The Lunar New Years Special: Part 2

of our conversation with Jane and Jane you know. The other thing I wanted to script touch on like this is I think kind of defferenting off the topic, but I think it is also something that I've been running into a lot, which is that like, you know, you have this kind of like you know, you have this kind of bind right because on the one hand, you're stuck between you know, like a lot a lot of the organizing and sort of in Asian communities has all

of these problems, and then you know, okay, well, you know the other thing that's happening is is the sort of mainstream American left and the mainstream American left, I think the Canadian left has problem similar problems with this is that like it's a bunch of just like it's a bunch of tankies, it's a bunch of people who love the CCP. It's a bunch of just we are genocide deniers and like people who think that every Asian person who like doesn't like the government is a cia

psi op And I don't know. This is something that I've like, I mean, I've I ran into a lot trying to, i mean, help people do in Kong Kong. Organizing is something I've run into just in like every organize, like I've I've run I run into this an anarchist

spaces to like it's it's just I don't know. It feels really bad because it's like like you're you're just sort of caught between and I guess it's is sort of there's this three way triangulation, right because on the one hand, you have this sort of like you have the local dynamics with you know, the sort of the

sentence of the sort of reactionary small business owners. You have this, you know, the Chinese community also being sort of split in between like pro and anti CCP factions, both of whom have like are absolutely chock full of natical right wingers. It's like, well, okay, it's like the CCP vers Epoch times and it's like I don't want any of them to win and then use them out. And you're caught in the middle of this sort of they're caught in the middle of the sort of I

don't know. I think it's sort of like a fox geopolitical struggle, but like one of one of the big sort of ideological conflicts being between both the CCP in the US sort of like using the specter of each

other to sort of like disturb their basis. And I don't know, I am incredibly frustrated by I'm incredibly frustrated by the way that these groups have expected like the ant CCP, like the pro CCP groups are sort of selectively been using and like selectively been using anti ation violence, as you know, they basically making the arguments of the importance of anti ation violence is that while this only happens because people say many things about the CCP, and

if no one didn't like the CCP, then there wouldn't be any violence, even though like anti Asian violence here predates the existence of a communist party in China by centuries, like we we like the we we invaded, we invaded China, like how many times, at least twice, maybe three I think at least twice and maybe three times, like before there was a communist party. And so I don't know, I I feel trapped a lot between these dynamics in ways that are very frustrating. And yeah, I just want

to open the floor to talk about that. I guess I see it as like co optation partly, UM, but I guess I also see it as how power works. Like I there's like this local paper and I was researching sort of the history of Chinese diaspora organizing locally, and there was a spat in the paper between two people who one of whom is from UM, a newer Hong Kong diaspora. There was like a whole spat um

in the paper about his history. And there's the history of like those tensions are like written in the community itself, like it's it's it's not a new thing that people argue about what happened on June four. It's not new that people are really mistrustful each other and that there are actual like government forces that infiltrate and create a like basically deny other people's struggles like UM, when the

that government is themselves perpetuating it. And I guess it just is really hard when fellow organizers that you otherwise really like I want to get along with, are are like uncritical of the state that has oppressed your family because you're just kind of like you're kind of like, wait, so are we have we had a conversation about this, Like we clearly haven't talked eno if this is what you believe in, And it's just a little bit hard

because it's like community building is not assuming that we're in solidarity. Community building is actually like doing that hard work like what is your community experiencing and what is my community experiencing? How are we being like weaponized against each other? Like yeah, how are these governments like manipulating

like communities? But that's like really hard when trust has been and probably broken, Like me, yeah, I think you're so right that it's it's really about co optation and a lot of it, like what I've witnessed is really so much about UM And this is like, like you're saying, Jane, this is a much older dynamic than you know just

the past couple of years. Is like, uh, states being able to use this kind of home and asper of framework to UM demand loyalty through like targeting desper people's guilt UM and so there's so many like guilty desper people I know who are like you know, usually from usually from a class perspective, right, because they had the their family had the resources to leave or uh they were not born in the home country or whatever because of their family background, that type of thing, and they

want to subsume that by taking this radical you know, anti U s anti Canada stance, um, which is fine, Like obviously being anti US and anti Canada is a good thing. But um, the thing that's really kind of frustrated me the most is seeing these kind of like radical folks in North America, especially queer folks who are like they'll take the most reactionary positions against women and queer and you know LGBT folks in China, for example,

by supporting a state that is repressing them. Right. So it's it's such cognitive dissonance to me, Like, I don't understand why these folks can't see, um that they're kind of perpetuating this violence in the service of this kind of overarching imperative of not ever seeing anything bad about China because it will help, it'll it'll bolster the US propaganda war machine, which is like, there's absolutely a way that I mean that absolutely happens if you do that,

uh un carefully right if you just kind of repeat um US media narratives and stuff like that. But I think there's absolutely a way to do both right and UM. To me, the way to do that is to not um support the state discourses that demand loyalty from the dask bro but to actually, you know, it's the grassroots thing, right. It's just kind of like we support career folks around the world who are struggling under oppression from their governments

and that type of thing. UM. And being able to very carefully say that with nuance UM and to be against both at the same time, for example, UM, well that's really really difficult, right, UM. And people have very kind of vitriolic reactions when you try and do that. Um. As you know, she set up talk Chris, So, I don't know this. This is still the contrum for me because I tend to take the more rigid stance against

against these folks. But I know people who are very kind of they take a more compassionate stance, which is like these these are newly plus politicized youth. Um, they're just coming to a lot of these politics and positions. UM. And you know, being anti US is better than not being anti us. Is it's what a lot of folks say, and you know, I agree to a certain extent, But then it's also like if they're being miseducated in these histories, Um, that's okay to a certain point when you're exploring and

discovering these things and becoming radicalized. But you know, like Jane said, there's also these kind of material, direct impacts that you have on people that you work with, that you organize with, that that are your friends or loved ones, um that you know, that kind of explanation of like, oh, they're just learning is like it's insufficient in that kind of individual way because you're still hurting people and threatening people around you, right, So I think there has to

be a balance and like being able to steer folks in into these like non Stalinist, non statist directions even while they're discovering. I hate how we're even having to be like steering people into a non sell yeah perspective. I'm just like I'm not a horny for stalin I like the thing that pisces me off about this it's

just like like they're not even Stalinist. Like this is the thing that's frustrating, Like if if if if they were merely twentieth century Stalinist, we wouldn't be having this argument because you know, twenty century Stalinism is like well, yeah, okay, like twenty century Stalinist or anti market economy, and it's like no, they've they've somehow found a way to take literally the worst aspects of Stalinism and then be like, okay,

but what if what if? What if Stalinism but also capitalism good at the same time, And it's just like

how how did you do this? Like how how did you come up with an ideology that like I don't know, I mean, I think, I think Also I think that's been frustrating to me about this is like it's a way of sort of of of it becomes this way of channeling you know, you have the deasperate guilt in the one hand, that you have just random sort of like white leftists sort of white guilt, and it becomes this way of like channeling that into this sort of follow anti racism where you know, you get you get

people who are like actual professional like hacks, right like Roger Day for example, being like, uh, you know, to doing things like wow, if you if you if you could if you criticize this time you stay it all that sinophobia and like you're directly leading to people getting killed,

and it's like, no, that's not how this works. And there's this kind of it's it's it's it's this problem of they have this this fundamental inability to see Chinese people as people and not a sort of undifferentiated mass

that can be sort of rallied behind in ideology. And I don't know that's been I think weird to deal with because you know, like yeah, like you you're always just in in Chinese communities, like you're always you're just you're just gonna have like you know that there's gonna be a few people who are just sort of like pro CCP right wingers, right, that's just that's just a

sort of defailed political position. But there's there's this way in which you get this, you know, people adopting I mean just things that like if you said this about any like white American for example, if you if you argued that any like a white American making a thousand dollars a year wasn't in poverty, but like you just couldn't do it, you like, you know, it's it's it's literally impossible, like you you'd be laughing out of the room or you know, like you're you would you would

you would be like ratioed until the cows come home. But you can just but everyone and people just say this constantly, like this is just just a thing that was like, well, if you look at poverty productions, like well Chinese, China's eliminated absolute poverty, it's like, yeah, okay, they a thousand dollars a year is outside of this now.

And I think there's these ways in which it becomes hard to to intervene in this stuff because like every every Asian person, specifically the Chinese person just becomes a sort of token that like you know, you just sort of like throw at each other as just like oh, well yeah, here's the Chinese person who says that the

CCP is good. It's like, well, here's another Chinese person who says that it's bad, and it's like you never It's like on both sides, whether whether the process people realize it or not, it's their agencies being sort of stripped by them and they've they've been turned into this sort of instrumentalized like you know, in the in the same thing that they're also doing to us, is that they're turning into sort of these instruments that you can use to like back your own sort of brought in

political agenda. And this I don't know, like this has gotten me to just I I just don't work with these people anymore. Like we tried it, it was a disaster. They screwed us over And so I don't know. But but but I think that's that's a that's a lonely stance in a lot of ways. Like you know, if if you take this kind of like hardline position, you're not gonna most people, even other people who don't support it,

probably won't follow you there. I don't know, it's weird because I find a lot of organizing is really lonely. It's like it's not like like I want to boast around being like why aren't you all donatings? But that's not that's also guilt, right, that's like projecting guilt onto

other people, um, and that's not an effective tool. And I think that like like so right, and addressing both the white guilt but also the diaspora guilt, and also just how frustrating it is to organize against the state when it's like two people, like three people doing it in a little group project for lack of a better word. But it's sort of like, how do we make this sustainable when it's so lonely? And how do we use the resources that are available to us? Two not replicate

these systems yet again? And I guess when it comes to the left or progressive in Canada, it's like so frustrating because it's like there isn't actually a lot of community outreach to like racialized communities. There's no translation. There's a lot of like nonprofit work that is frankly very draining and co optive themselves. Um Like it's it's a bunch of social service organizations in a trench code and a bunch of political organizations that don't work together or

talk to each other in a trench code. And um so I understand why youth would join like leftist like radical organizing, but it it's just really heartbreaking when it's you're they end up reading in reading groups where they're reading historical or so called historical texts that erase your histories. Like it's just such a like like reading is great, like political education is incredible. Um but I'm like it's

hard not to grow resentful. So when the guy at the top is a university educated white dude and they're reading texts that literally erase your entire family, and it's, um that like yeah, for me, it's like just really personal that way. It's like there are people who are suffering in the present and you're reading a text by a white sociologist from the eighties, like like not like I'm like, it's not that like I don't think that

we should do that political education. It's just that like at a reading group, will you listen to me when I call you out? Yeah, I definitely you know, both of you saying that this work is really lonely, especially if you take if you stand up for yourself, for you you really kind of stand by your principles. It's

I think that's so true. And um, you know, not to speak for everyone in laws on, but just my experience has been like you know, everyone just everyone hates us, like it's you know, we got hate from the right, we got hate from the left, um and from Hong Kong's asp or from Hong Kong locals, like it's it's just sometimes it's really hard to see you know, because we're we're trying to stay true to our principles, but it's hard to see sometimes whether there's an impact or

whether we're just kind of like in a little echo chamber with twenty other people, you know what I mean. And um, it's hard to find that balance because I don't want to become more and more pragmatists where I'm just like, all right, well, you know, I'll work with these people, but I don't agree with them on these fundamental issues, just on this one campaign or whatever happens

to be. I don't know. I know that's a part of like building power quote unquote like that a lot of uh, certain socialist groups like to do or they're

they're really focused on that kind of thing. But I don't know if it's too much of an academic few too to be like, if you're gonna do it that way, you're you're you're changing the outcome already, right because you're not addressing these kind of fundamental issues from the start um And I think that view can sometimes lead to like a lot of non starters where you're just like things don't ever get off the ground because you insist on whatever fundamental principle that you that you want to

stick to, uh like anti nationalism for example. So yeah, just just kind of reiterating and commiserating with you all on the long laitness of that people think that like not working in these sort of unitfferent things is this

like sort of purity logical position. But like you know, I mean so when when Occupy Ice was happening, right, Occupy Ice wound up being a kind of big friend thing, and one of the groups involved with it was was the Party for Socialism Liberation, who are this sort of like very much sort of like they're basically tanking cult like they've There's not a lot of other horrible stuff that will talk about at some point, but I mean, one of the things that happens, you know, Occupy Ice

is that they you know, in Philadelphia, they destroy the encampment, like they convince enough people to just leave and do this completely pointless like march they can do a photo op of like people in front of the Mayor's office and they do it, and they camp collapses because suddenly there's not enough people. You know, they don't even get a majority of the people, but it doesn't matter because they pulled enough people out that you know, that the

camp couldn't be held against the cops anymore. And I think that in some senses this is kind of microcosm of what they what these people actually do, which is that you know that these people will never have any actual institutional power, right, you know, they're they're never going to create their like salentist state or whatever, like they're never going to get this. They're they're never gonna hold

any power. What they can do is there are enough of them, they can they can siphon off enough people from actual leftist movements into this sort of just like white room pro capitalist stuff that they can they can cause peoples to collapse. And I mean they've done this. They did a lot of this stream the uprising, and there is a lot of them, you know, intentionally leading people on pointless marches. There's a lot of cop writing

with the police and stuff like that. And I think that you know, it's it's it's like having seen that like multiple times, right I I you know, I you know, for me, like not working with him is an incredibly pragmatic position because we tried it and they blew it up. But it's this problem especially you know, you have people who are radicalized in and it's like, well, yeah, I mean, I don't know, like a lot of them never saw

this stuff, right, don't know who these people are. And their first instruction to the left is just like incredibly well financed like media blitz, and I think that has you know, I think that as consequences both for us as sort of like people on the left doing like Chinese people on the left doing our own desk, but organizing, and it has consequences for the broader left, and like you you can see other sort of versions of this right where you know, you have a sort of right

wing we've been infiltrating left to spaces and destroying them like they're they're like there were there was a thing de cream Resistance basically blew up a like an anti lithium protest in the US by just like going there

and just hammering transphobia constantly. And so I don't know, I think there's there's this sort of dilemma because fundament like they will say a lot of the same things we do, but we have fundamentally different goals, and that manifests itself at you know, on the level of of of organizing individual campaigns, but it's something that's really hard to get people to see. I think we've lost a

lot of movements because of it. Yeah, not to be you know, not to pile on the cynicism or anything, but I think, I honestly do think, uh, you know, as all this new Cold War stuff ramps up, which is like completely independent of what a lot of folks, like grassroots folks are even thinking or advocating, it's all just kind of up to the the two uh you know, Chinese and US governments as they ramp up their own tensions.

I think it's really going to start, like people are going to start these people who are um, you know, tankys or whatever, are going to start narrowing our choices further and further right, like, you know, as soon it's going to be an athema to to not you know, take the anti US position and that's it, you know what I mean. And I think that's really scary to me. I don't I last year, I thought there was still

room for intervention, but things are closing so quickly. And you know, my personal opinion is that a lot of these kind of bigger groups like No Cold War UM and others like Code pink are are definitely being you know that they have much more funding than a lot of other groups who are boarding more nuanced positions, and so like you're saying, it's just like these media blitz is that these shiny events and all those different things are very appealing to newly ic radicalized folks, right because

they think that this, this is where the power is and this is where we can actually make a difference. Um and yeah, things to me, things look pretty bleak in the near future. I mean it just takes one Yeah, yeah,

I will see. I think I think they made one major city mistake, which is they tried to do the new the push the giant like new cold war war China thing at the exact moment of the US and Russia we're like heating up in actually, and this left them like kind of off balance because they've been for

the last two years. The whole thing has been the US gonna accelerate tensens with China, Use is gonna seltentions with China, and then it turns out that they're not doing that and in fact, like they're gearing up for just more proxy word stuff with Russia, which the thing

they've been doing for the past decade. So I think, like I don't know, like I think they their problem essentially is that they run into reality and there are certain points at which, like you know, you you can lie a lot, right, but when when when the lie that you're pushing is about what the mainstream media is going to say, and the mainstream if you just pivots and it's just completely about something that's entirely unrelated, Like I think, I think that hurts, and I think the

everything that the other problem they have that that makes me hopeful is that the way there, their base is getting split by just the anti vax grifters, because so many of their media people just you know, are are just are just full on grifters, and you know, and you're you're seeing splits right now and gray zone about

like basically between pro and anti VACS factions. And I think that also will help us in the long run, because you know, say, say what you want about most leftists and even most tankies, like anti vax is like a bit far even for them, and because you know, and the other things like the the it's it's hard to do anti vax without beginning to take positions that just like it's been baked into just sort of anti Chinese racism in so many ways that like you can't

really like you know, like you can't simultaneously be pro incredibly CCP and then also be talking about how the US is trying to implement social credit, right, you know, these these are these these positions are just contradictory, and I think that's something that plays to our advantage and I think is weakening them to some extent because they've they try to have their cake and eat it too, and now they're sort of I don't know, they're there,

their conspiracy theory base is interfering with their like left base in way. So I think you're helpful for us. It's just so interesting how like the anti vax position is literally rooted in racism and ableism, like um, there's an article in The Conversation called the inherent Racism of the anti vax movement that has like really good history around white settlers being afraid of African medicine, um um.

And then there there's also just the able ism of assuming that your kid will get autism if you get vaccinated. That was that that's been a huge thing before the pandemic and that was part of how this was effective in the first place. And um, yeah, and obviously the anti Chinese, um like uh anti Asian like scapegoating as well. But UM, I guess that also ties into like just how broadly ablest the left is and how like disability justice is not something that a lot of people know

about um or care about. And it's yeah, I don't know, it's a huge problem for me as a disabled person. Yeah. I wanted to add really quickly too. I mean, I totally agree with you, and you know, I think one of the pernicious things that I've noticed though, is like these kind of big, you know, quote unquote anti imperialist accounts,

like on Instagram for example. Um, they take this anti vax position precisely by saying that it's anti racist to take that position, which is like, it sounds that sounds very kind intuitive, it's not that does not reflect reality.

But they will point to instances of you know, anti black us um us medicine for example, you know, like the Tuskey experiments and then say this is why we shouldn't trust the U. S. Government on any of this, right, because look what they've done in the past and it's like that logic makes a lot of sense in a lot of ways, right, But you know, they obviously ignore the impacts that you know, anti vax uh and COVID

has had on black and other POSD populations. Right, So I think I don't know if it's exactly like, I don't know if it is appearing as hypocrisy to those people and then their audiences too, right, because I think they're able to spin it in this in this way. Yeah, but I think I think my my my argument here is I don't think those are the same. I think these are the same basis, Like, I don't I don't think that the majority of the Tanky base are people

who are anti factors. And you know that you can see a line of this right of of you know, like one of the big things that like they're they're they're obsessed with sort of like with the Cuban healthcare system,

right and like Cuba's Cuba's vaccines. You see this stuff from them a lot, and you know, and they also talk about like, yeah, like China's doing really well a good hitting COVID, And I don't think those positions are like, I don't think those people are the same people who are also turning around and then talking about how like you know, talk doing the CAZI experiments, the vaccines are

actually like racism thing. I think, I think there's some overlap between them, but but I don't think that those bases line up enough for it to you know, not have the effect of just kind of like tearing them apart as their media people lipped into into one of

the sort of camps. And I think the other thing, like, you know, if if you look at what's happening with like, uh like Max Bluemadal right now, is that he's just like full on like like he's just full on touring with like just straight up right wingers to an extent that even like even people who being habituated by the sort of like Syria false flags stuff into sort of working with right wingers, like you can't look at these people that you know, there's just these actually just like

Republican operatives and be like, well, okay, we're we're on the side of these people and also like support Cuba. I just I don't know, I I have I have some faith in these groups being separate and they're being there being a point of cognitive dissonance where the system break. I guess I've seen people who have gotten out of tanky is M by having to interact with the actual CCP, and and that that that that gives me hope that there's there, there's there's a point of cognitive dissonance at

which it falls apart. And I don't know, maybe maybe I'm just sort of like hopey m in here, but I feel like it's so interesting how like there are a lot of people for whom politics is a parlor game and not their every day like lived experience. Like I would not be so like like if I see my communities struggling, um and when people are dying or people are really like struggling with intragenerational trauma, I'm not gonna sit here and pontificate and theorize about like, um,

things that don't impact my communities. Um And Yeah, like the angle about class is so important here because it's like a lot of people can't insulate themselves from like the broader communities around them. Like if you're going around saying untruths in the media and your communities are like, hey, that that makes no sense, Like, um, if you're actually connected to people like like you would hopefully, unless you're just a big asshole, um, you would hopefully take some

accountability for what you're saying. UM. And I yeah, I just I just worry because this pandemic has also like really isolated people, like they people are not like talking to each other, and that makes it more easy for people to to be like, oh, I'm I'm just right, like this is my perspective, and I just yeah, I think about that the conditions in which we come to certain conclusions, like the conditions under which we become more vulnerable to culti e. Type things or like oversimplified like

understandings of history. Because like I feel like the the anti vax uh like not taking the vaccine being uh anti racist is a very like manipulative like argument because it ignores the fact that these experiments UM on black and Indigenous people in North America and beyond are like about neglect and are about um deliberately deliberate, ongoing genocide and how like it's completely understandable for for people to

not trust the government. But but like when the vaccine is actually a tool of protecting people, Like, there's not a lot of like campaigns other than people who are uh rooted and disability justice, saying, hey, vaccines are like here to protect us, and how can we make how can we make like a like how can we resist the medical industrial complex enough such that we can make people feel safer taking them at vaccine? How can we bring people in as opposed to fearmongering? Because I think

that fear is so powerful. It's like, once you're afraid, you're you're not gonna you're not going to even look into the research, right, So I don't know it's for me. I just think of all of this as like manipulation and human psychology on a on a like broad social basis, because it's like the stage is a big cult and these little groups are little cults. Yeah, do teach? You have any other things you want to say? Before we had oh here, Yeah, you're the tiger. I'm looking forward

to retweeting art like actually Ouary January one? Yeah, yeah we should I think my okay, okay, closing less depressing question. Yeah, what what do you think is the etiquette on retweeting? Like you every retweeting like you're the tiger art before the actual before like Lunar New Year's I've been torn on it because I just I like the art, but also I'm like, it's not the years yet I haven't seen any I guess, so I guess I'm lucky. I have been either guilty or not guilty, depending on how

you see it. Like I have retweeted all of the tiger are on January first because I did not care. I wanted to see the tigers um. But I hope that I see more tigers like in the coming days, because if the tigers aren't coming, or if we aren't retweeting it, that that is an issue. Like there need to be like a second like a like a like a like like a like a second wave of the

tiger are no pressure to all of the artists? Well alright, So if if people want to find you or work that you have that you want people to find where? Where where can they do that? Or if you also do not want them to find you, that is completely also valid. The internet is terrible in a mistake, Yeah, I mostly and do not perceive me mode um completely valid. If you want to check out allow some stuff, feel free a low song collective dot com, it's good work.

My social media is um pepack all Poetry um on Instagram. I uh, um, I have this graphic that I've turned into a sticker and it's raises funds for families who were affected by the fires and floods. Um. It's a sticker that says immunocompromised people are worth protecting, and it went viral multiple times. So I guess I cannot help but be perceived objections. So yeah, I don't know. Yeah,

people all poetry. Yeah this this is what happens when you create things that are both incredibly politically powerful and also gorgeous. So yeah, b B be cursed with the reward for good work, which is also being pretty see. Yeah, yeah, well you can you can find you can find us at Happened Here pod on Twitter and Instagram. There's the Cool Zone. You can find it. Yeah, go go, go, go retweet Tiger Art all right, go throw a brick at your sheriff non actionable, and yeah, destroy the American

and Chinese States. Happy two years. It could Happen Here as a production of pool Zone Media. For more podcasts from the Cool Zone Media, visit our website cool Zone Media dot com, or check us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts you can find sources for It could happen here. Updated monthly at cool Zone media dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.