience to US amongst a long list.
Much better had I likened him to Merkel and the many opportunist leaders who could effortlessly escape accountability and merge into what new pose serves them.
Reciprocating your best wishes
@@eightiesmusic1984
“Post truth age”…
“Extremists like Trump”…
“Misinformation”…
“Ugly racism openly expressed”…
“There is a (right wing) bias in the RUclips comments”…
“Left has been purged by the neoliberals”…
“Thatcherism”…
“Voters are obsessed with immigration”…
“In danger of turning even more to the right”…
“There is no way of reasoning with people”…
YUP 👍🏼 … yours is the perfunctory Leftists script
Ugh …. Where to start …
You are the prototypical Contemporary Leftist we need less of
The Leftist who takes TWO FACTS and puts them together , to create a FICTION.
You are the typical modern-day Leftist who presents their personal opinions as “delivered truths.”
You present personal conjecture as ‘statement of fact’.
You play to “victimhood” but also play the victim.
And what all you modern Leftists have in common is … you have ALL the CORRECT answers and your instincts are always good, and you are smarter than everybody else.
And always , using the language of FEAR.
None of you LEFTISTS ever see the increasingly authoritarian Politically Correct leftist radicals as concerning.
It’s barely mentioned or presented as benign …
Meanwhile, you modern Leftists see fascism EVERYWHERE!
I do agree, left need a reel revision
Equality of what? The word equality on it's own means very little, but equality of opportunity, equality before the law are the things that should be sought. Once those objectives are truly achieved and universally recognized, the exploitation that is inherent in capitalism will disappear as long as the courts remain unbiased where justice prevails. The gross income inequality that exists between the workers and the owners of businesses in the capitalist state is abhorent and only rewards greed and avarice giving it status. Therefore reforming the tax code in order to bring this income inequality under control must take place first. This is where effective government comes in. Make no mistake about it - the role of government is to eliminate this gross income inequality that exists in capitalist societies. This is imperative. The concept that corporations are people and therefore have equal rights under the law is ridiculous and has only increased the disparity between the rich and the poor. Corporations are not people and should not have the status of equal rights under the law. This happenstance must be addressed by governments and upheld by independent courts. The process of collective bargaining must be entrenched in any Bill of Rights as should the right for workers to unionize. Universal healthcare and education must also be seen as basic human rights that are guaranteed by the government as well as a universal basic minimum income for everyone who is gainfully employed. Binding arbitration should also be the law of the land, with a strict time framework that will eliminate the need for unions to strike and employers to lock workers out as tactics used by these two groups in the past to gain advantage in any negotiations. This will go a long way to achieve justice in the workplace. Employers cannot be trusted to be fair with their workers - this has been historically proven. Greed will always "trump" the common good! The common good should always be the objective of government. The elimination of work stoppages so that everyone benefits will result. Entrepreneurship and improving the individual's financial situation through education will still be rewarded as it should be but not to the detriment of the common good! It is far past the time for the elimination of unbridled capitalism and stop the exploitation and injustice that results from it!
Good post in theory, but the reality that the government is also greedy makes this a moot objective. Why would they destroy their cash cow? This will not change and will eventually be the demise of this system.
Bruh Yanis is on a ROLL...keep talking brother YOU'RE ON POINT !
also Chris Hedges is officially GOATED...as the REAL LEFT !!!
Yanis is the only leftist that makes sense to me anymore (and I'm one of them!)
FREEDOMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The meaning is lost.
Mr. VAROUFAKIS, PLEASE TALK ABOUT THE NAME OF THE REAL SYSTEM THAT WE ARE LIVING IN THAT WAS NAMED BY THE CITYCORP AS A PLUTONOMY; SINCE 2005 THREE YEARS BEFORE THE MORTGAGE CRISIS A MEMO FROM A GROUP OF SENIOR ECONOMISTS OF THE CITICORP NOMINATED THE UNSUSTAINABLE SYSTEM THAT WE ARE LIVING AS A PLUTONOMY, NOT A PLUTOCRACY AS SOME IDIOTS ARE CALLING; THIS SYSTEM IS ASSOCIATED WITH THE ABSOLUTISM OF KINGS, EMPERORS AND DICTATORS, AS THE ONE THAT WE LIVE TODAY IS AFFECT TO THE EXTREMELY WEALTHY BOURGEOISIE FOR WHOM THE LAWS AND THE ENTIRE SOCIAL, POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC STRUCTURES ARE CREATED DAN PERPETUATED FOR BY THE FARCE THAT IS A SO CALLED DEMOCRACY THOSE PLUTONOMIC DAYS DIFFER FROM THE PLUTOCRATIC ONES DUE TO THE FACT THAT THE SECOND WAS CREATED AND MAINTAINED BY THE SWORDS AND THE TODAY ONE ALSO BY THE ARMY'S BUT PRINCIPALLY BY THE POWER OF SOCIETY CONTROL BY THE MEDIAS AND THE INFLUENTIAL MONEY OF THOSE THAT DO HAVE IT AND BY THE DEMOCRATIC FARCE THAT DO EVEN NOT ACKNOWLEDGE AND PROHIBITS THE DIFFUSION OF THE REAL NAME OF THE PLUTONOMIC SYSTEM THAT IS THE ONE WHERE WE ARE REALLY LIVING IN!!!
The world isnt zero sum
we dont really need Left or Right.
We need God and Technology. Faith, Freedom and Family are what people really need.
Left and right are now outdated notions in polity! They made sense during and after the French Revolution but have extinguished all meaning by now. 😊
I admire Varoufakis greatly. He always provokes important discussion, which is vital. But I often find that the important discussions and thought processes he provokes through his writing are based on him almost, but not quite fully, getting to the crux of an issue. For example, the paragraph quoted in this video, which is getting to the very important point he makes about Marx and Marxism, references "the Left". I find the term "the Left" increasingly vague and dissatisfactory. One of the key elements of Marx, which I think has also been lost, was his focus on Working Class interests, and the contradictions between classes overall. So, getting back to his point - "the Left" nowadays has incrasingly come to mean "a group of politicians, bureaucrats, officials, academics - an intelligentsia, who probably hold sincere political beliefs about how society should be organised, but they are idealistic beliefs, separated from class based analysis and understanding". Essentially, "the Left" or the vast majority of what considers itself Left, is not Marxist at all because they are afraid of terms like "working class", "proletariat", "bourgeoisie" etc. and their connotations. Most workers do not consider themselves "left" or "right", but they have real material experiences that have been ignored, obscured, downplayed by commentators of "the Left"... but cynically exploited by the far-right, who get this important fact, and use it to decieve and exploit workers all the more.
Yanis, So if the Varou is dead what are we left with?