I love it when I can use a “YouTube Drama” video to talk about an important topic. So imagine my delight when Johnny Harris, a YouTube star I’ve critiqued once before, dropped a half-learned video on nationalism. It wasn’t THAT bad a video. There were some fairly egregious errors, that I addressed, but what bugged me most was the general attitude. According to Harris, all that matters about nationalism is its potential for disaster. That’s an important part of the story, but there’s a lot more to nationalism than just that. Like the independence of almost every country on the planet, as just one example. It was fun to make “What Johnny Harris Gets Wrong About Nationalism” and I hope you enjoy watching it.
A certain kind of commenter has real problems with videos like this one. It compares the trajectory of current Chinese leader Xi Jinping to a mid 19th century French dictator. Some see the idea of historical comparisons as ineffective, or even racist. To those who say it’s ineffective, I am forced to agree. It’s not like what happened to Napoleon III will predict exactly the path that Xi Jinping’s rule will take. But I never claimed it would. This video only talks about the surprising parallels, it makes no claims for the future. History is a treasure trove of events, processes, and situations. None of it will predict exactly what happens, but aspects are often similar. There’s no harm, and certainly no prophecy in drawing out parallels the way that this video does. Some other commenters, both Chinese and Western, claim that it’s ridiculous to compare China to European history. Both of them hold on to the idea that there’s something intrinsically different about the Chinese, and I’m either being racist, or not racist enough by assuming easy parallels with Europeans. I think that’s just balderdash. Chinese people are people too, and despite the scale and age of their country, it moves in similar ways.
Vague similarity to past situations is all I’m claiming here. I’m not claiming to know how Xi Jinping’s rule will end. But I am trying to make the case that Xi Jinping’s assumption of dictatorial power is something that we’ve seen before in modern history. Many in the US are reacting with panic to the idea of a great power backsliding in this way. They are acting as if it’s somehow unprecedented. It’s not. That’s all this video is saying.
