Among the pearls of wisdom in this video we have:
“Russia is imperialist because it has state capitalist monopolies” Yes, you heard it right, having certain economic sectors under exclusive state ownership is imperialism. Guess Putin should privatize Gazprom like Yeltsin did, that way he wont be imperialist right Paul?
“Russia is imperialist because it has a big state owned bank called Sberbank” Yes, having big state owned banks is imperialism
“Russia is imperialist because it invests and isnt indebted” He uses the Net International Investment Position (NIIP) as “proof” that Russia is imperialist. That index takes foreign assets held by residents of a country and subtracts it the total debt, both public and private, of a country. Thus, if the NIIP is positive, the country is a creditor/invester, and if its negative, its a debtor. Russia has a positive value, but what does that prove? That Russia isnt indebted, thats all it proves. He says this proves “Russia is a major exporter of capital”, which it doesnt, the index doesnt account for Russias biggest export, commodities, which makes it NOT imperialist. The NIIP only accounts for investment/credit and debt. Also this index has many flaws, since all you have to do to count in is be a resident of the country. Tax heavens thus have insane positive values, but that doesnt mean they are imperialist. I mean just look at the NIIP values online. France and the US are negative, yet Argentina and Botswana are positive! I guess Botswana is imperializing the US, you are right Paul.
“Russia is part of international monopolist organizations. Russia is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and a BRICS member” yes, he fkin said this i swear. Does this guy know the USSR was a permanent member of the UN Security Council? Im sure he would say they were dirty revisionists. Also apparently BRICS, an alliance formed by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, with no western countries in it, is imperialist. He does specify tho, that of BRICS only Russia and China are imperialist. Thanks Paul!
“Russia sending its military into Donbass, despite the people of Donbass wanting it, is imperialism” Wow, guess the Soviet presence in Afghanistan was imperialism. Nevermind hes a maoist, he probably thinks that.
“Russia helping Syria against the US is imperialism” I dont even know what to say, besides that he should go to Syria and tell the people there that Russia should leave them alone against US aggression, see what happens. Fkin idiot.
“Supporting Russia, China, Iran, Syria, etc is lesser evilism, they are all imperialist” 🤦♂️
“We must support the oppressed nations such as Cuba or Venezuela” Does this anglo idiot know that Cuba and Venezuela support Russia? The doublethink is insane.
“Russia is not an oppressed nation” Does this idiot know what happened in Russia in the 90s?
“Only anticapitalist countries can be antiimperialist” Oh, so i guess Venezuela (whom he supported just 2 seconds ago), Nicaragua, Allendes Chile, Bolivia, etc are not antiimperialist. Nice one Paul!
Then he finishes with an “inspiring” “no war but class war, long live communism” speech. Yeah yeah great words, says the stupid brit from his privileged house in the imperial core. Hes the true marxist, not the people of the third world who overwhelmingly support Russia and China, whom he calls “capitalist imperialist”. Fkin idiot
Edit: I want to add that Marxist Paul has good videos regarding theory and criticism of the west, but when he steps out of that, especially regarding China and Russia, he says the dumbest shit. Considering hes a maoist who loves Gonzalo and the Shining Path, i guess that was to be expected.
I completely agree, that video was awful and you pointed out perfectly and precisely why his arguments don’t hold any water.
There are plenty of problems that one can criticize Putin’s Russia for (e.g. reactionary social policies) but being imperialist is not one.
I agree. I had had that video recommended to me several times, but i didnt want to cringe so i hadnt watched it yet. I watched it today and omg, it was much worse than i thought. “Russia is imperialist because its a member of the UN Security Council” was one of the worst parts. I mean its not just Russia, the dude calls Iran and China imperialist, and says that no capitalist country can be antiimperialist, basically saying that only Cuba, DPRK, Laos and Vietnam are antiimperialist, which is ludicrous.
I think it’s even worse than that, if no capitalist country can be anti-imperialist, and he considers China to be capitalist, then that makes Cuba, Vietnam and Laos also capitalist and therefore not anti-imperialist because they too had market reforms in one form or another and have significant amounts of private enterprise.
By this logic there is only one anti-imperialist country left in the world and that is the DPRK because it is the only “pure” socialist one. This is evidently a ridiculous conclusion as it begs the question how can one tiny anti-imperialist country survive alone in a world in which all major powers are imperialist?
This is an ideological and geopolitical dead end if you believe something like this, i’m sorry to say, and it’s typical of first world leftists who are extremely prone to idealism because they are so far removed from the material reality in the global south where these are not theoretical discussions to be had in an academic void but questions of immediate practical importance.
I mean yeah, thats the logical conclusion xD. My guess is he doesnt say “Vietnam, Cuba, Laos are imperialist” because they are weak and attacked by the west so it looks bad. China he can do it because China is strong. Which brings us back to the typical western “not true socialism”, the only socialists westerners like is the ones that lose. Also, he has a “muh chinese social imperialism” video in which he quotes gonzaloites like Tjen Folket and Jose Maria Sison, which is even worse because those people think not even DPRK is socialist, because they were proUSSR in the Cold War so they must be revisionists and capitalists. According to these people, there are no socialist states and the global vanguard of communism is Gonzalo and the Shining Path xD
Edit: The video in question: https://youtu.be/oc-3aE8mAlA
western leftists support every revolution except the ones that succeed