We talk to former Green Party nominee for Vice President of the United States Ajamu Baraka about Palestine, imperialism, and the Western psychopathology of White Supremacy.
Ajamu Baraka is one of the most incredible political minds of our time and he has been operating at this level of clarity and incisiveness for a long time. He's been a vice presidential candidate for the Green Party and it says a lot about the US that a social activist and politician of his quality cannot get in power, and instead the country is run by the most amoral and corrupted.
I recommend that people go through the archives of the BlackAgendaReport website, for much more of Ajamu Baraka's writing, for example the way that he and the late Glen Ford was another great mind like this, dissected Obama's con game, long before others understood he was a con man.
As for white supremacy re-emerging, I have been saying this a long time. People in our time are too distracted by the sideshow of each moment and typically failing to under stand historical context and connect the dots. That has to change - fast - if we are to be able to resist the reemergence of naked white supremacy, which BTW lies at the core of modern capitalism. If you oppose what capitalism is doing, you had better understand what its founded on: dehumanising people and consuming their bodies and their labour.
I heard one of you talk about R2P for Russia, and was sad to hear that you didn't have more of the back story. For example the CIA backed coup in 2014 in Ukraine that overthrew their democratically elected government, the broken Minsk agreements, Zelensky campaigning on a platform of peace, etc.
When Peter asked Ajamu how do we educate the large number of apolitical, apathetic Americans, to inform them about choices, I thought that Ajamu’s response was slightly shamanic, absolutely brilliant:
“…Ideals are not fixed; consciousness is a legitimate terrain of struggle…when taking this position you are more able to effectively engage people…engagement is really important, ‘cause we’re not going to necessarily teach people…”
My long involvement in commercial media has steered me toward an understanding, a belief that cognitive brain work is not the route to informing people who aren’t actively inquiring. The student is the outlier. Most people in a highly indoctrinated, propagandized society, where most people think they know what is true, acquire most of their views unconsciously.
I would wager that the chilling news with pics that was all over social media, that the Iranians, while anticipating a negotiation with the Americans, were overtaken by the Israelis in a sneak attack that was coordinated with the U.S. President, in which their highest military officials and nuclear scientists were assassinated, I would expect that that brief experience for a vast number of Americans, did more for the anti-Zionist movement, than what 18 hours of lectures would achieve.
Baraka’s views of racism are provocative. I would never challenge a black American intellectual on racism, but I think that the evidence is compelling that white states led the world in weapons fabrication and manufacture, and this quickly became self justifying. Nothing about it was innocent or benign, but I think that the deviousness of ethnosupremacy is a pseudo-intellectual or anti intellectual argument that attempts to explain or justify unjust, criminal policies and actions. People are skilled at tuning out, and not viewing many random news items with any empathy. That is pragmatism in many cases. I certainly believe that any progressive movement has to prioritize racial equality and diversity overall, because that is the only way to threaten entrenched, illegitimate power.
Conversely, I think the Israeli goal of Palestinian extermination is an amalgam of shared religious, self-serving myths that is taking the nation toward a predicted apocalypse.
Ajamu Baraka is one of the most incredible political minds of our time and he has been operating at this level of clarity and incisiveness for a long time. He's been a vice presidential candidate for the Green Party and it says a lot about the US that a social activist and politician of his quality cannot get in power, and instead the country is run by the most amoral and corrupted.
I recommend that people go through the archives of the BlackAgendaReport website, for much more of Ajamu Baraka's writing, for example the way that he and the late Glen Ford was another great mind like this, dissected Obama's con game, long before others understood he was a con man.
As for white supremacy re-emerging, I have been saying this a long time. People in our time are too distracted by the sideshow of each moment and typically failing to under stand historical context and connect the dots. That has to change - fast - if we are to be able to resist the reemergence of naked white supremacy, which BTW lies at the core of modern capitalism. If you oppose what capitalism is doing, you had better understand what its founded on: dehumanising people and consuming their bodies and their labour.
Yup, we’ve been following them for many years.
I heard one of you talk about R2P for Russia, and was sad to hear that you didn't have more of the back story. For example the CIA backed coup in 2014 in Ukraine that overthrew their democratically elected government, the broken Minsk agreements, Zelensky campaigning on a platform of peace, etc.
When Peter asked Ajamu how do we educate the large number of apolitical, apathetic Americans, to inform them about choices, I thought that Ajamu’s response was slightly shamanic, absolutely brilliant:
“…Ideals are not fixed; consciousness is a legitimate terrain of struggle…when taking this position you are more able to effectively engage people…engagement is really important, ‘cause we’re not going to necessarily teach people…”
My long involvement in commercial media has steered me toward an understanding, a belief that cognitive brain work is not the route to informing people who aren’t actively inquiring. The student is the outlier. Most people in a highly indoctrinated, propagandized society, where most people think they know what is true, acquire most of their views unconsciously.
I would wager that the chilling news with pics that was all over social media, that the Iranians, while anticipating a negotiation with the Americans, were overtaken by the Israelis in a sneak attack that was coordinated with the U.S. President, in which their highest military officials and nuclear scientists were assassinated, I would expect that that brief experience for a vast number of Americans, did more for the anti-Zionist movement, than what 18 hours of lectures would achieve.
Baraka’s views of racism are provocative. I would never challenge a black American intellectual on racism, but I think that the evidence is compelling that white states led the world in weapons fabrication and manufacture, and this quickly became self justifying. Nothing about it was innocent or benign, but I think that the deviousness of ethnosupremacy is a pseudo-intellectual or anti intellectual argument that attempts to explain or justify unjust, criminal policies and actions. People are skilled at tuning out, and not viewing many random news items with any empathy. That is pragmatism in many cases. I certainly believe that any progressive movement has to prioritize racial equality and diversity overall, because that is the only way to threaten entrenched, illegitimate power.
Conversely, I think the Israeli goal of Palestinian extermination is an amalgam of shared religious, self-serving myths that is taking the nation toward a predicted apocalypse.
Corporate TotalitarianFascist WEALTH $$upremacy