Give Them An Argument

By Ben Burgis

Give Them An Argument is a YouTube show and podcast dedicated to building a smarter, funnier and more strategic Left. New episodes are live on YouTube on Monday nights with an exclusive postgame fo

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FAQs about Give Them An Argument:

How many episodes does Give Them An Argument have?

The podcast currently has 286 episodes available.

Give Them An Argument episodes:

October 21, 2025 Trump: We Lost Vietnam and Iraq Because of Woke
Donald Trump, who we keep hearing is a peacemaker, said his speech for the 250th anniversary of the founding of Navy that the U.S. only lost the wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan because we got too "woke" about war tactics. Ben Burgis breaks it down.

Get tickets to the election night show in NYC:

https://www.barfreda.com/#/events/156966

Read Ben's article in Jacobin:

https://jacobin.com/2025/10/trump-vietnam-afghanistan-war-woke

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
1h 1min
October 16, 2025 The Labor Theory of Value and Marx's Theory of Exploitation
Both supporters and opponents of the Labor Theory of Value often assume that the LTV and Marx's theory of capitalist exploitation are a package deal. Others, like G.A. Cohen, have questioned that link. Ben Burgis takes a look at the debate, arguing that these two ideas are related...but not in the way a lot of people assume.

Sign up for Ben's Capital classes at patreon.com/benburgis

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
1h 33min
October 14, 2025 Krystal Ball vs. Saagar Enjeti: Is it “Neo-Confederate” to Refuse to Cooperate with ICE?
Last week, Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti had an interesting mini-debate on whether states and cities that don't cooperate with ICE are doing something wrong on the grounds that it involves a "neo-Confederate" rejection of federal supreamcy. Ben Burgis breaks it down.

Watch the 32-hour workweek video previewed at the end:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rr35Wr0H9mM

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
53min
October 13, 2025 Curtis Yarvin Says We Can't Handle the Truth
Ambiguously fascist JD Vance guru Curtis Yarvin has written an odd little essay called "You Can't Handle the Truth." Ben Burgis responds!

Read the essay:

https://graymirror.substack.com/p/you-cant-handle-the-truth

Read Matt McManus's essay on Yarvin:

https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/curtis-yarvin-thiel-carlyle-monarchism-reactionary

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
1h 8min
October 09, 2025 Robert Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain Argument Against Redistribution
Libertarian philosopher Robert Nozick made a classical argument against redistributing wealth and economic resources in his book "Anarchy, State & Utopia" based on a thought experiment about the basketball player Wilt Chamberlain. Marxist philosopher G.A. Cohen takes it apart piece by piece. Ben Burgis discusses!

Read Ben's article about this in Jacobin:

https://jacobin.com/2024/12/capitalism-freedom-nozick-cohen-philosophy

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
40min
October 07, 2025 Debunking Pro-Israel Talking Points on Gaza
Today is the 2-year anniversary of the beginning of the genocide in Gaza. Ben Burgis breaks the absurdity and evil of the way many people have tried to defend it, and puts the issue in a larger context.

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
1h 8min
October 06, 2025 Democrats are Screwing Up the Shutdown
Ben Burgis talks about his Jacobin article "Democrats are Screwing Up the Shutdown" and subsequent developments.

Read the article:

https://jacobin.com/2025/10/democrats-shutdown-health-care-bernie-aoc

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
38min
October 03, 2025 Breaking Down Zohran on The View
It's Friday! Let's end the week with something fun and watch Zohran sparring with the ladies on The View about Palestine, electability, and more.

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
52min
October 02, 2025 Is Analytic Philosophy a Dead End for the Left?
That's the claim made by Neil Vallelly in a shockingly poorly-informed article for Jacobin (reviewing Christopher Schuringa's book "A Social History of Analytical Philosophy"). Jacobin editor Nick French defended analytic philosophy in a counterpoint review of the same book ("Is Analytic Philosophy a Class Ideology?") published the same day. In this episode, Ben Burgis argues in this episode that French is correct but that the whole exchange suffers from ignoring the overlap between analytic philosophy and Marxism. Jacobin readers should be hearing about the (considerable!) contributions of analytical Marxist thinkers.

Read the Vallelly article:

https://jacobin.com/2025/09/analytic-philosophy-history-hume-rawls

Read the French article:

https://jacobin.com/2025/09/analytic-philosophy-history-hume-rawls

Read Matt McManus's review of the same book on Ben's Substack:

https://benburgis.substack.com/p/thoughts-on-christoph-schuringas

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
1h 21min
October 01, 2025 Trump Classifies "Anti-Capitalism" as Political Violence Pre-Crime
Trump's new national security directive classifies all of the following as indicators of incipient political violence that need to be investigated and disrupted before they come to fruition:

• anti-Americanism,
• anti-capitalism,
• anti-Christianity,
• support for the overthrow of the United States Government,
• extremism on migration,
• extremism on race,
• extremism on gender
• hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family,
• hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on religion, and
• hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on morality.

Beyond making the obvious point that this is almost cartoonishly authoritarian, Ben discusses the way this exactly reverses the real relationship between political violence and structural analysis.

Follow Ben on Twitter: @BenBurgis

Follow GTAA on Twitter: @Gtaa_Show

Become a GTAA Patron and receive numerous benefits ranging from patron-exclusive postgames every Monday night to our undying love and gratitude for helping us keep this thing going:

patreon.com/benburgis

Read the weekly philosophy Substack:

benburgis.substack.com

Visit benburgis.com
...more
56min

FAQs about Give Them An Argument:

How many episodes does Give Them An Argument have?

The podcast currently has 286 episodes available.

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