US Protests & Marxist Critique of Žižek, Foucault, Arendt & the Frankfurt School, w Gabriel Rockhill

[@criticaltheoryworkshop5299]

Comment from Gabriel Rockhill: "I did not mean to suggest that Eric Hobsbawm was simply a Trotskyist (1:09). As everyone knows, he was a longtime member of the CPGB. However, his views evolved significantly, particularly toward the end of his life. When I refer to the mistakes I think he made, I primarily had in mind a number of the public positions he took after what he referred to as the 'end of socialism' (see, for instance, the interviews available via the links below). Nevertheless, Hobsbawm was quite different than other Marxian figures in the British intelligentsia like Perry Anderson (see 1:05)." kzbin.info/www/bejne/Znm0nKp8iMtqjck kzbin.info/www/bejne/hne3omymr8SbfK8

[@B_Estes_Undegöetz]

Your time stamps in the above comment don’t pertain to the subject you seem to be referring to. Try clicking and you’ll see.

[@nminkovsky]

Wow! This guy is brilliant. Dialectical analysis at it's best. Can't wait for the book to come out.

[@joshuacox534]

it's been a long time coming at least for me, to see other leftists call out frankfurt school as garbage. the frankfurt school has been extremely useful to right wing propagandists because they claim frankfurt school is marxist. sickening falsehoods abound.

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

What are you even talking about 😅 This person is projecting and deflecting, as a stalinist apologist himself, he's putting the blame on left libertarianism for being compatible ruling class agendas, when that's actually true of authoritarian/statist leftism. See what Prof. Chomsky has said about French critical theorists also being stalinists.

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

His intellectual history of traditions within Marxism is totally wrong. Listen to Chomsky for the history of world socialist movement getting divided between statist and anti statist forms. Read more of Guerin, Pannekoek and Luxembourg. Don't listen to Bolsheviks like him Good luck

[@nminkovsky]

@@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314 Why would anyone care what the ideologically rigid anarchist Chomsky thinks?

[@mrbrex95]

​@@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314😂😂

[@seanmoon7095]

Rockhill is a ROCKSTAR! Kicking ass and taking names.

[@francbacon]

I agree

[@rozalialuks6583]

The interviewer is Excelent. The interviewee is BEYOND Expectations: Opened many doors for further research. Thank you both. #LONGLIVERESISTANCE

[@DMGrass-gb9kg]

Thank you prof. Rockhill. What a great opportunity you had to observe and understand the anti-marxist intelligensia of empire. I'm glad you are one of those who continued to do real work as a philosopher and theorist to expose the opportunistic insincerity of their thought. Work that would take a lifetime to do.

[@vaska1999]

I'm a generation older than Rockhill, and it's good to see younger scholars understand post-modern philosophy as the ideological hand maiden of neoliberalism.

[@gorgeoushammer]

this is a fantastic interview. great questions, great answers. thank you!

[@jeffhicks8428]

excellent work. thank you sir.

[@mollyklein6355]

Interested to know why you leave out any mention of the hugely influential Nazi Paul De Man, a disciple and close friend of your mentor Derrida, and drop all your suspicions about ruling class sponsored antired intellectuals when discussing your own lodestar Cornelius Castoriadis the most positively crazed anticommunist of the New Left who even opposed 'Stalinists' in Greece fighting Nazi occupation and spent a lot of his prime career years with an important post at the OECD.

[@ananoelle20]

I don’t think he likes Derrida. He did work with Derrida but he makes it clear that they (French intellectuals, Frankfurt School, etc.) are an arm of US empire.

[@blublubblubblu]

I don’t know, but is mentioning many times that he was also part of this system that now he writes about. For me he seems like a genuine marxist. Maybe he will write in the future about them? I don’t think that he is not talking about them for a specific reason, maybe there are just to many intellectuals like the ones you mentioned. Otherwise you could ask him this question directly on a lifestream or write him an email. I don’t think, that he will see your question on a 3 months old video.

[@Syncing19]

Comintern for life

[@carlchapman3749]

Thanks!

[@criticaltheoryworkshop5299]

Thank you--greatly appreciated!

[@aaronnoisboy8122]

​@@criticaltheoryworkshop5299I wish you interview Norman Finkelstein and professor cornel west Yes please meet codepink organisation and they report all us university have spend 490 to 500 billion us dollars to Israel

[@criticaltheoryworkshop5299]

Just saw this. Great ideas--we'll discuss and see if they're available.

[@colonelweird]

Absolutely fascinating interview, but for me as an outsider & beginner, it just raises more questions, even as it affirms things I've sensed but have been unable to articulate. For example I grew up in the 70s in the U.S., and distinctly recall as I came of age and developed an interest in radicalism, I never, not once, came across a balanced discussion of the Soviet Union or the prospects for true socialism in the U.S. Even Marx was always described merely as a fanatic, a materialist/atheist, and a rigid economic determinist proved wrong by history. Over the years I've started thinking something was missing, but to this day I remain deeply ignorant about these subjects and confused about where to begin to develop understanding. I know a little about Marx, but on historical topics related to that legendary "actually existing socialism" I don't know where to turn, since most scholarship seems to have been shaped by the priorities of western anticommunism. So now I'm left wondering: what do I make of Lenin or Stalin, for example? Encountering present-day Marxist-Leninists often just adds another layer to my perplexity, as they can be dogmatic and anti-intellectual, or quite conspiratorial regarding CIA influence. In any case Prof. Rockhill provides many avenues for further investigation, so I hope to see more of his work in the future.

[@1851990ful]

I come from a similar background. I suggest you to join a party and learn theory with the comrades.

[@austinhattori6580]

A good place to start is Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds. He's accessible and lucid but is explicitly against the reactionary anti-Soviet "left."

[@DanFeldman-Edge]

Would it not be more effective and more fulfilling to read the original works of these philosophers and intellectuals rather than only joining a group? Most groups are susceptible to groupthink, and there is a big chance that very few of your comrades may have read the original works, and so would project their solipsistic utopian thoughts onto banalized understandings of second hand communications.

[@ellengran6814]

Conolweird. I suggest you read a book by Iain McGilchrist (UK psychiatrist, brain researcher) or listen to him one KZbin. He talks about how our left and right brain hemispheres works. In some interviews he connects left/right policies to left/right hemispheres. One focus on individualism, one on collectivism.

[@cheri238]

​@ellengran6814 Thank you for mentioning Dr. Iian McGilchrist books and name.❤

[@JeninLF]

Since I found out about this version of Marxism "with teeth in", I've listened to quite a few interviews with Dr. Rockhill so I'm not sure if this is the one where I heard about anti-imperialist news media, but I'm super excited to have Prensa Latina and teleSUR news!

[@Jorenanthony]

Wow. You guys rock. 💪🏽 We rock……

[@tomasandrew9354]

This was brilliant. Questions that gave Rockhill the opportunity to expound on the different aspects of the topics at hand. Can’t wait for his book to come out.

[@ronmackinnon9374]

I wonder, is it at all contradictory for Rockhill to say, on the one hand, that we mustn't regard this as a matter of US intelligence having brought into existence the intellectual currents that served its purpose, as opposed to making use of what was already developing of its own accord; while on the other hand characterizing these intellectuals strictly as 'opportunist,' as being motivated by 'exchange value' -- i.e., producing whatever their imperial paymasters wanted? The latter suggests that, without those financial incentives, these intellectuals might have gone on to produce materialist class analysis, and had positive things to say about 'actually existing socialism.' If we don't think they would have acted that way in the latter case, then wouldn't that mean that they developed their outlook for their own reasons, and thus 'opportunism' wouldn't be an accurate explanation for those views? From what I understand, the disillusionment among west European intellectuals with the Soviet Union and Marxism was strong and deep in those years, especially after 1956. Meanwhile, they were in a context in which revolution appeared to be taking the form of national liberation struggles by colonized peoples, rather than of working-class revolt domestically -- capitalist elites in the west were being knocked back on their heels, but not in the way that Marx had predicted. In such a context, it was perhaps not surprising that their thinking -- of their own accord -- would develop in a way that was useful to the managers of US empire. But, again, that explanation would seem to work against the 'opportunist' characterization of their behavior.

[@aimsophie]

I didn't manage to finish the whole video as it became clear to me that his basic tenet is rather tenuous. He seems to be suggesting that anyone found to have any connection, no matter how tangential, to the "bourgeois apparatus", is to be suspected, save those who are of little importance. I wonder whether his heavy involvement in mainstream social media makes him any more or less suspicious. Also I noticed a couple of times when he referred to socialism, communism and Marxism interchangeably. Sign that he himself doesn't know more about these ideas than those he seeks to critique.

[@BusinessGamesAI]

This is really insightful! ❤️

[@dalemcd1408]

A terrific interview

[@jorgi6335]

9:08 How can I find more information about this? The internet/Google is so hard to navigate in. It's seems almost impossible to find good-quality information like this. Do any of you, in the comment section, have any tips?

[@ronmackinnon9374]

Here's a few I would recommend: 'Killing Hope,' by the late William Blum. Practically any of the books and lectures (online videos) by Michael Parenti. 'The Cultural Cold War,' by Frances Stonor Saunders, is one of the standard works on that subject (it has also been published under the title, 'Who Paid the Piper?'). You might also try looking up online videos with CIA whistleblower John Stockwell.

[@jorgi6335]

@@ronmackinnon9374 Wow, interesting. Thanks for your extensive response! I will definitely look into everything!

[@rsavage-r2v]

Yeah, everything that can be used to filter information is used to push people toward a bourgeois narrative. For example it's impossible to search for truthful information related to the DPRK. My experience has been that I have to proceed directly from one source to another and gradually build up my list of resources that way. Mostly this consists of names of individual scholars and journalists. Reddit is an ultra-"leftist" cesspit but I've gotten many good links there too.

[@LadyRavenhaire]

I'm being cens0red. Please contact me. You can find my contact info on the KZbin description page.

[@abrambadal8997]

I am over twenty five years older than Gabriel Rockhill , but I came pretty close to his analysis after 1997-- 2001 , on studying the Great S. East Asian crisis , displaying the grave essence of the new economic order of The Washington Consensus , what I called The Neo--Fascism ! Sadly to find out what was termed as neo-liberalism by CIA backed Chicago School of Friedman Economics and adopted by the whole world in the terminology , that was so discouraging to economists that pondered on the content of what was declared as the New World Order later on after 1971 / 79 qualitative changes in The New Bankers' Oligarchies , taking over completely the leading political party leaderships , some twenty years later ! However after 2001 was laid bare this fascistic new content of what I termed neo--fascist Fictitious Kapital social order ( distinct social order from Real Capital described by Marx in The Capital ! ) was in command in West and had taken up the task of conquering the entire world after 1989 / 91 '' fall '' or set--backs of socialism , but not erasing The continuing Needed Alternative for a genuine socialism to replace the Capitalism of The Permanent Wars , that I had called the neo--fascism after 1997--2000 ! Today , this new content or new phase of Kapitalism , shines brighter in Gaza Palestine , and in Ukraine Kiev fascists( war--mongering leadership , backed by The New World Order neo-fascism of The Fictitious Kapital in The West , opposed by resistance by The BRICS Plus & The OPEC Plus Countries of The Shanghai Cooperation Pact !

[@abrambadal8997]

I forgot this instead of modest work--shop I was promoting The Alternative of a Global Networks of what I called The Open Social Political Global University socialism of groups engaged locally to develop through praxis their local independent projects , producing use-value property and products for general usage and consumptions ! I defined the use--value , in contradiction to exchange value of the monetary financial capitalists , to be One Hour of Socially Needed activity to produce the use-value property offered for general usage or renting or consumption ! No bureaucracy needed as this cannot be banked , but is managed through A.I. networks globally , and local referendums decide for local or regional needed temporary rules ! Thus you can get rid of political bureaucrats , get rid of banks , and get rid of republican political structures and hierarchies etc.... Each member or users are attributed by the A.I. a Universal Status , giving her or him his social share for usage or for consumption ! Production can be qualified by old inspectors grade A , B , C , D or E get multipliers of 1.4 , 1.3 , 1.2 , 1.1 , 1.0 & F for unfinished or reworking needed gets 0.40 to 0.50 % multipliers or reduction of One USE--VALUE for trying ! O.S.P.G.U. will be The New Institution of the genuine socialism , abolishing systematically what becomes uneconomical systematically on the rise of the new genuine socialism and it's global networks ! Good Luck !

[@samaval9920]

Good!!

[@jamesayres1225]

Excellent

[@franblack2227]

In Brazil we have a alternative journalism channel called ICL

[@absoluterefusal]

Whose interpretation of the French revolution does Rockhill agree with?

[@ronmackinnon9374]

He didn't say. I think it helps to consider different analyses, including Tocqueville's (which Rockhill referred to in what seemed a dismissive way). The thing is, in their own references to the French Revolution, even Marx and Engels emphasized changes in the political and legal sphere over the economic, unlike later Marxist historians (like Georges Lefebvre).

[@sonarbangla8711]

European thinkers are reduced to protesting funding Israeli projects with workers' funds. It is a long way to 'forceful overthrow of imperial west'. Very respectful of Marx, no doubt.

[@robertcarpenter8077]

Foucault was interested in a set of problems having to do with the history of systems of thought. Now if Rockhill wishes to contest some specific analysis made by Foucault why not simply do that ? For instance: Foucault's research led him to conclude that science did not arise owing to any gradual transformation of the theories of alchemy. To the contrary Foucault states that it is when the methodologies of the legal realm - its techniques for reducing evidence to the least set of mutually exclusive facts - its insight that the simplest, least complicated theory accounting for those facts is the preferred theory i.e. theoretical parsimony - were transposed from the realm of law to the realm of natural phenomenon that science emerges. Now if Rockhill wants to tell us why he thinks this is wrong, fine. But to resort to polemics rather than reason does not seem helpful. Rockhill should, it seems to me, tell us why science did in fact emerge from alchemy rather than trying to discredit Foucault by smearing him as a crypto statist.

[@chickenbutt420]

He talked a little about Foucault in this video, but he's done a lot more research about him. I'm sure you can find a much more detailed critique of Foucault from Rockhill elsewhere. I don't understand what you mean when you say Rockhill was "smearing him as a crypto statist", I don't think that's what he was talking about. Rockhill's main criticisms, not necessarily of Foucault himself but rather of the apparatus that creates people like him to create theory like his, is that it is in the intellectual's best interest to avoid materialist analysis, to create complicated and intentionally dense idealist theory, and condemn actually existing socialism. The theory is a commodity, you consume it and you feel radical. It has no practical value, no "use value", and that's why the compatible left is useless. They want to sell you their book, not add to a materialist tradition or add to our understanding of the world.

[@marialuisasantoniw.818]

outstanding historian Annie Lacroix-Riz research "L'histoire et Les historiens sous influence"

[@armandpellerinhautenauve448]

You really shouldn't trust Lacroix-Riz, one her main work re-used a far-right conspiracy theory the "synarchist conspiracy" that pretends the reason of France's military defeat against Germany in 1940 is due to an alliance between a secret esoteric society and certain technocrats. This is Vichy (the French fascist regime that help commit the holocaust) propaganda that sought to descredit the parliamentary system of the third republic and promote an authoritarian state that would purge France of it's "inner enemies" (religious minorities, foreigners, homosexuals, leftists etc...). Whenever she was critized for the way she used uncritically propagandistic sources and ignored every proof against her theory she accused her critics of being in service of the bourgeoisie. There's a balance to be found between being critical of the academia and straight up refusing scientific debate. I don't think she's intellectualy honest.

[@gugamar]

What does Gabriel mean when he said the US internationalized Fascism after WW2?

[@Dorian_sapiens]

In large part, he means the US funded, trained, and gave other operational support to fascist organizations all over the world (and created them from scratch where necessary). He wrote a really good article about it in Counterpunch, called "The U.S. Did Not Defeat Fascism in WWII, It Discretely Internationalized It".

[@ronmackinnon9374]

@@Dorian_sapiens Yes - even though, in the FDR and at the very start of the Truman administration, there likely were some in the U.S. bureaucracy who took at face value the talk about 'de-nazification' and fully expected that the business conglomerates behind fascism in Germany and Japan would be broken up, it wasn't long before those interests would be looked upon instead as allies in the fight against communism and the Soviet Union.

[@joshuacox534]

the u.s. continued colonialism. the U.S. has the EXACT SAME FOREIGN POLICY AS THE ENGLISH CROWN, and the english crown is either an ally or vassal of Rothschild bankers

[@LadyRavenhaire]

I am and some activists I know have been to the encampments. There are alot of gatekeepers and agents controlling students as you'd expect. This is why the students never give out flyers or even try to connect with workers. Unfortunately most of the activists who I know will not go to the encampments at all, because immediately they get asked about their views on Covid and they don't want to be attacked for their anti lockdown, anti-mandate views. Understandable. This week I'll be attending my 12th plus funeral. All were healthy. All died of aggressive cancers. All were jabbed. One friend who has gone to all of the encampments to show support is consistently attacked as a Trumpster for no other reason then the fact that he argues that covid didn't cause a recession, but that covid is just a rebranding of the flu in order to distract people from the financial collapse, which he ties in with the gen@€ide. The students lack basic theoretical knowledge, whether in economics, understanding imperialism, or basic organizing. They are often guided by emotion which is fine, but it's not enough to create a movement. Emotions can also easily be swayed by propaganda. Unfortunately the CIA has done a great job in polarizing our society. We no longer can have conversation at all. This is especially true of youth who refuse to engage with older adults. I expect to be attacked for my anti-scienticism views. But if I don't say it, no one else will: Covid was a dress rehearsal for The Pandemic Preparedness treaty. The Pandemic measures are war measures. It's so obvious! Right down to the health passports. The Nazi called their travel ID papers, health passports. Jews, gypsies, and political prisoners literally had "carriers of typhus stamped on their travel passports. WW3 is coming! But we on the Left can't have this conversation until the CIA lets us by which time it will be too late.

[@mrbrex95]

Lol why do you think that COVID is that important to fight against imperialism?

[@ronmackinnon9374]

As Rockhill frequently uses the term 'spectacle,' it seems that one French intellectual of that era whom he exempts from such criticism would be Guy Debord, author of 'Society of the Spectacle.' That would be fitting, as Debord (whatever one might think of the 'Situationist International') absolutely did believe (as I understand it) in the continuing importance of Marx's analysis of capitalism and tried to update it for the world of electronic mass media. But I'm also curious concerning an even earlier work by a French intellectual -- namely Roland Barthes' 'Mythologies', from 1957. Would Rockhill see any anti-capitalist merit in such a work, as a means of helping to expose the workings of capitalist and imperialist propaganda? Also, on the subject of British intellectuals, I was surprised that the discussion had more to do with Marxist historians like Eric Hobsbawm and E.P. Thompson, while the cultural theorists of the so-called Birmingham school -- like Raymond Williams, Richard Hoggart, and Stuart Hall -- who would seem to be more the counterparts of the French and German critical theorists, went completely unmentioned.

[@beyondaboundary6034]

At one point (just after the 43:00 mark) Gabriel describes Eric Hobsbawm as a Trotskyist. That's incorrect. Otherwise I agree with much of what he said.

[@hansfrankfurter2903]

What was he then? Eurocom?

[@carolsunanday2098]

Wow

[@DS-tz4lk]

Another fantastic conversation, monumentally enlightening. TY! About the bourgeois culture industry being one never ending psychological warfare campaign, which it absolutely is---this is so stunning in retrospect: It started as class struggle dub poetry and was monumentally meaningful, and that scared the settler social dominance group of racists so bad, that they diluted it down to an ongoing psychological warfare operation called operation "MK rap"/operation "MK-hiphop", that does nothing but boast and covet, criminalizes everything non-Eurasian, and literally recuperates by trafficking endlessly miserable racist minstrel show tropes by forcing the so-called artist to reproduce them for the validation of the racist implicit biases in the Eurasian settler social dominance group, but what it started as was all about class struggle, but since it became operation MK-rap, you will find NO class struggle in anything that was elevated by the bourgeois cultural apparatus. 😒 It is sofakin obvious--the timeline is absolutely clear. Di Black Petty Booshwah --"...they side with oppressor when the going to get rough..." kzbin.info/www/bejne/pV6yp2ahip2EfZosi=HHK0WjykHlEeh9MS Listen to all of this epic dub poet's work, it is all about class struggle. Dub poetry is Proto "rap" - Rap is a Psyop

[@N0tEnuffMana]

More of Gabriel Rockhill!

[@fernly2]

Cultural forensics is a topic rarely addressed as profoundly as this interview does. TY for your work. Professor Darrel Hamamoto, formerly teaching at UCDavis reveals much practical info re this issue in his book Servitors of Empire and in his Utube videos.

[@Whatiswhat]

Enjoyed this convo very much. Not sure if “tateleological” (27:40) was a stutter or new terminology. I think he meant teleological. The French anti-communist democratic socialist accounting was interesting happening likely in parallel with the intentional platforming of American artists creating abstract expressionism to undermine political content and oppose the rise Soviet Socialist Realism.

[@Alloballo123]

Tautological? Means circular reasoning.

[@Whatiswhat]

@@Alloballo123 ahh ty!

[@ronmackinnon9374]

Apart from the apolitical content of those artworks, another basic point of promoting such artists was simply to help win the sympathies of influential intellectuals and 'tastemakers' overseas, by showing that they were mistaken in regarding the United States as a cultural backwater of bourgeois philistines, and should instead see it as very much with the avant garde, at the front of cultural trends.

[@gabrielroot8736]

he said teleological

[@A.R-ol5vm]

That’s exactly what bell hooks said about Foucault and co.

[@happygucci5094]

I think bell hooks is a much more dangerous intellectual than she is given credit for - precisely by how overlooked and under appreciated amongst “the big name intellectuals…” she is. I would love to hear Gerald Horne, Gabrielle Rockhill, Lewis Gordon, Joy James, Alenka Zupanic, Arundhati Roy in conversation. Please! Someone make this happen please!!

[@Alloballo123]

Interesting that he leaves people like Jameson and Balibar, etc.

[@ronmackinnon9374]

Also not a word about Baudrillard.

[@cheri238]

What an interesting discussion?My mind learned more. Have you ever read Frantz Omar Fanon's works, "The Wretched Earth, " "Black Skin White Masks?" Dr. Lewis P. Gordon?( Sartre wasn't mentioned ) Another suggestion is Dr. Iian McGilchrist books, "The Master and His Emissary," The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, "The Matter With Things," 2 volumes, Our Brains and the Unmaking of the Unmaking of the Western World, and lectures of many various backgrounds and fields of higher education, sciences, philosophy, languages, religions, art and literature. Thank you both again for a vigorous discussion. May I also add that many of your news programs I watch also, and many others. 🙏❤️🌍🌿🕊🎵🎉🎶🎵

[@ronmackinnon9374]

That's 'The Wretched *of the* Earth' (not 'The Wretched Earth').

[@voiceofchina1788]

Just watched Zizek's video, he blamed Mao for his irresponsible attitude toward the great famine, what Zezek said is true. Stalin's purge and manmade famine did not contribute to the anti fascism cause, but opposite. China and USSR shared the persecution of different thinking. If history were not learned it would repeat.

[@kurtaikido2889]

Empire of spectacle! Yes! Perfect characterization. Psy-op empire

[@kevintewey1157]

A book too

[@JM-xd9ze]

Great discussion, but might I suggest a forward-looking one with Mr Rockhill in the future? Specifically: - AI and the coming tsunami of disinfo AND white collar job loss - Russia and China: how will capitalism (their respective flavors) evolve in the wake of their ascendancy?

[@IvoNeto1949]

22:10 funny how kke is doing exatcly the same thing today

[@randomthgt7807]

Hella informative!!!

[@ahmuqasim7540]

Interesting discussion. Two points, first Prof. Rockhill has a point when he says that the Soviets promoted women's rights, rights of nationalities forming 15 republics, and supported decolonization. But the relative poverty of the ussr and focus on class and cold war didn't allow for sufficient focus on other issues. Key weakness was absence of religious freedom. Second, what does Prof. Rockhill think of dependency school gang: Gunder Frank, Samir Amin, and Emanuel Wallerstein?

[@happygucci5094]

Gabriel Rockhill… I think I’m in love 🥰 I will be devouring everything of this man’s beautiful mind- 35:15 the interviewer is QUALITY. I really want to hear how the Black radical philosophical/political theorists and how they read this moment or how to read them against history, the Frankfurt School and the intellectual industrial complex… Amazing.

[@fredfuckstone914]

The trend you see from black radicals is complete rejection from the 50s onward. As early as 1970 Kwame Ture advocated a complete split from the white/European left and a move towards Pan-Africanist socialism, which wasn't particularly friendly to the USSR but it was directly connected to Castro and Cuba. Less active and more academic black radicals like Adolph Reed completely rejected these Euro/Western Marxist trends but also rallied against the rise of "black leaders" to replace the earned radical leadership of King, Shabazz, and Ture with the docile attitude of people like Cornell West and Butch Reed.

[@Antiposmoderno]

wow. thats gold bro

[@wallybrooker1189]

I have a lot of respect for Rockhill's work, but that respect has been undermined by his baseless charges that British historians E.P. Thompson and E.J. Hobsbawm were Trotskyists. While both broke with the CPGB I see no evidence to support these claims.

[@vaska1999]

That's odd because they're generally acknowledged as Trotskyists.

[@fredfuckstone914]

You don't side with Radio Free Europe as a Marxist, back then or now.

[@douggokellam]

Very informative!

[@antoniomachado1808]

Very good

[@MartinBraonain]

Thanks for the interview. A little pushback from someone with an interest in these ideas, but no professional reading: So if I was to claim that marxism was only a dominant theory because the states of Russia and China promoted it (which they naturally did) would I be being 'dialectical'? That would be such a crude response to Communism and Marxism. To view 60s theory/pomo as 'simply' extreme forms of individualism that were then promoted (what does that even mean) by the CIA and other forces is likewise crude. This isn't to deny that this is not part of understanding a theory or groups of ideas and how they gain institutional standing, but its statement here as an 'explanation' is almost risible. After all if we considering the theories of Socialism and Marxism as strucutural theories they also do not stand outside the context as Derrida for one showed with 'Stucture, sign, play.' The political implications of Foucault are definitely not socialist but I view him more as a bastard child of Romaniticism, a wonderful thought provoker, likewise deconstruction is not a 'political' theory like S/C it is a way of reading texts and to do with the instablity of meaning - I undestand that a totalising theory (if that is how one sees Marxism) would be nervous about that.

[@BlakeJortles]

Love Rockhill. Still don't really see a way forward. Twain quote, if truly him "if you don't read the news you are uniformed. If you read the news you are misinformed."

[@rsavage-r2v]

Mass parties are building everywhere.

[@SreyashiChoudhuryify]

What a great response to the question of nuances and how the collaborators of Imperialism might have brought on so called important works that the Imperial culture/propaganda industry propagates. What did those works do? Propagate Identity politics, at least in India, the whole of Marxist discourses have been rendered into cultural marxism and idpol.

[@bigusj]

Hey Gabriel, someone pointed out to me that you referenced Arendt several times in at least one of your articles (and not in a disparaging way). It was really disconcerting! What was up with that? I can provide links if necessary, but it was with regard to Adorno leaving Benjamin to die which came from Arendt’s account. (I ask this sincerely and in good faith)

[@jancoil4886]

Good point. Benjamin's death is murky. He was in his forties, and not in the best physical shape. He was perhaps lucky to get as far as he did. Responsibility must remain with him and no one else.

[@bigusj]

@@jancoil4886 not an Adorno fan, just weird sourcing by GR

[@LadyRavenhaire]

Adorno did let Benjamin die. Adorno was jealous and hated Benjamin. I knew Joseph Maier, Adorno 's student and although he worshipped Adorno, he admitted Adorno was not a nice man, putting it lightly.

[@LadyRavenhaire]

​@@jancoil4886Adorno could have helped him and didn't. If he had shown him support, things could have been different.

[@bigusj]

@@LadyRavenhaire oh yeah for sure, it’s not that I’m doubting GR’s accounting, it’s that in many circles I’ve gotten pushback on sharing CTW and GR’a articles because of two specific issues: dubious sourcing (easy example is Arendt) and close association with patsocs/nazbols (specifically Midwest Marx). I was hoping for any clarification but I’ve been ignored on livestreams and wherever despite my goal being to more widely share GR’s work.

[@willieduffie4967]

Very informative and interesting 🤔

[@ronaldoferreira594]

Excelent!

[@meshgraphics]

Hegemonic empire = freedom

[@vaska1999]

night = day

[@Cyberphunkisms]

My issue with rockhill is that he doesn't see what is right in front of him.

[@kevintewey1157]

Elaborate?

[@vaska1999]

And that is?

[@robertcarpenter8077]

But was not Foucault the very one to characterize the university system in terms of its function in 'bureaucratizing' knowledge, as an institution whose bureaucracies resolve the problem of what does and does not constitute 'truth', of what is admissible and what is inadmissible as truth ? Foucault in fact analyzed this problem at considerable length. One is left to wonder why on earth Rockhill is taking the very analysis given us by Foucault and trying to use it now to discredit Foucault.

[@mrbrex95]

Because Foucault is an imperialist tool

[@robertcarpenter8077]

@@mrbrex95 Question: So in his book 'Society Must Be Defended' Foucault wrote, 'While colonization, with its techniques and its political and juridical weapons, obviously transported European models to other continents, it also had a considerable boomerang effect on the mechanisms of power in the West, and on the apparatuses, institutions, and techniques of power. A whole series of colonial models was brought back to the West, and the result was that the West could practice something resembling colonization, or an internal colonialism, on itself.' How are you able to read such a Foucauldian text as this and reach the conclusion that Foucault was 'an imperialist tool' ?

[@vaska1999]

​@@robertcarpenter8077 Because Foucault's critique was always a dead end, in the end.

[@garrettramirez428]

We need to apply this analysis to Fanon...but ya'll aint ready for that conversation ;)

[@Dorian_sapiens]

I'm not sure I understand your point, your comment is a bit vague. But, if you're suggesting that Fanon, like the purveyors of French Theory, is a sort of "ruling class plant" with backwards ideas falsely presented as left-wing, meant to ensnare and dissipate the revolutionary momentum of the working and oppressed classes―this is incorrect. In Fanon's case, what's going on is recuperation. Opponents and distorters of his work have laid a claim to it and now present it in a completely declawed and anti-materialist form. And, because these distorters are part of the culture industry, they are often successful at passing off their ineffectual, liberal pseudo-Fanon as the real thing to those who haven't bothered with his work itself and what it means in context. They're doing to Fanon what the French Theory hucksters did to Marx. But perhaps that is your point.

[@thedualtransition6070]

@@Dorian_sapiens Just like the recuperators have defanged Gramsci of his historical materialism to make his use safe for capitalism.

[@Dorian_sapiens]

@@thedualtransition6070 💯

[@anopinionatedlaymanappears9052]

I like Rockhill but criticising actually existing socialism doesn't mean you're anti-marxist. There are serious flaws that need addressing and just fawning over MLs isn't going to help things. And no it's objectively incorrect to label western-Marxism as reactionary or revisionist. Have you actually read Trotsky? The guy, like most Leninists basically treated him like the second coming of Christ. The main reason why ML's are cult adjacent is because they believe the word of Lenin to be true without any actual dialectical materialist analysis. And finally if all the "actually existing socialisms" are so different, which they are, then by definition it means that some of them are doing it wrong. Also not criticising them is literally liberal as fuck like when you don't respond to something stupid a person of colour said out of second hand guilt. You guys are doing the ML version of identity politics. Finally, did you ever stop to think that the material conditions of supposedly flawed and inferior western Marxists make it the only way to wage class struggle. That's basically the same argument MLs use for doing literally anything they want.

[@yellowsheeps]

Fantastic interview. Would love to see an intellectual boxing match between Dr. Gabriel Rockhill and that whining baby Jordan Peterson. I'm sure Peterson would be crying all the way home thinking about how dirty his room is.

[@avi2125]

Why "use" the protests to discuss various left factions?? There is hardly any insightful analysis of the protests; there really need not be, in fact, any tortured leftist analysis of legitimate resistance. These students will be able to articulate their cause better...

[@wokeisweak]

Ok let's start with this questions to these very articulate students. How do you propose to overthrow religio-fascist Hamas? What leftist Palestinian organizations or traditions do you positively support? The dominant position of pro-palestinian protestors is to limit their analysis to a critique of Israel, with no positive program to assert. The politics of negation is a very weak politic.

[@OrwellsHousecat]

Hmmm Dissident Right say the same thing, only not as razor sharp as this guy

[@ronmackinnon9374]

Far from razor sharp, those critics on the right typically take the CIA's actions at face value, seeing support for western or 'cultural' Marxism as evidence of actual CIA anti-capitalist sympathies (!), rather than as aimed in precisely the opposite direction (just as Rockhill outlines it), namely to *undermine* and *isolate* actual Marxism and material analysis and class consciousness.

[@ronmackinnon9374]

Seems my reply to this comment is only visible when comments are viewed with 'Newest' selected (where you'll have to scroll down further to find this one) rather than 'Top.' And the censor likewise seems determined to keep me from re-posting to try altering it to make it visible under 'Top' view as well. Will it even allow this explanatory reply to stay visible? We shall see.

[@stivelars8985]

Great talk, however i think the criticue of Zizek is somewhat thin and i cant realy get how Gabriel view the actual sovjet system as it was found in the eastern block and yogoslavia. Futher Ziek never hides that he thinks himself a right-marxist thinker.

[@vaska1999]

Yugoslavia was not a part of the Soviet world, having broken away from the Soviets in 1948. Zizek on Yugoslavia is pure fiction and calumny. The dictionary entry for opportunist should have his photo as illustration.

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

He's saying that Foucault and French critical theorists stood for a ruling class compatible form of Left like anarchism or libertarian socialism. No problem with the first part but wrt the second part-- No, Foucault stood for state leftism which is MORE compatible with ruling class and bourgeois state capitalism because it's not real left like anarchism. And no, anarchism and libertarian Marxism are not more compatible with state socialism /capitalism.

[@william6223]

Yes, This we see currently in the West. Bureaucratic collectives cause most wars, and maintain centralized control. Aka, totalitarianism.

[@boi9842]

You're petty bourgeois anti communist. Anarchism and libertarian Marxism does not exist in real life, nor make sense in theory.

[@kevintewey1157]

Liberal left destiny c n n real left: infrared, jackson hinkle, midwestern marx

[@StalinistSwiftie]

Absolutely not. Infrared, hinkle and midwestern marx are straight patsocs. A right wing maldevelopment even more pernicious than left anticommunism. They take leftist aesthetics to promote their wack reactionary ideologies.

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

He should not use communism and state socialism interchangeably because that means that while he's critical of state capitalism in the west , he's not critical of that in Bolshevism etc. Materialist dialectics opposes state partnership with private interests in both these forms State capitalism (modern welfare state) and state socialism (Bolshevism)

[@william6223]

I am an anarchosyndicalist. We are wary of all governmental structures. We use Ad Hoc committees which disband after the collectivist task is succeeded. For a few years, I contemplated Trotskyism as a path, but, now, I am wary of all collectives Amongst the projects I am working for, one is called Mutual Respect. This is another concept written in the 19th century, by the little prince, Peter Kropotkin. I think it is an adequate basis for human interactivity. Anyway, I am not on the take. I don't get government money. And I strive for fairness and reciprocity. Who is it whom harms most people? Governments or Individuals? Those whom seek nonproportional domination over the individual, the family and upon local populations are the creators of most Human suffering. It is not individualism/anarchism which is the problem. Imagine a Left/Center/Right/Independent coalition which seeks ending all collectivistic tyrannies and corruptions? Hopefully, someday...

[@rsavage-r2v]

He's quite familiar with ultra-"leftism" and how it serves the ruling class.

[@MarmaladeINFP]

​@@william6223 - "We [anarchosyndicalists] use Ad Hoc committees which disband after the collectivist task is succeeded." Interestingly, that is not unlike the Anti-Federalist view among some American revolutionaries and founders. Because of the East India Company, they were highly suspect of corporations. Corporations had become quasi-govenrments back then, with even many colonial governments having begun as trade corporations. There was a common view at the time that self-governenance should only allow corporate charters to be given to temporary organizations that serve public interest, such as building a bridge or operating a hospital. Such corporate charters should only last about 20 years at most, what was considered a 'generation', so as to not enforce anything on future generations (i.e., the dead hand of ancestors). This was a distinction between free markets and corporatism. It was thought that corporate charters should never be applied to private ventures and for-profit businesses. That is because a corporate charter is a way of givimng extra privileges and rights to organized actiivty that serves the public good. That is the original purpose of corporations before it became conflated with capitalism.

[@MarmaladeINFP]

How can "state communism" even exist? That is an oxymoron, almost by definition. Compare Soviet Stalinism and Chinese Maoism to Nazi fascism, Russian oligarchy, Saudi theocracy, and American neoliberalism (the latter being either soft fascism, where big gov controls big biz, or inverted totalitarianism, where big biz owns big gov). In all six cases, a ruling elite of some variety owns, monopolizes, directs, or otherwise controls the capital (fungible wealth), land, property, industry, trade networks and policy, banks, investment funding, monetary system, overall economics, and the legal-police-military complex that maintains it all. Aren't these all variants on state capitalism or something akin to it where the ownership caste, hereditary plutocracy, kleptocratic oligarchs, entrenched monied elite, deep state bureaucrats, corporate operatives, and/or organized lobbyists seek to manipulate and determine economic outcomes in their own favor? Isn't central to all of these a modern, industrial system based on capital as fungible wealth that is controlled by those of the same class (i.e., capitalists)? There can be no communism where a capitalist-controlling elite oppresses a disenfranchized, permanent underclass that's only valued for the exploitation of their labor, as is or was the case in six examples.

[@rsavage-r2v]

@@MarmaladeINFP "Communism" can refer either to a post-scarcity society where class oppression is impossible, or it can refer to the revolutionary scientific socialist movement led by the working class as distinguished from other nominally left movements that are not revolutionary and are dominated by the middle class (Social Democracy, Anarchism, Ultra "Left"-Communism, etc) . Paul Cockshott has a video on this exact topic, titled "Defining Terms" if you're interested. The USSR and the PRC had/have been ruled by a dictatorship of a workers' party (the level of worker participation in which has been highly variable and debatable but they are nonetheless still "socialist" in the marxist sense for this reason). I would argue that the modern Russian Federation fits the term "State Capitalist". The means of production are owned by a state with a bourgeois form (ie elections are bought by corporations, everything we're accustomed to).

[@pgohearn]

KZbin algorithms pushing this Rockhill character so you know you are being fed points to water down the elements.

[@kevintewey1157]

I think you said nothing

[@liamf2300]

the video literally has 20k views. the algorithm is obviously not giving it much help.

[@happygucci5094]

Gabriel Rockhill… I think I’m in love 🥰 I will be looking into this man’s work. Wow. 35:15 the interviewer is QUALITY!!!!! 🫡✊🏽🔥 I really want to hear how the Black radical philosophical/political theorists and how they read this moment or how to read them against history, the Frankfurt School and the intellectual industrial complex… Amazing.

[@Edward-my9nk]

i don’t see how this dude is “rockstar!” where’s his critique on scamdemic?!

[@LadyRavenhaire]

I've responded twice to your comment, but each time my response has been removed. The fact my comments are removed repeatedly shows, Rockhill must also be controlled opposition, because why would someone promoting Marxist Dialectics be censoring someone's comment on the Pandemic Preparedness Treaty? Very disappointing!

[@LadyRavenhaire]

Please check my KZbin description for contact info. I'm being censored and can't answer you.

[@kevintewey1157]

Pay attention to the critique on control under neofeudal capitalism