WHAT IS POLITICS?
Politics is one of the only practical disciplines where none of the main concepts have clear, coherent definitions.
We define ourselves with terms like "left” and "right" and we believe in things like "democracy," “markets,” "capitalism" and "socialism" even though we don’t really know what any of these words actually mean.
This series aims to make sense out of the political muddle that we've inherited from media, academia, and from decades of cold war propaganda, so that we can figure what it is that we want when it comes to politics, and how we can achieve it.
- Update frequency
- every 52 days
- Episodes
- 30
- Years Active
- 2019 - 2025
Dumbundance: can the “Abundance Agenda” fix the eternal housing crisis?
In the book Abundance, left liberal authors Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson identify unnecessary bureaucracy and red tape as an important factor in why there is a shortage of housing across the USA.
Ve…
How Inequality of Wealth and Power are like Obesity and Diabetes
Why are human beings so greedy and why are our societies so hierarchical, if our ancestors were so fiercely egalitarian?
What is “human nature” in this regard?
A new theory about inequality of wea…
Hello, Fellow Jews! How Lies About Oslo led to the Destruction of Gaza
My message to Jewish supporters of the war in Gaza.
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Why Elites Ruined the Meaning of the Left Right Political Spectrum (and we need it back!)
Market Exit, like many others before him, tells us that the left-right political spectrum is obsolete and does more harm than good. That’s because he doesn’t know what they mean.
This video explains:
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“Nationalism vs. Globalism”: Why is the Populist Right on the Rise?
Why are nationalist / populist / far right candidates and parties getting elected all around the world?
Why isn’t the populist left enjoying the same success?
Why does inequality keep getting …
12.1 – The Secret History of Israel / Palestine, Part I: the Jews of Europe and the rise of Zionism
This series focuses on those aspects of the origins of the Israel/Palestine conflict that partisans on both sides mutually ignore.
This episode examines jewish life in Europe and the conditions lead…
Q&A on the ABCs of Israel/Palestine
This is a Q&A where I respond to questions and critiques about episode 12: The ABC’s of Israel/Palestine (https://youtu.be/OLr_VCqnId0) and also go off on a whole bunch of related tangents.
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Brainstorm: Israel/Palestine – Who Started It?
What was supposed to be an informal QnA about the “Israel/Palestine ABCs” episode, turned into a What is Politics “live” brainstorm session à la Matt Christman “grillstream,” where I discuss my argum…
12: From “Never Again” to “There are No Uninvolved Civilians”: The ABC’s of the Israel/Palestine Conflict
Elites use identity, particularly national identity, as a way of advancing their own interests, often against the interests of the populations that they pretend to represent.
But before we can und…
9.2 – Equity, Equality and Lizard People: when right wing politics masquerade as left wing politics
When ideas and movements that threaten to overturn established hierarchies of power are absorbed into elite institutions like Ivy League universities and for-profit corporations, they get transformed…
11.1 Why the Russian Revolution Failed: When Rich Kids do all the Socialism
The leaders of the Russian Revolutions of February and October 1917 sought to establish socialism: a deeply democratic economic and political system where the employee/employer relationship is abolis…
11. Why are Communist countries all one-party dictatorships?
Why has every communist country so far been a one party dictatorship?
Is it something inherent to Socialism or Marxism?
Is human nature incompatible with political equality?
Has “true” communis…
10.4 What Causes Seasonal Social and Political Structures? The Dawn of Everything Chapter 3:
10.3 The Ingredients of Hierarchy: Graeber & Wengrow’s Dawn of Everything Chapter 3, ”Unfreezing the Ice Age”
We cover the first part of chapter 3 of David Graeber and David Wengrow’s book The Dawn of Everything: ”Unfreezing the Ice Age”, and we investigate the authors’ claims that human inequality has no or…
10.2 The Dawn of Everything: How Graeber & Wengrow’s book sets us up to fail like Occupy Wall Street
In this episode we cover chapter 1 of David Graeber & David Wengrow’s book The Dawn of Everything, entitled Farewell to Humanity’s Childhood; or Why This isn’t a Book About the Origins of Inequality.
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10.1 Graeber & Wengrow’s “The Dawn of Everything”: What is an “Egalitarian” Society?
In this episode we read and critique the conclusion of Chapter 2 of Dawn of Everything, “Wicked Liberty: The Indigenous Critique and the Myth of the Noble Savage”, which was previously released in Fr…
10. David Graeber & David Wengrow’s The “Dawn of Everything”: The Wisdom of Kandiaronk
A critical reading of “The Wisdom of Kandiaronk, The Indigenous Critique, the Myth of Progress and the Birth of the Left” from David Graeber & David Wengrow’s upcoming book The Dawn of Everything.
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Interview: Fight Like an Animal / Arnold Schroeder
Interview with Arnold Schroeder of Fight Like an Animal, a wonderful and endessly fascinating show that looks through 20 years of experience of hardcore climate activism, at why left political moveme…
9.1. Cancel Culture is Corporate Management Culture
The terms “cancel culture” and “political correctness” are used to delegitimize ideas like gender equality and racial equality by conflating them with toxic dominance behaviour practiced by up-and-co…
9. The Real Cancel Culture is At-Will Employment
The foundation of “cancel culture” and “political correctness” is the wage labour employment contract.
ARTICLES QUOTED:
Corey Robin, Chris Bertram and Alex Gourevitch 2012 – Life at Work, …