Comrade Joti on RT’s CrossTalk: ‘Free Assange’
Those publishing the truth are hounded, while public trust in most journalists and politicians has collapsed. How has this happened, and what can we do?
Comrade Joti Brar (@joti2gaza) joins the panel on RT’s flagship discussion show CrossTalk.
Joti opens by explaining that the ‘crisis of legitimacy’ in capitalist political institutions stems in large part from the lies upon which imperialist wars have been fought, and noting the unique part that Wikileaks played in exposing those lies.
Julian Assange – whose only crime, as presenter Peter Lavelle points out, was exposing war crimes – has accomplished much more than this, however. His ongoing saga has also cast light on the shameful hypocrisy of ‘mainstream’ corporate journalists.
For a long time, Joti explains, the presstitute fraternity have been intimately connected to the imperialist war machine. This is why Donald Trump’s ‘fake news’ rhetoric had such resonance in the USA four years ago. It is also why, in Britain, journalists are now trusted even less than estate agents.
Journalists like Luke Harding at the Guardian – who made their careers on the back of Wikileaks – have led the campaign to try to destroy Assange’s character, so that the public will look the other way when he is unjustly put in the dock.
Joti goes on to explain how poverty and inequality in our society are not simply the result of the ruling class’s neglect of the poor, but inevitably arise from the system of production for profit; they are inescapable so long as the capialism exists.
Finally, she emphasises that large-scale capitalism – monopoly – is the logical conclusion of small-scale capitalism. The very existence of monopoly capital shows that seeking a return to a society of small and independent businesses is a pipe dream. Any attempt to take us ‘back’ to an imagined ‘level playing field’ will only land us back where we are now.
She concludes by pointing out that urgent redistributive measures taken now could go some way to addressing acute and immediate problems, such as the imminent fall into destitution of millions of workers and their families, but that in the long term an entirely different system is required.
With co-panellist George Szamuely (@GeorgeSzamuely).
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Broadcast on 21 December 2020
