So, David Pakman is having a bit of a spat with Hasan Piker. Pakman criticized Piker for dressing up like Mao, Hasan's fan base is pissed and is brigading Pakman's social media, and the whole thing is a crapfest. Ya know, real battle of cringe type stuff, one faction too moderate as I see it, and the other too extreme.
With that said, Pakman released a video explaining why he's not a socialist, and defended social democracy. And I'm gonna be honest, I agree with 90% of the video, with the other 10% being the weird UBI related wrinkles in my worldview that make it unique. However, I also don't really feel like Pakman is a political ally of mine a lot of the time. If anything, I actually do end up siding with DSA, and it's probably good to explain why.
As I see it, the modern civil war within the democratic party is actually between establishment and anti establishment. Or establishment vs populist. Either way, it's between a faction that dominates the democratic party that is for some iteration of the status quo, and progressives who want to change things to make them better. I said my peace on what this change should look like. It's not socialism, it's actually closer to Pakman's stated beliefs in social democracy.
However, here's the important thing here. Actions speak louder than words. Pakman is relatively establishment. He wasn't a Bernie bro in 2016. He seemed to be supporting Hillary and telling everyone to vote blue no matter who. He did the same thing with Biden in 2020 and 2024. Heck, he actually got to meet Biden. And it's suspected he's been part of a program to push establishment talking points. He's in with the establishment. And the establishment is markedly not social democrat. The establishment is an entirely different ideology that we call "third way."
Social democracy, New Deal Liberalism, etc, was a compromise between capitalism and socialism. It was the idea that we'd keep capitalism, but heavily reform it to improve things. It's been an effective ideology at solving problems. It aint perfect, as I've pointed out, but even my own ideology is just basically that....with UBI and a more libertarian bend. The point is, we reform capitalism. This was the ideology that dominated from around the 1930s in the US, or post 1945 in Europe, until around the 1980s when we shifted toward neoliberalism with the Reagan consensus. This caused the democrats to moderate and "triangulate" to the center, forming a new ideology that is called by some as "third way", or "neoliberalism" (although that refers to something else), with the democrats being called "New Democrats." If New Deal liberalism and social democracy are a compromise between capitalism and socialism, third way politics are a compromise between social democracy/ND liberalism and the right.
And when I look at David Pakman, I don't see a social democrat, I see a third wayer. Again, actions speak louder than words. Whatever Bernie called himself with "democratic socialism", his priorities running for office were explicitly social democratic. It was Bernie Sanders who ran on medicare for all, free college, public housing, a green new deal, etc. Bernie did that. The best he offered on the literal socialism from was worker coops. otherwise he was just running on New Deal Liberal or social democratic policy. And that happens. Demsocs, despite their rhetoric and ideological belief in socialism, end up having many of the same policies as social democrats, with the ideology in practice being indistinguishable in policy from literal leftists.
Now, that's not to say there arent differences, and Bernie's movement has radicalized since then. And a lot of his supporters ARE socialists, and this DOES lead to cringe takes on social issues (like defund the policy, open borders, etc.), and foreign policy issues (basically implode the American empire), and even economics (go too far into seize the means of production territory at times), and I've had spats with them, which is why I've written articles that show disdain toward them in the past.
BUT....and this is important, the DSA types do more to advance social democratic causes in practice than most self described social democrats. If anything, a lot of explicit social democrats in America seem to actually seem to side more with that third way establishment side of the spectrum. Which punches left, and attacks progressives for advocating for progressive things, and scolds people for not being "vote blue no matter who", or thinking that the democrats and republicans are closer to each other than the left (which they are, the third way seems more interested in preserving the ideological consensus of the 6th party system than actually advancing progressive priorities). And yeah. Even on those social democratic priorities they purport to have, it seems like they're always making excuses for not actually implementing of them, hand wringing over electability, or hiding behind the same weasel words of "pragmatism", "incrementalism", etc.
The thing is, these types love to CALL themselves social democrats, but how often do they actually fight for social democratic priorities? And that's the rub, they don't. And that's why I don't like the Pakman crowd much. Seriously, I interact with his audience and they're all a bunch of insufferable third wayers who buy into the establishment's BS, and Pakman actively seems to reinforce that ecosystem. He isn't advancing those priorities. And that's why I dont trust him.
I mean, say what you want about DSA, but read a DSA candidate's platform and most of it is just....social democracy in practice. Even whackjobs like DAC still mostly advocate for stuff I agree with like a UBI, medicare for all, free college, etc. That's not to say they don't advocate for some massive cringe and that they do go too far into the literal socialism aspects of things at times, we can disagree with specific proposals, but if people wonder what has gripped the left to support these guys, I'll be blunt: they're the only ones standing up and doing the work. The establishment of the democratic party can claim to support these ideas in theory all they want, but any time we talk about implementing them, they always make excuses why we can't. It's like they exist to stab us in the back. Pretend to care, but then chew us down. And when we can't get a faction that actually addresses these solutions within liberalism, because the party establishment and its donor class is fundamentally against them, and the DSA are the only ones actually putting in the work to move heaven and earth to get these priorities done, guess what? people are gonna support the DSA. And that's why they support the DSA.
Ironically, I keep hearing Pakman's audience point this out and say we need a capitalist alternative to it. But that's the thing, they've had ten years to actually do this. And they just sat there making excuses for why they can't like a South Park cable guy. It's actually pretty pathetic.
Anyway, that's why, IMO, David Pakman gets so much crap from the online left. He can call himself a socdem all he wants, but when he cheerleads a party establishment that does the bare minimum to advance social democratic priorities and often falls flat on its face even doing that, yeah, people are gonna support DSA. Because our capitalist system as it exists is unlivable for younger people. It hasnt been working since AT LEAST the 2008 recession, we far as Im concerned, many of us never recovered from that, or never got off the ground, and a lot of us know the system is rigged and just want a better shake. And when the establishment doesn't do that, and the DSA is basically advocating for socdem priorities in practice, well...do I need to say it again?
Yeah. If the democrats seriously view the DSA as a legit illiberal threat to the country, they better get off their butts and offer a new New Deal like I've been calling on them to do since 2016. But Im not even sure they're doing that. Like the right, I suspect many of them are just trying to create a red scare to make them sound more communistic than they are, while pointing out the most extreme behavior to make their case. It really is hard to say.
Either way, my stance on actual socialism should be apparent, I'm not a fan. Worker coops sound nice in theory, but I'm not even hardcore on that. I mostly just want socdem priorities and UBI. And while I support DSA candidates a lot of the time, I don't actually support democratic socialism, but rather, a version of the social democracy Pakman claims to support. I just don't see him as actually doing that in practice.
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