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Vaush Facts

This page is still a work in progress. This means some information may be incomplete, or some links may be broken.

Fact 1. Vaush claimed Marx and Lenin would have voted for Biden.

Fact 2. Vaush clams that Marxism is an ‘extension of liberalism’.

Fact 3. Vaush refers to himself as a liberal.

Fact 4. Vaush (a cis man) called the non-binary lefty Youtuber ThoughtSlime ‘fragile’ and ‘dumb’ for his opinion on gender abolition.

Fact 5. [CW: pedophilia] Vaush stated “there’s a difference between exploring child sexuality and sexualising children” then went on to ‘joke’ about owning CP. link

Fact 6. Vaush has engaged in forms of Holocaust denial, using common nazi dogwhistles and believes the numbers are inflated as propaganda.

Fact 7. Vaush (a cis man) claims “Trans people do not have a better understanding of trans-ness…"

Fact 8. [CW: pedophilia] Vaush said: “If you are not paying for child pornography there is no argument in favour of morally condeming people who view it.

Fact 9. Vaush said Black people trying to preserve their culture (that was systematically eradicated) is “exactly the same as white nationalism”.

Fact 10. Vaush argued passionately against socialists demanding a $25/hour minimum wage.

Fact 11. Vaush uses the n-bomb unironically for some fucking reason.

Fact 12. [CW: sexual harassment] Vaush is a self-confessed sexual harasser. link Despite this ‘apology’ he went on to ‘joke’ about scaring his victim into shutting up link He said he had ‘done nothing to feel remorseful for’ link and ‘nothing to apologise over’ link. In fact, his own sysadmin suggested he change his handle link to hide from sexual harassment allegations.

Fact 13. [CW: pedophilia] Vaush appears to have a pre-occupation with paedophilia. He:

Asked if anyone had ever fucked a minor as an adult.

Replied with “unironically hot.”

Asked someone “what did pedos ever do to you?

Refered to ‘Salem Pedophile trials..

Joined in this conversation about child-sex bots.

Fact 14. [CW: pedophilia] Vaush has defended the consumption of child pornogrpahy because ‘there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism’. link This paints a deeply troubling picture when added to his history of sexually innapropriate behaviour (see Vaush Fact 8), his sharing of drawn CP on Twitter (see Vaush Fact 21) , his claim that under socialism the age of consent “should be lowered” link and this exchange on Discord. link

Fact 15. Vaush admits to being an informant when he lived in Santa Monica, California. He admits to revealing activist identities to the FBI.

Fact 16. Vaush is explicitly anti left-unity: “God, I fucking hate leftists. There is no left unity with me."

Fact 17. Vaush had a meltdown when someone in his chat joked that he couldn’t get laid, and responded with ““Do you have any idea who the fuck you’re talking to? When I got off Tinder because of the fucking quarantine, Tacoma wept. Even ignoring the fact that I have a girlfriend, even if we’re just talking like randos, I’m two hours away right now from being inside someone else. I have two skills -it’s non-monogamy and speaking publicly, okay? Do some fucking research!”.”

Fact 18. [CW: pedophilia] An ‘old close friend’ of Vaush has alleged that Vaush once admitted to viewing images of child pornography. link

Fact 19. Vaush unironically endorsed Keynesian economics, stating “I feel neo-Keynesian economists have the answer.”

Fact 20. Vaush called the LGBT community ‘cancerous as fuck.’ because there’s a “ton of mental illness” and said they should be “excised from the left.” He also called them “less than human” and “fucking disgusting”.

Fact 21. Vaush said that a “large portion of the left is predicated on shared mental illness.” He then doubled down in a future video.

Fact 22. [CW: pedophilia] I’m not going to link to it for obvious reasons, but here’s Vaush admitting to ownership of a Twitter account that shares drawn child pornography. link

Fact 23. Vaush claimed that he was taken out of context when he called trans people ‘mentally ill’, then doubled down and did it again.

Fact 24. Vaush posted a meme saying that socialism must be ‘balanced with minority rights’, a clear nod to class reductionists.

Fact 25. ContraPoints defended Buck Angel’s transphobia. Vaush called trans people who were critical of this “worthless, mentally ill, basement dweller fucking queer people with absolutely nothing to offer the world” and “degenerates sucking off the back of society like a leech”.

Fact 26. Vaush told his followers to vote for Joe Biden while saying of ‘tankies’ (a term used to refer to all Marxist-Leninists by his followers): “Mock them, socially ostracise them, kick them out of your communities. What sort of leftist advocates voting for liberals while ostracising communists?

Fact 27. Vaush freely admits to calling black and trans people ‘subhuman’.

Fact 28. In response to a Tweet saying the left ‘should stand up for the weak and vulnerable’ Vaush replied “Yeah, enjoy your Left, built on weakness and a collective inability to criticise one another. I’ll be over here building my left, which isn’t full of mentally ill crybabies desperately carving out safe spaces and whining about criticism. Debate it if you want, elsewise fuck off”

Fact 29. Vaush called trans people ‘removed’ for taking offence when misgendered“

Fact 30. Vaush Tweeted a literal Nazi meme – glorifying the Nazi-allied Finland for fighting against the USSR in WWII.

Fact 31. Vaush defended saying “fuck trans people” by claiming he has a ‘6-figure’ income for some reason.

Fact 32. Vaush called the Marxist, Iraqi YouTuber Hakim a ‘pseudo-fascist’ and a ‘cancer on online discourse’ because he said Biden will be worse on foreign policy than Trump. Vaush then had a ‘debate’ with Hakim where he politely agreed with everything Hakim said. Following that debate (mere moments after Hakim had left) Vaush said “a lot of tankies are aesthetically and functionally indistinguishable from neo-Nazis”.

Fact 33. Responding to Hakim’s video on George Orwell, Vaush defends Orwell for being a government informant, calls the USSR fascist, implies Stalinists are worse than Nazis, claims the USSR was allied with the Nazis, says that Hakim (an Iraqi) should have been abducted by the Americans at the start of the Iraq war and forcibly indoctrinated in US propaganda for 20 years, and more. (Full Thread)

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The Information Research Department (IRD)

The Wikipedia article for this organization is damning enough:

The IRD was a secret Cold War propaganda department of the British Foreign Office, created to publish anti-communist propaganda, including black propaganda, provide support and information to anti-communist politicians, academics, and writers, and to use weaponised information, but also disinformation and “fake news” to attack not only its original targets but also certain socialists and anti-colonial movements. Soon after its creation, the IRD broke away from focusing solely on Soviet matters and began to publish pro-colonial propaganda intended to suppress pro-independence revolutions in Asia, Africa, Ireland, and the Middle East. The IRD was heavily involved in the publishing of books, newspapers, leaflets, journals, and even created publishing houses to act as propaganda fronts, such as Ampersand Limited. Operating for 29 years, the IRD is known as the longest-running covert government propaganda department in British history, the largest branch of the Foreign Office, and the first major anglophone propaganda offensive against the USSR since the end of World War II. By the 1970s, the IRD was performing military intelligence tasks for the British Military in Northern Ireland during The Troubles.

The IRD was the government department to which George Orwell submitted his list of suspected Communists (Orwell’s list), including many prominent people such as Charlie Chaplin, Paul Robeson, and Michael Redgrave. With the help of Orwell’s widow Sonia Orwell and his former publisher Fredric Warburg, the IRD gained the foreign rights to much of Orwell’s work and spent years distributing Animal Farm onto every continent, translating Orwell’s works into 20 different languages, funding the creation of an animated feature film based on Animal Farm, and working with the CIA to create the feature-length Animal Farm animated movie, the first of its kind in British history. Many historians have noted how Orwell’s literary reputation can largely be credited to joint propaganda operations between the IRD and CIA. The IRD heavily marketed Animal Farm for audiences in the middle-east in an attempt to sway Arab nationalism and independence activists from seeking Soviet aid, as it was believed by IRD agents that a story featuring pigs as the villains would appeal highly towards Muslim audiences. The IRD funded the activities of many authors including Arthur Koestler, Bertrand Russell, and Robert Conquest.

Internationally, IRD agents took part in many historic events, including Britain’s entry into the European Economic Community, the Korean War, the Suez Crisis, the Malayan Emergency, The Troubles, the Mau Mau Uprising, Cyprus Emergency, and the Sino-Indian War. Other IRD activities included forging letters and posters, conducting smear attacks against British trade unionists, and attacking opponents of the British military by planting fake news stories in the British press. Some of these fabricated stories the IRD created included accusations that Irish republicans were killing dogs by setting them on fire, and falsely accusing EOKA members of raping schoolgirls.

Although the existence of the IRD was successfully kept hidden from the British public until the 1970s, the Soviet Union had always been aware of its existence, for Guy Burgess had been posted to IRD for a period of two months in 1948. Burgess was later sacked by the IRD’s founder Christopher Mayhew, who accused him of being “dirty, drunk and idle”. The IRD closed its operations in 1977 after its existence was discovered by British journalists after an investigation into a heavy amount of anti-Soviet propaganda being published by academics belonging to St Antony’s College, Oxford. An exposé published in The Guardian titled by David Leigh “Death of the Department that Never Was”, became the first public acknowledgement of the IRD’s existence.

— Wikipedia. Information Research Department

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The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)

The CFR is a powerful and influential organization, sometimes called “Wall Street’s Think Tank”, which represents the interests of the capitalist ruling class in the United States and plays a significant role in shaping U.S. foreign policy in favour of corporate and imperialistic interests, while downplaying the needs of the working class and other marginalized groups. Founded in 1921, the CFR is a private non-profit headquartered in New York City. Its funding comes from membership dues, corporate sponsorships, foundation grants, and individual donations.

Membership is by invitation only (typically proposed by current CFR members), prospective members must undergo a rigorous nomination and vetting process based on their expertise, experience, and potential contributions to the CFR’s mission.

• Imperialist: The recommendations made by the CFR often reflect imperialistic goals aimed at maintaining and expanding U.S. global dominance. It advocates for military interventions, economic sanctions, and other measures that serve the interests of multinational corporations and the capitalist ruling class, even at the expense of other nations and peoples.
• Influential: Government officials, policymakers, and media outlets have very close ties to the CFR. The organization’s concerning influence on foreign policy decisions leads to policies that prioritize capitalist interests over broader social and humanitarian concerns.
• Undemocratic: There is a lack of transparency and democratic accountability in the CFR’s operations. The organization is not subject to public scrutiny or electoral processes, allowing its members to exert considerable influence on U.S. foreign policy behind closed doors.
• Neoliberal: The CFR’s policy recommendations tend to align with neoliberal economic principles, advocating for free trade, deregulation, and privatization. This approach is seen as promoting corporate interests at the expense of workers’ rights, social welfare, and economic equality.

In the Whitehouse

Biden’s current administration is comprised of a (perhaps) shocking number of CFR members:

The CFR is funded and led by members of the old plutocracy. For example, David Rockefeller was the CFR’s chair for fifteen years and has been its leading financial donor historically. No less than seventeen Biden team members (out of thirty total, or 56.7 percent) are members of, have close family ties to, or are otherwise connected to the CFR (see box on page 3). These include: vice president Kamala Harris; secretary of state Antony Blinken; secretary of the treasury Janet Yellen; secretary of defense Lloyd Austin; CIA head William J. Burns; national security advisor Jake Sullivan; secretary of agriculture Thomas Vilsack; secretary of commerce Gina Raimondo; secretary of homeland security Alejandro Mayorkas; chief of staff Ron Klain; climate envoy John Kerry; domestic council chief Susan Rice; Indo-Pacific coordinator Kurt M. Campbell; ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield; chief of Council of Economic Advisers Cecilia Rouse; director of science and technology Eric S. Lander; and counselor Jeffery Zients. All have at least a minimum level of commitment to the CFR, in the sense of having the necessary connections, making the effort needed to become a member, and paying expensive annual dues. Several of this group are especially close to the Council. For example, Blinken is not only a CFR member, but his wife, father, and uncle are also members. Since 2004, Blinken has also often donated to the Council’s annual fund drive. Kerry, a Boston Brahman member of the old money plutocracy whose family wealth exceeds a billion dollars, has at least four other family members in the CFR. Rouse has been a director of the Council since 2018. Vilsack was the cochair of a CFR independent task force study group in 2007. Many have spoken at CFR meetings, such as Mayorkas in June 2011.

Vice President Harris and Chief of Staff Klain are the only ones of the seventeen listed in the box on page 3 who are not members but are tied to the CFR by family. Harris’s sister Maya, who was her campaign manager, has been a Council member since 2013. Klain’s wife, Monica Media, was elected to CFR membership in 2016.3

Although not currently a CFR member, National Security Advisor Sullivan also has close ties to the Council. In recent years, he has written no less than five articles for the CFR’s in-house journal Foreign Affairs, and spoken at the CFR’s New York headquarters.

Finally, Biden himself was allowed to write an article for Foreign Affairs during the presidential campaign. Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren were the only presidential candidates invited to advertise themselves and their ideas in Foreign Affairs during the 2019–20 election period.

— Lawrence Shoup. (2021). The Council on Foreign Relations, the Biden Team, and Key Policy Outcomes

Additional Resources

• The American Empire and its Media | Swiss Policy Research (2017)
• Wall Street’s Think Tank: The Council on Foreign Relations and the Empire of Neoliberal Geopolitics, 1976-2019 | Lawrence Shoup (2019)

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The U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM)

The USAGM is a federal agency of the United States government responsible for overseeing and funding U.S. government-supported media organizations that provide news, information, and cultural programming to audiences around the world. It was formerly known as the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) until 2018 when the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017 restructured and rebranded it as the USAGM.

Despite many of these organization’s claims to the contrary, it should be obvious that none of them are unbiased and all of them have an agenda.

“Freedom of the press” in bourgeois society means freedom for the rich systematically, unremittingly, daily, in millions of copies, to deceive, corrupt and fool the exploited and oppressed mass of the people, the poor.

— V. I. Lenin. (1917). How to Guarantee the Success of the Constituent Assembly

USAGM oversees several media organizations, including:

Radio Free Europe

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) was initially established during the Cold War to broadcast to audiences in countries under Soviet influence. It was funded by the United States government through the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) until 1971 when it was reorganized as a private, non-profit corporation, the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Incorporated.

Radio Free Asia

Radio Free Asia (RFA) is a sister organization to RFE/RL, both sharing similar missions. RFA was established in 1996 with funding from the U.S. government, specifically through the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB), which is now part of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM). Similar to RFE/RL, RFA has also received grants from the NED to support some of its activities.

Middle East Broadcasting Networks

Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN) was established in 2004 and targets Arabic-speaking audiences in the Middle East. From MBN’s USAGM profile:

MBN is an Arabic-language news organization with a weekly audience of 27.4 million people in 22 countries in the Middle East and North Africa. …

Alhurra and Alhurra-Iraq are 24/7 Arabic-language television networks that provide news and analysis to more than 15.7 million viewers each week. Its in-depth discussion programs provide points of view from throughout the region and the U.S.

Office of Cuba Broadcasting

Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), headquartered in Miami, operates Radio and Television Martí, providing news and information to audiences in Cuba. From OCB’s USAGM profile:

The Martís are a multimedia hub of news, information and analysis that provide the people of Cuba with interactive programs seven days a week through satellite television and shortwave and AM radio, as well as through emails, DVDs, and SMS text. Combined with the online platform, radiotelevisionmarti.com, the Martís are a one-of-a-kind service that brings unbiased, objective information to all Cubans.

Voice of America

Voice of America (VOA) provides news and information in more than 40 languages, reaching a global audience. From VOA’s USAGM profile:

Voice of America provides trusted and objective news and information in 48 languages to a measured weekly audience of more than 326 million people around the world. For more than 80 years, VOA journalists have told American stories and supplied content that many people cannot get locally: objective news and information about the US, their specific region and the world. VOA uses the devices and platforms target markets use to connect audiences on five continents with the people, thoughts and institutions that make America unique.

VOA uses digital, web and mobile media to engage viewers, listeners, users, and friends. Radio and television broadcast to approximately 3,500 affiliates and satellite transmissions reach countries where free speech is banned or where civil society is under threat.

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The National Endowment for Democracy (NED)

The NED is an organization based in the United States that was established in 1983 and is funded through an annual appropriation from the U.S. Congress. Its creation was authorized by the National Endowment for Democracy Act, signed into law by President Ronald Reagan. The NED’s primary purpose is to promote and spread the United State’s values and version of democracy around the world and advancing its foreign policy objectives.

The NED operates by providing grants to a wide range of organizations, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), civic groups, labor unions, media outlets, political parties, etc. These organizations, in turn, implement programs that align with U.S. foreign policy interests, often under the guise of protecting human rights, promoting free and fair elections, etc.

In a nutshell, the idea of what was to become NED arose as a response to revelations about covert CIA efforts to promote democracy, and was debated periodically in Congress between 1967 and 1983. NED was funded initially entirely by Congress, chaired initially by the chairman of the relevant congressional committee, and formally incorporated on the day a congressional conference committee finally decided to authorize spending for it.

…NED acknowledges its ongoing relationship with lawmakers, saying that its “continued funding is dependent on the continued support of the White House and Congress.” Those who spearheaded creation of NED have long acknowledged it was part of an effort to move from covert to overt efforts to foster democracy. President Reagan said in 1983 that “this program will not be hidden in the shadows. It will stand proudly in the spotlight, and that’s where it belongs.” Allen Weinstein, a former acting president of NED and one of the authors of the study that led to its creation, told David Ignatius in a 1991 interview that: “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA. The biggest difference is that when such activities are done overtly, the flap potential is close to zero. Openness is its own protection.”

— ProPublica. (2010). The National Endowment for Democracy Responds to Our Burma Nuclear Story – And Our Response

An article written by David Ignatius, which contains more details and context, can be found here: Innocence Abroad: The New World of spyless Coups

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The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

The CIA is an instrument of capitalist imperialism and covert interventionism which serves the interests of the ruling (Capitalist) class in the United States. It works to maintain global dominance and advance U.S. geopolitical interests: subjugating nations, exploiting their resources, and preventing the rise of Socialist or anti-imperialist movements.

Methods including coups, assassinations, and support for right-wing regimes are used to undermine sovereign nations and popular movements that challenge Capitalist hegemony.

The CIA’s historical association with anti-Communist activities is a significant concern for us. During the Cold War, the CIA was involved in countering Socialist and Communist movements around the world, often collaborating with repressive regimes and engaging in propaganda campaigns against leftist ideologies. The CIA’s secretive nature and lack of transparency make it susceptible to abuses of power. The agency’s covert operations are a way for Capitalist interests to exert control without public scrutiny, undermining democratic principles.

• The CIA is a Terrorist Organization | SecondThought (2020)
• Former CIA Agent John Stockwell Talks about How the CIA Worked in Vietnam and Elsewhere
• CIA Officer Frank Snepp Discusses Planting Stories in Vietnam
• John Pilger interviews former CIA Latin America chief Duane Clarridge, 2015
• Kissinger and the CIA in Chile: An Interview With Peter Kornbluh, Part I | Truthdig (2023)

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Ideological State Apparatuses

“Ideological State Apparatuses” (ISAs) is a concept introduced by the French Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser. According to Althusser, the state, as a dominant institution, uses various mechanisms to maintain its control and influence over society. ISAs are one of the key components of this control apparatus, alongside the “Repressive State Apparatuses” (RSAs), which involve institutions that use force or coercion to uphold state power, such as the police and military.

Ideological State Apparatuses encompass a wide range of institutions, practices, and organizations that disseminate dominant ideologies, beliefs, values, and norms within society. Their primary function is to secure the consent and conformity of individuals to the ruling ideology, thereby maintaining the existing social order and perpetuating the hegemony of the ruling class.

This series highlights some of the major institutions which operate(d) in this sphere.

• The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA): The CIA can be understood as both an Ideological State Apparatus and a Repressive State Apparatus. While its primary function is espionage and intelligence gathering, it is also involved in shaping ideological narratives and perceptions, both within the U.S. and abroad.
• The National Endowment for Democracy (NED): The NED functions as an indirect Ideological State Apparatus by providing funding to various organizations that support democratic development and human rights advocacy worldwide.
• The U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM): Through its broadcasting and media activities, the USAGM disseminates information and narratives that align with the dominant U.S. foreign policy objectives and promote American values and interests abroad.
• The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR): The CFR is composed of influential individuals from various sectors, such as business, academia, and media, who shape and promote a particular worldview regarding U.S. foreign policy and global affairs. Through its forums, publications, and policy recommendations, the CFR disseminates ideas and perspectives that align with the interests of the capitalist ruling class. It contributes to the legitimization of American imperialism, neoliberal economic policies, and the promotion of corporate interests in the realm of foreign affairs.
• The Information Research Department (IRD): Now officially defunct, the IRD was a propaganda department of the British Foreign Office, created to publish anti-Communist propaganda, including false flag propaganda, provide support and information to anti-Communist politicians, academics, and writers, and to use weaponized information, disinformation, and “fake news” to attack not only the Soviets, but also Socialist and anti-colonial movements.

These organizations are all part of a larger project of U.S. imperialism; they seek to control the flow of information, undermine independent media, and advance American geopolitical interests in the regions in which they operate. Rather than providing an objective and impartial news source, the media outlets funded and amplified by these organizations are tools of U.S. foreign policy, which help shape the narrative in ways that serve the interests of the U.S. government and its allies.

Additional Resources

Video Essays:

• You’ve Never Had an Original Thought (Media Manipulation and “Freedom” of the Press) | Hakim (2022)
• Why Is US Media Becoming More Right-Wing? | Second Thought (2022)
• Why “Hearing Both Sides” Is Dangerous | Second Thought (2022)
• Who Funds And Controls The Online Right? | Yugopnik (2022)
• You’re Not Immune To Propaganda | Second Thought (2023)
• Why Is There So Much Right-Wing Media? | Second Thought (2023)

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George Orwell (real name Eric Arthur Blair) was many things: a rapist, a bitter anti-Communist, a colonial cop, a racist, a Hitler apologist, a plagiarist, a snitch, and a CIA puppet.

Rapist

…in 1921, Eric had tried to rape Jacintha. Previously the young couple had kissed, but now, during a late summer walk, he had wanted more. At only five feet to his six feet and four inches, Jacintha had shouted, screamed and kicked before running home with a torn skirt and bruised hip. It was “this” rather than any gradual parting of the ways that explains why Jacintha broke off all contact with her childhood friend, never to learn that he had transformed himself into George Orwell.

— Kathryn Hughes. (2007). Such were the joys

Bitter anti-Communist

[F]ighting with the loyalists in Spain in the 1930s… he found himself caught up in the sectarian struggles between the various left-wing factions, and since he believed in a gentlemanly English form of socialism, he was inevitably on the losing side.

The communists, who were the best organised, won out and Orwell had to leave Spain… From then on, to the end of his life, he carried on a private literary war with the communists, determined to win in words the battle he had lost in action…

Orwell imagines no new vices, for instance. His characters are all gin hounds and tobacco addicts, and part of the horror of his picture of 1984 is his eloquent description of the low quality of the gin and tobacco.

He foresees no new drugs, no marijuana, no synthetic hallucinogens. No one expects an s.f. writer to be precise and exact in his forecasts, but surely one would expect him to invent some differences. …if 1984 must be considered science fiction, then it is very bad science fiction. …

To summarise, then: George Orwell in 1984 was, in my opinion, engaging in a private feud with Stalinism, rather that attempting to forecast the future. He did not have the science fictional knack of foreseeing a plausible future and, in actual fact, in almost all cases, the world of 1984 bears no relation to the real world of the 1980s.

— Isaac Asimov. Review of 1984

Ironically, the world of 1984 is mostly projection, based on Orwell’s own job at the British Ministry of Information during WWII. (Orwell: The Lost Writings)

• He translated news broadcasts into Basic English, with a 1000 word vocabulary (“Newspeak”), for broadcast to the colonies, including India.
• His description of the low quality of the gin and tobacco came from the Ministry’s own canteen, described by other ex-employees as “dismal”.
• Room 101 was an actual meeting room at the BBC.
• “Big Brother” seems to have been a senior staffer at the Ministry of Information, who was actually called that (but not to his face) by staff.

After all, by his own admission, his only knowledge of the USSR was secondhand:

I have never visited Russia and my knowledge of it consists only of what can be learned by reading books and newspapers.

— George Orwell. (1947). Orwell’s Preface to the Ukrainian Edition of Animal Farm

1984 is supposedly a cautionary tale about what would happen if the Communists won, and yet it was based on his own, actual, Capitalist country and his job serving it.

Colonial Cop

I was sub-divisional police officer of the town, and in an aimless, petty kind of way anti-European feeling was very bitter. … As a police officer I was an obvious target and was baited whenever it seemed safe to do so. When a nimble Burman tripped me up on the football field and the referee (another Burman) looked the other way, the crowd yelled with hideous laughter. This happened more than once. In the end the sneering yellow faces of young men that met me everywhere, the insults hooted after me when I was at a safe distance, got badly on my nerves. The young Buddhist priests were the worst of all. There were several thousands of them in the town and none of them seemed to have anything to do except stand on street corners and jeer at Europeans.

All this was perplexing and upsetting.

— George Orwell. (1936). Shooting an Elephant

Hitler Apologist

I should like to put it on record that I have never been able to dislike Hitler. Ever since he came to power—till then, like nearly everyone, I had been deceived into thinking that he did not matter—I have reflected that I would certainly kill him if I could get within reach of him, but that I could feel no personal animosity. The fact is that there is something deeply appealing about him.

— George Orwell. (1940). Review of Adolph Hitler’s “Mein Kampf”

Orwell not only admired Hitler, he actually blamed the Left in England for WWII:

If the English people suffered for several years a real weakening of morale, so that the Fascist nations judged that they were ‘decadent’ and that it was safe to plunge into war, the intellectual sabotage from the Left was partly responsible. …and made it harder than it had been before to get intelligent young men to enter the armed forces. Given the stagnation of the Empire, the military middle class must have decayed in any case, but the spread of a shallow Leftism hastened the process.

— George Orwell. (1941). England Your England

Plagiarist

1984

It is a book in which one man, living in a totalitarian society a number of years in the future, gradually finds himself rebelling against the dehumanising forces of an omnipotent, omniscient dictator. Encouraged by a woman who seems to represent the political and sexual freedom of the pre-revolutionary era (and with whom he sleeps in an ancient house that is one of the few manifestations of a former world), he writes down his thoughts of rebellion – perhaps rather imprudently – as a 24-hour clock ticks in his grim, lonely flat. In the end, the system discovers both the man and the woman, and after a period of physical and mental trauma the protagonist discovers he loves the state that has oppressed him throughout, and betrays his fellow rebels. The story is intended as a warning against and a prediction of the natural conclusions of totalitarianism.

This is a description of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, which was first published 60 years ago on Monday. But it is also the plot of Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We, a Russian novel originally published in English in 1924.

— Paul Owen. (2009). 1984 thoughtcrime? Does it matter that George Orwell pinched the plot?

Animal Farm

Having worked for a time at The Ministry of Information, [Gertrude Elias] was well acquainted with one Eric Blair (George Orwell), who was an editor there. In 1941, Gertrude showed him some of her drawings, which were intended as a kind of story board for an entirely original satirical cartoon film, with the Nazis portrayed as pig characters ruling a farm in a kind of dysfunctional fairy story. Her idea was that a writer might be able to provide a text.

Having claimed to her that there was not much call for her idea… Orwell later changed the pig-nazis to Communists and made the Soviet Union a target for his hostility, turning Gertrude’s notion on its head. (Incidentally, a running theme in all every single piece of Orwell’s work was to steal ideas from Communists and invert them so as to distort the message.)

— Graham Stevenson. Elias, Gertrude (1913-1988)

Snitch

“Orwell’s List” is a term that should be known by anyone who claims to be a person of the left. It was a blacklist Orwell compiled for the British government’s Information Research Department, an anti-communist propaganda unit set up for the Cold War.

The list includes dozens of suspected communists, “crypto-communists,” socialists, “fellow travelers,” and even LGBT people and Jews — their names scribbled alongside the sacrosanct 1984 author’s disparaging comments about the personal predilections of those blacklisted.

— Ben Norton. (2016). George Orwell was a reactionary snitch who made a blacklist of leftists for the British government

CIA Puppet

George Orwell’s novella remains a set book on school curriculums … the movie was funded by America’s Central Intelligence Agency.

The truth about the CIA’s involvement was kept hidden for 20 years until, in 1974, Everette Howard Hunt revealed the story in his book Undercover: Memoirs of an American Secret Agent.

— Martin Chilton. (2016). How the CIA brought Animal Farm to the screen

Many historians have noted how Orwell’s literary reputation can largely be credited to joint propaganda operations between the IRD and CIA who translated and promoted Animal Farm to promote anti-Communist sentiment.^[1] The IRD heavily marketed Animal Farm for audiences in the middle-east in an attempt to sway Arab nationalism and independence activists from seeking Soviet aid, as it was believed by IRD agents that a story featuring pigs as the villains would appeal highly towards Muslim audiences.^[2]

Additional Resources

• George Orwell was a terrible human being | Hakim (2023)
• A Critical Read of Animal Farm | Jones Manoel (2022)

Wiki

%%last updated to match The Deprogram Wiki on 2025-06-15%%

As revolutionaries, we don’t have the right to say we are tired of explaining. We must never stop explaining. We know that when the people understand, they cannot help but follow us.

— Thomas Sankara

Automod Index

Our automod has a list of preprogrammed responses which work in tandem with this wiki. You can find a full index of automod responses here

Subreddit Rules

We have an extensive wiki to explain each one of our rules. Please visit it here

Education

These articles seek to explain various fundamental Communist concepts. However, these are often oversimplistic and sometimes reductive and they are no substitute for reading actual theory. Please see the Study Guide for details.

Primers:

• Class Struggle
• What is Freedom
• What is Fascism
• What is Imperialism
• What is Revisionism
• What is the National Right to Self-Determination? (WIP)

Praxis

Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.

— Karl Marx. (1845). Theses On Feuerbach

• Get Involved
• Protest Advice

Debunking

These articles aim to dispel common myths and misconceptions about a variety of topics.

• Authoritarianism
• Freedom of the Press

USSR

• The Gulag System
• Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
• The Holodomor

PRC

• The Uyghur Genocide
• Tiananmen Square Massacre

Cuba

DPRK

Logical Fallacies

• Ergo Decedo
• Whataboutism

Israel

• Israel: Timeline
• Israel: Ideological Roots
• Israel: US Backing and Christian Zionism

Profiles

• Che Guevara

Dunking

Naming and Shaming

• Yeonmi Park
• Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
• George Orwell
• Vaush (WIP)

Ideological State Apparatuses (ISA)

• The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
• The National Endowment for Democracy (NED)
• The U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM)
• The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)
• The Information Research Department (IRD)

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Read

General Rules for Independent Study (1934)

Introduction

• The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism | V. I. Lenin (1913)
• Karl Marx: A Brief Biographical Sketch With an Exposition of Marxism | V. I. Lenin (1914)
• The Principles of Communism | F. Engels (1847)
• Manifesto of the Communist Party | K. Marx, F. Engels (1848)
• Why Socialism? | A. Einstein (1949)

Historical Materialism

• The German Ideology, Part 1. A: Idealism and Materialism | K. Marx, F. Engels (1845)
• Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy | K. Marx (1859)
• Dialectical and Historical Materialism | J. V. Stalin (1938)
• In Application:
  • The Class Struggles in France, 1848 to 1850 | K. Marx (1850)
  • The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte | K. Marx (1852)
  • The Civil War in France | K. Marx (1871)
  • The Peasant War in Germany | F. Engels (1850)
  • Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Germany | F. Engels (1852)
  • The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State | F. Engels (1884)
  • Settlers: The Mythology of the White Proletariat | J. Sakai (1983)

Scientific Socialism

• Socialism: Utopian and Scientific | F. Engels (1880)
• What Is To Be Done? | V. I. Lenin (1901)
• State and Revolution | V. I. Lenin (1917)
• The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky | V. I. Lenin (1918)
• V. I. Lenin. Texts against revisionism and opportunism:
  • The Historical Destiny of the Doctrine of Karl Marx (1913)
  • Opportunism, and the Collapse of the Second International (1915)
  • The Collapse of the Second International (1915)
  • Imperialism and the Split in Socialism (1916)
  • Certain Features of the Historical Development of Marxism (1910)
  • Marxism and Revisionism (1908)
  • Marxism and Reformism (1913)
• “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder | V. I. Lenin (1920)
• Anti-Dühring - Part III: Socialism | F. Engels (1877)
• Anarchism Or Socialism? | J. V. Stalin (1906)
• Foundations of Leninism | J. V. Stalin (1924)
• On Practice | Mao Zedong (1937)
• Oppose Book Worship | Mao Zedong (1930)
• Combat Liberalism | Mao Zedong (1937)

Philosophy

• On contradiction | Mao Zedong (1937)
• Anti-Dühring - Part I: Philosophy | F. Engels (1877)
• Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy | F. Engels (1886)
• Theses on Feuerbach | K. Marx (1845)

Political Economy

• Wage Labour and Capital | K. Marx (1847)
• Wages, price and profit | K. Marx (1865)
• Anti-Dühring - Part II: Political Economy | F. Engels (1877)
• Capital Volume I | K. Marx (1867)
• Reading Marx’s Capital with David Harvey | D. Harvey (2007)
• Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism | V. I. Lenin (1916)

Watch

• Socialism for Absolute Beginners | Second Thought (2022)
• Why You Should Be A Socialist In 2023 | Second Thought (2023)
• Marxism Today’s Socialism 101 Playlist:
  • Why Communism?
  • #1 What is Communism?
  • #2 What is a Mode of Production?
  • #3 The Difference Between Personal and Private Property
  • #4 What is Capitalism?
  • #5 What is Socialism?
  • #6 What is Social Class?
  • #7 What is Marxism?
  • #8 What is Dialectical Materialism?
  • #9 What is Historical Materialism?
  • #10 What is Contradiction?
  • #11 Utopian Socialism and Scientific Socialism
  • Marx’s Law of Value: Intro to Marxist Economics
  • What is Commodity Fetishism?
  • Base and Superstructure: The Marxist Analysis of Society
  • What is Alienation?
• Marxism Today’s Socialism 201 Playlist:
  • What is the State?
  • What is a Vanguard Party? ML & MLM Formations
  • What is Capitalist Imperialism?
  • The National Question: Nations & Self-Determination
  • On Women’s Emancipation
  • What is Bureaucrat Capitalism? | On Oppressed-Nation Economies
  • How To Know Things
  • How to Criticize Comrades | Constructive Crit and Self-Crit

Listen

• The Deprogram
• Socialism for All / S4A | Foundations of Marxism-Leninism (Basically audiobooks)
• Revolutionary Left Radio
• Red Menace
• Total Liberation
• Blowback
• TrueAnon