"This is a fictional dialogue between characters created for philosophical and artistic purposes. I do not necessarily endorse the viewpoints of any of the characters involved." - ContraPoints
"Political videos tend not to be interpreted very charitably (I know this video is going to be upheld by centrists as evidence I’ve “gone full Antifa” and by leftists that I’m a closet centrist) so I’d better state unambiguously what I think.
The character Tabby represents a lot of what I think is wrong about leftist strategy: the indifference to optics, the undisguised hostility to the ideologically impure, the sectarian nitpicking, the alternation between extreme optimism (“a communist revolution can happen in the United States and it will go well if it does”) and extreme pessimism (“neoliberal propaganda has so tight a grip on the general public that why should we even bother trying to appeal to them?”), the blurring of lines between recognizing the necessity of violence in certain situations and the aesthetic celebration of violence as an end in itself.
Nevertheless I try to represent Tabby with some sympathy, and anticipate that my viewers will like her—my audience is at least 95% trans Antifa cat girls, but I hope that doesn’t prevent them from thinking about the critique. The character Justine is a mouthpiece for a lot of my complaints about the left, and the recipient of some leftist criticisms of me (“you go to brunch with these people?”), but I chose not to represent her as an attractive alternative. She’s complacent, frivolous, and ineffective, full of derision for the way other leftists do things but not contributing much for her own part either. When a fascist comes knocking on the door it’s better to have Tabby there than Justine. To see if Justine can put her money where her mouth is we’d have to see what speech she delivers following the fascist speech. This YouTube channel is effectively my attempt to make that speech, and I can’t be the one who judges how successful it is." -ContraPoints