Hey everyone, thank you for checking out the video and leaving so many great comments. For people who left questions below I am still going through them and answering as best I can. Be sure also to check out the source document linked in the description, which explains several of the commonly asked questions. I'm pinning a comment here because I noticed an error in the video: 53:30 - In the chart it accidentally says that Soldaty were cavalry, but that was supposed to say infantry.
Hey John, thanks for the question! My profile picture is just an old drawing of myself. I may have to switch to a more channel-specific branding at some point, I'm not too sure.
@@nojrants Hello dear sir, I would have to disagree with this. I think your current profile picture, while somewhat atypical for the kind of channel and RUclips content you make, is tied to the identity of your RUclips channel and very unique in appearance. It challenges a norm and makes you stand out, both as a regular user of RUclips and as a RUclips channel. I would suggest for you to keep it. However, these are just my thoughts; it is entirely up to you what the future of your channel and its branding will look like. All the best, and keep up the good work!
He uses cultural determinism to fill the gap left by materialist history and the interactions of social classes. He tries to claim that the Caste system was 100% spiritually derived and was nothing to do with class politics. Lol.
@@boozecruiserLmao, check your own biases my dude. Class warfare is probably the most reductionist view of history one can have, and unfortunately it has taken over as the dominant historiography.
Its direct analogue to racists who assign distinct and definable traits and specialisations (aside from just adapting to enviromental conditions of place of their origin) to human races while in reality it have nothing to do with race and everything with social/economic conditions of their country, settlement, household
@AtticusKarpenter My man race has strong pulls otherwise sickle cell anemia wouldn't affect blacks at such large rates. Race is VERY real at an anatomical level, there's a reason blood transfusions are more difficult for mixed race children.
@@redaerf2b414 Fukuyama is a philosopher, and “the end of history” is a philosophical work in the Hegelian tradition. He doesn’t purport to be a scientist at any point.
47:31 Kraut's point here is absolutely astounding when one considers that he has made a video on Denmark, and must therefore presumably be at least somewhat acquainted with Danish absolutism, which was in actuality the closest any European country came to 'a perfect absolutism'. Danish absolutism was the only formally codified form of absolutism in Europe, and has frequently been cited as the most absolute of the absolute monarchies. Danish absolutism was no fluke either, as it lasted almost two hundred years without any serious revolts or threats made against it, and the modern day Danish civil service is a direct inheritance of absolutism, as the introduction of a parliament in 1848 did not do away with the old absolutist institutions. Most were just given a name-change.
I think Danish absolutism is the best showcase agains the common view of absolutism being some totalitarian evil overlord monarch who decides everything and is everywhere at the same time, and nothing happens without their will. Considering the perfectly absolutist Denmark managed to function just fine under a certifiably insane monarch that was de facto reduced to a living stamp machine.
I stg its always the delusional "United States of Europe" wankers spouting such nonsense. At this point theyre just looking for excuses to hate an entire people and not so long ago were saying the same exact things to Ukranians as to Russians: That theyre orks, controlled by corrupt oligarchs, cannot make a real democracy and arent European to begin with. The only ones that seem to think otherwise are fucking Serbs and Poles lmao
@infine-8222 this sounds fascinating, I'm not well-versed in Danish history, do you have any recommended reading or media on this subject? Definitely has been left neglected by American historians
@@mingming919 Unfortunately I don't have any specific good reading. I just know about it a bit in passing in relation to the topic of absolutism. Danish history is pretty alien to me too otherwise. Look up Christian VII. Basically the country was de facto governed by advisors and bureaucracy in his name, and it lasted for quite a while without much damage to the country as a whole. This is kind of a main feature of absolutism. It actually requires competent government institutions to function.
Almost all of Kraut's videos are taken from Fukuyama or Why Nations Fail. Like if you skim through the chapters, you can see where each video came from.
That’s because he does ideological content, based on his liberal viewpoint of society, not based on a factual research of history nor political science.
And yet, this insanely well-researched video has merely 200k views, while doom and gloom sensationalism as practised by Kraut gets millions. It's clear what the people prefer to see...
Response videos tend to naturally have less views. Besides that, people who want more acurate content usually wouldnt have watched Kraut in the first place and have no need to then watch this video
Really, its what RUclips prefers to promote. Though, given the trend of video essays getting promoted, I expect this channel to be at least around the same level as someone like hoser or Kraut.
Kruat’s videos appeal to the biases of your avg western liberal. They’re popular since they essentially just jerk off the viewer underlying “us good them bad” mentality
To be completely fair it's an easy mistake for a foreigners and laymen cos these days Rostov-on-Don is commonly referred to as just Rostov nowadays, and old Rostov is now called Rostov Velikiy, (Great Rostov), and former gets more attention because now it's a bigger more important city.
It greatly varies. For example, I am from Lugansk, which is not that far (relatively) from Rostov Na Donu. I even have family members there. Most people from my circle of friends and relatives call it Rostov Na Donu, whereas people I met from Moscow and other cities call it just Rostov.
What makes the errors about the mongols in this video far worse is that in Kraut's series about Turkey, which he made before the russia video, he explicitely argues in the opposite sense of many of his charachterizations of the mongols, such as that nomadic peoples where isolated, had no state, where "barbaric" or despotic, and yet when he talks about russia he forgets all of that and just regurgitates centuries old historiography Really makes you think
@@CasaTelvanni there’s a good video replying to part of Kraut’s Turkey series somewhere iirc Tldr the whole thing is just Orientalism and Kemalist historical negationism
@@Kornilovite Not surprising considering the average quality of his historiography, but mind you my point wasn't that his other view was correct, just that interestingly the two are diametrically opposed on the same issue
What you said could be right but I don't think you have shown the inconsistency.....different places where affected by the mongols differently depending on how the conquest went and follow up events
@@MrJpc1234 the thing is he wasnt talking about just mongols or turks qhen he made those points, the section where they come from explicitely begins with "nomadic societies" which obviously also encompasses mongols, and thus its inconsistent that to him nomadic societies carry those traits but the Mongols for some reason he never explains dont
I suspect Kraut is one of us in the comment section. The thing that sets him apart from most of us isn't that he holds unexamined prejudices, clings to old theories, or is sometimes unaware of the gaps in his knowledge. He's the only one of us who makes successful RUclips videos. The problem Kraut runs into is what all autodidact amateurs run into. He tried hard, worked on his worldview, he can keep up with the Polandball Europa Universalis crows no matter the topic, but he still falls short whenever an expert joins the discussion. And we as an audience have to accept that if we want to know, really know something, we'll have to do better than listen to some random person on RUclips.
Russia didn't have castles, which is why **checks notes** we use the word for Russian castles as a metonym for the Russian government. I have never watched Kraut, mostly because it always seemed like neoliberal propaganda
@@nsdapcommunism2780 honestly I always thought "kremlin" meant like a fortress, but I'm not russian that's just what I learned somewhere what's the most accurate translation?
Kraut likes to set political theory and beliefs over history. It's convenient to explain a certain political theory using a very narrow slice of history.
Because what he makes isn't a historical content at all slightly, but he uses political analysis using historiography methodology, classical old-timer way by academia back then, thus actually political and philosophical content. Analyzing history CAN'T be done with theory and methodology from political science studies, students from social and political school would know that, even better if by history students. When you want to make statements about historical phenomena in professional way, so you need to use researching tools that are measurable, this is why in present day combining their effort alongside STEM researcher for it.
@@williemherbert1456I think that's a big problem. There's a reason we call it "old-timey", since modern academia has indentified the flaws in conducting research in that way. In many ways, this methodology creates a false impression of history and the world, whereby political theory cannot apply in any meaningful sense outside of ideology.
@@williemherbert1456 By this point games like Civilization are models built on those theories, defining that THIS is "Democracy" and THAT is "Communism"?
@@Dennamen1I mean that's cool and all, but I dont see the importance of that. People shouldnt draw their views from video games, and video games need ways to simplify things.
@@Dennamen1civilisation, the game where everyone starts at the same time, with the same technology and similar levels of resources? The game where technological advancement is along a pre defined, one way linear path as a result of passively accrued knowledge? The game that uses the Western European blueprint of statehood for cultures that doesn't apply to?
In other words, shitty russophobic propaganda coping with the fact that Russians look just like other Europeans hence more complex reasons to dehumanize them needed than just racist arguments
If you wanted to be charitable, this is metholocy that Kraut uses. In modern academia it is not that rare to look at history with ideology. Couple examples: feminism, critical race theory, post-structuralism, queer theory and postcolonialism. You could also add Marxism and nationalism here as old methods.
Just a two notes from Russian who studies History in University: 1. I think that the whole legend of "Good Russia under Novgorod" could be debunked by citing the fact that Novgorod enjoyed it's posotion on the North-Western corner of the Rus and just had no intention to become the unifier of Russia giving it's strong regional identity (heck, Novgorod even had it's unique dialect). 2. I just want to warn against calling the XVII-uprisings "popular riots" because those were mostly cossack/nobility rebellions more akin to the Polish "rokosz" (although less institutionalized). The myth of "Peasant Struggle" during XVII century is a product of the Soviet historiography - more exactly of one of the most ideologically charged and strange Soviet historians, Boris Porshnev (the man later was obsessed with the search of Bigfoot...)
Novgorod was pretty much an average Medieval aristocratic/merchant republic where only a handful of people could participate in its political process. I have no idea why the neo-liberals like Kraut ape so much over the idea of the Novgorod Russia (or most of historical "republics" for that matter). More so, even if Novgorod hypothetically takes over and becomes the alternative Russia, the political system isn't set in stone. Just like how the Roman Republic turned into the Empire, the Greek city states turned into kingdoms after Alexander the Great, or how France frequenly shifted between democracy and authoritarianism even after its first revolution, nothing in actuality prevents Novgorod from becoming a centralized monarchy. By Kraut's own logic, modern Europe should largely still be absolute monarchies.
@@andreydoronin6995 Still, I just don't think Novgorod was keen on forming a United Russian state- the farthest they got is setting up a pirate republic in Vyatka).
@@andreydoronin6995 It responded to 19th-century ideas that Russia has its own special path and doesn't need Western ideas like "democracy" or "freedom of speech" and that Russians somehow have an innate unity with their Tsar. So when you have Novgorod with a monarch as a hired official with quasi-parliament, and said Novgorod is one of the oldest cities of Russia - you get yourself a persuasive argument that absolute monarchism wasn't the only possible path that Russia could walk. But then Russia decided to go by the (semi-imaginary) Moscow path which locked its institutions in its current form... And since it is largely a liberal myth (by the OG 19th-century liberals), you can very well assume "...for now". But as I hoped I made clear it is a myth based on long outdated concepts.
He actually made that argument in one video about why Southern Italy is underdeveloped. He argued it was because of 'Norman Feudalism' without elaborating how why and what he meant (or why the same phenomenon did not produce the same effect in England).
@@Πολιτεία-λ6σ If anything, I could at least see how someone could argue that if they stretch Norman feudalism to mean just the harrying of the north and extrapolate from that to explain why northern England historically lags behind. But that’s *without* doing any deep research. Which is what people probably assume his videos are meant to be the products of.
As a Bashkir (Tatar), I really appreciate your work. It's an amazing video. You conducted great research on the topic. You can't imagine how often I encounter people who fall for the myths that you debunked in your video. Thank you very much!
I think the biggest problem with Kraut's video, which I'm glad you touched on, is that it does recycle the Tatar Yoke ideal. Not only is this an idea propagated with little to no legitimacy by historians from ages past whose goals always seemed to be to paint Russia as a perpetually backward, almost alien land in an attempt to explain away its perceived extreme differences, but indeed it feeds the very people who Kraut makes ideological arguments against. The notion that Russia is somehow formed by its history into a perpetually autocracy-loving, collectivist society of oblivious peasants congregating within their Miry that is never to change because of the inheritance of said history is quite frankly right out of the words of Ilyin or the utopian fantasies of Krasnov in Behind the Thistle and, in truth, Putin himself. The Tatar Yoke is not only a horrifically narrow-minded theory, it's one that actively works against Kraut's professed beliefs and the reason he makes these videos to discredit such supposed ideas.
Alot of medieval Russians did live in more collective social units, but those were some of the LEAST authoritarian societies in Eurasia. The Mongols and Rus were decidedly individualistic in their social outlook
@@jackthetimberlog7023 what’s funny is that in Kraut’s other horrible video where he tries to explain Putin he claims that Ilyin and the Bolsheviks were eurasianists lmao I genuinely want to know what the Mongolians did to Kraut that makes him blame every bad thing on them
As if Putin is not being proven right for 2 and a half decades now, going on for 3; and it's as if there aren't russians in any comment thread of this video yelling about the greatness of their country.
@@senatuspopulusqueromanus2082 as if anyone cared. What we do care however is Western people of common sense, awaken from or resistant to neoliberal propaganda and feeling oppressed in their own countries. Judging by YT only their number is growing and it is hopefully a matter of time before they take over and stop all of this nonsense which is going on. Those who have lost all hope are very welcomed here btw
Honestly, the one and only channel which covers the Russian history in relaxed but objective manner to broad audiences in English. It’s a rare find even in Russian RUclips, much appreciated.
Im glad you brought up France. They were the ones who were famous for their absolutism. There modern history is of them going from an absolutist monarchy to a revolutionary government both at times fanatatical or corrupt or authoritarian in there own way, an empire with a centralized one man show with some "republican" institutions, then a resurrgent reactionary monarchy, then the Orleanists, then the revolution of 1848, then Napoleon III making a 2nd French Empire, then a Republic, the Vichy Frace, then a rth republic but that fell due partially to a wierd military coup that led to Gaulle accepting being head of France only after creating the Fifth Republic with a more powerful Presidency. That is why historians remark it has not been a long time that France, the so called home of liberty, has been a stable liberal democracy. Why can't we ask why France is so prone to authoritarianism and at the least highly centralized regimes (France today is a unitary ste with high amounts of cultural, social and economic power concentrated into Paris with a fairly powerful head of state).
because a lot of these videos can be separated as Russia bad with cherry picked evidence and West good with glaring omissions. Not saying Russia isn't authoritarian or "bad" but that's to simplistic of an idea to stand behind.
I mean people have asked that question of why France is a historically unitary state and that does have actual answers. Much of it having to do with the governance structures of the early dynasties. That being said Russia is not afforded the same treatment of an honest inquiry
Because France hasn’t turned itself into an autocracy willingly in over 100 years. I’m not saying Russia is prone to authoritarianism, I don’t think they are, but asking why France is so prone to authoritarianism is like asking why any country is so prone to authoritarianism. Liberal republicanism in a historical sense is a new idea that’s only been around for roughly 300 maybe 400 years if you count the theories of philosophers on top of the United States and the first revolutionary governments in France. It’s a small sample size that’s often outweighed when you look at the entire 1500 year history of France since the franks first migrated into Gaul. They aren’t so much “prone to authoritarianism” as they are just historically stepped in it due to the prevalence and length of the medical and renaissance periods. If you want to look purely at the revolutionary and post revolutionary governments there’s also another difference here between how Russia is accused and how France is accused. When Russia is accused of being predisposed to authoritarianism its mostly in the sense that the monarchy and absolutist government is just changing form over time with Lenin, Stalin, and then Putin just adapting the institution to new codes of paint. French authoritarianism is comparatively different in every form it’s taken shape. Robespierre and his committee were so violently anti establishment and monarchy that they disavowed any connection to absolutism and aimed to create a completely different demagogic state in contrast to the “tyranny of kings”. The following directory wasn’t so much tyrannical as it was corrupt and incompetent and napoleons rise is a mixed bag of authoritarian and monarchical sympathies among some Frenchmen left over from the revolution and Europe’s first stint with nationalism and dictatorship. This trend of difference then continues when the kings are restored only this time with far more limits on their power and are then replaced by Napoleon III. This type of political chaos isn’t atypical in recent French history either. Hell, there have been five republics in the last 200 years and the most recent change was done because the French couldn’t select a single leader for more than a year or two. If anything France is more disposed to political chaos than authoritarianism (that’s a joke). On the Paris comment, it’s mostly because power has been centralized in Paris for centuries. The French kings based their court there, grew the bureaucracy out of it (requiring public sector workers and people to support them), and the surrounding lands make farming relatively easy permitting a large population. Consequently, people and power congregated in Paris over time and that only ramped up after industrialization concentrated it even more. To this day Paris remains the central node of French government and society because most people live in or near to it. The French president also isn’t very powerful, and has to jump through some pretty large hoops to get things done. This is reasonable considering it was only created to stabilize and balance the highly unstable legislature of the fourth republic. Ultimately though these predisposition arguments are stupid. Humans are not hive mind organisms that all think and believe the same thing, they’re intelligent enough to understand their basic needs and comprehend the most basic path to getting them. How they determine that path is based off of their knowledge of government, history, culture, and economics, along with their political socialization. This process is determined by historical and social trends and while some societies may encourage some authoritarian tendencies it’s not done in a vacuum nor is it a permanent fixture because the ultimate deciding factor in political beliefs are a persons basic needs. It’s why voters respond more to basic need issues like cost of living than social issues like gender. People don’t care about social issues if they can’t feed or house their families and they’ll choose a new form of government if the current one fails to meet those needs. Revolutions rarely start for social reasons and the Russian people are no more predisposed to authoritarianism than the French are to protesting over the slightest issue. They’ve simply chosen, or had imposed upon them, an authoritarian system of government because of the circumstances that have effected them. Russia did try democratic forms of government throughout the 1900’s and every time it failed to meet the basic needs of the people or were outmaneuvered politically by authoritarian leaders who promised to meet those needs. It doesn’t mean the Russian people inherently chose authoritarianism it simply means they never had a competent enough choice of democratic government in the often terrible situations with hie they were created. No democratic government led by anyone other than a generational leader could’ve survived the chaos of the late First World War or post soviet collapse. That’s why Russia has authoritarian governments, not an idiotic concept of predisposition.
@@hyperion3145 It was Spain where absolutism came from, though, compered to France, Spain absolutism was always less centralised and more religious in it's outlook.
I'm historian of art, thanks a lot for your work and sources. I have to often remind people that Russian history is more complex than usual - eastern barbarians, mongoloid horde and other ahistorical views.
@@Pioneer_DE we are not a separate race. Applying term racism here makes it sound too dramatic. People always find ways to hate on each other and they need no justification for that - just ask Balkaners.
The idea that the Russians are like the mongols and somehow became this "eastern horde" is an extremely racist trope popular in the 19th century that even nazi propaganda used this line. Even how they became authoritarian due to them is also shakey. The fact that almost none of his arguments supports this line and ignores any differences prior to the mongols, points to differences that aren't really unique to Russia or simply ignores conclusions in his own sources that directly contradicts his point just highlights how dishonest he is.
@@googane7755 I think hardly anybody (including Kraut) says "The Russians are the Mongol horde.". But many historian say "The Mongol rule as traumatized and heavily influenced, if indirectly, Russian elite outlook on the world." Many countries have "permanent traumas" which influence politics for a long time.
"I personally like to joke around Russians are Mongols or Tatars, like German are Huns, French are Germanic barbarians, Castilians are Moors, etc, but anyone who legitimately thinks Russian civilization descent from the Golden Horde is disillusioned. I’m from Spain, but there’s more arguments our society descend from Moors societies than Russia does for Mongols. It’s called the Black Legend. Russia is slandered and to extension Mongolia because Dutch, French, German, Polish, and Ukrainian nationalists use Mongolia as a clear lesser to attack the Russian nation. Kraut uses old Western European theories, such as ones originating in Netherlands, to view Russian history. It started out as political/cultural until it got into racial during the late 19th century to early 20th century. That’s when the “horde blood” was used to explain the actions of the Russian and East Slavic nations. These are the undertones. Kraut’s causal racism into a “history” video will be believed because many of his viewers are barely knowledgeable about European history. I can do the same: the origins of French centralism = Germanic Barbarian invasions. The origins of German militarism = Godless Pagans. The origins of Spanish statism = Moor Conquest." I copy and pasted this from r/mongolia and I couldn't have stated much better than this actually educated and unbiased Spanish individual. If foreign conquerors coming to your land leads to people and the nation to becoming authoritarian and unprogressive nation, why does world's 99% nations aren't governed by dictators then? It's like saying "Oh, a bully picked on me. Therefore, I shall transform into the most vile and idiotic dipshit to ever exist on this world, and blame my transformation on the bully who picked on me over fucking 1000 years ago".
There's an old phrase from the Roman times 'the conquered becoming the conquerors and the conquerors becoming the conquered'. I think that this applies. The Seljuk Turks pushed into Anatolia and took most of the region from the Eastern Romans. Later under the Ottomans they took Constantinople and began to occupy the geopolitical space the Eastern Rome controlled. The Principality of Moscow came to occupy the geopolitical space the Mongols had. Of course it is not all clear-cut and did not control the exactly the same space. I don't think Kraut ever said Russian civilization descended from the Golden Horde. I would say what he meant is they inherited the political system from the Golden Horde. One does emulate one's owns oppressors after all, which is an all too familiar theme in history. The part where it all went nuts and absolutist is when Constantinople fell and the Orthodox patriarchate moved to Moscow, because it was the only place it could go, and the head of the state could also be the penultimate religious leader. So now you have a people who inherited their political institutions from the Mongols, and apparently the leader has a divine mandate from God.
I just started watching. I'm only at 2:09 as of writing, but holy fucking shit does this go hard. Having the actual sources on screen, and showing where and how kraut's words came from visually is just amazing. Especially that is shows proof you read enough of the sources to make the video, that makes this guy top shelf. I'm subscribing
I saw Krauts video, and while interesting, there was always something that felt weird about it. His sources appeared decent from an outsider perspective, but everything just felt too perfect or cherry picked to make a rather surprising (or click-baity) title. Thanks for a good take on his video.
He's feeding you a narrative of history in his own liberal worldview. Safe to say that's not how historians speak because history is never this straightforward. The easiest way to tell if someone is talking out of their ass or not is if they actually cite their sources on screen for every claim they make.
As a Russian who has recently argued with so many people claiming we're (real quote) "r*pist descendants of Genghis Khan", as a Russian who believes in democracy, as a Russian who didn't sleep through history class completely... Actually, no, just as a Russian, thank you. This is an incredible video that hits all the right notes: debunks myths, teaches people about basic russian history (and makes me relive my school years learning all this), and clearly breaks from insane civilisational determinism that claims we have to be in chains forever. I especially liked the last part. 3/10 video, really bad pronunciation of russian words and also I wasted so much time trying to read the brief text in the last frame of the video. Please make more.
Imo, civilisational determinism only works at determining level of centralisation. Even then you have to consider the tradition of education and bureaucracy alongside infrastructure to come to a conclusion of how centralized a state is
Please don't believe in democracy, do you really want corruption with zero chance to fix it and a 30 percent approval rating while the government actively seems to destroy any culture you have?
At least with monarchy and authoritarianism you can get that one good man who can stamp out corruption, in democracy there is no chance to improve. Really it's just about degrading as slowly as possible. Even the Greeks hated democracy. The French will never be forgiven for popularizing democracy/Republic
In Russian, the same term 'tatar yolk' is used, but the meaning never (to my knowledge) denoted Mongol despotism. It is always used in the context of tribute and the Khans having the final say in affairs in the Rus lands.
Что очень смешно для меня как казаха. Так как у нас очень похожое слово по звучанию со словом иго( у нас пишется игі, и означает благо/благодать). Если у вас термин татарское иго ассоцируется с чем то плохим, то для меня звучал как татарское благо или татарская благодать.
it's yoke and not yolk yoke это иго yolk это желток (обычно яичный) ну в учебниках истории довольно часто пишут о монгольском "разделяй и властвуй" с пересадкой князей ярлыками, о угтенающем эффекте ига и о карательных маршах монголов на налогонеплательщиков, что не может трактоваться как деспотизм или автократия или оккупация но в целом с этими понятиями ассоциируется
Kraut's video about "russian authoritarianism" is the main example of how modern liberal-democratic... well, researches are influenced by orientalism and just socio-cultural misunderstanding between "Western world" (It's not monolithic and united, of course, I refer mostly to the centers of this world) and Russia, as well as it shows how much Western countries mostly know and understand nothing about Russia.
And it become NATO's downfall because if you completely don't understand your enemy you will lose. Classic case of believing in own propaganda for the western think tanks. The sooner Western countries stop think in terms "West vs the Rest" the sooner the become prosperous again
Its not about wanting to know about Russia, that would endear people to it. No, its about creating barbaric and backwards and alien aura around it on purpose. That makes it way easier for people to accept bad things happening to it.
@alfieingrouille1528 But this particular one proves to be at least partially true time after time again not only in some low youtube videos, but also in the high western "academia" (as you call it) circles, as well.
Is that statement not kinda in bad faith? We all can agree that every culture has their hacks. As non-English speaker, I think that English speaking historians are not that bad. The true problem is when English historians try and tell history about cultures they don't understand or even cannot read the primary sources of. In my opinion this problem is pretty universal in all languages.
I'm an undergraduate history student and now have watched some videos critiquing Kraut by different people. What I've found out what can summarise the errors in his videos is simply, that he doesn't know how a historian works. He makes simple mistakes which you learn not to do in your first 2 semesters. He uses outdated books, often only one source, doesn't care about primary sources, doesn't know how to start and stop while talking about a topic (thats why his videos always take stupendously long to make), he tries to paint history as proving his political views to be right (which you shouldn't and for that matter almost never actually can rightfully do) and he uses books by non-historians (like philosophers or political scientists) to reconstruct his history. Those were basically the first things I learnt NOT to do at university. That makes it kinda sad, because he definitely puts a lot of work into his videos and to see them held back by methodological errors so easily to avoid is just unnecessary af!
Yeah he does very little to prove his points. For how long he keeps talking, there isnt much progress he makes, before taking leaps in logic. I especially was irritated on the video of Christianity's influence on the family. Implying capitalism being less impactful in the atomisation of the family than Christianity which makes no historical sense. Eitherway kinda the last video I watched before I was fed up with it.
"He uses outdated books" Why is this relevant? I am no historian but even I understand that history is always viewed through the worldview of the person researching the topic. So why would modern be better? I can understand that history as a science has evolved and _hopefully_ is less biased today than what it was a century ago but this isn't a rule set in stone. For instance, you wouldn't want to use _modern books_ on Russian history published in Russia.
@OFfic3R1K it's less about bias but more about new discoveries historians have made. For example when new sources (like texts, archaeological evidence, linguistics, etc.) are found, they can be used and woven into theories, which bring us closer to the historic reality. Also, theories are proven wrong by historians who thoroughly examine the sources quite often. It's not like you can't use older books, especially when there simply aren't any new works about the topic, and newer doesn't necessarily mean better if the methodology is bad, but using books from 30 years ago is like using outdated books from any science. You can simply overlook important developments the science has made in the last years
@@OFfic3R1KThe issue isn’t so much that he’s using outdated books, but rather that he seems to take what they say at face value without considering more recent findings and academic counterarguments to his preferred source(s). History is complicated and our understanding of it is ever-shifting, just like any science.
I've been waiting for this. Ala Cunningham's law: the ACTUAL way to get a good research based video on Russian Authoritarinism isn't to ask for one, it's to watch one by someone doing a bad job at it and wait for youtube to recommend you a response video months or years later.
@dudu6647 ...Neither of these were lawless states? I suppose the Veimar was chaotic politically, but it wasn't an anarchist state or a wanderer culture. I'm not even sure what you mean about Israel.
@@dudu6647which cultures in this video are described as lawless? Pretty much every culture in history had laws. It's just that in the Wig History propaganda they pretend that before Magna Carta there were no laws, everything was anarchy and barbaric. Funny how all cultures think that to feel superior
The moment Kraut cited Fukuyama I completely disregarded his position. Fukuyama is infamous for being utterly illiterate when it comes to History. And the use of old sources is extremely common in pseudo-academic historical works. It gives it an air of academia without using more modern works that contradict their positions. Liah Greenfeld's works on nationalism did the same.
Fukuyama's book will always be remembered as greatest act of self-pleasuring by the Western capitalist liberal "democracy", thinking that it won the real life and there is nothing else to politically reform/evolve into. And now somehow "corrupt authoritarian regimes" that doomed to fall actually the efficient ones, while Western "open society" can't produce shells, can't stop smash trains, ships and jets into ground, while people in government can't decide what is woman
Always found it insane how much kraut’s videos value ideology over historical accuracy but I’d never known how much plagiarism was actually involved. Great video!
@@himpim642Kraut is insanely biased though, I feel like listening to a PragerU historian. Every video he does is about meritocracy, liberalism and market capitalism and how it's the sole factor for societal development 😂
Western parahistoric narrative is so dominated by 'Paradox thinking' and Cold War propaganda, that I'm frankly surprised there are people who actually study Russian history out there. Great job!
@@ilililil490 Yep. There have been issues with books being translated from Russian. That being, they often aren't. I hope I'm mistaken for obvious reasons.
I never seen the original Kraut video, and the ideas he put together seem really absurd. However, this video change my mind on the topic. As a Russian, I had a very shallow and simplistic understanding of the Tatar yoke times, formed by school education which itself is largely based on Soviet historiography, only remembering that tatars made us Russians pay high taxes a thousand years ago. It was really nice learn a bit more and put it into context of European history of that era. Thank you for the video.
I have a question, is the Tatar Yoke myth so big that even in Russia many accept it as a truth? And how deep is the myth in terms of how ingrained it is in the public consciousness. There are some articles where people like Putin or some close to him mentioning the Tatar yoke as a defining period that sets apart Russia from the west.
@@FilYRU999 Well, Tatar Yoke is not entirely a myth, after all, it is a real historical era. The myth part is fossilized in the form it was presented in Soviet history textbooks for school students. Hence, young people accept it as a truth without giving it a second thought. But it is not because it is so big of a myth, just no one cares to revise it, because it is not used by Russian propaganda to build a narrative anymore, unlike it is apparently used in some western narratives to 'explain' the nature of Russian authoritarianism.
Kraut is a very dishonest youtuber, his video on the French police is complete bs since it blames french collaborator Maurice Papon for the organisation of the Holocaust in France, while in fact Maurice Papon was a minor civil servant who only acted on the regional level during the war (he helped the deportation of the Jews in the few cities under his administration, that is true). When I pointed this fact to him he asked me for references, and when I gave them to him he deleted my comments.
I have another question - why he did this, blamed Papon? It is this some kind of stupidity or he have another goal, maybe covering somebody, trying to shift focus from another persons? What’s the goal?
@@juliap.5375Chance is he had existing views of certain things, then worked backward to explain his view to audience in stead of showing history in a fair and complete manner.
Interesting to say the least. I like how you don't go after easy explanations to complex topics but rather provide the viewer for open-ended conclusions to research and explore on their own.
Careful with that view, you might be lead into false impressions. Some questions are answered, they are not open for debate. The nuances sure but not the conclusion, such as the Holocaust and Climate Change
@@comradeofthebalance3147 the existence of a thing and how that thing came to be are two very different questions. for example, comparing "where do oranges come from?" to "are oranges orange?" means that you've misunderstood what the question of the origins of the orange means to us
@@eroorefulufoo6625 Yes but I don’t think you quite tackled my point as I believed you are confusing the two. The existence of a thing is explained by how it came to be. Your example is a question of existence which begs a ‘how’, and then question of its property. To frame it with my two brought up examples, You would say “What occurred for it to be called Holocaust” and “Did it really include an attempt at genocide”.
Can't wait for your video. At first, I did agree with Kraut's Origins of Russian Authoritarianism but I looked at the topic myself (still a uni student and have access to multiple scholarly platforms) and do not agree with his conclusion. I just think Kraut generalise the whole topic, particularly Novgorod as a bastion of democracy that if it had unify Russia, Russia today would have been a democratic state I think that is too far-fetch what if. Can't wait for what you have to say on the topic.
Yes I agree. Not only is the notion of Novgorodian democracy pretty reductive, all indications point toward it moving away from that system anyway, especially as it expanded. And even assuming Novgorod replaced Moscow, there's no guarantee that this would have ensured a democratic state in modern-day Russia from that fact alone.
@@kindlingking and that the authority of the Russian tsars during the 16th-17th centuries was upheld not because the tsar killed everyone that was against him, but because the estates of Russia knew that without a central authority, things would go pear-shaped.
@@nojrants It is not so much that novgorod was a republic but that it had, in Kraut's mind certain conditions that might have made a creation of a more firmly democratic russia easier/more likely.
basically it's the same guy who attempted to devise some sort of delirious masterplan back in 2017 to undermine some youtubers associated with the alt-right at the time. These included creating a discord server where they would go about doxxing, flagging these people but also creating scientific "debunking videos" - one of which involved talking about trouts getting pregnant. Trouts do not get pregnant guys. That's it
I LOVE IT this not only disproves hystorical myths about our country outside of russia, but also kinda makes fun of our own educational system that sometimes pursues the same misconceptions
42:10 This is a point he seemed to ignored. Comunities such as the Volga Germans wouldn't exists if there was no reason for people in other places in europe to migrate to Russia.
They were reaosons for germans to emigrate in search for better life.In cae of RUssia they were invited by german origin empress and had privileges and support of goverment at least at first.
@@hachiko2 as large minority they didnt.they di move aroudn including my coutnry as expert mienr and traders and were in nobility but that numbers were not great.funily they slo started emigratign more massively in parts of my country in 18th century.
@@himpim642 yes. Special privileges. **Special**. Unique. Do you know what those words mean? It means what the Germans got, no one else got. It means that Russia was an authoritarian shithole for the regular Russians. Because they didn't get any special privileges. Using volga Germans to claim Russia was somehow progressive or not backwards as fuck is disingenuous and lazy revisionism.
I was rather confounded by Krauts claim of the Mongols having no state or legal structure. As the Jackmeister: Mongol History illustrated in Video on Mongol nomadic political unit structures (highly recommend) they did have highly developed steppe feudal like statelets. It was also as though he Ignored the Yassa code of Chinngiss Khan.
Yes I'm a big fan of Jackmeister as well! As he talks about, the Mongols demonstrably had political organization, laws, and writing, so that was a poor claim on Kraut's part.
As a Russian person, I not only vehemently attest to the upmost quality of this video, especially in regards to the socio-historical aspect, but I can also say that THIS video truly made me feel like the creator sought out and even ultimately reached understanding of “Russia” and our people, and it warms my heart that the creator professed against stereotypical dogmatization and demonization of my people by calling it out and providing many non-Russians (which may not necessarily have the recourses to properly understand and dive into the subject at hand, unlike natives) the truth. Искреннее спасибо, товарищ! Сей монументальный труд и работа просто молит о признании! God speed, cheers, и хорошего дня!
@@anonanon2614 most western internet users don't worry about Russian government actions by generalising and hating on Russians, they are people seeking to feel better about themselves by hating on someone else, they found a scapegoat and now display their supposed virtue by typing "Slava Ukraine" or something, under every video and post, though it changes nothing. They also seek soothing illusion that falling into dictatorship is something which can happen only to countries with certain traits and history thus it supposedly can never happen to them. If they cared about changing something they would petition their governments and representatives to help Ukraine more, not waste their time
Coytryball guy quotes japanese guy, that quotes some american guy, which not even know a flinch about Russia. I love the internet. Thank's for debunking this entangle of misunderstanding and stereotypes.
About 98% of youtube video essays are trash tier, present wrong facts, push agendas, and/or contribute nothing of significance to the wider discussion (@ all the wikipedia readers). This video is, without a doubt, in the very small minority that contribute extremely positively to the video essay space. No flawed arguments using cherry picked sources, no agenda, just straight history and an excellent synthesis of different historical processes to present a clean, well informed vid. If every video essay was like this, the format wouldn't have such a terrible reputation
I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed the video, and thank you for the kind words! This video was a lot of work to make, but I'm glad to hear that people appreciate the level of effort put in. I agree there are a lot of problems with history youtube, but hopefully this video contributes toward pushing people in the right direction.
What do expect where it’s just regular people that became historians and professionals in whatever subject they talk about over night … but yes indeed I believe you right unfortunately
@@argon65 If unbiased historical education is an "agenda", sure. But education itself isn't really an agenda in that sense or if it is, than what is the meaning of an agenda anyway
Honestly this might be one of the best videos on the platform. Bravo. EDIT: I wrote this before your conclusion. Which elevated this video even further beyond. Wow. Just, simply, wow.
I used to watch kraut until he made a video about my own country. then I realized how much his content is just presenting his own ideology as factual history. btw I didn't feel that way just because I disagreed with his ideology, but because very basic facts were incorrect or very critical nuances ignored
You know whose laws also don't subordinate the sovereign? Canada's! You cannot sue the king here. You can sue his government, but not the king himself.
Thats just a part of of it. You mean to tell me that in western states th laws that apply to the common man also apply to the ones who govern the countries? If that was the case war criminals like Clinton, Bush, Obama, Blair and many others would've been put behind bars
At one point, Kraut put out a video asking people to calm down when another RUclipsr seemingly plagiarized his video. Turned out that both of them had plagiarized the same history book. (Specifically, an explanation/hypothesis that Venetian mercantile empire emerged because the city-state created an open, meritocratic system for participating in trade fleets (both investing into them, and crewing them.) But once dynasties of merchant families emerged, they slashed the meritocracy to solidify their power. This caused Venice to severely decline. This is quite likely another case of trying to substitute political theory for history - there were MAJOR geopolitical changes that would've made it harder for Venice to maintain their Mediterranean trade network, regardless of how optimal their political system would've been: mainly the rise of the Ottoman empire (assuming this hypothetical "Meritocratic Venice" wouldn't have plot armor to prevent that, or even sillier, defeat them at their prime) and new trade route to India (sailing around the Africa - a LOT of Venetian trade was basically just being one middle man in a chain of India->Arabia->Mamluks->Venetians->Central Europe.)
The funniest thing is, it only means that in modern Russian basically by accident. At the time, the term actually meant "guidance" or "rulership" - from the root "korm" for such a concept. That's why in modern Russian still an archaic term for "helmsman" is "kormchy"; or why the aft of a naval vessel is called "korma" - that's where the damn rudder is!
This was pretty eye-opening. I see the potential for a lot of history youtubers doing this, especially in the more narrative ones. Messing up 17th century for the 1700s is an elementary level mistake, begs the question if he even understands the text.
He actually says "by the 1700s" as a paraphrase of "by the end of the 17th century" which is completely correct. You really chose the wrong example to prove your point
@@fajl Technically yeah, though it's kind of a rounding-up. Fukuyama was talking about Russia on the eve of Peter the Great (1682), and Kraut changed it to the 1700s.
@Ben-ek1fzHe’s a stupid egalitarian. He understands that western European liberalism is the best political system but fails to grasp that it can only be built and maintained by high-IQ peoples.
On mongols from Russian perspective I don’t know exactly how trustworthy is sources I want to bring out, and I can’t prove what they tell us, but I just wanted to point out that even in our Russian historical school books they tell that mongols demanded very little tribute and their “tax collectors” almost never stepped out of the boundaries (and when they did they were punished harshly). It is also said that as aftermath of mongol invasion rus’ people lost some technologies (namely, the ability to construct stone buildings) for some time, but not only those we lost were reclaimed soon after, also mongols brought with them something that we learned about, like their military equipment (curved bows and scale armour), and some inventions from Asia. In schools they teach us that mongol invasion was harmful to some degree, but also beneficial to some extent I don’t try to say this is true, I just wanted to show what Russian historians try to teach their population
Thank you for the comment! It's interesting to hear how these concepts are taught in Russia. In my experience, there is certainly more nuance in the modern-day education, rather than focusing on only the negative aspects.
Про каменное строительство полная бредятина - из камня на руси стоили задолго до монгол. Наоборот, монголы застопорили развитие архитектуры Руси, и пока европейцы уже перешли к более продвинутой на тот момент готике - Русь все чахла над громоздкой тесной романской архитектурой, которая уже устарела и даже в ней деградировала. Сравните домонгольские храмы вроде Дмитриевского собора во Владимире с тем что строили позже в период монгольского ига.
I think what makes Krauts videos so appealing are two things: 1. his way of making complex things sound so simple (which they never truly are) and (at least to me) 2. his quite funny animations and pictures (which also can never really realisitically portrait any of the things he talks about). Those two things were what at first drew me, somebody who has mostly surface-level history knowledge from playing paradox-games and reading wikipedia articles and absolutely no knowledge of political history, to him. Those two things are also what I really appreciate in your video, but in your case you didn't need to resort to oversimplifications or misrepresentations of historical and political circumstances, like Kraut did. Really great video!
genuinely nothing, the entire video is a comically racist german rattling off orientalist myths from the 19th and early 20th century and even some ultranationalist russian talking points from very disturbing creatures such as alexander dugin
No idea even the part about the mongols was wrong since the Mongols whilst tribal did practice marriage diplomacy, and the Mongols did alter the politics of the regions
I love the way Kraut says "There's a tendency among modern historians to paint the Mongols in a positive light" and implies that he's going to disprove them and 'set the record straight' in a RUclips video. It shows that not only does he not understand what those historians are saying but also that in the making of his video he never stopped to consider that maybe the many modern historians who research and write history for a living know a few things that he doesn't. Very open and proud display of his arrogance and Dunning Kreuger syndrome
@@board-qu9iuthat would be the ideal, but by far is not the norm. Not even in academic circles. I've read tons of papers buried under contemporary misconceptions and prejudices.
I’ve been getting into Russian history lately as it is something I have hitherto never learned about. Something I find interesting is that Russia, even under the early Tsars, had multiple opportunities to go in a different direction-Russia actually had a tradition of local governance that could have eventually evolved into a constitutional monarchy as it happened in England.
For sure, there were certainly opportunities in which Russia could have gone in a completely different direction, and we don't just need to look at just macro changes like Novgorod versus Moscow. There were individual decisions, events, and close-calls all along the way, which also could have compounded in interesting ways. As you point out, Russia had a rather unique form of local governance and administrative decentralization, even as late as the Empire, which is often overlooked because of the much more visible overarching monarchy.
@@nojrants As historians we can't entertain counterfactuals like what if what if they took a different turn too seriously. It's really just an ugly distraction from our ability to observe and study the world AS IT IS not how it could have been
Most «specialists» on Russia in the West give me the impression that their minds are littered with propaganda alone rather than containing any history.
It's impressive how Kraunt paint as negative things like central control over the army and the provinces as long as it happens in Russia. In western Europe, kings taking power from local nobles to establish central government and army no longer relying on feudal relationships are always portrayed as kind of good things: modernisation, effective modern states etc as opposed to "archaic" feudalism. But as long as it happens in Russia, in Kraut narrative it turns in a pathologic development due to cultural miscegenation with the "asiatic hordes". I mean as a Frenchman, the myth of the modern state making as a progressive feature of absolutists kings is deeply ingrained in our national mythology so it's particulary unsettling to see Kraut framing these highly meliorative (at least in the classic french view of state history) as the marks of an hypothetical russian abnormal development
And of course, even if it's prominent in France's national myths, the turning away from nobles autonomous power to the king's administration central power was a key feature of almost all Europe during the early modern period, even in England, (of course i'm overlooking many developments and regional differences) so it's really weird that he acts as if it were a peculiarity of Russia and not a historical trend crossing the vast majority of European states.
@@come7850 the problem with arguments like Kraut's is that it tries to provide a grand narrative that explains everything. We are talking about some 700 years of history of Moscow. It included instances of great central control as well as measures that can be considered more feudal and decentralizing. You cannot simply cherry pick what you like and pass it on as history. In the oriental despotism theory, one of the arguments is that states surrounding large river systems tend to be more centralized and thus more despotic in order to control those rivers. That would explain the general despotism of the orient. But the same orient included India which never managed to establish a centralized state. Where "each village was a republic" as the British saying goes. Yet, it was a rich and fertile place surrounding rivers like the Ganges. On the other hand the "evil, despotic mongols" never controlled any rivers, never had centralized bureaucracy or at least in the beginning and yet they were part of the orient and in their eyes despotic.
@@umang3227 Yeah we totally agree, I was pointing to an even more specific bias of Kraut which is to portray as negative things that, in the West, are taught to us as progressive achievements of the state and the beginning of European modernity, as long as these things are said to happen in Russia. Not sure if I'm clear enough though. Like, to him things like an army controlled by the state directly and provinces governed directly bu the state are proof of so called "oriental despotism". In my country, the fact that the kingdom's administration progressivily gained control over the military and the provinces, evicting the autonomous power of the nobility (without of course suppressing nobility as a class) was always portrayed as the march of our country towards progress and modernity. But in Kraut's narrative, if these things happen in Russia (or Moscovy) they are proof of retardation and oriental pathology.
Generally speaking, a lot of liberal historiography is cut from the same cloth as the Marxist tradition, due to their shared ancestry (e.g. Hegel) and similar presuppositions about the process of history (although diverging to different conclusions). In the handful of Kraut videos I've seen so far, I think he underrates just how much common ground they probably have, as he often disparages Marx as completely wrong out of hand. It's especially obvious here though, since the young Marx wrote an entire treatise on how Russia was authoritarian because of the Tatar Yoke, Church, and the crushing of Novgorod, almost point-for-point the same as Kraut's video.
This is what history video essay should be like: footnotes, list of literature, every point or thought is linked to a source. I’m history student and I know how annoying is to make references. Very much appreciated
I honestly feel bad for the Russian people; the amount of hatred they have received based on false perceptions of Russia is simply wrong. This video does a good job at explaining how Russians are a people group that have changed over time; just as England, France, and Spain have changed. They aren’t “inherently authoritarian” as the NAFO crowd will scream to the high heavens. Their systems are as much a result of the challenges the Russian people have been met with - and a result of the solutions they chose - rather than anything “inherent” with them. This is why I believe the best thing we can do is interact with other cultural groups; to learn about them and appreciate them for their differences, yet understand them as human beings.
Yes, feel bad for them as they trample over a free country and Russians sit idly & supporting Putin. These not-inherently-despotic people don't ever seem to have tasted freedom, don't care to fight for it today, and don't seem bothered by it. There's a reason: they're used to licking the boot of their despot for 1000 years.
@@PhilSophia-ox7epAnd even in this case you put every Russian in this tier. I've seen a lot ukranians and other NAFOids who pissed off even pro-western Russians just because they're Russians. Just ask questions to yourself firstly.
@@PhilSophia-ox7ep Russia literally can't have normal existence without strong leader. Russia had this in 1917 and 90s - not good times for Russians. And why you even interested in internal Russian politics. This is their deal. You just keep finding another reasons for your Russophobia which touches even pro-western Russians. This is one of the reasons of this strong support for Putin :)
I watched this and your video about Putin, and I just want to say how much I appreciate in especial the way you're cautious with your words so as to make your points clear, and also, to ensure what you're saying is interpreted the way you mean it to be (e.g, "because I say X, I'm not claiming Y, but rather so and so"). I feel that a lot of people today seem to frequently make big, overarching statements without clarification, and an equal number of people are ready to jump to conclusions about those statements, so I really enjoy the nuance in your explanations.
Completely blown away by the amount of work that was put into this video. Phenomenal sourcing and historiography and just had me hooked throughout. I am not well versed in Russian history, but I feel like I learned something today.
I am Russian and i am a bit of ashamed that you know our history so much better than i do, even though i had lessons for it in school and just finished one year course about Russian history in university (which was amazing, but sadly too short to actually learn it well). Anyway, really nice and not biased video, such things are rare right now. It gives me hope that one day Russia and our western neighbours will understand each other a bit better than right now.
Same here brother, you're not alone. I've been learning to question the information I consume on the Internet And if I can't or unwilling to scrutinize it, I try my best now not to immedieatly accept it as fact. Anyway. Yeah don't feel too bad Happens all the time, where we receive new information to challenge our pre existing information. Even this video you should take the time to read the sources.
Sometimes I'm stunned by the general lack of critical thinking among the western public. I'm not telling anyone should have any knowledge of russian history, if they aren't russian, but half of the 'facts' debunked in the video don't have any sense even from the general logic stand point. Great work, btw
I watched Kraut's video on Russia around the same time as I learned about the Heartland vs Rimland geopolitical thesis, and although I now understand that my idea of Russia during this time was retroactively explained by geographic determinism and outdated senses of cultural/political/ideological influences, I loved this concept of a "built different" sort of Russia. This authoritarian and proud orthodox empire with countless cultures subsumed or assimilated, protected by geography with a fatal east European gateway that somehow inevitably led to WW1 and WW2 playing out the way it did, ended up beginning to crack after watching Kraut's videos, and realizing that he was doing the same thing as me, with a different ideological lens. While it originally didn't sit right with me at the time due to the opposing perspective, it led me to want to look deeper into the factuality of specific events of these overarching stories, which landed me at your Wikipedia videos. It was very exciting to watch you go over Kraut's topic with a much more critical and well read lens, because by this point I had a feeling that both my sense of "western feudalism into democracy" and my view on Russian social/political history were horribly off the mark, and were ready to be smashed like warped mirrors. Thank you for the video, I hope to see more deep analysis like this pop up on occasion.
Thank you for the comment! Glad to hear you enjoyed the video, and that it got you thinking more about history. I definitely plan to do more deep analyses, so stay tuned!
To me Kraut's fake accent and the way he intentionally pronounces words differently than everyone else to sound more "intellectual" is incredibly grating to listen to. For me it's an impossible struggle to sit through any of his videos even if am interested in the subject matter just because he sounds like such a cunt.
@@kszug trouts can get pregnant ruclips.net/video/PfVLAkq8nHk/видео.htmlfeature=shared "The male does not remain with the female, the pregnancy is very short." (The joke is that fish don't get pregnant, they lay eggs.)
Great video, deserves a lot more views. I find Kraut's videos frustrating because the slick design fools people into thinking that much more substantive scholarship lies behind his arguments. He also projects himself as a sort of objective critical thinker, and most people will not be aware of his right-wing biases which were more radically phrased on his previous channel. Having a perspective and agenda is fine, as long as people are upfront about it. I think Kraut misleads by presenting himself as an academic populariser when he would be more accurately described as a political propagandist.
Rather than right wing biases, I would describe it as doctrinal liberal biases. He rejects the conservative and traditionalist analyses rather aggressively just as he rejects the socialist or post-modern frames. He is so buried in the post-war consensus that he can not see facts which damage the historical narrative held by the dominant political order.
In my opinion, you shouldn't trust anyone who poses himself as an objective critical thinker, because no such thing can exist in the real world. But I also think he doesn't have any right-wing bias, he's very consistently a leftist, and wherever it might appear that he has a right-wing bias, it's just the 200 years of German racial science on the "Asiatic horde" weighing down on him. The traces of such things can show up in very unexpected places
Very nice and useful video. Kraut seems quite popular, especially I would guess with younger viewers, so it is very important to do the tiring work of countering his biased, click-bait content. I cannot stress this enough, Kraut and for that matter a large group of RUclips history "explainers" should not be taken seriously. People like stories, and especially stories that fit in with their existent "common sense" beliefs, and these people just provide them.
Long time watcher Noj and finally had the time to really sit down and follow your sourcing as a fellow academic. Great video. Really appreciate the source variety and quality. So much about the history of the Rus people is misunderstood nowadays, excellent video. You should be proud of yourself
1:01 "It was adapted pretty heavily from *FRANCIS FUKAYHAMA'S* Origins of Political Order." Me: "Oh god. Please God. No. no. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" The "End of History" man strikes again. The End of History and it's consequences have been a disaster for the human race and political thought.
Before watching this video, i had never heard of Tatar yoke. But after watching it, it sounded eerily similar to the Ottoman decline thesis, where after a specific historical event, a country's future doom, centuries later, was foretold.
@@thisworldisinsane5679 eeeh sorta. My friends from Russia are using VPN so they can watch stuff, but 1) Russians are located not only in Russia (especially today, as lots of Russian citizens are leaving the country because of ÆVIL PUTIN and MY COUNTRY IS RUINING POOR DEMOCRATIC UKRAINE (which has movements like Azov or Right Sector, capable to blackmail the government, yep)), but in post-Soviet states too, and 2) Russian is a lingua franca for citizens of post-Soviet states, just like English for the Globe or French for their former colonies
Nitpick but the Slavic tribes did actually assimilate many people they conquered during the Early Middle Ages, like the Anglo-Saxons did in Britain, even though it was mostly migratory and a case of them settling in depopulated/sparsely populated regions. They assimilated local Romanized Balkaners, presumably some Germanics, Finns, Iranics, even some Romanized Celtic groups in Austria.
Yes I agree to an extent, depending on what we're talking about. But what Kraut is referring to is not the Slavs assimilating peoples, but rather those peoples assimilating the Slavs (as his argument is that the exogenic peoples enter a region and then "become" that which they conquered). I would consider the creation of the Slavic kingdoms in Eastern Europe more an example of the exogenic populations becoming dominant, in the sense that Poles, Czechs, etc didn't "become" Germanic.
I'm so glad for this video. The Mongolian Empire is extremely interesting and unexpectedly nuanced. They practice a wide variety of ideas, some of which would be considered pretty progressive. They are probably the only large empire state in history to understand that it is more beneficial to let people do what they know best without unnecessary intervention. To degrade down to "some barbary tribes who destroyed everything in their path", is just so unjust to that era. Mongolia probably has the largest impact on the modern states of Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe in ways much more complex than we realize.
Rus used to be somewhat unified in early stages of its development when Kiev had higher economic prominence and importance than the rest of the cities and principalities, not to mention that the Rurikid dynasty was quite small at the initial stage of their rule so they could resolve most things peacefully. Kiev lost the upper hand when the trade route from northern Europe to Byzantine Empire and Middle East has lost its importance because of the crusades.
Yes you can certainly make the case that there was a more unified entity around Kiev prior to the mid 11th-century, although I personally lean toward the camp that there was never a truely centralized "state" over the Kievan Rus' even back then. The Crusades likely contributed to the wider economic situation, among other factors in and around Kiev, like the expansion of Baltic trade around the same time.
@@nojrants Kievan rus is Soviet historical cliche. There was multiple Slavic states that govern themselves on its own. In years prior to USSR this period was called "ancient Rus states". Not the state, but states.
Great video! Also Kaut's video has an overwhelming focus on Western Europe. And he seems to like to superpose 19th-20th Western European values on a 11th-13th time period....
Thank you! Yes there's a bit too much generalization in the original video I feel. Even in Fukuyama's chapter, he often limits comparisons more (juxtaposing Russia with just Hungary for example).
Btw, it's even weirder to call Russia "non-European/Asiatic", because since the Peter's empirial time the waves of Germanic and Dutch immigration grew even stronger - Peter and his descendants for a while encouraged many Western academics, military experts and nobles to join them and gave them the ability to built in the hierarchy by developing the List of the Ranks. Not to say that after the Peter the Great, Romanovs practically became a dynasty of russified, baptised into Orthodoxy Germans. Like, Germans even had their own autonomy at the Volga region before the Stalin's repressions. You can name an underappreciated military genius general Barklay de-Toli, who was believed to be of French or Scottish lineage (can't recall it for certain), a famous Russian poet Mikhail Lermontov, who was a descendant of Scottish nobility. Not to mention, that the majority of nobility up to the end of Napoleonic Wars or even later periods, were severely Europeanised or particularly Frankophile. So, that's said, Russia was always actually inclusive and pretty welcoming to Western culture. From my Russian perspective, it was the West who tried and still tries to allienate itself from Russia because of their semi-rational fear mixed with a latent superiority/inferiority complex.
@@gallicat9783 No Western European nation engaged in a concerted effort to import Brits, Germans and Frenchmen to teach them how to industrialize, to master science, and to become enlightened. Russia did that because it has always been politically, economically, culturally and scientifically a backwaters.
@@PhilSophia-ox7ep And its statement is very false. Especially about Economics and Science. What about this topic - even migration in Europe was and current the fact. France was studied a lot from Englishmens in terms of Industrial Revolution. What about Science and Economics - can you give me normal proofs? The Internet full with facts of Russian science achievements.
thanks for putting the effort of making this video, it makes me excited to learn and study more when I see this comprehensive response instead of just a low-effort commentary video
Hey everyone, thank you for checking out the video and leaving so many great comments. For people who left questions below I am still going through them and answering as best I can. Be sure also to check out the source document linked in the description, which explains several of the commonly asked questions.
I'm pinning a comment here because I noticed an error in the video:
53:30 - In the chart it accidentally says that Soldaty were cavalry, but that was supposed to say infantry.
Legend as always, this is a question completely unrelated to the video but what's your profile pic? Thanks!
Hey John, thanks for the question! My profile picture is just an old drawing of myself. I may have to switch to a more channel-specific branding at some point, I'm not too sure.
@@nojrants Hello dear sir, I would have to disagree with this. I think your current profile picture, while somewhat atypical for the kind of channel and RUclips content you make, is tied to the identity of your RUclips channel and very unique in appearance. It challenges a norm and makes you stand out, both as a regular user of RUclips and as a RUclips channel. I would suggest for you to keep it. However, these are just my thoughts; it is entirely up to you what the future of your channel and its branding will look like.
All the best, and keep up the good work!
ok smart guy, where are the countryballs and funny memes? your video is not credible without these.
this, but unironically
@@8isUnironically?? U crazy??
Countryballs and it's consequences have been a disaster for political analysis@@8is
@@8is Minors shouldn't be watching videos for adults
I mean style is important. You will not be able to educate if your videos are not exciting
I hate how people act as if nations are inherently a certain way, I think it’s one of the worst ways to view politics, and kraut has that big time
Ironic because he has a video about why that isnt true
@@bighillraft You mean the one against racism? That one is really bad
He uses cultural determinism to fill the gap left by materialist history and the interactions of social classes. He tries to claim that the Caste system was 100% spiritually derived and was nothing to do with class politics. Lol.
@@boozecruiserLmao, check your own biases my dude. Class warfare is probably the most reductionist view of history one can have, and unfortunately it has taken over as the dominant historiography.
@@boozecruiser He also misses another very important detail
Treating irl nations as if they have faction traits/specializations like in strategy games is entertaining but otherwise silly and narrow minded
Its direct analogue to racists who assign distinct and definable traits and specialisations (aside from just adapting to enviromental conditions of place of their origin) to human races while in reality it have nothing to do with race and everything with social/economic conditions of their country, settlement, household
but in the case of russians gets proven right every single time.
@AtticusKarpenter My man race has strong pulls otherwise sickle cell anemia wouldn't affect blacks at such large rates. Race is VERY real at an anatomical level, there's a reason blood transfusions are more difficult for mixed race children.
@@AtticusKarpenterwow, this comment is enlightening.
@@loserinasuit7880 Not what we are talking about little bro.
Remember kids, Fukuyama failed so badly that he is still alive but his opus magnum is already outdated.
Fukuyama haters when tasked to actually read “the end of history.”
@@ygthemoth9425 hater is a strong word. I just dislike when "scientists" write very debatable and opinionized works.
@@redaerf2b414 Fukuyama is a philosopher, and “the end of history” is a philosophical work in the Hegelian tradition. He doesn’t purport to be a scientist at any point.
@@ygthemoth9425 so he failed before he even started, lol.
@@ygthemoth9425 so practice showed that his theoretical philosophy failed.
47:31 Kraut's point here is absolutely astounding when one considers that he has made a video on Denmark, and must therefore presumably be at least somewhat acquainted with Danish absolutism, which was in actuality the closest any European country came to 'a perfect absolutism'. Danish absolutism was the only formally codified form of absolutism in Europe, and has frequently been cited as the most absolute of the absolute monarchies. Danish absolutism was no fluke either, as it lasted almost two hundred years without any serious revolts or threats made against it, and the modern day Danish civil service is a direct inheritance of absolutism, as the introduction of a parliament in 1848 did not do away with the old absolutist institutions. Most were just given a name-change.
Thanks I will tell a Dane shut the hell up next time I hear one go on about western liberal democracies. Deadbeats of ww2
I think Danish absolutism is the best showcase agains the common view of absolutism being some totalitarian evil overlord monarch who decides everything and is everywhere at the same time, and nothing happens without their will.
Considering the perfectly absolutist Denmark managed to function just fine under a certifiably insane monarch that was de facto reduced to a living stamp machine.
I stg its always the delusional "United States of Europe" wankers spouting such nonsense. At this point theyre just looking for excuses to hate an entire people and not so long ago were saying the same exact things to Ukranians as to Russians: That theyre orks, controlled by corrupt oligarchs, cannot make a real democracy and arent European to begin with. The only ones that seem to think otherwise are fucking Serbs and Poles lmao
@infine-8222 this sounds fascinating, I'm not well-versed in Danish history, do you have any recommended reading or media on this subject? Definitely has been left neglected by American historians
@@mingming919 Unfortunately I don't have any specific good reading. I just know about it a bit in passing in relation to the topic of absolutism. Danish history is pretty alien to me too otherwise.
Look up Christian VII. Basically the country was de facto governed by advisors and bureaucracy in his name, and it lasted for quite a while without much damage to the country as a whole.
This is kind of a main feature of absolutism. It actually requires competent government institutions to function.
Almost all of Kraut's videos are taken from Fukuyama or Why Nations Fail. Like if you skim through the chapters, you can see where each video came from.
That’s because he does ideological content, based on his liberal viewpoint of society, not based on a factual research of history nor political science.
we really are the end of history and the last man (1992) 😔
Yeah! Actually did that at one point, then saw the counterpoints, then readed some actual history and then Kraut became insufferable
Source: trust me bro
did you watch the same video we did or are you just that desperate to defend kraut
And yet, this insanely well-researched video has merely 200k views, while doom and gloom sensationalism as practised by Kraut gets millions. It's clear what the people prefer to see...
Anti-Russian racism sells. It has for decades. Centuries, really, but I mainly know of the more modern manifestations.
Response videos tend to naturally have less views. Besides that, people who want more acurate content usually wouldnt have watched Kraut in the first place and have no need to then watch this video
Really, its what RUclips prefers to promote. Though, given the trend of video essays getting promoted, I expect this channel to be at least around the same level as someone like hoser or Kraut.
Kruat’s videos appeal to the biases of your avg western liberal. They’re popular since they essentially just jerk off the viewer underlying “us good them bad” mentality
No my friend, it’s the algorithm, the house always wins, let’s just say.
13:35 Kraut mistakes Rostov with Rostov-on-Don, which was founded centuries later. Oh, boi...
To be far, I'm half russian and 1/4 polish, 1/4 Ukrainian and i often mistake them too...
To be completely fair it's an easy mistake for a foreigners and laymen cos these days Rostov-on-Don is commonly referred to as just Rostov nowadays, and old Rostov is now called Rostov Velikiy, (Great Rostov), and former gets more attention because now it's a bigger more important city.
It greatly varies. For example, I am from Lugansk, which is not that far (relatively) from Rostov Na Donu. I even have family members there. Most people from my circle of friends and relatives call it Rostov Na Donu, whereas people I met from Moscow and other cities call it just Rostov.
@@FirstLast-wk3kc That's not so bad if you don't make historical videos.
@@f-14btomcat i know, it's just happens to be not this uncommon, that's all.
What makes the errors about the mongols in this video far worse is that in Kraut's series about Turkey, which he made before the russia video, he explicitely argues in the opposite sense of many of his charachterizations of the mongols, such as that nomadic peoples where isolated, had no state, where "barbaric" or despotic, and yet when he talks about russia he forgets all of that and just regurgitates centuries old historiography
Really makes you think
@@CasaTelvanni there’s a good video replying to part of Kraut’s Turkey series somewhere iirc
Tldr the whole thing is just Orientalism and Kemalist historical negationism
@@Kornilovite Not surprising considering the average quality of his historiography, but mind you my point wasn't that his other view was correct, just that interestingly the two are diametrically opposed on the same issue
What you said could be right but I don't think you have shown the inconsistency.....different places where affected by the mongols differently depending on how the conquest went and follow up events
@@MrJpc1234 the thing is he wasnt talking about just mongols or turks qhen he made those points, the section where they come from explicitely begins with "nomadic societies" which obviously also encompasses mongols, and thus its inconsistent that to him nomadic societies carry those traits but the Mongols for some reason he never explains dont
@@CasaTelvanni Now I'm straining my memory to remember who said what where haha
Kraut be like:
“Let me try and fit history into my political axiom whilst sounding posh”
This man split his dick in half with an axe and wears nipple clamps and I think shocks his balls, he shouldn't be taken seriously
Best explanation I've seen so far for many of these RUclips "historians".
I suspect Kraut is one of us in the comment section. The thing that sets him apart from most of us isn't that he holds unexamined prejudices, clings to old theories, or is sometimes unaware of the gaps in his knowledge. He's the only one of us who makes successful RUclips videos.
The problem Kraut runs into is what all autodidact amateurs run into. He tried hard, worked on his worldview, he can keep up with the Polandball Europa Universalis crows no matter the topic, but he still falls short whenever an expert joins the discussion. And we as an audience have to accept that if we want to know, really know something, we'll have to do better than listen to some random person on RUclips.
That is something I have noticed with this guy.
I dont think a German can sound posh exactly. Not in English atleast.
Russia didn't have castles, which is why **checks notes** we use the word for Russian castles as a metonym for the Russian government. I have never watched Kraut, mostly because it always seemed like neoliberal propaganda
Can you say which word you have in mind? Cause I am Russian and I feel really dumb since I cannot remember the word. Are you talking about the Kreml?
@@nsdapcommunism2780 yes he's referring to "kremlin". at least in american media, the word is used as shorthand for the russian government as a whole
@@sereysothe.a ok, thanks. I was unsure because Kremlin is not a usual word for castles in Russian.
@@sereysothe.a People refer to the Russian government in Russia as "Кремль" (Kremlin) as well.
@@nsdapcommunism2780 honestly I always thought "kremlin" meant like a fortress, but I'm not russian that's just what I learned somewhere what's the most accurate translation?
Kraut likes to set political theory and beliefs over history. It's convenient to explain a certain political theory using a very narrow slice of history.
Because what he makes isn't a historical content at all slightly, but he uses political analysis using historiography methodology, classical old-timer way by academia back then, thus actually political and philosophical content.
Analyzing history CAN'T be done with theory and methodology from political science studies, students from social and political school would know that, even better if by history students. When you want to make statements about historical phenomena in professional way, so you need to use researching tools that are measurable, this is why in present day combining their effort alongside STEM researcher for it.
@@williemherbert1456I think that's a big problem. There's a reason we call it "old-timey", since modern academia has indentified the flaws in conducting research in that way. In many ways, this methodology creates a false impression of history and the world, whereby political theory cannot apply in any meaningful sense outside of ideology.
@@williemherbert1456 By this point games like Civilization are models built on those theories, defining that THIS is "Democracy" and THAT is "Communism"?
@@Dennamen1I mean that's cool and all, but I dont see the importance of that. People shouldnt draw their views from video games, and video games need ways to simplify things.
@@Dennamen1civilisation, the game where everyone starts at the same time, with the same technology and similar levels of resources?
The game where technological advancement is along a pre defined, one way linear path as a result of passively accrued knowledge?
The game that uses the Western European blueprint of statehood for cultures that doesn't apply to?
The level of detail and research in this video is insane! All the customs maps, graphics, and music really go above and beyond. Awesome video
Thank you! I appreciate it
From my perspective, it seems like that Kraut's video had a predetermined conclusion and he just searched for "justifications" to support that thesis
In other words, shitty russophobic propaganda coping with the fact that Russians look just like other Europeans hence more complex reasons to dehumanize them needed than just racist arguments
The term you're looking for this is called Motivated Reasoning. It is basically the inverse of performing the scientific method.
@@chazcmeekins83 Yes, exactly.
My english isn't that good, tahnks for the clarification
Classic
If you wanted to be charitable, this is metholocy that Kraut uses. In modern academia it is not that rare to look at history with ideology.
Couple examples: feminism, critical race theory, post-structuralism, queer theory and postcolonialism. You could also add Marxism and nationalism here as old methods.
Just a two notes from Russian who studies History in University: 1. I think that the whole legend of "Good Russia under Novgorod" could be debunked by citing the fact that Novgorod enjoyed it's posotion on the North-Western corner of the Rus and just had no intention to become the unifier of Russia giving it's strong regional identity (heck, Novgorod even had it's unique dialect). 2. I just want to warn against calling the XVII-uprisings "popular riots" because those were mostly cossack/nobility rebellions more akin to the Polish "rokosz" (although less institutionalized). The myth of "Peasant Struggle" during XVII century is a product of the Soviet historiography - more exactly of one of the most ideologically charged and strange Soviet historians, Boris Porshnev (the man later was obsessed with the search of Bigfoot...)
It can be debunked by the massacre orchestrated there to leave only 200 people alive by Ivan "the terrible" (totally unjustified name, right?)
Novgorod was pretty much an average Medieval aristocratic/merchant republic where only a handful of people could participate in its political process. I have no idea why the neo-liberals like Kraut ape so much over the idea of the Novgorod Russia (or most of historical "republics" for that matter).
More so, even if Novgorod hypothetically takes over and becomes the alternative Russia, the political system isn't set in stone. Just like how the Roman Republic turned into the Empire, the Greek city states turned into kingdoms after Alexander the Great, or how France frequenly shifted between democracy and authoritarianism even after its first revolution, nothing in actuality prevents Novgorod from becoming a centralized monarchy. By Kraut's own logic, modern Europe should largely still be absolute monarchies.
@@andreydoronin6995 Still, I just don't think Novgorod was keen on forming a United Russian state- the farthest they got is setting up a pirate republic in Vyatka).
The history of Russia is undeniably authoritarianism, corruption, militarism, failure, homophobia, and misinformation.
@@andreydoronin6995 It responded to 19th-century ideas that Russia has its own special path and doesn't need Western ideas like "democracy" or "freedom of speech" and that Russians somehow have an innate unity with their Tsar.
So when you have Novgorod with a monarch as a hired official with quasi-parliament, and said Novgorod is one of the oldest cities of Russia - you get yourself a persuasive argument that absolute monarchism wasn't the only possible path that Russia could walk.
But then Russia decided to go by the (semi-imaginary) Moscow path which locked its institutions in its current form... And since it is largely a liberal myth (by the OG 19th-century liberals), you can very well assume "...for now".
But as I hoped I made clear it is a myth based on long outdated concepts.
this is like a history teacher correcting the thesis of a self-absorbed student who doesn't know how to do history
Can’t wait for Kraut to cover the “Norman yoke” next.
Didn't he do that already?
He actually made that argument in one video about why Southern Italy is underdeveloped. He argued it was because of 'Norman Feudalism' without elaborating how why and what he meant (or why the same phenomenon did not produce the same effect in England).
@@Πολιτεία-λ6σ If anything, I could at least see how someone could argue that if they stretch Norman feudalism to mean just the harrying of the north and extrapolate from that to explain why northern England historically lags behind. But that’s *without* doing any deep research. Which is what people probably assume his videos are meant to be the products of.
Good one
Then England and France should be under developed since they were under French feudal reign right?
As a Bashkir (Tatar), I really appreciate your work. It's an amazing video. You conducted great research on the topic. You can't imagine how often I encounter people who fall for the myths that you debunked in your video. Thank you very much!
A real Bashkir would rather die than call himself tatar...
I think the biggest problem with Kraut's video, which I'm glad you touched on, is that it does recycle the Tatar Yoke ideal. Not only is this an idea propagated with little to no legitimacy by historians from ages past whose goals always seemed to be to paint Russia as a perpetually backward, almost alien land in an attempt to explain away its perceived extreme differences, but indeed it feeds the very people who Kraut makes ideological arguments against. The notion that Russia is somehow formed by its history into a perpetually autocracy-loving, collectivist society of oblivious peasants congregating within their Miry that is never to change because of the inheritance of said history is quite frankly right out of the words of Ilyin or the utopian fantasies of Krasnov in Behind the Thistle and, in truth, Putin himself. The Tatar Yoke is not only a horrifically narrow-minded theory, it's one that actively works against Kraut's professed beliefs and the reason he makes these videos to discredit such supposed ideas.
Alot of medieval Russians did live in more collective social units, but those were some of the LEAST authoritarian societies in Eurasia. The Mongols and Rus were decidedly individualistic in their social outlook
@@jackthetimberlog7023 what’s funny is that in Kraut’s other horrible video where he tries to explain Putin he claims that Ilyin and the Bolsheviks were eurasianists lmao
I genuinely want to know what the Mongolians did to Kraut that makes him blame every bad thing on them
@@Kornilovitehe is a german.. memory of ancestors?
@@boozecruiser I don’t see how he could have done the video without at least touching on the Stolypin reforms in that regard.
As if Putin is not being proven right for 2 and a half decades now, going on for 3; and it's as if there aren't russians in any comment thread of this video yelling about the greatness of their country.
A Russian citizen here. A very balanced and thorough review of the subject! Objectivity is a rare thing nowadays. My compliments.
Thank you! Glad to hear you enjoyed the video
Very not happy to see anyone russian here
@@senatuspopulusqueromanus2082 cry about it.
@@senatuspopulusqueromanus2082 as if anyone cared. What we do care however is Western people of common sense, awaken from or resistant to neoliberal propaganda and feeling oppressed in their own countries. Judging by YT only their number is growing and it is hopefully a matter of time before they take over and stop all of this nonsense which is going on. Those who have lost all hope are very welcomed here btw
@@senatuspopulusqueromanus2082 Cope harder nafo cuck.
Honestly, the one and only channel which covers the Russian history in relaxed but objective manner to broad audiences in English. It’s a rare find even in Russian RUclips, much appreciated.
Thank you! Glad to hear you enjoy the videos
Im glad you brought up France. They were the ones who were famous for their absolutism. There modern history is of them going from an absolutist monarchy to a revolutionary government both at times fanatatical or corrupt or authoritarian in there own way, an empire with a centralized one man show with some "republican" institutions, then a resurrgent reactionary monarchy, then the Orleanists, then the revolution of 1848, then Napoleon III making a 2nd French Empire, then a Republic, the Vichy Frace, then a rth republic but that fell due partially to a wierd military coup that led to Gaulle accepting being head of France only after creating the Fifth Republic with a more powerful Presidency.
That is why historians remark it has not been a long time that France, the so called home of liberty, has been a stable liberal democracy.
Why can't we ask why France is so prone to authoritarianism and at the least highly centralized regimes (France today is a unitary ste with high amounts of cultural, social and economic power concentrated into Paris with a fairly powerful head of state).
Burgundy pratically invented the concept of Absolutism as we know it
because a lot of these videos can be separated as Russia bad with cherry picked evidence and West good with glaring omissions. Not saying Russia isn't authoritarian or "bad" but that's to simplistic of an idea to stand behind.
I mean people have asked that question of why France is a historically unitary state and that does have actual answers. Much of it having to do with the governance structures of the early dynasties. That being said Russia is not afforded the same treatment of an honest inquiry
Because France hasn’t turned itself into an autocracy willingly in over 100 years. I’m not saying Russia is prone to authoritarianism, I don’t think they are, but asking why France is so prone to authoritarianism is like asking why any country is so prone to authoritarianism. Liberal republicanism in a historical sense is a new idea that’s only been around for roughly 300 maybe 400 years if you count the theories of philosophers on top of the United States and the first revolutionary governments in France. It’s a small sample size that’s often outweighed when you look at the entire 1500 year history of France since the franks first migrated into Gaul. They aren’t so much “prone to authoritarianism” as they are just historically stepped in it due to the prevalence and length of the medical and renaissance periods.
If you want to look purely at the revolutionary and post revolutionary governments there’s also another difference here between how Russia is accused and how France is accused. When Russia is accused of being predisposed to authoritarianism its mostly in the sense that the monarchy and absolutist government is just changing form over time with Lenin, Stalin, and then Putin just adapting the institution to new codes of paint. French authoritarianism is comparatively different in every form it’s taken shape. Robespierre and his committee were so violently anti establishment and monarchy that they disavowed any connection to absolutism and aimed to create a completely different demagogic state in contrast to the “tyranny of kings”. The following directory wasn’t so much tyrannical as it was corrupt and incompetent and napoleons rise is a mixed bag of authoritarian and monarchical sympathies among some Frenchmen left over from the revolution and Europe’s first stint with nationalism and dictatorship. This trend of difference then continues when the kings are restored only this time with far more limits on their power and are then replaced by Napoleon III. This type of political chaos isn’t atypical in recent French history either. Hell, there have been five republics in the last 200 years and the most recent change was done because the French couldn’t select a single leader for more than a year or two. If anything France is more disposed to political chaos than authoritarianism (that’s a joke).
On the Paris comment, it’s mostly because power has been centralized in Paris for centuries. The French kings based their court there, grew the bureaucracy out of it (requiring public sector workers and people to support them), and the surrounding lands make farming relatively easy permitting a large population. Consequently, people and power congregated in Paris over time and that only ramped up after industrialization concentrated it even more. To this day Paris remains the central node of French government and society because most people live in or near to it. The French president also isn’t very powerful, and has to jump through some pretty large hoops to get things done. This is reasonable considering it was only created to stabilize and balance the highly unstable legislature of the fourth republic.
Ultimately though these predisposition arguments are stupid. Humans are not hive mind organisms that all think and believe the same thing, they’re intelligent enough to understand their basic needs and comprehend the most basic path to getting them. How they determine that path is based off of their knowledge of government, history, culture, and economics, along with their political socialization. This process is determined by historical and social trends and while some societies may encourage some authoritarian tendencies it’s not done in a vacuum nor is it a permanent fixture because the ultimate deciding factor in political beliefs are a persons basic needs. It’s why voters respond more to basic need issues like cost of living than social issues like gender. People don’t care about social issues if they can’t feed or house their families and they’ll choose a new form of government if the current one fails to meet those needs. Revolutions rarely start for social reasons and the Russian people are no more predisposed to authoritarianism than the French are to protesting over the slightest issue. They’ve simply chosen, or had imposed upon them, an authoritarian system of government because of the circumstances that have effected them. Russia did try democratic forms of government throughout the 1900’s and every time it failed to meet the basic needs of the people or were outmaneuvered politically by authoritarian leaders who promised to meet those needs. It doesn’t mean the Russian people inherently chose authoritarianism it simply means they never had a competent enough choice of democratic government in the often terrible situations with hie they were created. No democratic government led by anyone other than a generational leader could’ve survived the chaos of the late First World War or post soviet collapse. That’s why Russia has authoritarian governments, not an idiotic concept of predisposition.
@@hyperion3145 It was Spain where absolutism came from, though, compered to France, Spain absolutism was always less centralised and more religious in it's outlook.
I'm historian of art, thanks a lot for your work and sources. I have to often remind people that Russian history is more complex than usual - eastern barbarians, mongoloid horde and other ahistorical views.
The United States is far more barbaric than Russia ever was, especially those below the Mason-Dixon line.
But how else can I justify my anti Russian Racism?
The problem is this myth is a Russian myth and much more known within than abroad.
@@Pioneer_DE we are not a separate race. Applying term racism here makes it sound too dramatic. People always find ways to hate on each other and they need no justification for that - just ask Balkaners.
@@stariyczedun Racism also describes discrimination based on Ethnicity, not just race.
The idea that the Russians are like the mongols and somehow became this "eastern horde" is an extremely racist trope popular in the 19th century that even nazi propaganda used this line. Even how they became authoritarian due to them is also shakey. The fact that almost none of his arguments supports this line and ignores any differences prior to the mongols, points to differences that aren't really unique to Russia or simply ignores conclusions in his own sources that directly contradicts his point just highlights how dishonest he is.
Russians are white as snow. As East Asian I laugh when other whites call Russians Asiastic
It’s true though lol
@@Yku30 What part of it is true? You have an entire video here debunking every point.
@@Yku30Heinz Guderian be like:
@@googane7755 I think hardly anybody (including Kraut) says "The Russians are the Mongol horde.". But many historian say "The Mongol rule as traumatized and heavily influenced, if indirectly, Russian elite outlook on the world."
Many countries have "permanent traumas" which influence politics for a long time.
"I personally like to joke around Russians are Mongols or Tatars, like German are Huns, French are Germanic barbarians, Castilians are Moors, etc, but anyone who legitimately thinks Russian civilization descent from the Golden Horde is disillusioned.
I’m from Spain, but there’s more arguments our society descend from Moors societies than Russia does for Mongols. It’s called the Black Legend. Russia is slandered and to extension Mongolia because Dutch, French, German, Polish, and Ukrainian nationalists use Mongolia as a clear lesser to attack the Russian nation.
Kraut uses old Western European theories, such as ones originating in Netherlands, to view Russian history. It started out as political/cultural until it got into racial during the late 19th century to early 20th century. That’s when the “horde blood” was used to explain the actions of the Russian and East Slavic nations. These are the undertones.
Kraut’s causal racism into a “history” video will be believed because many of his viewers are barely knowledgeable about European history. I can do the same: the origins of French centralism = Germanic Barbarian invasions. The origins of German militarism = Godless Pagans. The origins of Spanish statism = Moor Conquest."
I copy and pasted this from r/mongolia and I couldn't have stated much better than this actually educated and unbiased Spanish individual.
If foreign conquerors coming to your land leads to people and the nation to becoming authoritarian and unprogressive nation, why does world's 99% nations aren't governed by dictators then? It's like saying "Oh, a bully picked on me. Therefore, I shall transform into the most vile and idiotic dipshit to ever exist on this world, and blame my transformation on the bully who picked on me over fucking 1000 years ago".
Can you give me the link?
There's an old phrase from the Roman times 'the conquered becoming the conquerors and the conquerors becoming the conquered'. I think that this applies. The Seljuk Turks pushed into Anatolia and took most of the region from the Eastern Romans. Later under the Ottomans they took Constantinople and began to occupy the geopolitical space the Eastern Rome controlled. The Principality of Moscow came to occupy the geopolitical space the Mongols had. Of course it is not all clear-cut and did not control the exactly the same space.
I don't think Kraut ever said Russian civilization descended from the Golden Horde. I would say what he meant is they inherited the political system from the Golden Horde. One does emulate one's owns oppressors after all, which is an all too familiar theme in history. The part where it all went nuts and absolutist is when Constantinople fell and the Orthodox patriarchate moved to Moscow, because it was the only place it could go, and the head of the state could also be the penultimate religious leader. So now you have a people who inherited their political institutions from the Mongols, and apparently the leader has a divine mandate from God.
I just started watching. I'm only at 2:09 as of writing, but holy fucking shit does this go hard. Having the actual sources on screen, and showing where and how kraut's words came from visually is just amazing. Especially that is shows proof you read enough of the sources to make the video, that makes this guy top shelf. I'm subscribing
Thank you! I appreciate the support
@@nojrants After having watched the video in full, and starting to binge your channel, I must say you didn't disappoint.
I saw Krauts video, and while interesting, there was always something that felt weird about it. His sources appeared decent from an outsider perspective, but everything just felt too perfect or cherry picked to make a rather surprising (or click-baity) title. Thanks for a good take on his video.
Every time someone tries to explain immensely complex topic in simple and short terms he lies.
He's feeding you a narrative of history in his own liberal worldview. Safe to say that's not how historians speak because history is never this straightforward. The easiest way to tell if someone is talking out of their ass or not is if they actually cite their sources on screen for every claim they make.
As a Russian who has recently argued with so many people claiming we're (real quote) "r*pist descendants of Genghis Khan", as a Russian who believes in democracy, as a Russian who didn't sleep through history class completely... Actually, no, just as a Russian, thank you. This is an incredible video that hits all the right notes: debunks myths, teaches people about basic russian history (and makes me relive my school years learning all this), and clearly breaks from insane civilisational determinism that claims we have to be in chains forever. I especially liked the last part.
3/10 video, really bad pronunciation of russian words and also I wasted so much time trying to read the brief text in the last frame of the video. Please make more.
Imo, civilisational determinism only works at determining level of centralisation. Even then you have to consider the tradition of education and bureaucracy alongside infrastructure to come to a conclusion of how centralized a state is
Please don't believe in democracy, do you really want corruption with zero chance to fix it and a 30 percent approval rating while the government actively seems to destroy any culture you have?
At least with monarchy and authoritarianism you can get that one good man who can stamp out corruption, in democracy there is no chance to improve. Really it's just about degrading as slowly as possible. Even the Greeks hated democracy. The French will never be forgiven for popularizing democracy/Republic
>really bad pronunciation of russian words
true and real, -10/10 literally unwatchable, please make more
Гойда?
In Russian, the same term 'tatar yolk' is used, but the meaning never (to my knowledge) denoted Mongol despotism. It is always used in the context of tribute and the Khans having the final say in affairs in the Rus lands.
Что очень смешно для меня как казаха. Так как у нас очень похожое слово по звучанию со словом иго( у нас пишется игі, и означает благо/благодать). Если у вас термин татарское иго ассоцируется с чем то плохим, то для меня звучал как татарское благо или татарская благодать.
@@QasqaZholИго происходит от латинского "jugum", "ярмо". Почему это нежелательное явление думаю объяснять не надо
it's yoke and not yolk
yoke это иго
yolk это желток (обычно яичный)
ну в учебниках истории довольно часто пишут о монгольском "разделяй и властвуй" с пересадкой князей ярлыками, о угтенающем эффекте ига и о карательных маршах монголов на налогонеплательщиков, что не может трактоваться как деспотизм или автократия или оккупация но в целом с этими понятиями ассоциируется
Kraut's video about "russian authoritarianism" is the main example of how modern liberal-democratic... well, researches are influenced by orientalism and just socio-cultural misunderstanding between "Western world" (It's not monolithic and united, of course, I refer mostly to the centers of this world) and Russia, as well as it shows how much Western countries mostly know and understand nothing about Russia.
And it become NATO's downfall because if you completely don't understand your enemy you will lose. Classic case of believing in own propaganda for the western think tanks. The sooner Western countries stop think in terms "West vs the Rest" the sooner the become prosperous again
Thats what happens when Russia is the enemy for a full century.
Its not about wanting to know about Russia, that would endear people to it. No, its about creating barbaric and backwards and alien aura around it on purpose. That makes it way easier for people to accept bad things happening to it.
It’s worse than the west understands nothing about Russia it’s so bad the west makes a point of deliberately misunderstanding Russia!
not only that but how neoliberal pop historians dont even understand, or dont want to, understand their own history.
Finally an English speaking historian, who read more then one book.
Ah yes negative stereotypes
@alfieingrouille1528 But this particular one proves to be at least partially true time after time again not only in some low youtube videos, but also in the high western "academia" (as you call it) circles, as well.
Is that statement not kinda in bad faith? We all can agree that every culture has their hacks. As non-English speaker, I think that English speaking historians are not that bad. The true problem is when English historians try and tell history about cultures they don't understand or even cannot read the primary sources of. In my opinion this problem is pretty universal in all languages.
You can probably hear my eyes rolling at the discussion of this joke comment.
And I'm an insufferable pedant myself, mind you…
@@MuradBeybalaev Yeah. It is cringe that people has to say that racism is wrong.
I'm an undergraduate history student and now have watched some videos critiquing Kraut by different people. What I've found out what can summarise the errors in his videos is simply, that he doesn't know how a historian works. He makes simple mistakes which you learn not to do in your first 2 semesters. He uses outdated books, often only one source, doesn't care about primary sources, doesn't know how to start and stop while talking about a topic (thats why his videos always take stupendously long to make), he tries to paint history as proving his political views to be right (which you shouldn't and for that matter almost never actually can rightfully do) and he uses books by non-historians (like philosophers or political scientists) to reconstruct his history. Those were basically the first things I learnt NOT to do at university. That makes it kinda sad, because he definitely puts a lot of work into his videos and to see them held back by methodological errors so easily to avoid is just unnecessary af!
Yeah he does very little to prove his points. For how long he keeps talking, there isnt much progress he makes, before taking leaps in logic. I especially was irritated on the video of Christianity's influence on the family. Implying capitalism being less impactful in the atomisation of the family than Christianity which makes no historical sense. Eitherway kinda the last video I watched before I was fed up with it.
"He uses outdated books" Why is this relevant? I am no historian but even I understand that history is always viewed through the worldview of the person researching the topic. So why would modern be better? I can understand that history as a science has evolved and _hopefully_ is less biased today than what it was a century ago but this isn't a rule set in stone. For instance, you wouldn't want to use _modern books_ on Russian history published in Russia.
@OFfic3R1K it's less about bias but more about new discoveries historians have made. For example when new sources (like texts, archaeological evidence, linguistics, etc.) are found, they can be used and woven into theories, which bring us closer to the historic reality. Also, theories are proven wrong by historians who thoroughly examine the sources quite often. It's not like you can't use older books, especially when there simply aren't any new works about the topic, and newer doesn't necessarily mean better if the methodology is bad, but using books from 30 years ago is like using outdated books from any science. You can simply overlook important developments the science has made in the last years
@@Kaiserinmeli That video was just objectively true though.
@@OFfic3R1KThe issue isn’t so much that he’s using outdated books, but rather that he seems to take what they say at face value without considering more recent findings and academic counterarguments to his preferred source(s). History is complicated and our understanding of it is ever-shifting, just like any science.
I've been waiting for this. Ala Cunningham's law: the ACTUAL way to get a good research based video on Russian Authoritarinism isn't to ask for one, it's to watch one by someone doing a bad job at it and wait for youtube to recommend you a response video months or years later.
The idea that a lawless culture would inherently lead to authoritarianism is such odd logic to begin with.
big examples are weimar germany and current israel
@dudu6647 ...Neither of these were lawless states? I suppose the Veimar was chaotic politically, but it wasn't an anarchist state or a wanderer culture. I'm not even sure what you mean about Israel.
@@dudu6647which cultures in this video are described as lawless? Pretty much every culture in history had laws. It's just that in the Wig History propaganda they pretend that before Magna Carta there were no laws, everything was anarchy and barbaric. Funny how all cultures think that to feel superior
The moment Kraut cited Fukuyama I completely disregarded his position.
Fukuyama is infamous for being utterly illiterate when it comes to History.
And the use of old sources is extremely common in pseudo-academic historical works. It gives it an air of academia without using more modern works that contradict their positions.
Liah Greenfeld's works on nationalism did the same.
Fukuyama's book will always be remembered as greatest act of self-pleasuring by the Western capitalist liberal "democracy", thinking that it won the real life and there is nothing else to politically reform/evolve into.
And now somehow "corrupt authoritarian regimes" that doomed to fall actually the efficient ones, while Western "open society" can't produce shells, can't stop smash trains, ships and jets into ground, while people in government can't decide what is woman
Always found it insane how much kraut’s videos value ideology over historical accuracy but I’d never known how much plagiarism was actually involved. Great video!
this goes for most commentators sadly.
@@himpim642Kraut is insanely biased though, I feel like listening to a PragerU historian. Every video he does is about meritocracy, liberalism and market capitalism and how it's the sole factor for societal development 😂
@@nathaelvhaseyar4350
thats why one don listen to kraut.
@@nathaelvhaseyar4350 Yeah they're both neolibs so it checks out lol
His ideology is europe is good, no-europe is bad. Thats it.
Western parahistoric narrative is so dominated by 'Paradox thinking' and Cold War propaganda, that I'm frankly surprised there are people who actually study Russian history out there. Great job!
Theres also the factor a lot of Russian books are sorta scarce to find in the West which attributes to this ignorance.
@@ilililil490 Yep. There have been issues with books being translated from Russian. That being, they often aren't. I hope I'm mistaken for obvious reasons.
I started reading into Russian History When I was 12.
@@MikeHunt-zy3cn If they're translated into Telugu, Then Andhra people would understand Some Foreigners.. I am afraid not.
lowkey feel the same as a Spaniard, ive never seen a video like this on spain
I never seen the original Kraut video, and the ideas he put together seem really absurd. However, this video change my mind on the topic. As a Russian, I had a very shallow and simplistic understanding of the Tatar yoke times, formed by school education which itself is largely based on Soviet historiography, only remembering that tatars made us Russians pay high taxes a thousand years ago. It was really nice learn a bit more and put it into context of European history of that era. Thank you for the video.
Thank you for the comment! I'm glad to hear you enjoyed the video and found it informative.
I have a question, is the Tatar Yoke myth so big that even in Russia many accept it as a truth? And how deep is the myth in terms of how ingrained it is in the public consciousness.
There are some articles where people like Putin or some close to him mentioning the Tatar yoke as a defining period that sets apart Russia from the west.
@@FilYRU999 Well, Tatar Yoke is not entirely a myth, after all, it is a real historical era. The myth part is fossilized in the form it was presented in Soviet history textbooks for school students. Hence, young people accept it as a truth without giving it a second thought. But it is not because it is so big of a myth, just no one cares to revise it, because it is not used by Russian propaganda to build a narrative anymore, unlike it is apparently used in some western narratives to 'explain' the nature of Russian authoritarianism.
@@yyyy12344 thank you
@@vladthemagnificent9052 thank you
Kraut is a very dishonest youtuber, his video on the French police is complete bs since it blames french collaborator Maurice Papon for the organisation of the Holocaust in France, while in fact Maurice Papon was a minor civil servant who only acted on the regional level during the war (he helped the deportation of the Jews in the few cities under his administration, that is true). When I pointed this fact to him he asked me for references, and when I gave them to him he deleted my comments.
I hated that video of his
His ego could not cope that *he* made error?
I have another question - why he did this, blamed Papon? It is this some kind of stupidity or he have another goal, maybe covering somebody, trying to shift focus from another persons? What’s the goal?
@@juliap.5375Chance is he had existing views of certain things, then worked backward to explain his view to audience in stead of showing history in a fair and complete manner.
Its probably exemplative of the liberal habbit of asigning copability for tragedies on individual bad actors instead of examining systemic causes
Interesting to say the least. I like how you don't go after easy explanations to complex topics but rather provide the viewer for open-ended conclusions to research and explore on their own.
Thank you! Indeed, these are complicated questions, there's really no one-size-fits-all explanation in history.
Careful with that view, you might be lead into false impressions. Some questions are answered, they are not open for debate. The nuances sure but not the conclusion, such as the Holocaust and Climate Change
@@comradeofthebalance3147 the existence of a thing and how that thing came to be are two very different questions. for example, comparing "where do oranges come from?" to "are oranges orange?" means that you've misunderstood what the question of the origins of the orange means to us
@@eroorefulufoo6625 Yes but I don’t think you quite tackled my point as I believed you are confusing the two. The existence of a thing is explained by how it came to be. Your example is a question of existence which begs a ‘how’, and then question of its property. To frame it with my two brought up examples, You would say “What occurred for it to be called Holocaust” and “Did it really include an attempt at genocide”.
Can't wait for your video. At first, I did agree with Kraut's Origins of Russian Authoritarianism but I looked at the topic myself (still a uni student and have access to multiple scholarly platforms) and do not agree with his conclusion. I just think Kraut generalise the whole topic, particularly Novgorod as a bastion of democracy that if it had unify Russia, Russia today would have been a democratic state I think that is too far-fetch what if. Can't wait for what you have to say on the topic.
Yes I agree. Not only is the notion of Novgorodian democracy pretty reductive, all indications point toward it moving away from that system anyway, especially as it expanded. And even assuming Novgorod replaced Moscow, there's no guarantee that this would have ensured a democratic state in modern-day Russia from that fact alone.
It also doesn't account for the fact that Romanovs were elected as tsars
@@kindlingking and that the authority of the Russian tsars during the 16th-17th centuries was upheld not because the tsar killed everyone that was against him, but because the estates of Russia knew that without a central authority, things would go pear-shaped.
Lmao that's literally EU4 tier of historical knowledge, Kraut and other libtard historians are a fuckin joke
@@nojrants It is not so much that novgorod was a republic but that it had, in Kraut's mind certain conditions that might have made a creation of a more firmly democratic russia easier/more likely.
Ask Kraut what he thinks of pregnant trouts, and you will know how serious he is
Wait what
You cant just say that and not elaborate
??????
I request more information
bruh
basically it's the same guy who attempted to devise some sort of delirious masterplan back in 2017 to undermine some youtubers associated with the alt-right at the time. These included creating a discord server where they would go about doxxing, flagging these people but also creating scientific "debunking videos" - one of which involved talking about trouts getting pregnant.
Trouts do not get pregnant guys. That's it
I LOVE IT
this not only disproves hystorical myths about our country outside of russia, but also kinda makes fun of our own educational system that sometimes pursues the same misconceptions
42:10
This is a point he seemed to ignored.
Comunities such as the Volga Germans wouldn't exists if there was no reason for people in other places in europe to migrate to Russia.
They were given special privileges Russians were not.
They were reaosons for germans to emigrate in search for better life.In cae of RUssia they were invited by german origin empress and had privileges and support of goverment at least at first.
@@himpim642 they came long before Ekatherine II
@@hachiko2
as large minority they didnt.they di move aroudn including my coutnry as expert mienr and traders and were in nobility but that numbers were not great.funily they slo started emigratign more massively in parts of my country in 18th century.
@@himpim642 yes. Special privileges. **Special**. Unique. Do you know what those words mean? It means what the Germans got, no one else got. It means that Russia was an authoritarian shithole for the regular Russians. Because they didn't get any special privileges. Using volga Germans to claim Russia was somehow progressive or not backwards as fuck is disingenuous and lazy revisionism.
I was rather confounded by Krauts claim of the Mongols having no state or legal structure. As the Jackmeister: Mongol History illustrated in Video on Mongol nomadic political unit structures (highly recommend) they did have highly developed steppe feudal like statelets. It was also as though he Ignored the Yassa code of Chinngiss Khan.
Yes I'm a big fan of Jackmeister as well! As he talks about, the Mongols demonstrably had political organization, laws, and writing, so that was a poor claim on Kraut's part.
I will have you know that Kraut most likely has hundreds, if not thousands of hours of Paradox gameplay to back him up. Post your steam hours!
4,000
@@NCR-National-Reclamation-Gov how much was spent alt-tabbed
@Dmitrisnikioff 50, I just figured it out what it was last month
As a Russian person, I not only vehemently attest to the upmost quality of this video, especially in regards to the socio-historical aspect, but I can also say that THIS video truly made me feel like the creator sought out and even ultimately reached understanding of “Russia” and our people, and it warms my heart that the creator professed against stereotypical dogmatization and demonization of my people by calling it out and providing many non-Russians (which may not necessarily have the recourses to properly understand and dive into the subject at hand, unlike natives) the truth. Искреннее спасибо, товарищ! Сей монументальный труд и работа просто молит о признании! God speed, cheers, и хорошего дня!
Have you ever considered that worrying about Russias current actions is more important than some supposed demonisation?
@@anonanon2614 most western internet users don't worry about Russian government actions by generalising and hating on Russians, they are people seeking to feel better about themselves by hating on someone else, they found a scapegoat and now display their supposed virtue by typing "Slava Ukraine" or something, under every video and post, though it changes nothing. They also seek soothing illusion that falling into dictatorship is something which can happen only to countries with certain traits and history thus it supposedly can never happen to them.
If they cared about changing something they would petition their governments and representatives to help Ukraine more, not waste their time
@@anonanon2614🐖
@anonanon2614 Perhaps so, but that is no justification for pushing mindless civilizational war/essentialism rhetoric and chauvinistic ideas.
@@anonanon2614Perhaps so, but that is no justification for pushing mindless chauvinism and civilizational war rhetoric.
Coytryball guy quotes japanese guy, that quotes some american guy, which not even know a flinch about Russia. I love the internet.
Thank's for debunking this entangle of misunderstanding and stereotypes.
About 98% of youtube video essays are trash tier, present wrong facts, push agendas, and/or contribute nothing of significance to the wider discussion (@ all the wikipedia readers).
This video is, without a doubt, in the very small minority that contribute extremely positively to the video essay space. No flawed arguments using cherry picked sources, no agenda, just straight history and an excellent synthesis of different historical processes to present a clean, well informed vid. If every video essay was like this, the format wouldn't have such a terrible reputation
I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed the video, and thank you for the kind words! This video was a lot of work to make, but I'm glad to hear that people appreciate the level of effort put in. I agree there are a lot of problems with history youtube, but hopefully this video contributes toward pushing people in the right direction.
I mean, let's be honest. All content has an agenda, be it explicit or not.
What do expect where it’s just regular people that became historians and professionals in whatever subject they talk about over night … but yes indeed I believe you right unfortunately
@@MoneyDawgHavingShit360kraut ain’t even a historian he’s more a political scientist
@@argon65 If unbiased historical education is an "agenda", sure. But education itself isn't really an agenda in that sense or if it is, than what is the meaning of an agenda anyway
Honestly this might be one of the best videos on the platform. Bravo.
EDIT: I wrote this before your conclusion.
Which elevated this video even further beyond.
Wow. Just, simply, wow.
Thank you! I appreciate it
I used to watch kraut until he made a video about my own country. then I realized how much his content is just presenting his own ideology as factual history.
btw I didn't feel that way just because I disagreed with his ideology, but because very basic facts were incorrect or very critical nuances ignored
What your country?
Which country?
What’s your country?
1 hour NoJ Rants video?!?!?? Crazy what the gods have blessed me with
You know whose laws also don't subordinate the sovereign? Canada's! You cannot sue the king here. You can sue his government, but not the king himself.
Thats just a part of of it. You mean to tell me that in western states th laws that apply to the common man also apply to the ones who govern the countries? If that was the case war criminals like Clinton, Bush, Obama, Blair and many others would've been put behind bars
And in other common law countries as well. Sovereign immunity is a thing.
You’d think if they’re gonna just plagiarise a history book they’d choose an actually good one
At one point, Kraut put out a video asking people to calm down when another RUclipsr seemingly plagiarized his video. Turned out that both of them had plagiarized the same history book. (Specifically, an explanation/hypothesis that Venetian mercantile empire emerged because the city-state created an open, meritocratic system for participating in trade fleets (both investing into them, and crewing them.) But once dynasties of merchant families emerged, they slashed the meritocracy to solidify their power. This caused Venice to severely decline.
This is quite likely another case of trying to substitute political theory for history - there were MAJOR geopolitical changes that would've made it harder for Venice to maintain their Mediterranean trade network, regardless of how optimal their political system would've been: mainly the rise of the Ottoman empire (assuming this hypothetical "Meritocratic Venice" wouldn't have plot armor to prevent that, or even sillier, defeat them at their prime) and new trade route to India (sailing around the Africa - a LOT of Venetian trade was basically just being one middle man in a chain of India->Arabia->Mamluks->Venetians->Central Europe.)
"Kormlenie" which mean "feedings" gives away the predatory intent behind the institutions"
That's enough internet for today
@@yyyy12344 watch the video to find out idk
Didn't understand
"Kormlenie" means "feeding" not "feedings " but ok
@@Hull-m8 Yes. This video addresses that and how Kraut takes Fukiyama's mistranslation verbatim.
The funniest thing is, it only means that in modern Russian basically by accident. At the time, the term actually meant "guidance" or "rulership" - from the root "korm" for such a concept. That's why in modern Russian still an archaic term for "helmsman" is "kormchy"; or why the aft of a naval vessel is called "korma" - that's where the damn rudder is!
This was pretty eye-opening. I see the potential for a lot of history youtubers doing this, especially in the more narrative ones. Messing up 17th century for the 1700s is an elementary level mistake, begs the question if he even understands the text.
He actually says "by the 1700s" as a paraphrase of "by the end of the 17th century" which is completely correct. You really chose the wrong example to prove your point
@@fajl Technically yeah, though it's kind of a rounding-up. Fukuyama was talking about Russia on the eve of Peter the Great (1682), and Kraut changed it to the 1700s.
Always fun to see somebody curbstomp Kraut’s wikipedia voiceovers.
But the balls are foenni to look at
It's fascinating how bad and incompetent Kraut takes are. Even a rando in /pol/ is maybe more competent.
that's overselling him a bit lol
@@CamstonIsland Watch Bokoen1 or something idk. His videos genuinely make you less intelligent.
@Ben-ek1fzHe’s a stupid egalitarian. He understands that western European liberalism is the best political system but fails to grasp that it can only be built and maintained by high-IQ peoples.
On mongols from Russian perspective
I don’t know exactly how trustworthy is sources I want to bring out, and I can’t prove what they tell us, but I just wanted to point out that even in our Russian historical school books they tell that mongols demanded very little tribute and their “tax collectors” almost never stepped out of the boundaries (and when they did they were punished harshly). It is also said that as aftermath of mongol invasion rus’ people lost some technologies (namely, the ability to construct stone buildings) for some time, but not only those we lost were reclaimed soon after, also mongols brought with them something that we learned about, like their military equipment (curved bows and scale armour), and some inventions from Asia.
In schools they teach us that mongol invasion was harmful to some degree, but also beneficial to some extent
I don’t try to say this is true, I just wanted to show what Russian historians try to teach their population
Thank you for the comment! It's interesting to hear how these concepts are taught in Russia. In my experience, there is certainly more nuance in the modern-day education, rather than focusing on only the negative aspects.
Про каменное строительство полная бредятина - из камня на руси стоили задолго до монгол. Наоборот, монголы застопорили развитие архитектуры Руси, и пока европейцы уже перешли к более продвинутой на тот момент готике - Русь все чахла над громоздкой тесной романской архитектурой, которая уже устарела и даже в ней деградировала. Сравните домонгольские храмы вроде Дмитриевского собора во Владимире с тем что строили позже в период монгольского ига.
@@monsieurkot5858 так я и написал, что умели, а из-за нашествия потеряли.
@@Elite_Tauren_ChieftainЯ слепой не увидел, прошу прощения
Невнимательно читаю
Sounds like Mongols weren’t as awful towards the Rus’ as westerners like to portray
I think what makes Krauts videos so appealing are two things: 1. his way of making complex things sound so simple (which they never truly are) and (at least to me) 2. his quite funny animations and pictures (which also can never really realisitically portrait any of the things he talks about). Those two things were what at first drew me, somebody who has mostly surface-level history knowledge from playing paradox-games and reading wikipedia articles and absolutely no knowledge of political history, to him. Those two things are also what I really appreciate in your video, but in your case you didn't need to resort to oversimplifications or misrepresentations of historical and political circumstances, like Kraut did. Really great video!
At this point, what in the video did Kraut even get RIGHT?
I think he spelled his name right
/J
Uuuuuhhh there’s a country called Russia, and its capital is Moscow
That’s basically it
genuinely nothing, the entire video is a comically racist german rattling off orientalist myths from the 19th and early 20th century and even some ultranationalist russian talking points from very disturbing creatures such as alexander dugin
No idea even the part about the mongols was wrong since the Mongols whilst tribal did practice marriage diplomacy, and the Mongols did alter the politics of the regions
2 million views baby.
I love the way Kraut says "There's a tendency among modern historians to paint the Mongols in a positive light" and implies that he's going to disprove them and 'set the record straight' in a RUclips video. It shows that not only does he not understand what those historians are saying but also that in the making of his video he never stopped to consider that maybe the many modern historians who research and write history for a living know a few things that he doesn't. Very open and proud display of his arrogance and Dunning Kreuger syndrome
Considering that Kraut used to be a political RUclipsr before rebranding to making History, it sort of shows the generalizations he makes
History is never unpolitical tho
@@thelvadam2884 yeah but you usually don’t try pushing your own politics ahead of history
@@board-qu9iuthat would be the ideal, but by far is not the norm. Not even in academic circles. I've read tons of papers buried under contemporary misconceptions and prejudices.
@@migueldeuna3261 true but Kraut is probably worse at it than other history sources
I mean all his videos are explicitly political
I’ve been getting into Russian history lately as it is something I have hitherto never learned about. Something I find interesting is that Russia, even under the early Tsars, had multiple opportunities to go in a different direction-Russia actually had a tradition of local governance that could have eventually evolved into a constitutional monarchy as it happened in England.
For sure, there were certainly opportunities in which Russia could have gone in a completely different direction, and we don't just need to look at just macro changes like Novgorod versus Moscow. There were individual decisions, events, and close-calls all along the way, which also could have compounded in interesting ways. As you point out, Russia had a rather unique form of local governance and administrative decentralization, even as late as the Empire, which is often overlooked because of the much more visible overarching monarchy.
Russians also hated and got rid of every possible attempt of not having a brutal tyranny.
@@nojrants As historians we can't entertain counterfactuals like what if what if they took a different turn too seriously. It's really just an ugly distraction from our ability to observe and study the world AS IT IS not how it could have been
Wow, an English-speaking historian who knows something about Russia. I didn't think such people existed…
An American one that specialises on this no less
@@the90thhunter92 Most Americans who call themselves specialists on Russia have their minds littered with loads of ideology rather than history
Most «specialists» on Russia in the West give me the impression that their minds are littered with propaganda alone rather than containing any history.
It's impressive how Kraunt paint as negative things like central control over the army and the provinces as long as it happens in Russia. In western Europe, kings taking power from local nobles to establish central government and army no longer relying on feudal relationships are always portrayed as kind of good things: modernisation, effective modern states etc as opposed to "archaic" feudalism. But as long as it happens in Russia, in Kraut narrative it turns in a pathologic development due to cultural miscegenation with the "asiatic hordes". I mean as a Frenchman, the myth of the modern state making as a progressive feature of absolutists kings is deeply ingrained in our national mythology so it's particulary unsettling to see Kraut framing these highly meliorative (at least in the classic french view of state history) as the marks of an hypothetical russian abnormal development
And of course, even if it's prominent in France's national myths, the turning away from nobles autonomous power to the king's administration central power was a key feature of almost all Europe during the early modern period, even in England, (of course i'm overlooking many developments and regional differences) so it's really weird that he acts as if it were a peculiarity of Russia and not a historical trend crossing the vast majority of European states.
@@come7850 the problem with arguments like Kraut's is that it tries to provide a grand narrative that explains everything. We are talking about some 700 years of history of Moscow. It included instances of great central control as well as measures that can be considered more feudal and decentralizing. You cannot simply cherry pick what you like and pass it on as history. In the oriental despotism theory, one of the arguments is that states surrounding large river systems tend to be more centralized and thus more despotic in order to control those rivers. That would explain the general despotism of the orient. But the same orient included India which never managed to establish a centralized state. Where "each village was a republic" as the British saying goes. Yet, it was a rich and fertile place surrounding rivers like the Ganges. On the other hand the "evil, despotic mongols" never controlled any rivers, never had centralized bureaucracy or at least in the beginning and yet they were part of the orient and in their eyes despotic.
@@umang3227 Yeah we totally agree, I was pointing to an even more specific bias of Kraut which is to portray as negative things that, in the West, are taught to us as progressive achievements of the state and the beginning of European modernity, as long as these things are said to happen in Russia. Not sure if I'm clear enough though.
Like, to him things like an army controlled by the state directly and provinces governed directly bu the state are proof of so called "oriental despotism". In my country, the fact that the kingdom's administration progressivily gained control over the military and the provinces, evicting the autonomous power of the nobility (without of course suppressing nobility as a class) was always portrayed as the march of our country towards progress and modernity. But in Kraut's narrative, if these things happen in Russia (or Moscovy) they are proof of retardation and oriental pathology.
@@come7850 Because for some reason he regards France as a "failed" absolutist state which is incredibly disingenuous in my opinion.
@@umang3227 😭😭😭😭 this guy is a joke
18:35 I love the idea that Kraut actually agrees with Marx on something, the guy talks about Marxists as if they were devil incarnate
Tbf not even Marxists like other Marxists. Its kinda a battle of the ego
Modern liberals haven't gone far from Marx 😂
@@PoklonsparklHow so?
Generally speaking, a lot of liberal historiography is cut from the same cloth as the Marxist tradition, due to their shared ancestry (e.g. Hegel) and similar presuppositions about the process of history (although diverging to different conclusions). In the handful of Kraut videos I've seen so far, I think he underrates just how much common ground they probably have, as he often disparages Marx as completely wrong out of hand. It's especially obvious here though, since the young Marx wrote an entire treatise on how Russia was authoritarian because of the Tatar Yoke, Church, and the crushing of Novgorod, almost point-for-point the same as Kraut's video.
@@nojrants Yet another thing Marx was right about.
This is what history video essay should be like: footnotes, list of literature, every point or thought is linked to a source. I’m history student and I know how annoying is to make references.
Very much appreciated
Thank you! I appreciate it
I honestly feel bad for the Russian people; the amount of hatred they have received based on false perceptions of Russia is simply wrong.
This video does a good job at explaining how Russians are a people group that have changed over time; just as England, France, and Spain have changed. They aren’t “inherently authoritarian” as the NAFO crowd will scream to the high heavens. Their systems are as much a result of the challenges the Russian people have been met with - and a result of the solutions they chose - rather than anything “inherent” with them.
This is why I believe the best thing we can do is interact with other cultural groups; to learn about them and appreciate them for their differences, yet understand them as human beings.
Yes, feel bad for them as they trample over a free country and Russians sit idly & supporting Putin.
These not-inherently-despotic people don't ever seem to have tasted freedom, don't care to fight for it today, and don't seem bothered by it. There's a reason: they're used to licking the boot of their despot for 1000 years.
@@PhilSophia-ox7ep Your channel was registered on January 3, 2024. You are just a stupid bot)))
@@PhilSophia-ox7epAnd even in this case you put every Russian in this tier. I've seen a lot ukranians and other NAFOids who pissed off even pro-western Russians just because they're Russians. Just ask questions to yourself firstly.
@@gallicat9783 What did I say that was false? Has Russia tasted freedom since the Mongol invasion? Nope. Seems pretty staunchly authoritarian to me.
@@PhilSophia-ox7ep Russia literally can't have normal existence without strong leader. Russia had this in 1917 and 90s - not good times for Russians. And why you even interested in internal Russian politics. This is their deal. You just keep finding another reasons for your Russophobia which touches even pro-western Russians. This is one of the reasons of this strong support for Putin :)
I watched this and your video about Putin, and I just want to say how much I appreciate in especial the way you're cautious with your words so as to make your points clear, and also, to ensure what you're saying is interpreted the way you mean it to be (e.g, "because I say X, I'm not claiming Y, but rather so and so"). I feel that a lot of people today seem to frequently make big, overarching statements without clarification, and an equal number of people are ready to jump to conclusions about those statements, so I really enjoy the nuance in your explanations.
Thank you! I'm really glad to hear that, as that is something I consciously think a lot about when writing the scripts.
Completely blown away by the amount of work that was put into this video. Phenomenal sourcing and historiography and just had me hooked throughout. I am not well versed in Russian history, but I feel like I learned something today.
Thank you! I appreciate the support
I am Russian and i am a bit of ashamed that you know our history so much better than i do, even though i had lessons for it in school and just finished one year course about Russian history in university (which was amazing, but sadly too short to actually learn it well). Anyway, really nice and not biased video, such things are rare right now. It gives me hope that one day Russia and our western neighbours will understand each other a bit better than right now.
They won’t.
This is kinda scary. I completely believed everything Kraut said in that video. Lesson learned I guess.
Same here brother, you're not alone. I've been learning to question the information I consume on the Internet
And if I can't or unwilling to scrutinize it, I try my best now not to immedieatly accept it as fact.
Anyway. Yeah don't feel too bad
Happens all the time, where we receive new information to challenge our pre existing information.
Even this video you should take the time to read the sources.
Western europe also had a large number of wooden castles which are no longer extent (i may have heads that they were actually the majority)
Yes absolutely, there is a long history of castle-building across Europe in both stone and wood.
Sometimes I'm stunned by the general lack of critical thinking among the western public. I'm not telling anyone should have any knowledge of russian history, if they aren't russian, but half of the 'facts' debunked in the video don't have any sense even from the general logic stand point. Great work, btw
the lack of critical thinking spans over all of the world's public. Nothing special in westeners
I watched Kraut's video on Russia around the same time as I learned about the Heartland vs Rimland geopolitical thesis, and although I now understand that my idea of Russia during this time was retroactively explained by geographic determinism and outdated senses of cultural/political/ideological influences, I loved this concept of a "built different" sort of Russia. This authoritarian and proud orthodox empire with countless cultures subsumed or assimilated, protected by geography with a fatal east European gateway that somehow inevitably led to WW1 and WW2 playing out the way it did, ended up beginning to crack after watching Kraut's videos, and realizing that he was doing the same thing as me, with a different ideological lens. While it originally didn't sit right with me at the time due to the opposing perspective, it led me to want to look deeper into the factuality of specific events of these overarching stories, which landed me at your Wikipedia videos.
It was very exciting to watch you go over Kraut's topic with a much more critical and well read lens, because by this point I had a feeling that both my sense of "western feudalism into democracy" and my view on Russian social/political history were horribly off the mark, and were ready to be smashed like warped mirrors. Thank you for the video, I hope to see more deep analysis like this pop up on occasion.
Thank you for the comment! Glad to hear you enjoyed the video, and that it got you thinking more about history. I definitely plan to do more deep analyses, so stay tuned!
It's the cute ball animations and his pleasant voice plus an argument with sweeping conclusions that "explain everything".
To me Kraut's fake accent and the way he intentionally pronounces words differently than everyone else to sound more "intellectual" is incredibly grating to listen to. For me it's an impossible struggle to sit through any of his videos even if am interested in the subject matter just because he sounds like such a cunt.
Never ask Kraut what he was up to around 2015-2018
what was he up to?
@@kszug Trying to dox people he disagreed with
@tiredidealist why am I not shocked that Kraut is a shitheel.
@@kszug trouts can get pregnant
ruclips.net/video/PfVLAkq8nHk/видео.htmlfeature=shared
"The male does not remain with the female, the pregnancy is very short."
(The joke is that fish don't get pregnant, they lay eggs.)
@@kszugtalking about how fish can get pregnant
Great video, deserves a lot more views. I find Kraut's videos frustrating because the slick design fools people into thinking that much more substantive scholarship lies behind his arguments. He also projects himself as a sort of objective critical thinker, and most people will not be aware of his right-wing biases which were more radically phrased on his previous channel. Having a perspective and agenda is fine, as long as people are upfront about it. I think Kraut misleads by presenting himself as an academic populariser when he would be more accurately described as a political propagandist.
he also tends to just flat out ignore class conflict, even when he practically described it word for word in one of his videos on Denmark I believe.
Rather than right wing biases, I would describe it as doctrinal liberal biases. He rejects the conservative and traditionalist analyses rather aggressively just as he rejects the socialist or post-modern frames. He is so buried in the post-war consensus that he can not see facts which damage the historical narrative held by the dominant political order.
In my opinion, you shouldn't trust anyone who poses himself as an objective critical thinker, because no such thing can exist in the real world.
But I also think he doesn't have any right-wing bias, he's very consistently a leftist, and wherever it might appear that he has a right-wing bias, it's just the 200 years of German racial science on the "Asiatic horde" weighing down on him. The traces of such things can show up in very unexpected places
Very nice and useful video. Kraut seems quite popular, especially I would guess with younger viewers, so it is very important to do the tiring work of countering his biased, click-bait content. I cannot stress this enough, Kraut and for that matter a large group of RUclips history "explainers" should not be taken seriously. People like stories, and especially stories that fit in with their existent "common sense" beliefs, and these people just provide them.
if there's a single thing that can encapsulate the quality of kraut's videos, it's the map of rus with the cities in all the wrong places 😹
Long time watcher Noj and finally had the time to really sit down and follow your sourcing as a fellow academic. Great video. Really appreciate the source variety and quality. So much about the history of the Rus people is misunderstood nowadays, excellent video. You should be proud of yourself
Thank you for your great comment, and your continued support as always! Glad to hear you enjoyed the video
"What have the Mongols done for us?"
I hate how smug Fukuyama is despite being so wrong.
Wrong about what?
Kraut and whatifalthist opposite yet same
And both are midwits pretending to be pseudo-intellectual
Both kids of fukuyama
Spiritually, parallel.
Ooh, damn!
Very excited to see this video
Glad to see your channel grow!
1:01
"It was adapted pretty heavily from *FRANCIS FUKAYHAMA'S* Origins of Political Order."
Me: "Oh god. Please God. No. no. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"
The "End of History" man strikes again. The End of History and it's consequences have been a disaster for the human race and political thought.
Before watching this video, i had never heard of Tatar yoke. But after watching it, it sounded eerily similar to the Ottoman decline thesis, where after a specific historical event, a country's future doom, centuries later, was foretold.
Автор, спасибо за разбор видео Краута на составные части. От лица всего русского интернет-сообщества выражаю благодарность и респект за это
Didn't Russia ban RUclips?
@@thisworldisinsane5679 eeeh sorta. My friends from Russia are using VPN so they can watch stuff, but 1) Russians are located not only in Russia (especially today, as lots of Russian citizens are leaving the country because of ÆVIL PUTIN and MY COUNTRY IS RUINING POOR DEMOCRATIC UKRAINE (which has movements like Azov or Right Sector, capable to blackmail the government, yep)), but in post-Soviet states too, and 2) Russian is a lingua franca for citizens of post-Soviet states, just like English for the Globe or French for their former colonies
@@thisworldisinsane5679 I'm just using a VPN router
Nitpick but the Slavic tribes did actually assimilate many people they conquered during the Early Middle Ages, like the Anglo-Saxons did in Britain, even though it was mostly migratory and a case of them settling in depopulated/sparsely populated regions. They assimilated local Romanized Balkaners, presumably some Germanics, Finns, Iranics, even some Romanized Celtic groups in Austria.
Yes I agree to an extent, depending on what we're talking about. But what Kraut is referring to is not the Slavs assimilating peoples, but rather those peoples assimilating the Slavs (as his argument is that the exogenic peoples enter a region and then "become" that which they conquered). I would consider the creation of the Slavic kingdoms in Eastern Europe more an example of the exogenic populations becoming dominant, in the sense that Poles, Czechs, etc didn't "become" Germanic.
Oh no, the academics actually responded.
Inside kraut brain: "Russia bad. I should explain it in my posh video essay". Today scientific goals for ya
I always felt that he was just a propagandist for the status quo.
That's true regardless of the video's topic
@@outerspace7391 Yeah true.
I'm so glad for this video. The Mongolian Empire is extremely interesting and unexpectedly nuanced. They practice a wide variety of ideas, some of which would be considered pretty progressive. They are probably the only large empire state in history to understand that it is more beneficial to let people do what they know best without unnecessary intervention. To degrade down to "some barbary tribes who destroyed everything in their path", is just so unjust to that era. Mongolia probably has the largest impact on the modern states of Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe in ways much more complex than we realize.
Haz Al-Din already settled the mongol question for all of us, people are still catching up.
Rus used to be somewhat unified in early stages of its development when Kiev had higher economic prominence and importance than the rest of the cities and principalities, not to mention that the Rurikid dynasty was quite small at the initial stage of their rule so they could resolve most things peacefully. Kiev lost the upper hand when the trade route from northern Europe to Byzantine Empire and Middle East has lost its importance because of the crusades.
Yes you can certainly make the case that there was a more unified entity around Kiev prior to the mid 11th-century, although I personally lean toward the camp that there was never a truely centralized "state" over the Kievan Rus' even back then. The Crusades likely contributed to the wider economic situation, among other factors in and around Kiev, like the expansion of Baltic trade around the same time.
Kiev lost out as the chief city to Vladimir by the 12th century at least, it's window as the most important Rus city lasted around 150 years.
Some Russian historians jokingly call these lands Kievan Rus LLC
Anyway, it's the part of history when russia didn't existed yet.
@@nojrants Kievan rus is Soviet historical cliche. There was multiple Slavic states that govern themselves on its own. In years prior to USSR this period was called "ancient Rus states". Not the state, but states.
Great video! Also Kaut's video has an overwhelming focus on Western Europe. And he seems to like to superpose 19th-20th Western European values on a 11th-13th time period....
Thank you! Yes there's a bit too much generalization in the original video I feel. Even in Fukuyama's chapter, he often limits comparisons more (juxtaposing Russia with just Hungary for example).
Lmao Chernigov and Kiev being like 1000 km apart of Kraut's rendition of map will never not be funny, they are literally neighboring regions lmao
Btw, it's even weirder to call Russia "non-European/Asiatic", because since the Peter's empirial time the waves of Germanic and Dutch immigration grew even stronger - Peter and his descendants for a while encouraged many Western academics, military experts and nobles to join them and gave them the ability to built in the hierarchy by developing the List of the Ranks. Not to say that after the Peter the Great, Romanovs practically became a dynasty of russified, baptised into Orthodoxy Germans. Like, Germans even had their own autonomy at the Volga region before the Stalin's repressions. You can name an underappreciated military genius general Barklay de-Toli, who was believed to be of French or Scottish lineage (can't recall it for certain), a famous Russian poet Mikhail Lermontov, who was a descendant of Scottish nobility. Not to mention, that the majority of nobility up to the end of Napoleonic Wars or even later periods, were severely Europeanised or particularly Frankophile. So, that's said, Russia was always actually inclusive and pretty welcoming to Western culture. From my Russian perspective, it was the West who tried and still tries to allienate itself from Russia because of their semi-rational fear mixed with a latent superiority/inferiority complex.
Russians don’t even consider themselves European. They consider themselves Russian first.
One would wonder why they had an urge to import Europeans if they were so European.
@@PhilSophia-ox7epis this thing only for Russia? Other European nations had foreigners and "imports" them.
@@gallicat9783 No Western European nation engaged in a concerted effort to import Brits, Germans and Frenchmen to teach them how to industrialize, to master science, and to become enlightened. Russia did that because it has always been politically, economically, culturally and scientifically a backwaters.
@@PhilSophia-ox7ep And its statement is very false. Especially about Economics and Science. What about this topic - even migration in Europe was and current the fact. France was studied a lot from Englishmens in terms of Industrial Revolution. What about Science and Economics - can you give me normal proofs? The Internet full with facts of Russian science achievements.
thanks for putting the effort of making this video, it makes me excited to learn and study more when I see this comprehensive response instead of just a low-effort commentary video
Also muscovite was polish term, not Russian