The administrative subpoenas [19] issued for Hasan Piker [20] and Medea Benjamin [21] over their participation in the Cuba caravan [22] are to be opposed—in part because the subpoenas will only give their sinister politics [23] greater cachet among neophyte activists! Piker's shameless shilling [24] for the dictatorships of Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin invisibilizes [25] the victims [26] of their ethno-supremacist detention states [27]—the Uyghurs [28] of Xinjiang [29] and the Crimean Tatars [30]. This more ciritcal point is obscured in the endless outrage [31] over his supposed anti-Semitism. And with Xi and Putin joining with Trump [32] to build a fascist world order [33], Piker's brand of campist pseudo-opposition (however overheated [34]) is compromised from the start, mirroring [35] what it ostensibly opposes—subpoenas notwithstanding. In Episode 330 of the CounterVortex podcast [36], Bill Weinberg breaks it down in his typically unsparing manner.
Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon [39].
Reccomended reading:
"Hasan Piker's Take on China May Matter More Than His Views on Israel"
by Danny Postel, New Lines [40]
"New Political Litmus Test: Hasan Piker"
by Michael Donnelly, This Small Planet [41]
"The Wrong Stuff: Hasan Piker and the politics of reactionary clickbait"
by Joseph Grosso, Left Critique of the Left [42]
"The real problem with Hasan Piker. Spoiler: It’s not about Israel."
by Eric Levitz, Vox [43]
Production by Chris Rywalt [44]
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