It's one of the reasons I can't take anything he does seriously, even if he is one of the broken clocks that is right a couple times a day. Every other segment he does is basically "here's why the problem is capitalism but I won't say that so I'll either end the segment abruptly or redirect the blame to a single person/entity instead of anything systemic

[–] BelieveRevolt@hexbear.net 20 points 5 months ago (2 children)

lol, figures that he wouldn't, I bet they agree on most things anyway.

Even if he wasn't a lib, I doubt he'd be allowed to have a show on American late night TV where he says capitalism is the problem. I also have to say that politics aside I don't find Oliver that funny, especially not that "This is just like (non sequitur)" thing he does that he thinks passes for a joke.

[–] FALGSConaut@hexbear.net 19 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Oh yea, just the way he frames her military service as positive gives it away. He can criticize the American Empire all he wants but at the end of the only part he has an issue with is the optics and aesthetics, not the core concept. If he actually had a problem with America he sure as hell wouldn't have married a completely unrepentant war criminal.

I used to like him back when his show first started and I was at the tail end of my liberalism, but I haven't watched any of his stuff from recent years. His humor began to grate on me and I got tired of the whole "I'll outline the problem and why it's capitalism's fault, but I'll just blame this one ceo/company instead of capitalism itself" cycle

[–] BelieveRevolt@hexbear.net 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I haven't watched his show since probably around 2018 or so, also at the tail end of my liberalism. Even back then, it irked me that he framed these inherent problems with capitalism as just the doings of a few bad apples, and of course ~~Trump~~ Drumpf as the reason America was bad now instead of just a part of the problem.

[–] FALGSConaut@hexbear.net 8 points 5 months ago

I will admit he was a factor in my radicalization, in part because he wasn't able/willing to explicitly state that capitalism is the problem. This was probably 2015ish, when Trump was still being treated as a joke and Hillary was the obvious shoe-in lenin-dont-laugh . I won't give him full credit, obviously most of the heavy lifting was done by reading theory and just paying attention to the world, but he did show me that even the best libs support the status quo and won't entertain alternatives

[–] RyanGosling@hexbear.net 7 points 5 months ago

Even if he wasn't a lib, I doubt he'd be allowed to have a show on American late night TV where he says capitalism is the problem.

This isn’t controversial at all. There have been multiple popular and successful “capitalism bad” shows and movies. Capitalists literally do not give a shit what you make as long as they make money from it. Jeff Bezos will allow you to make communist propaganda and depict him getting beheaded on Amazon Prime if you can guarantee the movie makes $300 million.