You know what would've been a lot worse than a vile McCarthyite smear against an important antiwar journalist igniting an ugly war in online left media circles? A vile McCarthyite smear against an important antiwar journalist being tolerated by online left media circles.
"This feud is destroying the left!"
Okay first of all no it isn't, that's stupid. Secondly even if it was, no "left" that would tolerate the use of disgusting McCarthyite smear tactics to marginalize important anti-imperialist journalists would be worth saving.
Okay first of all no it isn't, that's stupid. Secondly even if it was, no "left" that would tolerate the use of disgusting McCarthyite smear tactics to marginalize important anti-imperialist journalists would be worth saving.
I mean imagine a different timeline where TYT said @aaronjmate is paid by the Russian government and working for dictators, and NOTHING happened? Imagine if that had caused no controversy at all and everyone had just let that slide on through? How much worse would that have been?
Imagine if people in online US media circles had just gone "Yep, yeah, that's just how we behave now", and it became normal and acceptable for unprincipled progressive media outlets to target Maté and other anti-imperialist voices with that smear? Would you have preferred that?
Now imagine another timeline where instead of this becoming a contentious issue where those on one side try to blackmail the other into silence and half of lefty media takes the side of the blackmailing McCarthyites, everyone had just condemned the smearers from the start?
How much better would that have been?
So we're not in the best-case scenario where everyone just says "Yeah nah, GTFO" when McCarthyite smear tactics are deployed, but we're also not in the worst-case scenario where they have widespread acceptance n the left either. That's good.
So we're not in the best-case scenario where everyone just says "Yeah nah, GTFO" when McCarthyite smear tactics are deployed, but we're also not in the worst-case scenario where they have widespread acceptance n the left either. That's good.
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