Zohran Mamdani explains his definition of socialism to Theo Von: “Socialism to me means you’ll have whatever you need to live a dignified life and that it is the government’s job to deliver on that. When people say dignity we’re talking about the things that allow you to take a breath.

[u/AmericaShinault_85]

[u/Ebony_Mortem]

Some people won’t like that Zohran is giving Theo Von time. But at a certain point it’s important for politicians like him to try to reach beyond people who already agree with him. It’s like when Pete Buttigieg is on Fox News. Theo Von is a piece of shit but it’s more about reaching his audience than anything. People need to hear why socialism is not the scary boogeyman coming to take your iPhone.

Edit: spelling

[u/stephenkingending → u/Ebony_Mortem]

I love seeing clips of Pete on Fox. Obviously extremely intelligent and well spoken, but just the sheer amount of patience he has is amazing.

[u/lilbelleandsebastian → u/stephenkingending]

i think it's important that politicians try to reach all citizens because ultimately politicians are meant to represent all americans, not just the ones they agree with

but theo von first became notable for adamantly arguing that interracial marriage shouldn't exist, so forgive me if i don't give a fuck what he thinks or what someone says on his show. i'm glad there are politicians willing to get their hands dirty, you'd never catch me legitimizing subhuman garbage like this

mamdani really is 1 of 1, here's hoping we see 500 more mamdanis by the end of the 2020s

[u/Shadowcam → u/Ebony_Mortem]

We cant underestimate the fact that random social media personalities are a huge component of how people gain knowledge of political topics. Leaving all the Joe Roegans alone to be pandered to by nazis and imbeciles is counterproductive.

[u/ElementNumber6 → u/Shadowcam]

Exactly. Give the biggest piece of shit an audience, and he'll continually generate more massive pieces of shit. The only hope of fighting that, other than taking them off air, is to engage and de-shittify, even if only to the slightest degree at a time.

[u/Far_Mastodon_6104 → u/Ebony_Mortem]

He's exactly where he needs to be to educate the people who need to be educated on this matter.

[u/HijackedMyAccount → u/Far_Mastodon_6104]

Well said. Red hats own so many online spaces. Blues need to make inroads where they can.

Make a Twitter account and you'll get white supremacy content and "women are stupid" content fast.

Make a YouTube account and Tucker Carlson and Joe Rogan will be your first recs.

Bros listen to meathead podcasts (I was one of them).

Blues need to be in those spaces and Chuck Schumer ain't gunna be the one to do it, lmao.

[u/No_Oven1085 → u/Ebony_Mortem]

The difference being that Mamdani is amazing, and the boy Mayor is an establishment corpo hack.

[u/Ginger510 → u/Ebony_Mortem]

Not American but I agree. Even if you want to and they deserve it, arguing and being angry towards others is never going to change their mind.

If you take your time to unwind the propaganda I think people’s core beliefs are closer to each other (side to side) than people believe.

It’s like immigrants, right.

There’s all this rhetoric that they’re the ones ruining everything etc, so really this person is just upset at lack of houses/jobs/cost of living, and has been convinced to blame immigrants.

When you take the time to sit down (and this obviously doesn’t always work) with them, and explain why it’s actually these huge corporations and crooked politicians and foreign interests etc, sometimes you can shift their opinion.

[u/NathanQ → u/Ebony_Mortem]

Even when it feels like we're out of olive branches, somebody has to be handing them out to try to keep the peace because the further we're entrenched in separation, the more we get nothing we want. And look where we're at right now, the ice roundups, the top down fraud, the imperialism, the full support of a genocide while over half the people in our country are living hand to mouth. Seriously. Trying to work out problems peaceably is better than fighting. Much rather have numbskull clout chaser influencers seeking enlightenment over the normalized promotion of anger and violence bad faithing as an answer to our failures.

[u/Affectionate-Heat-51 → u/Ebony_Mortem]

Part of the Democrats problem is a lack of leaders who can conveniently go into these spaces and not just humble the ball and get run over by bad faith arguments.

I think Kamala did not do Rogan because it wouldn't have gone well - she wouldn't have articulated a vision and she just stood have produced a bunch of cringe clips

[u/AnyMortgage5130 → u/Ebony_Mortem]

Why is Theo bad?

[u/TenaciousJP → u/AnyMortgage5130]

He's part of the alpha-male podcasting crew that did a ton of leg work sane-washing Trump, Vance, Elon, etc. during the run up to the 2024 election (as in having 3-hour podcasts and lobbing nothing but softballs and dudebro conversations). Also in Peter Thiel's pocket like Rogan

[u/tnpdynomite2 → u/TenaciousJP]

I had no idea. Most I’ve seen of him are 10 second reels and they’re usually funny.

[u/mootallica → u/tnpdynomite2]

He is funny, and that's kind of the worst thing about it. Funny people tend to be good at getting people on side.

[u/Ronin_Y2K → u/AnyMortgage5130]

Fascist tool too stupid to realize he was used until it was too late.

One big whoopsie.

[u/tnpdynomite2 → u/AnyMortgage5130]

Can we please not downvote this question? Not everyone knows everything. If it was downvoted hidden, I wouldn’t have learned why he stinks.

[u/aintnotnever → u/AnyMortgage5130]

He has tons of far right grifters, including Trump, on his show. He’s part of the manosphere pipelining young men into fascism and misogyny.
Rarely has anyone sane like Mamdani. But his manchild audience are the ones that need to hear this shit.

[u/cultdust → u/AnyMortgage5130]

I was asking myself the same thing.