I feel like an idiot half the time watching political videos and having a vague idea of certain concepts but not fully grasping them. This video is such a great bridge to understand, without being overwhelmed or talked down to. Keen to get through your other videos
thank you, i love comments like this, that’s my goal, talk to normal people in a way that makes things clear and simple - because basically they are, it’s just mass media and education systems that make them complicated for nothing!
@Tim B Perhaps viewers “feeling like...idiot[s] and having a vague idea of certain concepts but not fully grasping them” IS the GOAL of the broadcasts!! 🤡 🤡 🤡
From WHERE did YOU learn all of this???? The information is extremely well presented. I had never thought of politics as decisions, but after hearing your explanation, that definition makes sense. You explain things very clearly. You clarified some terms for me, and helped to spark my thinking about which people and HOW CERTAIN people seem to make all the decisions for the masses! It’s also making me ponder, WHAT WAS the CORE decision of the MEN who established the UNITED STATES governmental FOUNDATION and WHAT CORE DECISIONS CURRENTLY govern the government today?? Something tells me that BEHIND politics (decisions) lie a relatively small group of people b anded together who have VERY personal and selfish motives AND A BOTTOMLESS need for CONTROL!! Something also tells me that a relatively small group of people can band together and create a HUGE system that favors THEM, while confusing the masses, who PREFER to be ignorant as long as they have moderately enough resources to live on. Thank you SO much!!! 🙏🏽
i sat down to make a video of basic definitions, but found that everything i read was confused contradictory mess, so i came up with more own more or less! based on a zillion years of reading politics and some of the better definitions or implied definitions
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 Aha! I knew it! You've had the unfair advantage of living a zillion years, whereas us mere mortals only live about three times the lifespan of our dogs.
Omg I gotta say: I laughed when (SPOILER!!!) Latoya got her ex's thirst trap text and went psycho on everyone in the car 😂😂😂 This series is super informative and you make it funny lol
thanks! it had 2k views until saint andrew bumped one of my other videos, so share it with people who have some reach when appropriate - i have no other ideas for how to market these things at this point….
thanks! yes, it makes everything a lot clearer if you look at it that way. for government i got it from Elizabeth Anderson, Private Government and for capitalism that’s how the anarcho capitalists define it more or less and it’s the most useful definition i think
Wow, I love this serie. I was introduced to it by a fellow Trotskyist camarade, and though I notice you don't like Lenin and stuff, your message is too on point to be missed. Really great, I'll watch it all (and joined the Patreon).
thank you, it’s very much appreciated! lenin gets mixed reviews from me, i think at this point in time we need to focus on his mistakes so as not to repeat them. i’ll talk about it in a future episode. you’re french? you said “camarade”
I did a pol. science master, read lots of politic related topics, from left and right perspective, and followed 2 years Trotskyit poliltical lectures. At some point, after a few years, I got confused and realized that I dont know some basic concepts like politics, or I felt like there were to many different definitions. Your work brings me out of the orwelian or alice in wonderland situation were words lose their meaning. Thanks. I'm sharing it around me. Really outstanding stuff.
Great definition of "politics" to kick us off. A political science professor I once met at a conference suggested that "Politics is 'who gets what'". An elegant take, for sure, though it's somewhat focused on the result rather than the processes, isn't it? One could offer a person as an answer to his formulation: Mary got the last drumstick. But the important questions here are *how* and *why*?
I do want to caution you on something; in your example with Latoya they are unintentional implications. I believe them to be: 1. Latoya is a name common among black women, particularly African American woman 2. Her ex wants her to go to the Chicken shack and liking chicken (Particularly fried chicken) is a common stereotype people hold about black people 3. Latoya becomes the dictator in the situation and acts in her own interest and in your example, seemingly angrily So in this example it could be seen as a black woman that loves fried chicken who ends up ruining everything. I'm sure you didn't mean this, but I noticed these things as I am black.
haha, that was definitely not my intention, except that all five names are the names of the Jackson 5 (look them up if you don’t know) - so i guess they’re *all* black if anything!
I have seen hundreds of interpretation about politics and this is the one that closely match to my interpretation of it. Actually, there is no widely accepted definition for the the word politics. And thinking about the proper meaning of it is extremely complex, since we ourselves ended up coming with so many counter arguments. But by analysing all the definitions, i think in a broader sense, our politics means our viewpoints. but the situations or subjects by which we take viewpoints must include power dynamics (even if the one that resist or oppose our viewpoints may don't have a physical presence there. for example, you belongs to a family that support lgbt. in a dining table discussion you also talk for the rights of lgbt, then that is politics, though there are no homophobic members in that family). if you say, 'i'm not going to shop to buy you cigarettes', to your poor father's request because you think it may affect his health then there is no politics in it. but if your boss force you to go to shop to buy cigarettes and you by rejecting his authority say 'i won't', then that is a political statement by you. if you say, 'it is sad that petrol price keep rising', then there is no politics in it. but if you think government should do something to regulate it, then politics comes there, since that viewpoint invoke a power dynamics between you and government in power. and the left-right political spectrum is just black and white thinking. actually your total politics is the collection of your many different politics on respective subjects. your environmental politics may be so-called left (ex - your activism on conservation of forest from corporates), but your gender politics may be so-called right, at the same time your lgbt politics may be a kinda mix of so-called left and right.
You're really getting me thinking here. What you speak of as Capitalism is something I had given up on ever finding some solid definition of. It came to the point where I'd decided it had only a reference to political policy. Same with Socialism. But then, I have had a hard time thinking of a group outside of some overarching authority. So the policy of the authority would be, in Capitalism, to support the accumulation of capitol. In Socialism, the policy would be to support the welfare of society. I guess the confusion came from the reluctance of so many to place any meaningful identity to these structures. I tried affixing something that was meaningful to me. Lots to digest here. I'm reluctant to let go of hierarchies and authorities because of how I've come to regard them as enforcers of regulation, which seems necessary in a large complex society. That reluctance is likely a product of the power gathered through manipulating the institutions by the wealthy. The wealthy always seem to tip the scales in their favour. There's also the problem of the threat from exterior polities. Lots to consider. I'm only just starting on your material, so I don't know if you go into international relations, yet. Thank you.
i think hierarchies are sometimes necessary for the same of efficiency - like imagine trying to make a movie if every crewmember and actor had an equal say over the lighting, and script and sound etc… but the people on top of the hierarchy should be accountable to the people on the bottom - so for example in a movie, the profit should be shared by everyone, and the crew should be able to determine their working conditions etc, it shouldnt all be done for the same of the investors
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 I agree on it's a necessity. I think it's always been there, even from a family perspective. I'd come across a definition of power several decades ago that finally made sense to me: "The ability to act." My thinking has come to exploring the idea that the less stratification of that power, the better. But I do expect some stratification is going to be necessary for multiple reasons, and under different contexts. The culture seems to have been cultivated to worship the wealthy. I expect that's a product of the wealthy's influence over many instruments of idea expression. You've touched on that in "Worbs" I think. I'll need to go through your material several times. I think it's brilliant. I just get overwhelmed quickly. It's very dense with clear content. It just takes time to work it into my currently existing mental structures. Whereas many of my past experiences have been rather painful, this is a pleasure.
6:30 My one question is: how do you define who is affected by a decision? You said earlier that someone choosing to either drive off a cliff or go to get food is a non-political decision because it only affects that person; however driving off a cliff will affect their family and the people investigating the not-so-accident accident, and going to eat will affect the people working at the restaurant and the owner of the restaurant. Are consequences like these considered a different tier of affection and thus not counted?
oh i’d agree, you’d include the people making the sandwiches and the people affected by the suicide as part of the group. i think for democracy to be ideal, you need decision making power to be weighted according to how much you’re affected by the decision - like if you’re at work your collegues should have to say over what photos you put up in your locker or your cubicle, or your desktop, but they should have an equal say over what music is played out loud that they all have to listen to
@@WHATISPOLITICS69So i am still not quite clear about what equal say means here, when push comes to shove. The example of the hungry friends includes a rather large amount of interconectedness. Whether altruism or self interest, i wanna keep being friends with them, so i probably won't leverage all i could - its one of your premises, no coercion. Now without bringing said coercion into play, your example with the colleagues does not have me invested quite as much as with the friend group, a veto everything position might work well for me, given i have only a very functional relationship with these people - how is this democracy salvagable without coming up with qualified mayorities and hence party systems - or i guess oligarchy as it was termed by Aristotle? Do you see a way to make council systems work? You told me in the first video i propbably would like the rest of the playlist and i do so far, if the answer is further along said list, i'll be patient :)
@@pisoi_negru i’m not sure i understand 100% - you mean how to equalize power? The exact specifics i don’t know - i know others have spent time on this, yanis varoufakis, michael albert - luckyblackcat has a video about this on her channel - but for me what matters it that we’re aiming for that. whoever is affected by a decision should have a say in that decision in proportion to how much they’re affected. is that done directly, through councils, through representation, through sortition, with algorythmically weighted computer voting - i don’t know but if we go from that principle we can figure it out from trial and error, and always keep an eye out to have mechanisms to prevent oligarchy or leveraging of position to accumulate power etc.
thank you! it’s only when i sat down to make these videos that i realized that none of these concepts were well defined and that even I didn’t know what they meant! so i needed to figure out what they do mean!
Politics of the TI-DO Interval is Public Politics and politics of the MI-FA Interval is Private Politics of the sociocosmic octave in the body of the FA-Historical Sociocosmic Species of Capitalism (1788 AD - 2148 AD)
Going to be a long term project to get people to see how reified the concepts of the public and private sphere have become. Might never happen. But good on you for trying.
yeah, it takes more than a video, but in the right circumstances the “common sense” of the day can and does change, so first step is just articulate the ideas at least
If politics is anything related to the power of decisionmaking in groups, what does a term like "political art" mean? How is it related to power in decisionmaking?
art about political ideas, or intended to influence politics. like a banksy painting expresses critical ideas about capitalism, which is a system of decision making via property rights. he’s critiquing the power structure.
Say, will you at some point in the series define "bargaining power" or point to where I can get a useful understanding of the concept which is not inferential? Or do I have to go to the library and read those bo-oks by myself ^^ like with pdfs is easy ... CtrlF, so I guess I will come around something eventually, but maybe you got it covered and I have to wait for it *~* Other than that excellent again.
haha, i’ll have to think about it - the ability to make people do things they don’t want to do thanks to external factors? often having things to exchange that the other person needs but it could be the threat force as well
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 Mhh a good start but somehow it does not convince me yet... I feel like the word "bargaining" is kind of central for the understanding as to me it seems a very specific kind of interaction which depends much on how people perceive it. I will do some research and summarice my findings. If you come up with something more definition-like lemme know :)))
@@nissigaleano4252 sure let me know what you come up with - it’s basically those elements that will enable a person to get their way or not, and how much of their way they’ll get in a conflict or negoitation with another person
i said somewhere before that these videos/podcasts influenced my political understanding immensely and now thats becoming relevant: in an undetermined future i want to "publish" "my" ideas about stuff and for that i want to read more about the kind of decisional materialism that you engage in. online (mainly wikipedia) has helped me very little with gathering related ressources tho. can you maybe help me out with relevant sources maybe? or is this a framework you came up with? meaning i should cite you?
i think i’m synthesizing it in a more coherent systematic way (thought i just started doing that) - for sources, check the bibliographies on all the episodes. there’s no great source that i know of on this, the explicitly materialist stuff is kind of outdated, it;’s just an approach that some people take for granted
oh, there isn’t one for this one, this is all me mostly … you’ll have to look up the episodes that specifically discuss materialism, mostly the david graeber ones, 7, 7.1, 10 etc
Isn't "murder" illegal by definition? You can, in some jurisdictions, kill a tresspasser, sure. But in other ones it is illegal and as such constitutes a murder.
I know this is the second time im back here but i have a question about your rules about capitalism. The first two are fantastic descriptions but i do have questions about the last one about not being able to use property to infringe on others rights. How does it account for imperialism and colonization?
i made this 3 years ago so i don’t remember the specific order of the rules - but i’m using the concept of capitalism the way the libertarian or “anarcho capitalists” conceive of it. so colonialism and imperialism by force wouldn’t be considered legitimate, but imposing free trade agreements by leveraging bargaining power type of imperialism and colonialism would be considered legitimate.
@@WHATISPOLITICS69if that's an Anarcho capitalist definition then what would the capitalism that a country like the US currently practices be defined as?
@@iamafro well in real life capitalism has always been the state supporting the rich in various ways - that’s what the early socialists were talking about when they invented the term “capitalism” - but if you take the anarcho capitalist view of capitalism (which is basically just a pure regime of property rights that people will magically respect) then what the US has is some kind of capitalism distorted by state socialism
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 interesting. I was initially thinking it was more a mix of fascism and capitalism. My line of thinking with this is that the state does not own the means of production but it does readily encourage and support businesses that aid it's affairs (weapons manufacturers, private prisons, Hollywood etc), has historically built up a fervent nationalism and used said nationalism to enact violence at home and abroad, and suppresses "undesirables". What would make it more socialist in their minds?
@@iamafro they basically think socialism is state ownership or control of production, so given that the state is involved in propping up capital in various ways they see that as socialism
Lmao not the sawdust factory 😂, as a vegan id love to see a video on the animal industrial complex though. Professor david nibert has great books regarding the history of how humans and other animals oppression are linked. The open university in england released a free course on the open learn website called "Why are nonhuman animals victims of harm?" Which is really well written, if anyone reading this is interested in veganism.
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 Oh, thank Heaven! I thought one of my favorite fellow travelers was deliberately snubbing me! LOL. Anyway, brother, please 'google' the phrase (in quotes) "Community, Belonging and the Polycrisis" by James R. Martin (The R-Word on Substack). Wherein I mention your ownself. XO.
i get blocked a lot as well .....tho i use very "harsh" language cause im generally pissed at the sh t the world around me has always been it would be nice to have better algorithms to evaluate what we are "actually" saying and freedom to speak our minds but the world we living in is such i guess
Some libertarians argue for "freedom to roam" (see article on wikipedia). I believe you have this right in Sweden for example. I wouldn't assign the island example to be fault of capitalism per se, but more to the lack of exposure to the concept of freedom to roam, that I am sure most people would agree to, regardless of the political spectrum. But most people are not aware of this concept.
sure, but that’s an violation to property rights - the idea that i was getting across is that if capitalism is something coherent, it’s a pure property rights regime. you can make any exceptions you want, from freedom to roam to welfare benefits, but then you’re getting away from that.
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 I understand your point. That is a harsh and strict definition for capitalism. I just started watching your videos, lets see if you use the same harshness and strict definitions for opposing views :p
@@anothersomething haha, well that’s me EZ definition, but when i actually do a full episode i’ll give various definitions from various points of view and explain why i chose that particular one. basically it’s just easier to discuss when it’s something simple and undiluted, and say x is a variation or y is a deviation etc than giving a very convoluted definition
@@anothersomething btw, you can check episode 4 where i explain how i choose definitions (how anyone should choose definitions, even if they’re not the same ones i choose!)
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 a nice video but I think you've mixed some incompatible property rights theories when defining capitalism which then makes for a tricky conceptual ground for thought experiments. granted you didn't do the typical move and apply the term to whatever the economic injustice one happens to not favor. back to the definition of capitalism and property rights - for example homesteading excludes just laying verbal claims to territory, and that's even more true for the usufruct theory, and thus under normal circumstances and under those property rights theories. take into account also that there are some people who affirm the Lockean proviso and/ have concerns about absentee landlordship (is that even a word? - landlord absenteeism?). moreover, if we affirm some property rights (for example at least bodies, cars and toothbrushes - it's always the fucking toothbrushes), there's also a question of whether you can compel people to serve your needs with their property, i.e. are there such things as positive rights. granted, this was 2 and a half years ago but it'd be nice if you addressed those in some of your subsequent videos (all of which are interesting nonetheless and i'm kinda binging them as you might've noticed). so in the end, i guess it would be correct to saythat capitalism is about property rights, but you can say that about any economic theory. i mean, any x-theism is about god(s) even though classical theism affirms the omni-god and excludes all else, and igtheism finds the term god itself to be gibberish. thus, if we're gonna talk about capitalism,i think it would be more helpful to specify which definitions of property rights are commonly accepted by those who call themselves capitalists, ancaps, or right-libertarians etc and that then you get different capitalisms. also, i think it would've been opportune to mention that the market which favors landlords over tenants doesn't just exist in a vacuum but is shaped by various laws and licensing which is enforced by the state - i.e. that there are material conditions which constrain people's options. i mean, if i'm not allowed to just build a house, or a temporary shelter, or just let my RV sit on some plot of land, my only option will be being a landlord. if i don't have any resources of my own, i'll have to slave away for the one who does etc.
what aspect of politics are you interested in? i don’t have any recommendations for a general book about political theory besides these videos, but id have a ton of recommendations about more specific topics
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 Hmm.. Well I'm pretty ignorant in every area lol. Is there any books on the basics? I get lost in all the terminology. I would like to understand capitalism
@@JustFollowingOrders12 hmm, these aren’t exactly “into to capitalism” books, but they do look at some very important fundamentals of capitalism that most people ignore - “Private Government” by Elizabeth Anderson on how ownership over property creates government over the people dependant on that property, and Capitalism vs Freedom by Rob Larson on how the rules of capitalism are only freedom for owners but servitude for non owners.
private property exists in almost any society, but the idea that you can theoretically amass an unlimed amount of it, and that the rules of ownership are the ones we take for granted (you can do anything you want with or to it, and you can sell it whenever you want to whoever you want, and they get all the same rights etc) are more specific to capitalism
@@gatro91 i’ll be doing a full episode on property, and haven’t yet done the deep dive into getting the right definition yet but it’s basically something that you have exclusive control over
Thanks! I was asking these questions cause I realized private property is one of those words that I feel I know the word, but don't actually know it. I was having a discussion with someone and they mentioned that private property is exclusive to capitalism.
Im wondering what you think about the venus project and resource based economy (by jacque fresco).. I'd be sooo interested in your analysis about their proposals and strategy and if you'd think they should engage with the far left way more and vice versa. Also would you be interested in two graphs i made about anarchist communism and an updated political spectrum? i'd like to send it to you, maybe you find some use for it. GREETZ!
never heard of it! give me a short TLDR cause i don’t have time to start researching more stuff unless i already think its’ super exciting… sure send me whatever, but can’t guarantee ill look at it in depth…
hi! i’m not a big fan of hyper specific socialist subgenres (anarchism is a branch of socialism) so I don’t have a specific tendency name that I adhere to or identify with. in general I think political hierarchies are inherently dangerous, that no one should be allowed to own property that other people depend on, and therefore that workers should be in change of their workplaces and people should be in charge of their living spaces. historically that’d just be general socialism, tending towards anarchism because of the a priori skepticism about hierarchy. what makes you ask the question? i didn’t realize that there was anything in this particular video that suggested anarchism or even socialism to it. I tried to make it as neutral as possible, because I think this is stuff that everyone should know regardless of where they think they are on the political spectrum
@@WHATISPOLITICS69 I watched some of your other videos, that's what made me ask but I asked here because that was the one I was watching at that moment sorry, yeah this one is pretty neutral. And I was expecting that kind of answer. Which is not bad. I'm more interested in labels as they are meant to point to a set of principles that you might have adhered to, which you kindly have specified. Yes, against hierarchies and maybe power specifically not by eliminating power altogether but by spreading it equally I'd say places you within the libertarian socialism, and from there in the broader socialist trend. Anyway, I like what I saw so far in your videos
