Karl Marx was a free speech warrior - with László Molnárfi

We talk with Irish organiser Laszlo Manafi about why class-first socialism is clashing with the liberal left, and how that split shapes everything from campus politics to protest rights. We dig into Marxism as a way of analysing power, then trace why free speech matters even when the cause feels righteous. 

• Class-first organising and why self-criticism on the left matters 
• what Laszlo means by liberalism and how identity politics displaces class 
• the cultural turn, NGO influence, and elite capture in universities 
• Marxism as a framework rather than a fixed policy menu 
• libertarian socialism, workplace democracy, and limits of liberal democracy 
• what the Soviet Union shows about power and internal democracy 
• Marx on censorship and why hate speech laws expand state power 
• protest policing, Palestine activism, and the risks of deplatforming 

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Transcript

Intro And Guest From Ireland

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Free to Speak, the New Zealand Free Speech Union podcast. If you enjoy the show, subscribe for uncensored conversations and free speech news from New Zealand and beyond.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

My name is Dane Giroud. I'm a council member of the Union and your host. And joining me today, a very special guest all the way from Ireland, Laszlo Manafi.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Laszlo. Thank you very much for having me on your show. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 0:30

Fantastic. So Laszlo is a Marxist. You are a real Marxist, aren't you? You are the real deal, as opposed to a lot of people that may sort of claim to be, but aren't quite. Well, you might have a few things to say about that.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Yes, precisely. Um, well, I would say, you know, I'm a communist. Um, let's say I am the more uh traditional um communist. Um, we I would be opposed to um the liberal left, and I would uh uh advocate for a left which stands for the working class and which advocates a class-first policy, as well as opposing the in influence and infiltration of uh various degrees of liberalism into uh communist spaces and into the leftist movement.

SPEAKER_03 1:20

Okay, interesting. I'm gonna be writing down notes here furiously, okay? So just um because you know you're a very smart guy. Uh what's uh uh you were brought to my attention actually by a um a listener to the podcast who found a clip of yours where that that had gone viral where you were uh at a meeting and you're clearly scolding a lot of your comrades, comrades, and um you know, and you had my admiration straight away because someone that can get up and criticize their own side, I think, um, needs attention. Uh that's why I was always such a great fan of George Orwell. It's the, I mean, we can criticize the right, because I consider myself broadly on the left. So we uh we can criticize the right to our heart's content, but they're always going to be the right. And it's almost like it's not our garden to tend to. We know what the problems are, you know, with that type of politics. It's really our own house that we need to keep in order. Um, so I do have a lot of respect for people that are prepared to do that. And um, do you remember the clip?

Marxist Critique Of The Modern Left

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Yeah, yeah, but of course I I think that there has been a retreat from criticism and self-criticism on the left. There has been a general um sense of uh retreating into our own leftist subcultures, um, rather than actually engaging with the working class and with people who might think differently than us, rather than bringing them with us. There has been, after, especially in the 2010s, uh, with the rise of what people colloquially call the vogue wave, I think that there has been an attitude um which is really exclusionary on the left, an attitude which um which sort of moralizes and patronizes and talks down to people, an attitude of always hunting for enemies uh rather than trying to work with people. Um and so in my in my video, essentially I I advocated for a return to a sort of more traditional uh form of socialism um of working class politics where uh we not just talk, we don't talk down to members of the working class, but we talk with them, we engage in dialogue with them, and in that exchange is the only way we'll be able to build any sort of movement. The infiltration of liberalism especially peaked around into the socialist movement, peaked around 2016, and there's a bunch of morbid symptoms, I think, um, from that, which uh uh amount to you know the sort of identity politics and identity opportunism um and just a general uh prioritization of um social issues, nothing wrong with the social issues that were advocated for, but they were advocated for in a way which I think disregarded class and class politics, and just uh a really a grave mistake there on the left to accept uh that infiltration into the into the movement. And now we see people obviously speaking up and and and returning to more standard working class politics. My speech was part of that, and the positive reception to that speech, I think, indicates that there is appetite for a left, uh for a new sort of left.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

How was it in the room that night? Did you did people want to go out for drinks or not? Were you on your own after that?

SPEAKER_01 4:45

But you see, but you see, this is this is the thing with with uh with liberalism or with this sort of with this um with the left being captured by liberals, is that is that they seem like they have a lot of support, but in secret and in private, people will obviously say um that you know this this doesn't represent me. So all that was needed was to put uh the feelings of people, you know, these aren't just my ideas, these are ideas shared by a lot of people to actually go out and say it publicly. And and and that's what I did. And people were receptive, whether in the in the room at the university where we had the debate on whether the left has failed the working class. This was the debate. And they were and people were receptive, of course, on on social media as well, um, to to the points that I was that I was making. Broadly, the socialist movement needs to differentiate itself from um liberalism and from the liberal left, because those two are not the same. Leftists are not the same as liberals. I think that's a a point that the right, the right-wingers often use against us, that we seem to be the same, but we're not.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

Well, well, you brought up liberalism. That was what I wrote down, liberalism. So I want to hear your definition of it because like I think definitions have been very tricky in this age. Um, like work politics to me and the identitarianism feels closer in complexion to a far-right politics in a strange way, like a nationalism. Even some gay movements, and I'm I'm supportive of the gay movement, but some of the rhetoric they use, it seems like they want a new hierarchy rather than equality in the you know, broadly speaking, the the Martin Luther King sort of sense. So uh so definitions are important. How are you using liberalism? How are you making that distinction uh between the liberal and and the Marxist or the left?

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Liberalism is something that is used by capitalist parties um in order to present themselves as being uh really progressive and as you know standing for um minority rights, all of this, while completely ignoring um the economic suffering that working class people are put under uh under capitalist systems. So um various ideas have infiltrated the left, um, including the idea of intersectionality, which uh perceives class as just another set of identities amongst many, rather than the Marxist critique that class is actually a structural component of capitalism and hence is primary. So liberal parties like the Democrats in America, what they did in the 2010s is heavily lean in to um to the sectional advocacy of minority interests while not doing anything for the class, while not talking about the working class, while not talking about economics. And so once that enters the socialist movement, uh we see that um socialists as well begin talking um in in these terms. They talk about um they talk more about social issues, and in this amalgamation um of the liberals and the left, the real left critique gets lost, which is the critique of class relations in capitalism. That's simple as.

SPEAKER_03 8:30

Um, which sort of sort of ended effective leftism as an option. So we had left-wing parties, but they were they sort of had right-wing economic policies, actually, you know. And then they do things like say, Oh, we're a left-wing party because we've got this new policy where the the poor get a$20 a week tax credit. That's not left-wing. That's just a crumb. It's like, oh, a crumb fell off my plate. Of course you can eat it. You know, that's that's basically all that was. Blair's another one. So it's all happening at the same time. There's a shift to the right economically, and it's like, how are we going to keep people here? Oh, we'll throw all this new stuff at them and we'll call that leftism. Do you think there's a little bit of that going on?

SPEAKER_01 9:14

Absolutely. It's called the cultural turn. The uh neoliberal um soft left parties um turned to um advocating uh sort of meant for for progressive social positions while putting for the Tatcherite um neoliberal economic policies. And so in Ireland we had Fina Fall and Finagel, and they would, you know, there was a big campaign to push for abortion rights, a very good campaign, in my opinion, and something that I absolutely support. But they used this to present themselves as the progressives, um, while at the same time um implementing the austerity that has been imposed uh by the European Union and implementing uh basically neoliberal capitalist policies. The housing market, for instance, throughout all of those years was progressively given away to vulture funds and to um to big multinational companies. So we call this a in Marxist theory, or Marxists call this the cultural turn of the left. Um, but also back in the days, I mean, it started um in the 1960s, 1970s already with the new left. The new left no longer saw the working class as the revolutionary subject, but they saw um the sort of a variety of new uh movements, the feminist movement, the LGBT movement as being the primary drivers of change. That could drive liberal change and reformist change, but not revolutionary change.

SPEAKER_03 10:50

Why did they stop seeing the working class? Because I've read about this a bit. Were they disappointed that uh we didn't go along with them? Like what exactly what what do you think it was? I I have a theory. I'd like to hear what you have to say about that.

Liberalism Defined And Class Comes First

SPEAKER_01 11:04

I think that the traditional uh left, which the the sort of which are concentrated in trade unions, let's take the UK for an example, the industrial proletariat, um, were crushed by uh by Thatcher. Uh those movements were crushed uh during the minor strike in the 1980s. Um, and that I think really led to disillusionment um within the left with with the working class, and working class politics slowly receded, and uh uh that was replaced by what is essentially a middle class or professional managerial class, the politics of the professional managerial class, which tended towards being socially progressive and tended toward tended towards liberalism, and socialists latched onto this uh in the hopes of being able to secure a new a new class, class basis. And the working class was given over to the right, the working class went over to to the right, and so it's a capture essentially. It's a that's what that's how I see it, as that there is a capture, and I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with the socially progressive policies that were advocated for, but what but but the focus is about emphasis, isn't it? Yeah, it's about emphasis, precisely. I support all those policies, but it's about emphasis.

SPEAKER_03 12:30

It's about emphasis. Like well, I I come from a very working class neighborhood, South Auckland, which is very multicultural, very working class. When I travel out there, none of this work stuff exists. It's a little bit like 1984, you know, how the the the the proletariat, the plebs are just out doing their own thing, basically. Like it's a little bit, it's like that. The structure is not that dissimilar. Um, it never really reaches these neighborhoods. No one is gonna police the speech of people out there, they're not gonna do that. It's all like it's it's all happening sort of in the middle classes in a strange way. It's big because I think they're sort of jockeying for position. We had a guy out here, Musa Algabi, who who was a um uh interesting American uh um sociologist, and and he was he was basically saying wokeness is really just a an employment scheme. Like you show your credentials and then you get it, you know. So it's actually extremely capitalist. Yes, yeah. It's about who gets tenure, who gets the book deal. It's all about that.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

Yes. We call it the sort of angioliberal complex, uh, situated in urban centers and uh universities that uh promote a a constant uh rhetoric, which which we call call vogue. We can call it a lot of things, we can call it elite capture, we can we can call it standpoint epistemology because a lot of this identity politics stuff is actually founded on on standpoint epistemology um and not on actual analysis of uh real material conditions. Uh, but we can cut a lot of things, but the point being this doesn't have widespread support amongst the population. This is why um I think right-wingers have been successful in the 2010s of criticizing it, making fun of it, because it doesn't really stand up to the test of reasonability at all, um, and then using it uh as a way to paint the left as being full of you know vogue vogue people who are looking to take away your your free speech rights and and all that. So uh no, this is a uh uh a university middle class uh student phenomenon rather than something that's that's accepted or even talked about in wider society.

SPEAKER_03 14:53

What one of my more controversial views, and I've said this sometimes just to rack people up, because I know it's not 100% true, nothing like nothing like this is a hundred percent true, but I often wonder can you truly be left and understand leftism if if you don't come from the working classes?

SPEAKER_01 15:14

Uh well that would uh yes, I mean uh a lot of leftists in the past have like I understand obviously your point makes sense in in the way that many sort of uh you know university students these days claim to be left yet have no understanding of the working class. But in the past, uh, you know, for instance, Lenin uh was uh was a lawyer, he was actually a middle class person. It's not about uh it's about what ideology you have and whether you can actually sit down and understand the world as it is, and whether you actually do the research from a scientific analysis from the perspective of Marxism, or whether you do this vibe-based politics where you read something on Twitter and and that becomes your politics, and your politics becomes about you know um this like intersectionality, or you're trying to score points of I'm the most oppressed, or this person is the most oppressed, which happens a lot in university organizing spaces. A Marxist would obviously advocate for class unity of all people, whether they be trans or migrants or or class unity, and that is what what the Marxist position is. Um there is uh definitely like a people are captured by a sort of liberal way of thinking.

SPEAKER_03 16:31

Well, I guess you just need an additional discipline, don't you? Because your some of the, you know, your foundational thought or some of the your cultural memory and all that stuff is going to be probably more middle class. So you're gonna I mean George Orwell's a good example of that. Uh he he wasn't necessarily working class. Um he he was um middle class, but was clearly you know, I mean, he did all sorts of experiments, he he tried to live poor in Paris, you know, he wrote a book about that. Um and and wrote to work in peers interesting, but he's he critiques the middle class as coming into the the working class movement a lot, and and um it is sort of he's sort of like a heartbringer, heartbringer of doom in a way, isn't he? Because he does say this isn't going to end well. He's sort of he is he is saying that he's identifying the the risks of having uh of having too many middle class people in in the left. Or or in the upper echelons of the left, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 17:34

Yes, every every um every member of society is part of a class, and that class does have certain uh ways of thinking and certain um attitudes. So the sort of middle class, or let's say from my perspective, I see like this the student body sort of taking the lead in the left has certain consequences. Um, and one of them is indeed uh a sort of a liberal mindset rather than a Marxist mindset. So absolutely it's the class basis of the left has has shifted. That's what I studied in my speech as well. The moment that you um that you begin working with liberal NGOs or liberal left parties, and you have more liberal-minded people in your movement, you will abandon the working class unless there are strict ideological um sort of guardrails against that, and unless people have an understanding of Marxist theory. And self-reflection.

SPEAKER_03 18:34

I think politicians or or activists need self-reflection. They need a lot of self-reflection. Um, it's something we probably don't talk about a lot, but people need to sort of be looking inwardly constantly about their thoughts, their reactions, uh, the campaign say what you know they're gravitating towards why, why are they making the statement? Uh I I wonder because a lot of it happens in a mob, we might sort of forget that we, you know, we are individuals that do need to sort of test ourselves constantly on this stuff. Um yeah, uh I I I think that. Um let's talk about Marx a bit. Or unless you want to comment on that.

How The Left Lost The Workers

SPEAKER_01 19:10

Um no, no, I mean that's absolutely it. I think if the left is too scared of criticism, and if the response to criticism is just to accuse people of having uh become right wing, uh, which has happened to me um before, then then the movement cannot grow. I think the left doesn't see um that some of it's some of the ways that it's it's behaving, some of the the messaging that it's putting forward is alienating. It's not about the fact that the the social policies that are being pushed are are bad or that I oppose them. It's the fact that they are designed to pit us against one another. A good example of this, I'll just say one example because we have talked about the Vogue a lot, um, but I but I think we need to define it. It is, for instance, when in Ireland an NGO is being given 100,000 euros in order to provide a critical race theory education to secondary school students. That critical race theory is an American import that in Ireland doesn't make much sense. And that critical race theory actually specific because of our past colonial history, and also in general, a critical race theory is something that prioritizes the so-called lived experience of people over um the over an objective analysis of society. And this does lead to a certain hierarchy, as you've mentioned before. And this hierarchy is something that is divisive and something that is against class politics. So just to take an example, um, because I think it's important to be precise and accurate as to what we're talking about. No, 100%.

SPEAKER_03 20:52

Um, so let's let's back up a little bit. I mean, uh it would be good to know a bit about your background too, you know, like what brought you to this, what inspired you? Um, maybe well, maybe we could start there, but I'd like to talk about Marx as well. And because, well, actually, let's start with you. Who are you? I mean, you know, normally this happens at the but yeah, but I'm a screenwriter and I'm always looking for new structures and things.

SPEAKER_02 21:12

So we'll get your bio in the middle.

Elite Capture In Universities And NGOs

SPEAKER_01 21:16

Well, well, I'm I'm Laszlo. I'm 25 years old. Um, I grew up in Brussels, I'm from Hungary originally. I study in Ireland. In Ireland, I did my undergraduate in philosophy, politics, sociology, and economics. And now I'm doing a master's in comparative social change. I've been very involved in the leftist movement here, and I have done campaigns on various issues. You know, I've been someone who has been campaigning for migrant uh rights and migrant solidarity. I've been someone who has been at eviction preventions. I led the Trinity Students' Union uh for a year as its president. I've campaigned for uh boycott divestment sanctions against Israel, you know, pro Palestine activism, all of that. But I I am let's say controversial on the left because um i i like to to point out where there are certain failings um tactically and and strategically and in general for my criticism of um of of uh of of liberalism uh which is something the left wants to they want to keep being friends with with liberals and with angels because there's a shared interest whereas I'm saying no it makes us look really stupid um if if if we share spaces with uh certain people who who who we shouldn't share spaces with because uh of their uh ideological leanings and the things that they say yeah that's interesting we we should get to that um uh um i i'll but let's let's talk about marx um now uh uh so i i i i listened to a podcast where where you talked about people sort of misreading marx in a way by saying that uh by by uh assuming it is a it's like a what were you saying that it's a theory with steps that uh but rather it's a lens to look at the world so so i i probably didn't say that very well so how would you how would you uh articulate that so uh as marx marx articulated it himself very well um he said je ne suis pas marxist he said i am not a marxist because marxism is um not a set of policies it is rather a heuristics framework for analyzing and understanding the world so it's a set of principles uh by which we look at certain events so for instance in Ireland we had the fuel prices protest and we can point out that there the economy had a determining effect on uh the protest and we can point that to the diff point at the different class interests converging there the farmers and the drivers due to rising fuel prices are are protesting it's it's a it's a matter of analysis using it as a framework to um analyze the world but Marxists who believe that there are certain um definitive um uh policies it's it that's not correct Marxism at least it does there are some uh guiding principles um namely the overthrow of the capitalist ruling class and the establishment of uh workers' democracy at every level of society political and and economic um but don't be dogmatic yeah but would you say it's the most radical form of democracy in a in a way oh indeed uh Marxism depending on which reading of Marxism you take I'm more closer to the libertarian socialist reading so the anarcho-communist or libertarian socialist reading of Marx um then it would actually be for radical democracy it would mean that you democratize not only the political system but also the economic system so you have workplace democracy the workers own the means of production it that's that only means that the workers uh can vote in their factories in the companies in in the businesses on how to run things it also means the economic democracy consequently also means that there is a planned economy people come together to plan uh what to produce so only you produce what society needs and then politically I don't think we can say that liberal democracies are really representative uh liberal democracies are a very limited form of democracy and and mostly captured by capitalist interests and corporate interests so yes I would argue that uh actually libertarianism uh is a core part of Marx and and of some some socialist movements because I've called myself a libertarian Marxist or leftist in the past and I've had people look at me sideways and say that's actually an oxymoron it's um it's impossible you can't be that guy because you're two different things you're trying to combine two different ideas which don't fit together that's that's not not true at all in fact I mean I would say that uh um the uh there is a certain understanding of uh uh prior uh socialist states and and the the understanding there when you look at the history is that is that they tried to implement the vision but it was a deformed implementation of the vision. The October revolution in 1917 was one of one of the greatest events in in world history probably but then it did degenerate into um essentially a a one-party dictatorship it still achieved great great things but it wasn't a democratic form of socialism but there are other examples of democratic forms of socialism so look at revolutionary catalonia in 1936 and 1937 uh an anarcho-syndicalist um an attempt at an anarcho-syndicalist implementation of socialism and the libertarian socialists to this day continue to you know advocate for uh workers democracy even in 1917 there were council communists there were more libertarian versions uh that that wanted to to sort of implement their visions in in Soviet in the Soviet Union so so that's interesting so so let's go to the Soviet Union which is going to be the you know the counter argument that's that that's the people that are going to be screaming at the screen right now and they're gonna be they're saying well this is sort of proof of something that I mean maybe it's proof that human instinct will always try to create a hierarchy so it's gonna be near impossible to sort of maintain democracy at the lowest level because people are always going to want to laud it over others which is what Orwell's trying to say with Animal Farm um but but I wonder could could the Soviet Union still call itself Marxist w without that radical democracy?

SPEAKER_03 28:17

Do you know what I mean by that?

SPEAKER_01 28:18

It's like is that is that an intrinsic feature and once you take that away it's not really even communism anymore it's something else um it's yeah so humans have lived in a variety of societies uh since since our existence on on earth we have lived in uh in tribal forms we have lived in uh the feudal form we have lived in democracies and under despotic rulers uh there is no such thing as a fixed human nature i would say as marx says it is defined rather by the structures and the environment that that you are in um the soviet union um obviously this is a definitional issue here you know no true scotsman type of thing going on here because um but i will i will rather say that the the soviet union um in the soviet union certain laws of capitalism were were not in place they tried to do a planned economy but uh the system was uh obviously not as as democratic as as libertarian Marxists for instance would have wanted it to be but that's also due to a variety of factors they were besieged from all sides and this led to um a sort of paranoia within the Bolshevik party and the Bolshevik party then also obviously uh uh forbade opposition parties and over the years uh inner party democracy had died and eventually was replaced by uh a single a single leader and so there was a series of mistakes there but uh as far back as let's say 1921 even the Bolsheviks had proposed um you know expanding democracy the Kronstadt sailors in 1921 had revolted against Bolshevik rule and wanted a form of socialism that was democratic so the possibility of a more democratic path for the Soviet Union um um was there uh in uh in in history but that path wasn't taken it was the first time one of the first times that uh a socialist revolution had uh succeeded and it was an experiment one we which one we from which we must learn and socialists must learn from it and and it probably wasn't uh if Marx could have been given like you know pick your country he russia might have been last just because of its reactionary background they were c in you know even today it's not like they've had a lot of democracy um it it's not really how how they've ever rolled um and yeah if he was given a choice he probably would have gone for England or or even America Germany uh or Germany yeah which was very um progressive at the time um uh or heading that dire in in that direction I guess um but I I I don't think anyone would have chosen Russia as the first place as as the original petri dish for this um that would have been the last the last place and uh uh of course um according to orthodox Marxist theory the revolution would happen in the most economically advanced country and marx uh obviously technologically advanced and yes yes at the Paris commune uh in 1871 can be considered as a libertarian socialist experiment where they they democratize and obviously Marx actually changed his tune on before 1871 he advocated for a centralized state in 1871 when the Paris Commune happened um he actually started moving to a more libertarian direction and advocated for the destruction of the state and for it to be replaced by mass democratic assemblies so there are different strains of thought even within Marx as to a centralized direction or a um localized more yeah localized libertarian direction yes interesting and and it's interesting that like because you'd you'd think it'd start it'd start the libertarian and hardened but now he's gone the other way which I think is really really interesting. This is tied this is tied to the to the sort of more humanistic marks that appears um and around this around this time it is also tied to the question of um liberal uh liberal rights and democratic rights and the question of a republic um and so a lot of Marxists today for instance have a flawed conception of how Marx thought about bourgeois rights marx didn't criticize bourgeois rights uh because he disagreed and disapproved of the concept of rights he criticized rights such as the right to free speech or the right to assembly or the right to protest he criticized them precisely because they cannot be implemented under a liberal bourgeois country because the state will always come in and eventually override or can always override those rights. So he thought they were abstractions in my conception of Marx and Marxism and the conception of many of my comrades who are more in the libertarian socialist line is precisely that you must have these rights um and that they must be part of any future socialist uh state or or socialist system.

From Brussels To Student Union Politics

SPEAKER_03 33:38

Hmm so where is Marx on free speech generally because he's an he's an editor in Prussia which is another very more on the reactionary end politically so he he's setting up shop in a pretty tough neighborhood um yeah and and papers are being suppressed and closed down so a lot of his lifetime battles are free speech battles aren't they oh absolutely there is and and before I I answer that specifically I want to say that there is only one right which Marx wanted to abolish and that's the right of private property.

SPEAKER_01 34:14

All the other rights were just criticized for not being for the fact that you can't implement them in a in a capitalist country. Yeah Marx Marx spent his his whole life fighting against censorship um he he advocated for for free speech um and that is why it is disappointing to see when Marxists today um join in with liberals in the in the assault on our free speech rights. We obviously all want hate speech not to exist for instance but consider what happens when you empower the state to police free speech suddenly it won't be just um sudden they won't just be policing the people who let's say according to your or my interpretation are doing hate speech but they'll be arresting Palestine protesters for saying from the river to the sea. This is the same thing when the European Union wants to enact hate speech legislation and then the states each nation state in Europe will enact their own specific ones it gives power to the state and the state cannot be trusted with such a power because they will use it against political dissidents. So this sort of so Marx obviously when he was especially in the 1840s um you know he was being arrested he and his comrades were always being persecuted essentially just for writing one of his earliest writings I believe is an advocacy of the freedom of press and and and freedom freedom of of speech um and so I'm I'm one of the leftists uh and in Ireland who who would be opposed to hate speech legislation now this makes me uh obviously there's an there's a there's a shared interest here with the right the right is also saying this but that doesn't make me right wing I have my own ideologically consistent reasons for why I'm opposing hate speech legislation and we see what Trump has done you know uh with with with you know the right right wingers will advocate for um for for so-called free speech and but because the state has powers to police speech they'll they clamp down on pro-palestine protesters for instance so I'm a free speech absolutist yeah yeah well well uh so am I uh I mean that that's uh that there's a have you have you read a book by Jacob Michigama uh free speech from Socrates to social media no that sounds interesting but what is it yeah well um yeah we get your hands on it he came out here um Jacob we brought him out here and he's a fascinating guy Danish um he he's with fire in in the US now and the the running theme through the the the book the book's interesting because he deviates away from the West and he looks at like Muslim um India and and what which was surprisingly progressive for a while but then that leader would go and a new one would come in who was not so permissible.

SPEAKER_03 37:17

I really appreciated the way he was looking outside of the West to for the development of um speech rights and everything. It was really fascinating. It's a fantastic book um but the theme is that as soon as you know people want free speech they get it and then you know they become in power they get into power and then they suppress it and go, oh but well you know but this isn't but but we'll we'll we'll do away with that.

Marxism As A Lens Not Rules

SPEAKER_01 37:43

Because I mean you know I'm old enough to to remember the the early 80s when heavy metal needed to be banned and rap music needed to be banned and there was a whole lot of um and it was all coming from right wing evangelicals actually who were quite empowered under Reagan there was that um there was this uh Christian movement that was very very very um uh censorial and uh and now that there a lot of those people are the ones that's saying that they want free speech but that but that's not what I was used to like I was used to the right not wanting um wanting censorship yes um I wasn't really used to the left so I've been a bit knock knocked around by this to be honest with you uh it just wasn't my experience you know I mean I and I think that if you look at history which we must always look at consider that the left in the 1960s were the ones who were uh organizing the free speech forum so on the on the in the US on the uh campus of Berkeley for instance the the May 68 people in Paris France were adverse ardent advocates of the right to free speech um it was always the left who was pushing for free speech and as you say the right was the one who was trying to curb free speech so this relationship has been reversed and and I think I think that it's quite damaging for the left um and we have lost this idea of that that the left should be transgressive now the left is the one who wants to police um who wants to police speech and police people's behaviors and this comes across to the vast majority of the population um really negatively the idea of the overgrown hall monitor fun police type leftist who tries to come in and and and and police individual behavior this is is part of liberalism this reduction of leftism to an individual policing um to the sectional advocacy of um certain oppressed groups a real narrowing I think of what leftism stands for um and I think that's very unfortunate and leftism should um return to its more more traditional roots to stand for the class the class as a whole and to and stick to its principles um and I I've I am really disappointed when the when members of the Irish left for instance um would push for hate speech legislation given what just happened in the UK where people were being arrested for holding up signs that say I support Palestine action. We must never trust the state and I think that's something that you know libertarians even capitalist libertarians and and libertarian socialists can can agree on.

Radical Democracy Through Workplace Power

SPEAKER_03 40:32

Yeah the UK is an insane I mean New Zealand uh sort of like the states we've been holdouts um when it comes to like hate speech laws and and so forth we don't have the polarization that a lot of the other countries probably have um I know people say like to think we do um but but we really don't not not not not to those levels but but we but but we know some of the stories I hear out of um uh the UK just seem just completely I mean the fact that Kia Starmer and people can still say that they have free speech while all this is happening is very bizarre. Like it it's it's gaslighting it's just it's uh horrendous the the the thing with Palestine action well because we'll move on to protests and this is interesting um you know I I am Jewish and and pro-Israel right I'm pro-palestine too I'm a two-state guy I'm a two-state guy that that hasn't changed and I'm always going to be that guy but um uh uh when when the um Bondi massacre happened and all these uh word came out that all these hate speech laws were being pushed through now the Jewish community is a lot more nuanced on hate speech I think we we definitely do have people even here when when they came up hate speech laws came up after the the the atrocity in Christchurch against our Muslim community there there was a a healthy group of people in the community that that did want suppressions um but there were enough or even more that didn't which was interesting um uh and when I saw what was happening over there there were two things that struck me a lot of the people that were really complaining about the prohibitions on the protests and things like that probably were broadly supportive of hate speech laws five minutes ago now that their own speech because we you know this is one of those games where you never point the finger inward and go, because I've even said to people often if I have debates, I go, well tell me what it is that you like saying that you're prepared to give away and never say again. And they go, well I'm not the problem. You know like that's that's the way people always look at this stuff. So that was one part of it. But the other part of it was that the rhetoric of people that were quite embittered by by the proposed bans see Jews do control society and all this stuff. I thought well how's that helping us I mean that's worse you know I mean what what do neo Nazis say they say Jews control they have an outsized influence and control the media and society and that and and this is just affirming it for a lot of people so we weren't going to be safer anyway you know um I I I yeah I mean Palestine action was interesting. At first I thought I understood the terrorism ban or label to be honest because they had gone on to a military base and and and messed with equipment which is a I would have I would have thought was a red line um but since and and and also the fact that people were wanting to oppose that labeling were getting arrested for just opposing it in a democracy Democracy to me was just insane. But I think there has been court action, hasn't there? And it's been overturned.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

It has been overturned, in fact, yes. Because at the end of the day, when you sort of peacefully um walk and and hold signs and and write to your to your MPs and such, it's the citizen a neutral entity which just uh receives complaints and then acts on those complaints. The state has certain um interests to which it is embedded. And so, for instance, in the case of the UK, um it if they are embedded with arms companies like Lockheed Martin and those uh arms companies, you know, Israel purchases weapons from those arms companies in order um to sort of to sustain its its apartheid regime, um, then people will have to be more militant in opposing that. And so that's why I support those types of of protests. Um the property uh damage to warplanes uh isn't uh a sort of uh a moral um sin in my book at all. And that is something that I would be uh supportive of if it gets the the the results.

SPEAKER_03 45:37

Um no, no, it's it's not a moral sin, I guess, but but in terms of like um being front-facing to the to the world, saying that activists can come in and just mess with your war planes, it's not sending a great message, you know. It's like yeah, that that's what they were probably concerned about, I guess. But but they you know, but they have it in their minds that they can just shut people down now, you know. Like censorship is a is a hungry beast, but it it it's never satiated, it will always eat and want more, and and it becomes whack-a mole, you know? Like they they think that is anything that comes up will just crash.

SPEAKER_01 46:16

Yes, that is why I I don't know if you've ever uh consulted the works of uh Michael Raktenwat, who is another libertarian, but he's quite opposed to to Israel. And he would, for instance, argue from a libertarian perspective that that Israel and the Israel lobby's influence is actually one of the number number one promoters of censorship uh around around the world. Uh the the pro-Israel lobbies, whether in the UK or in America, have been very involved in trying to shut down pro-palestine speech. And so from that perspective, he argues that Israel breaches the non-aggression principle, and Israeli lobbies breach the non-aggression principle because they are actually entities which would clamp down on free speech in the universities and through the the funding mechanisms in America, for instance, AIPAC, um they would they exert an uh like enormous amounts of effort in order to legislate against pro-Palestine speech. Um, and so that's the the libertarian criticism of um Israel's influence would come from that. Um and obviously you have the communist critique of which I agree with that it's a settler colonial regime, but I think it's very important to point out that it is actually Israel who not only is very intent on shutting down pro-palestine speech and also engages in a lot of identity politics around um around the the sort of Jewish identity in order to to push to push this line. I I say that as someone who is also in Hungary, most of us have some sort of Jewish um origin, so do I, uh Jewish ancestry. Um and so I think that's uh why um as a as a communist, and also that's why libertarians should should be anti-anti-Zionist or anti-Israel or at least support the free speech of pro-Palestine protesters.

Soviet Union Democracy And Degeneration

SPEAKER_03 48:20

Yeah, we're gonna disagree a bit on that. I've got a very different cultural view on this. Um now, when it comes to AIPAC and everything, I I'm not as knowledgeable on. I know there has been, like I said before, you know, there are factions in the community that were uh like and and there are factions in any minority community that that it's like censorship sort of makes logical sense to them. It's like someone says something bad, we shut it down, they're not saying the bad thing anymore. I can go about my day and everything's good, but they're not thinking, well, it's still you've broken the it's like what um uh Jonathan Raush says about climate change. It's like so solving climate change by smashing the thermometers. Oh, we can't measure it anymore, so it doesn't exist, you know. Like that's what hate speech laws really do, you know. Um, but there are lots of permissible, and there's a lot of debate out there from uh pro-Israel people too, who are who are debating the issues and wanting to debate the issues. It's very hard to debate Israel and Palestine. I mean, you're probably someone that I could have that debate with. I can feel it, but a lot of people don't want to go there. Um it it's it it's it's hard to go there. See, when you say a settler colonial enterprise, I would compare it more to the Reconquista of Spain. You know, the the the the Muslim uh uh was an empire, it's an empire, you know, and it it it took these lands. The lands under the Turks were very cosmopolitan for a long, long time. And you know, you're Hungarian. I mean, you know, you've had an empire collapse on you. Um when these uh empires collapse, there's often ethnic groups going, okay, well, what now? What happens now? Well, I should own that this piece of land. No, I should own this piece of land. It's not unique. What's happening over there is not unique. It's caught the imagination of the world, but it's not really that unique. But uh to me, if there's a lot of unfortunate things that happened in in there on the Jewish side and the Arab side. I think the Mufti of Jerusalem at the time, Husseini was was pretty, pretty rank. They were selling land to Jews, a lot of Arabs, and saying it's okay, we'll get it back soon when we have our war against them. You know, so there's been all sorts of sort of skullduggery and and and things like that. But for me, it's a decolonization project, actually.

SPEAKER_01 50:52

Yeah, I think we would, I think we would, I think we would we would disagree. I mean, I've I visited, you know, I visited Palestine before. I've been in Ramallah and in and in Masifayat. And it's it's not uh so you know before 1948 and and for a long time, uh Christians, uh Jews, and and Muslims live together peacefully. The criticism of the communists and of the pro-palestine people is is is not the fact that it's you know that there's an ethnic strife, it's that there is a relationship there where there is uh uh a sort of a government funded by uh the West and armed by the West, which which sort of creates a uh uh a dominant, a uh sort of more uh unarmed body that then oppresses the Palestinian population um in order to extract resources from from Palestine. So that is the settler colonial perspective. And what brilliant is that if there is if there is the the solution, obviously, is to dissolve that uh dominant uh and uh submissive relationship, that that's sort of relationship of oppressor and oppressed, and create a state, one state where everybody can live together.

SPEAKER_03 52:10

All the Jews get massacred men.

SPEAKER_01 52:13

The Jews would be massacred.

SPEAKER_03 52:16

There is uh the the Jews would be massacred. We've been the victims of pogroms right through history in all of these countries in the Nagba.

SPEAKER_01 52:24

In the Nagba in 1948, for instance, it was the Western-funded, um British-funded uh Zionist militias which expelled uh close to 800,000 uh Palestinians um from the land of Palestine and established the state. So there is the issue of the establishment of the state of Israel is not just the fact that that Jews live there, but that it comes with uh a specific relationship of oppressor and oppressed, creating an apartheid regime, um which obviously.

Free Speech Versus Hate Speech Laws

SPEAKER_03 53:03

Well, there wasn't there was a civil war. There was a civil war to start with, and then Arab armies came in because they reject the the Palestinian side rejected um partition. So there was a civil war, and and and then, yeah, so the Nakba wasn't as simple as like, right, everyone out. There was actually war that preceded that and also invasion that it was going on at the same time. So it's a bit more complex than that, I think. But um obviously we can spend hours disagreeing on this on this topic. Uh no, but but I'll tell you what though, I'll tell you what, I appreciate being able to talk about it because we don't get a chance to, you know. Um and it's interesting, uh people get very head up about it. Um, and we'd probably get head up about it, but you know, I'm sure we could shake hands at the end of it virtually. Um you on the other side of the world. But um, yeah, it it it's one of those put it this way, I'd rather we spoke about it than then banned each other over it. Like I I don't I don't see how I'm safer or my community safer, or or the um or the conflict is closer to being solved by uh uh uh banning protesters from taking to the streets and talking about it and and and saying what they want to say. That's my issue. A lot of these conflicts are sticky. There's there's bad people on both sides. They're not they're not I mean they're hard to solve because they're not they're not clean cut, they're not clear. When you're not see, this is interesting. When you're not talking about things, then that's how conflicts can become the cowboy with the white hat and the cowboy with the black hat. You know? We you sort of you move, you retreat into your corners, and I think you're not being tested, and I'm not being tested by the other side enough in debate. So our swords aren't being sharpened on each on each other. And what happens is we sort of we get this very singular view of we're completely right.

SPEAKER_01 55:16

The new one is missing. The issue is of isn't you and me debating. Obviously, it's when the state or universities or whoever come in and try to regulate that speech and that exchange. So if we see like the University of Colombia, for instance, and how like students for justice in Palestine were banned, that was before the uh encampment was set up. Like the issue here fundamentally is not one of, you know, between between me and you as people who who are talking about a given issue, I think it's it's always good to bring it back to the idea of the authorities in power who share, who have certain certain interests. And if the University of Colombia, for instance, is invested in arms companies, which which which they were invested in arms companies, and they act on those that some more bureaucratic group of administrators act based on those interests to shut down a campaign for divestment. And and again, it's very important to mention that the that students protesting um at Colombia, for instance, uh, you know, they are merely asking for uh divestment from companies that are associated with the war industry or with Israel, but then the university um comes in and crushes them, then the state actually has certain laws which let's say ban divestment for from Israel. Uh that there is certain laws, state-level laws in the US, which ban that freedom to divest from from Israel, right? So so that that's the issue is that there are certain authorities that that are actually by default um sort of crushing these opposition or oppositional voices.

SPEAKER_03 57:01

I'm 100% with you on that. And and do a and you're right, obviously, that you know, you and I can have the you know, sensible people or whatever. I'm calling myself sensible here, um, can can have these debates, and we'd probably disagree. You'd probably move me slightly, I may move you slightly. That uh we may still stay in the same position, or one of us may flip, who knows what happens, but yeah, it's it's about authority. You're right. No, definitely um totally agree with you there. Uh I I don't think it should happen. I don't think we're any safer for it. I don't think the I don't think the um uh the the conflict gets any closer to being solved. I I don't know really who it helps. I mean, there was a bit of violence in some of those protests. That's different, you know. If we're getting into violence, you know, that's a separate law, you know, there's and there's laws that exist to deal with that. So that's fine. Um one thing, um we earlier on, you know, just still on protest rights and abortion. I presented our submission to the government on safe zones around abortion centers. And and it was really interesting when I was getting into that, because this is one of these topics that I hadn't really um uh uh delved a lot into, especially the activism part of it. Uh and I found it quite interesting. Like it's almost like some of the arguments that the pro-abortion side were using were were very almost prototype woke, you know, like they were there was some bullying aspects there and all that kind of thing. But you know, again, you know, I mean, I can respect a woman's right to choose. But the um what what what was interesting when I was really drilling down into it is they didn't want any sign uh outside it were within a hundred meters. And what they were really concerned about, I thought, and it was ideological, they didn't want people to be persuaded out of it. That's really what was going on. It wasn't about harassment. We have harassment laws. They didn't want someone to turn and reconsider this decision. Now they may not admit that to themselves, but that's clearly what was going on, and that really troubled me because in society we should have the right to try to persuade that's democracy, isn't it?

Palestine Activism And Protest Policing

SPEAKER_01 59:28

In so far as insofar as this this specific case, um, I mean, I've seen you know uh Catholic fundamentalists sort of try to to be at the abortion clinics and and sort of harass people, and that's something that that should be absolutely opposed. And and I I haven't looked into this submission or whatever. I think there are certain restrictions which which which should be made to keep to keep those people away. But in general, I do see uh that's not the specific case, but when in universities um there is certain um debates um or debating societies or certain ideas around uh safe spaces which just serve as a way to keep uh people away from from different opinions. I I disagree, I disagree um with those. And I also I will tell you a story about my time as TCDSU president when um when I advocated for a policy of uh free free speech, free debate, but in a way, and this is also very important, in a way that there is always a place for speakers' questions at the end, because what the university used to do, for instance, was to bring in government ministers and have them have a little talk at a university seminar room, but they wouldn't allow students or any members of the public to put forward questions to them. That is also a form of safe space, but a safe space for the government ministers and the government politicians. I I disagree with uh and with uh this uh concept that the university should be uh a safe space. It actually should be a uh space for confrontation, and that's very infantilizing and patronizing when uh students are being kept away and it's protected. It's this sort of welfherism, is what some of my friends and uh some writers have called it. Felice Basbol's work is very good on this. She's part of this free speech Ireland uh group here, the the Irish Irish group. Uh, she calls it a form of welfareism. Uh, this incessant focus on the welfare of students, which comes at the expense of them being um uh sort of exposed to, so they're not allowed to be exposed to confrontational or controversial opinions. I'll say my opinions are controversial. I'm a communist. That's certainly a controversial view. Should we just all bend the knee to the to the liberal consensus and never be able to challenge it? What about uh the views of people on um immigration? There was uh an event uh held at UCD, uh, which was sort of anti anti-immigration, it wasn't anything inflammatory, um or or racist, I would say, but that event was deplatformed. I, as a communist, said, and that event had right-wingers at it speaking at it. I as a communist said the most revolutionary thing is to go in there and uh ask a question. Why are you talking about migration and and not about class, for instance? What for me as but obviously on on the topic of migration, I I I also have certain views which um which don't exactly align with with the liberal view of open borders.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:52

Yeah, I heard you talking about them. Like I I think I'm very similar. Like I'm uh being brought up in a working class neighborhood. Um, we had a lot of Polynesians coming over from the Pacific Islands at that time when I was a child. Um, and it would clog hospital waiting rooms and things like that, not in a not in one of our more affluent suburbs, in in my suburb, right? Now, we have Polynesians in our family now. I mean, that that's that's all fine. It was never about that. But you know, there are there are there is an infrastructure, there are infrastructure questions that you have to answer to make this stuff work. And it's not and it's going to affect the the working class people more. Um, you'd agree with that, wouldn't you?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:35

Yeah, that would, but that was exactly just my my critique. It's not a critique, my critique isn't a critique of migration per se. You know, I I don't share any of uh uh racialist uh right-wing ideology. My my simple uh issue that I raised amongst the socialist left is that the the way that the the state is conducting its migration policy is that it doesn't really plan ahead for for infrastructure and this causes tensions in the community. That was a point that I had argued uh uh for a long time, that you should make a critique of how the state is handling it its migration policy. Now, I also want to point out, and I think this is an important point to make, is the typical socialist position on migration used to be for decades that wasn't open borders. It was that the migration should uh is controlled by you know by any socialist state didn't have open borders, they all had had had borders and and migration was was controlled. And it will probably be in the future if you have a socialist state, migration will be controlled by the working class to the benefit of the of the working of the working class. Socialism is also, this is why I say all the time, socialism is not a set of fixed policies. Some socialist uh revolutions in Nicaragua, for instance, combine socialism with pro-life positions. Um, and I'm not I'm not a pro-lifer, I am fully for abortion rights. But what I am trying to, the point I'm trying to make here is that for a socialist revolution to succeed, you have to deal with the concrete realities of the of the country you're in and and the context that that you are in. So if in Likoraiva our socialists had to rely on a Catholic form of socialism, then that is what they have to do. And that's still a revolution to be supported. Uh, and you don't you shouldn't do purity tests all the time because reality is complex and often demand certain sacrifices.

Buffer Zones And The Safe Space

SPEAKER_03 1:05:39

Well well, my my community growing up being heavily, you know, a lot of Māori, a lot of Polynesians, many of them were were staunchly Christian. It's still quite socially conservative out there. Um that's just the way it is. But they're gonna vote left. They want to vote left, you know? And and they're voting faux left. Left at the moment. They're voting for parties that call themselves left that probably aren't really left. But no, that's right. Um, just just before we go, I just want to make one comment on um or you know, test you know what what you think of the whole idea with um uh some of the resentment in in the right becoming more racialized and and and and things like that. They're very out there with it now. I I they think the answer is conservatism and kicking all these people out and all that kind of thing. I wonder if a lot of this alienation comes from economics. You know, the a lot of people don't, a lot of young men probably don't think that they can uh they'll never buy property now. Uh wages are very poor. Um, it's gonna be hard for them to attract a um a wife, even like uh that kind of stuff. Do you think there could be aspects of that today?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:59

Well, of course it comes from well, I mean, uh a lot of this um uh a lot of the anti-immigration sentiment without a doubt comes from uh economic insecurity and the the gap that has been left um because uh our our leftists weren't able to speak to these people, weren't able to provide an answer. It it comes as a result of that. I mean, and it you see this in history when there is a period of economic insecurity and economic anxiety, and there is no like leading left-wing force, then people turn to the right wing and and people become more xenophobic and become more racionized. So this not a simple question of this uh this moral sin that these people are committing by being racists. It's not just that. This it's not something you can just denounce. You denounce racism, you counter-protest it. Not not you have to actually provide provide an answer, and that answer lies in in economics, an alternative vision. That's what you have to do. You can't just go out on the streets and shout at these anti-racist demos and shame people into not being racists. It goes back to the economics. Yeah, no, 100%.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:17

I will have had you over an hour, so we probably should wrap it up, but um, I I really appreciate you giving of your time here. Um, you're you you you're smart, you, you, you're able, you are able to sort of lay everything out in such a clear and fantastic way. Um, so I really appreciate you doing this for us. Um, it's important that we we are living through a time where a lot of people will think, who are on the right, will think, well, you know, uh the left are just completely opposed to free speech and we need to fight them. And that's not the case. Um, and and this is why voices like you are so important. I was actually joking to one of the colleagues that because we were going to do this a a couple of weeks ago, but you had a protest to to run away to, uh, we didn't get on to, which is a bit of a shame, but that's all right. Um, and and I made the comment that uh uh a woke person won't do the podcast. A genuine Marxist will, but they'll cancel because they'll have a protest to go to anyway.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:20

It's the way it tends to work, I've found, and that's my experience. So thank you so much, Leslo. It's been wonderful.

Migration Tensions Infrastructure And Rightward Drift

SPEAKER_01 1:09:26

I look forward to I look forward to seeing it uh published, and thank you very much.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:31

Thank you for listening to Free to Speak. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and consider sharing the podcast with others. We release new episodes regularly, and subscribing is the easiest way to stay up to date. If you have any questions, feedback or suggestions, you can contact us at podcast at fsu.nz. If you want to find out more about the New Zealand Free Speech Union, visit fsu.nz.