I have seen some of their stuff around, it is recommended a lot for me when watching anything related to Ukraine. I first saw them in relation to the stuff that was happening with Gonzalo Lira, and because of that I’ve always assumed they weren’t worth taking that seriously. They were promoting Lira this dude known for red pill sexist bs and when I looked them up I saw they had a news app with a description talking about “traditional values” which was a huge red flag for me and I’ve ignored them since.
But today I go to watch The Left Lens with Danny Haiphong, and he had them on. I’m about 20 minutes in so far and honestly this has me interested in them. They’re covering that recent video of a EU official talking about how Europe is a “garden” and the global south, Russia, etc are “the jungle” and shit. Surprisingly to me the first response was one of the Duran guys talking against European supremacy and colonialism and the like and how they exploit the global South. I looked up Alexander Mercouris and the first article I see is about how Asia is the future and US empire is dying. Maybe it’s just me living in the US, but I’ve never heard a right winger talk like this. What do you guys think?
Paleoconservatives, in general, tend to have a better understanding of geopolitics than do most other liberals. Back in 1998 and 2003, they were almost alone in condemning US military action in Yugoslavia and Iraq. They generally did this for wrong and somewhat silly reasons – i.e., Milosevic is fighting the Islamic menace, the Iraq war is a project of the Israel lobby – but their reporting on events was typically factual. So I would say that on the Russia-Ukraine issue the Duran is probably much more trustworthy than most mainstream sources. Obviously, ignore what they say about economics on the level of ideology, and approach them with the same grain of salt you take to other media. But they are in certain respects a very good source.