Propaganda is just speech with intent to persuade. Everything political is propaganda in some fashion.
The answer to this is always to vet your sources and, more so today, to look for obvious signs of AI involvement in whatever media you are consuming. Anything AI should be treated with additional scrutiny.
El-Sayed is pro Palestine but is explicitly not a socialist no? He is a progressive but he is a capitalist.
I get your point though. We need to work to keep shifting the culture back our way so we keep gaining more room to make more aggressive and expansive arguments people will listen to.
We can hope. DSA is run by reformists in NYC and LA atm but there is a massive contingent of communists taking over the reigns of the org bit by bit (I'm one of them. We are coming for this org and are going to make it the party we need)
On one hand it is very easy to not feel sympathy for those who have willingly opted to sell their bodies to the evil imperialist power in the world doing unrelenting murder and destruction every day.
On the other this is a somewhat tragic tale of two kids caught in a society that does not give a fuck about them. That does not care to give them a good life or want to see them succeed. So many people are left with no options and are forced into these positions like this. And while I do not think it absolves them of the acts they choose to commit, even under orders, it does make you think.
Capitalism will dehumanize us all if we allow it to. It degrades the human spirit until it's nothing but a husk - and this is the goal because what's easier to control and subjugate than a person that is beaten down into to submission, a shadow of their former self.
Ah yes just walking back one of the largest issues with the NYC mayorship - leading the largest standing occupying force in America outside of the military.
If Francesca Hong cared about a socialist movement she would be using her position to agitate the masses not whatever the fuck she is doing running as the left wing of the Dems.
I am uninterested in spelling people politicians who represent zero structural change to the fucked up systems we live under. I am interested in being honest about who they are and Francesca Hong is more of the same - working to extend the longevity of this system rather than seeking to build something larger to dismantle it
Her campaign is downplaying her being a DSA member (locally endorsed but not nationally which means a lot) and is walking back every bit of radical language she was using in favor of soc dem reformist positions. Talking down the possibility of radical change.
She is an opportunist who will be more of the same. People will learn eventually.
MAGAs like me? My favorite thing is liberals thinking anyone who criticizes them for being proponents of capitalism are to their right.
You are the right winger in this conversation my friend.
It is well known how police target communities of color and other marginalized groups. Pretending otherwise or that Mamdani has made progress on this as he engages in homeless encampment sweeps and approves the same budget for the police is naive and you just telling yourself what you desperately wish to be true.
He's running the largest militarized police force in the US right now and is actively using it to abuse the most vulnerable populations in the city even though he said he wouldn't.
What is he doing that substantively changes the systems we live under? I'll wait.
What a silly comparison the mayor of NYC has functionally no power to do a lot of the things Zohran wants to do because he is still beholden to the whims of their governor and Kathy Hochul does not really give a fuck on what Zohran wants.
I also think is continues to be rich how we describe Gaza as a Trump issue, obfuscating the long history of bipartisan support for genocide.
I am going to assume you don't live in the US based on your comment. I can only speak from a US centric perspective. I will try to explain what I am saying.
Living in the US is interesting because of how thoroughly propagandized the population is. Large swaths of the working class have been convinced their best bet is on the rich, not on building power for themselves. We are all "temporarily embarrassed millionaires". Living in the heart of the evil empire ruining the world does something to you that you have to work hard over time to deprogram.
As conditions in the country deteriorate many people become disabused of these ideas but it takes time and a direct confrontation with their beliefs for it to happen often times. On top of this the capitalist class has many pressure valves that allow people to wash their hands of feeling like they need to do anything - they went to stomp around at a protest sanctioned by the police and went home, they donated to an LGBTQ advocacy NGO, etc etc etc.
Moreso effective protests and strikes especially take massive amounts of coordination and planning to pull off in a safe way. To organize those you need people who have apparatuses to make them happen and we are largely still building those structures. Big strikes don't just happen out of nowhere they take years to make happen. It takes time to build the organizations that can even organize these efforts too.
And lastly people who are struggling to feed their kids and afford to go to the doctor simply do not have the ability to go to protests when it risks their only livelihood allowing them and their family to survive. We need to work as socialists to identify the material needs these people are lacking so they CAN join us.
I wrote this up hastily but would love to keep talking on this more. Broadly I think these ideas touch on my concerns about the material conditions even if it could probably be fleshed out and revised some more.
The oligarchic pseudo democracy we have does yes. The whole system is captured and only gives the illusion of choice.
True democracy has people working collectively to make decisions with robust systems of accountability to those who are elected to carry out those decisions. Democracy is truly having your hand on the wheel of your destiny by having a real voice in the world you live in.
Organizing mass protests or strikes like you are describing is downstream of the strategic agitation and education i am advocating for. You can't just manifest these forms of direct action - you have to do the work to build the material conditions for them to happen.
Propaganda is just speech with intent to persuade. Everything political is propaganda in some fashion.
The answer to this is always to vet your sources and, more so today, to look for obvious signs of AI involvement in whatever media you are consuming. Anything AI should be treated with additional scrutiny.
El-Sayed is pro Palestine but is explicitly not a socialist no? He is a progressive but he is a capitalist.
I get your point though. We need to work to keep shifting the culture back our way so we keep gaining more room to make more aggressive and expansive arguments people will listen to.
We can hope. DSA is run by reformists in NYC and LA atm but there is a massive contingent of communists taking over the reigns of the org bit by bit (I'm one of them. We are coming for this org and are going to make it the party we need)
On one hand it is very easy to not feel sympathy for those who have willingly opted to sell their bodies to the evil imperialist power in the world doing unrelenting murder and destruction every day.
On the other this is a somewhat tragic tale of two kids caught in a society that does not give a fuck about them. That does not care to give them a good life or want to see them succeed. So many people are left with no options and are forced into these positions like this. And while I do not think it absolves them of the acts they choose to commit, even under orders, it does make you think.
Capitalism will dehumanize us all if we allow it to. It degrades the human spirit until it's nothing but a husk - and this is the goal because what's easier to control and subjugate than a person that is beaten down into to submission, a shadow of their former self.
Elon won't buy you a pony
Its misogyny
Ah yes just walking back one of the largest issues with the NYC mayorship - leading the largest standing occupying force in America outside of the military.
If Francesca Hong cared about a socialist movement she would be using her position to agitate the masses not whatever the fuck she is doing running as the left wing of the Dems.
I am uninterested in spelling people politicians who represent zero structural change to the fucked up systems we live under. I am interested in being honest about who they are and Francesca Hong is more of the same - working to extend the longevity of this system rather than seeking to build something larger to dismantle it
Her campaign is downplaying her being a DSA member (locally endorsed but not nationally which means a lot) and is walking back every bit of radical language she was using in favor of soc dem reformist positions. Talking down the possibility of radical change.
She is an opportunist who will be more of the same. People will learn eventually.
Mayor Pete is a shrewd operator only interested in proximity to power. He is the exact kind of person we should be avoiding electing president.
You a Zionist bro? What the fuck?
Zohran is part a reformist caucus within DSA. Like explicitly reform through electoralism and liquidation into the Dems party apparatus.
MAGAs like me? My favorite thing is liberals thinking anyone who criticizes them for being proponents of capitalism are to their right.
You are the right winger in this conversation my friend.
It is well known how police target communities of color and other marginalized groups. Pretending otherwise or that Mamdani has made progress on this as he engages in homeless encampment sweeps and approves the same budget for the police is naive and you just telling yourself what you desperately wish to be true.
Many of these leftists are soc dems who just want nicer capitalism unfortunately
This is less praise for Zohran and more condemnation of the Dems.
He's not gonna give you a pony.
He's running the largest militarized police force in the US right now and is actively using it to abuse the most vulnerable populations in the city even though he said he wouldn't.
What is he doing that substantively changes the systems we live under? I'll wait.
What a silly comparison the mayor of NYC has functionally no power to do a lot of the things Zohran wants to do because he is still beholden to the whims of their governor and Kathy Hochul does not really give a fuck on what Zohran wants.
I also think is continues to be rich how we describe Gaza as a Trump issue, obfuscating the long history of bipartisan support for genocide.
I am going to assume you don't live in the US based on your comment. I can only speak from a US centric perspective. I will try to explain what I am saying.
Living in the US is interesting because of how thoroughly propagandized the population is. Large swaths of the working class have been convinced their best bet is on the rich, not on building power for themselves. We are all "temporarily embarrassed millionaires". Living in the heart of the evil empire ruining the world does something to you that you have to work hard over time to deprogram.
As conditions in the country deteriorate many people become disabused of these ideas but it takes time and a direct confrontation with their beliefs for it to happen often times. On top of this the capitalist class has many pressure valves that allow people to wash their hands of feeling like they need to do anything - they went to stomp around at a protest sanctioned by the police and went home, they donated to an LGBTQ advocacy NGO, etc etc etc.
Moreso effective protests and strikes especially take massive amounts of coordination and planning to pull off in a safe way. To organize those you need people who have apparatuses to make them happen and we are largely still building those structures. Big strikes don't just happen out of nowhere they take years to make happen. It takes time to build the organizations that can even organize these efforts too.
And lastly people who are struggling to feed their kids and afford to go to the doctor simply do not have the ability to go to protests when it risks their only livelihood allowing them and their family to survive. We need to work as socialists to identify the material needs these people are lacking so they CAN join us.
I wrote this up hastily but would love to keep talking on this more. Broadly I think these ideas touch on my concerns about the material conditions even if it could probably be fleshed out and revised some more.
The oligarchic pseudo democracy we have does yes. The whole system is captured and only gives the illusion of choice.
True democracy has people working collectively to make decisions with robust systems of accountability to those who are elected to carry out those decisions. Democracy is truly having your hand on the wheel of your destiny by having a real voice in the world you live in.
Organizing mass protests or strikes like you are describing is downstream of the strategic agitation and education i am advocating for. You can't just manifest these forms of direct action - you have to do the work to build the material conditions for them to happen.