2mo ago

Can anyone help me understand why Hasan Piker is so popular in leftist political spaces despite his immense privilege?

This guy's dad is the former VP of a multibillion dollar Turkish conglomerate, as well as the secretary of a government department. Mom and Dad were able to fly to their other home in NJ to give birth so he'd get US citizenship. His uncle is the founder and owner of TYT Media and gave him his media career. He went to Rutgers. He lives in a multimillion dollar mansion in the Hollywood Hills. This is by definition not the kind of person who can be a voice of the People. Saying "I recognize my privilege" over and over, while living his lifestyle, doesn't negate his privilege and complete lack of real-life experience outside of the curated garden of the wealthy. He gets paid obscene amounts of cash to sit in his bedroom and word-vomit for 9 hours a day. Why are his unending opinions taken so seriously? He gives me strong controlled opposition vibes.

Edit: Thank you all for this discussion. I learned a lot.

144 comments

I can give you my two cents. Currently, there aren't many left leaning pundits, and I won't look a gift horse in the mouth. His privilege means nothing if he's actually being a good progressive advocate. Also, he's actually talking about the things the left populace actually care about. Controlled opposition wouldn't look like him to me. They'd be more like the Democrat party, trying to copitulate with the right. He's been fairly consistent with his messaging of workers rights, lgbtq rights, womens rights, and the atrocities happening in Gaza. His income from streaming is incidental, and isn't a problem in and of itself. In fact, it lets him be independent and not beholden to corporate media. It's hard enough to afford bills working a regular job. The vast majority of regular jobs take all your time, leaving none for anything else, much less being a left leaning advocate online. I'm assuming you'd rather a full-time employee take his place, but how would someone like that be able to be effective in their advocacy?
- Maybe I'm just an old fart annoyed by the loudmouthed sarcastic child of immense privilege preaching about things he'll never understand. As long as he's saying what the people want to hear, I guess. A new leftist Rush Limbaugh for 2024, great. I'm on the left and I'm just exhausted. IDK.
  
  I disagree that it's impossible for someone coming from a place of privilege to understand working-class politics. Of course, people with privilege do have a tendency to create or buy into justifications for the system that upholds their position, but at the same time privilege grants people the freedom to do what those without cannot. It's admirable for someone with that background to use their privilege for the good of all, potentially even to their own detriment.
  It seems your distaste for Hasan is based on surface-level appearances and vibes, but those same traits that put you off of Hasan are very appealing to a large number of young men who are otherwise susceptible to right-wing cultural framing. I also used to avoid Hasan because he just didn't seem like someone I would identify with, and I was put off by the react content that made me associate him with shameless react streamers who leech off other people's work. After actually listening to him I realized he is very knowledgeable and is actually adding value to the content he reacts to. He used his privilege to study political science and become a political commentator, and he has genuine passion for his work and a commitment to progressive values.
  Edit: If you're looking for someone with a similar perspective but without the aesthetic baggage try The Majority Report with Sam Seder
  
  I get the sentiment. But I don't need to be lgbtq to be an advocate for their rights. I just want people to be able to be who/what they want and thrive. Compared to them I'm privileged (white cishet male), but I doubt they'd complain about me being an ally.

- this is hard as fuck holy
- Also, class is not defined by wealth, but by relation to labor. He is doing the work he is getting paid for, regardless of whether someone thinks its too much. He's not exploiting others to make that money as far as I know.
  
  Exactly!
- Moving to LA to buy a multi-million dollar house and be close to your other rich content creator friends is the same as setting yourself on fire for the proles.
  Got it.
  
  Fwiw, the picture doesn't show someone setting themselves on fire, it shows someone having lit a Molotov cocktail.

Is this a "no true Scotsman" thing where only poor people with a blue collar work history are worthy of being listened to?
- No. It's a "tired of the dropping standards" thing where I'm dissatisfied with the fact that the biggest voice of our political movement is a loud condescending nepo baby who sits in his bedroom playing video games, watching youtube, and reading Reddit posts for a living, and can't realistically claim to have any idea about the lives of the oppressed classes he claims to champion.
  
  I guess you want political and social "activists" to have a pathetic life and can't have fun and do fun activities like playing games. What make you think that he doesn't read interesting book etc to educate himself about certain issues? Your use of personal attacks remove all your credibility.
  
  Is Hasan Piker really the biggest voice on the political left?
  
  TBH, I don't know much about him and read the first few paragraphs of his Wikipedia page. It says while born in New Jersey, he grew up in Turkey under Erdogan, then back to the US to study poli sci. Seems like growing up under a democracy sliding back into authoritarianism would be relevant experience. Your description of him as a "nepo baby" seems quite incomplete and makes me wonder if your perception of him is charged by emotion rather than fact.
  
  Holy shit what a lib response
  
  How about a loud condescending poor who sits in their bedroom playing video games, watching YouTube, reading reddit posts for a living but is super right wing?
  Not like there's a litany of journalists, professors and former finance ministers with their work available online to watch or anything
  
  I suggest maybe watching the stream, then

Hasan occupies a niche within the broad "leftist" umbrella niche within the West. Unlike many breadtubers, he actually doesn't serve as much of a barrier for further leftist movement (see: Vaush, Destiny, etc.). He is privledged, but so was Engels. Hasan certainly is no Engels, but he does serve a useful role in radicalizing liberals towards the Left, like how he vocally combats the nonsense usage of the word "tankie" trendy among liberals these days.
Hasan is a pundit at the end of the day, and isn't bringing about the revolution, and he is definitely more of a USophile than he should be, but he is better than most leftist commentators and helps serve as a conveyor to the left of himself.
- Thank you for a nuanced reply. When you put it this way, I can see why many listeners find value in his content. I worked another shift today with him constantly droning in the background and I think my opinion is largely being colored by his presentation style, and my own distaste for "streamers" and "react culture" in general, with his aforementioned privilege issues now coming in third.
  His comments about people working "real" jobs having an easier time of it than he does certainly rubbed me the wrong way, though, and his response when called out on it was more of the exact same "BROOO WHAT ARE YOU STUPID? THATS NOT WHAT I MEANT! OK!?" that his streams are full of.

I think you have an extremely online view of "leftist political spaces" because I have never even heard this guy's name mentioned in any real life context, and I've been a very politically active communist since I was a teenager.
- Yeah the problem with living in capitalist hellworld at the heart of the empire is that you have two separated insular communities of leftists that are knife fighting rings. One in meetings and one on message boards, and they frequently know nothing about each other.
  While the meetings communists sometimes eke out wins like Kshama Sawant, they often struggle to connect to the message board communists who really should be their base. Meanwhile both struggle to connect to society at large.
  What's really funny is that most meetings communists I know locally essentially think of him in essentially the same way message board communists think of AOC. Most meetings communists cannot stand his level of yadda yadda when pressed on any specifics he often just goes more general and says things like 'I just want everyone to have healthcare bro'.
  
  The thing is, also, from the lefts perspective, the right seems united, meanwhile the left is constantly arguing about the right type of left or not being left enough or whatever. Someone had a go at me once cause I said I learned something off AOC.
- Same. I thought it was cause I was British though.

I understand where you're coming from, honestly. But I think this is a sort of trauma response on our end (myself included) at this point. I'm not trying to pin mental illnesses on you, I'm nowhere near a licensed head doctor of any kind, I'm saying that we've been kicked and abused so much by the rich, that it's only natural for those of us who broke free of the brainwashing to be on high alert, at least for a while. The continued unfolding of things surely can't help this situation, either.
That being said, as long as he acts in good faith and is sincere and logical in his approach, which so far seems to be true, I'd say we should embrace his participation! As I see it, we need all the voices we can get. We're already arguing semantics amongst ourselves all day long, I think it'd be a shame to let mistrust shatter "our side" without concrete proof of malicious intent.
At the end of the day, the greatest weapon the Right has is the fact that they yell united at everyone else. Let our chorus rival theirs!
- Thank you for being one of the only commenters to understand my question.
  
  Believe me, I'm keeping an eye on every piece of Leftist media I find, and not just for the purpose of learning. I know Capitalism is very good at repackaging our complaints and critiques and selling them back as dopamine hits, but... there's not much of a choice otherwise. Even the "underground networks' " infrastructure* is owned by someone at this point...
  
  This is very dismissive of the other commenters you've responded to who also appear to have understood you quite well. The difference is just that you like this one better.
  You rail against someone for their privileges, but can't seem to see past your own biases. We all have biases. It's important to be able to recognize them and try to see past them. Including against privileged allies.

A person's class is defined by their relation to labor, not their wealth. He's not exploiting labor. I'm not sure the people claiming he's a hypocrite for having money understand anything about communist/socialist theory. Engels was famously in a very similar situation.
- Plus as far as I know socialists have always been fine with class traitors who join them.
- A person’s class is defined by their relation to labor, not their wealth.
  This is literally not true. Like quite literally, even in socialist history this is not a true statement. Leninism particularly had some very funny hijinks about linking wealth to class.
  He’s not exploiting labor.
  I don't want to really get into it, but Hasan like every other content creator indirectly exploits the labor that provides the platform that he makes money off of.
  Twitch.TV is a stage that is built and maintained by workers working for a Twitch. Those workers are exploited. The stage is a means of production. The artists that use the stage also exploit those workers, because they procure use of the stage. The cool thing about Hasans typical response to this which is the thought terminating cliche of "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism" is that it by definition has a corollary. If there can be no ethical consumption, there can be no ethical production.
  Engels was famously in a very similar situation.
  Engels' factories were all unionized.
  Hasan has literally in 2019 after all the "podcasters don't pay guests drama" that he very well knows of given his friends, had exploited people that did free work for him. There's controversy about whether Hasan actually pays his mods. Most online personalities are not very forthcoming about how they get help with their content/community management and whether that is properly compensated, Hasan included. For a venture that's made $12m over 5 years Hasan 100% should be paying every single person that touches anything related to his work without them having to ask, whether it's hourly, piece work, or full time employment.
  Hasan is nowhere near Engels in his understanding and treatment of labor.
  I’m not sure the people claiming he’s a hypocrite for having money understand anything about communist/socialist theory.
  Most of Hasan's fans and Hasan himself don't have understand anything about communist / socialist theory or history. This thread at large is a perfect encapsulation of this where the history and theory is bent entirely in the defense of one online entertainer in 2024. I say this as a person who occasionally watches (e.g. election night since I dind't want to watch broadcast cable and nobody else good had election live streams).
  The real problem here is the deification of Hasan and the comparison of him to Marx or Engels that's done up and down this thread is indicative of the seriousness of the commenters in their understanding of socialism. A lot of these arguments are vibes + socialist bromides, they don't actually do anything beyond surface level reflexive defense. Nobody actually wants to open the Pandora's box here because as the famous tweet said "some of our faves might be implicated".
  
  This is literally not true. Like quite literally, even in socialist history this is not a true statement. Leninism particularly had some very funny hijinks about linking wealth to class.
  That's weird, because the class = relation to labor stuff is literally in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific by Frederick Engels
  I'm not deifying Hasan, I don't really care about Hasan. I was just correcting an incorrect sentiment in this post that having wealth means you can't be on the side of the working class.
  Everything else you said is weird too online gossip so I'll just move on.

'This person's not allowed to do the right thing, because he was born wrong.'
Uh huh.

He sometimes tells his audience to log off and join an org, we get a handful of new recruits occasionally due to the guy.
So he actually is successfully moving people from being socialist sympathizers to actual socialists (you need to be part of an org to be a socialist)
That's all I really know about him, besides some people being thirsty about him.
- Crazy that Marx and Engels weren't socialists.
  
  Marx was part of the Young Hegelians. Marx and Engles were part of the Communist League (if not it's literal sun around whom the League revolved), and Marx and Engels were also the founders of the German Workers' Society.
  The idea that Marx was a recluse internet style poster with no attachment to real society is a 21st century invention to make vaguely left people feel better about their alienation and a strawman for the right to attack.
  
  Lol someone got to it before I could.
  Crazy how history doesn't agree with your gotcha.

You can advocate for hungry people after eating a meal. You can advocate fornsex worker rights even if you are a virgin.
You can't tell people you are "working class" if you're rich. You can't advocate for punishing day people while pretending to be straight.
It is not complicated.

What's with the identity politics man? Does what he says makes sense or not? Don't tell me you won't listen to rich white people when they make sense because they're rich and white.

I don’t know Piker from a hole in the ground. This sure sounds like a red flag, and I think The Young Turks are hacks. Nonetheless, bourgeois class traitors are a thing, Engels & Mao being a prime examples.
Not knowing Piker’s particulars, I can only speak at the 30,000 foot view: Western “leftist” spaces have largely been captured by US imperialism since the end of WWII.
Gabriel Rockhill » Imperialist Propaganda and the Ideology of the Western Left Intelligentsia: From Anticommunism and Identity Politics to Democratic Illusions and Fascism
Domenico Losurdo » Western Marxism: How it was Born, How it Died, How it can be Reborn
- Thank you for an intelligent response! I will read up on the links you shared.

In case you're actually, seriously asking and not just trolling, having privilege and success under capitalism does not disqualify a person from being a leftist. You can't really criticize a person for participating in a system where if you don't participate, you starve.
He's using his influence to organize the working class and advocate for collective action, which is the one tool workers have in the fight against their own exploitation. Even if you don't like him personally or don't think he's part of the working class, he is a very strong ally and has undeniably strengthened the movement.
- He’s using his influence to organize the working class and advocate for collective action, which is the one tool workers have in the fight against their own exploitation.
  Posting and streaming (which is just video posting) is not "organizing the working class and advocating for collective action". The closest he gets to this is fundraisers, but the buck pretty much stops there.
  Money is important sure, but that's not what organizing is. If fundraising is organizing than the Democratic Party should be Bolsheviks.
  Going on stream to tell the people who decompress from their shitty McDonalds shifts that they should organize as they say hell yeah man and go back to the work the next day without doing anything isn't organizing, it's not advocacy, it's entertainment.
- Shame that seriously asking is so hard to distinguish from trolling at this point. For the record, I am a leftist, working a shitty physical job, who has to listen to this guy all day because of my coworkers. I am literally the archetype of the struggling worker class. I don't need him or any other millionaire to tell me about the working class.
  
  But there are working class people who like his message (the people you work w/). So clearly, he is saying something of interest. I disagree w/ him on a handful of issues, but don't think that disqualifies him from being helpful in the fight for equality. The same goes for the likes of JB Pritzker for example. That doesn't mean they're my ideal candidates but any port in a storm. Turning away useful allies while we wait for a perfect representation seems like a way to alienate some people because they "aren't like us" when it comes to their financial situation even if they agree on social and fiscal ideas.
  
  Shame that seriously asking is so hard to distinguish from trolling at this point.
  Common-L among left-ish Lemmy instances when you start noticing the paint chipping off of their golden idols.

Embrace petty bourgeouis class traitors and don't fetishize the working class.

My partner watches him a lot and while personally dislike Hasans loud yelly bro style I've never heard an opinion from him that I disagreed with.

The revolution will not have a channel on youtube.
- I was going to comment the same ö

I've never listened to him for more than a few seconds. He gives me shyster vibes and I don't need a pundit to tell me everything is shit.

Because he's cool to a certain type of person and those people are vaguely leftist (just like Hasan is vaguely leftist).
That cool factor and the parasocial relationships protect him a lot in places like this where some of the more knowledgeable users will actually dunk on his sources like Ettingermentum when they do/say stupid shit. It's incredibly funny to see.
Honestly that's pretty much it.

He's more conventionally attractive, confident, charismatic, muscular, well dressed, and less of a drama king/queen than most other leftist influencers his age, and he speaks in more Gen Z lingo/vocabulary than other left wing influencers (who are often older) with similar knowledge levels and political stances.
Oh, and he is already popular, on a platform where people love to exist in one-sided, parasocial relationships.
... Sorry if this bursts your bubble, but even most self described leftists basically operate by the same fundamental popularity / favorability dynamics that middle or high schoolers do, whether concsiously or subconsciously.

As long as you don't exploit workers there nothing wrong in having money. You probably know that Engels was rich - and to be honest he did exploit workers (owned a textile factory or something). Was he, by your definition, the kind of person who can be a voice of the people?

Hes good at breaking down media. Gets involved on community organizing. Does good propaganda.
People are free to like who they like and make up their own minds. Why you hating? Who made you thought police?
- I guess his ubiquity annoys me when he strikes me as hypocritical. Thought police? That's just a weird thing to say. Why am I "hating?" Nobody hates the Left more than the Left.
  
  I like that he's focusing on the relationship between labor and the means of production and its not about being poor or rich per se.
  Exactly why the infighting when we have bigger fish to fry.

What's your cut off? At what financial point is someone allowed to take part in trying to fix a broken system?
If it's only people who don't benefit from the system who are allowed to fight against it, should white people not try to fight the system? Cis? Straight? Able bodied? Able minded? Are only poor trans lesbians with two types of disabilities allowed to try to fight the system?
I don't know the guy from Adam and I'm not gonna say he's not well off, and I get that it seems sketch, but he's at least doing something with his money other than sitting on it trying to get richer.

So what? A class traitor is a class traitor, and we only have to win with this. What's next, you gonna say Engels wasn't a communist because he was a part of the bourgeoisie?
You do not need some sort of vow of poverty to be a true leftist.
- You do not need some sort of vow of poverty to be a true leftist.
  helps though

Semi off-topic but genuinely curious: did going to Rutgers become something that is fancy/seen akin to Ivy league? Or was mention of the school just a mention that he went to college?
- Rutgers and Princeton have an intertwined history, but that's pretty much it. Rutgers is seen as a good state school and to many it's mostly because it sounds like a private school.

Addition: his father is a founding member of a right wing party in Turkey

I have no idea who this guy is but Fidel was the child of a plantation owner.

Haven't seen/heard much of his videos.
And some gamers going RW is an issue, right? Maybe he'll be good there?
So what is to be done?
Are there other people you'd recommend?

Never heard of him.

I'll state this: I know of this person in name only.
He's a hypocrite. It's as simple as that. His popularity is probably derived from the novelty of a member of the upper class agreeing with the lower classes and his ability to entertain them. It gives those that belong to the lower class hope of change being enacted by those with capital. The Wikipedia page states he brought a $2.7 million USD mansion. He has access to capital, and what does he do? Asks others to donate to 'worthy' causes whilst accruing more capital for his own vested, personal vanity projects?
From what I've read he is not an ally. He's an entertainer. The capitalist system is able to create products that espouse anti-capitalist ideas. This is just another such product. It's not controlled opposition. It's just an individual who's found himself the owner of a sought after product. Just another capitalist.
- I’ll state this: I know of this person in name only.
  surely THIS is a solid base to work off of when forming an opinion of somebody
  He has access to capital, and what does he do? Asks others to donate to ‘worthy’ causes whilst accruing more capital for his own vested, personal vanity projects?
  a recent donation drive run by his community for Palestinian aid raised $840,000, with at least $75,000 coming directly from his pocket. Another previous donation drive last October raised $1,236,473.25, with another $50,000 coming directly from Hasan.
  
  My sentiment does not change. That's akin to pocket change if he makes around $200,000 USD a month on twitch...
  Consumption of luxury products and the defense of them is not something I support. Buying a mansion is antithetical to my views on socialism. An acceptable use of a mansion is to tear it down and build affordable apartments for the working people. Even then that'd be suspect, as you'd be able to build more dwellings on cheaper land... It would be more of a publicity stunt than an acceptable use of capital.
  This character might say "the right things" but he does not do them. Why is he even working for Amazon? He could be streaming on peertube or build infrastructure to stream without binding himself to such an exploitative company.
  He's human. It's not easy say the right things and do the right things. I don't give it much thought. He's not of interest to me, but I think it's quite obvious why communists might not like him.
- That's not very much for a house in LA
  
  Okay let's do some introspection, why does Hasan Piker need to live in LA?
  He could live in La Puente which has a median sale price of $700k, 20 miles from downtown LA, but for some reason he moved to LA.
  It's kind-of odd you know? That basically once a streamer, podcaster, or one of these online personalities makes it big they often move to like LA or NYC. Why is that? Why don't they move to Nabraska or something? It's kind of weird that there's this seeming class of people (new media people making it big) that have an interest in moving to some of the most expensive areas of the country that seemingly have a conglomeration of other people who are part of their class.

You will struggle to get serious answers here. But many leftists crave validation more than they crave good ideas. Not all of them, mind you, but on places like ML anyone outside the orthodoxy inevitably just gets shouted down.

Obsessing over "privilege" smells like jealousy

He cute though

Net worth isn't a thing except for the aristocratic right. There, privilege implies belonging; and when coupled with egocentric decisions is basically their entire theme.

There's nothing "leftist" about Piker, no matter what he chooses to call himself. People need to pay attention to what he does, not what he says.
- People need to pay attention to what he does, not what he says.
  ...He's a pundit. What he does is pick opinions and put them in front of his audience. He seems to have much better opinions than most Americans and is pretty good at spreading them. That's useful.
- What does he do
  
  He calls himself a "socialist " a "revolutionary" a "man of the people" despite being born into obscene wealth and having nothing in common with "the people." This is the guy who said, "America deserved 9/11" and has no problems with "imperialism" if it comes from China.
  Of course, you don't have to take my word on any of this. There are plenty of examples of Hassan on YouTube, being a complete dick.

His class shouldn't matter ultimately.
However, his superficial and putrid understanding of anything regarding politics or the world in infuriating. At one point he was simping hard for Russia's invasion of Ukraine repeating verbatim rt talking points.
I loathe this man more than I hate Joe Rogan. Joe is an imbecile, through and through. Hasan, on the other hand, supposedly has a poli Sci degree. He knows what he's doing and it's disgusting
Edit : I don't have time to go into every fact check of the mountain of lies he spews. The guy has never opened a book in his life and spends all day reading Twitter. Some great intellectual.
Willymac does a good breakdown on yt:
Hasan sucks
Ukrainians react to Hasan (yt) :
Ukrainians react
He's such a joke
- Can you elaborate?
  
  I don't have time to break down al his lies. Willymac does a decent job:
  Hasan

Oh screw off with this bullshit. So pathetic.
- Thanks for your contribution to the discussion, very insightful.
  
  These are bot account folks. There's been a surge of attacks against Hasan by the right and russian propaganda machine. They are opening the flood gates to undermine all the remaining progressive influencers.

Because he's funded by russia to split the democratic vote.
- Edit to add: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasan_Piker
  As of 2024, Piker is the most subscribed political commentator and has the nineteenth-most subscribed channels of all time on the streaming platform Twitch.
  His father Mehmet Behçet Piker is a political scientist and economist who served on the Board of Directors (and as Vice-President) of Sabancı Holding, and who is a founding member of the Future Party in Turkey. His mother Ülker Sedef Piker (née Uygur) is an art and architectural historian teaching at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. His uncle Cenk Uygur is a political commentator and co-founder of The Young Turks news network.
  During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Piker, in partnership with CARE, raised over $200,000 for Ukrainian relief funds while playing Elden Ring, with an average of over 70,000 people watching his coverage of the conflict.
  Twitch information: Followers: 2.7 million
  YouTube information: Subscribers: 1.43 million
  So he comes from money and is raking in buttloads from his social media presence. He has no need for Russian funding. Either provide evidence or don’t talk nonsense.
  
  Exhibit A: Jill Stein

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