The more I look into what the green party is doing this election, the more I cringe. I'm now looking into Jill Stein's vice presidential running mate, Ajamu Baraka. Baraka is a hardcore black activist who seems to have an extreme disdain for white culture, and even Bernie Sanders. He seems to view everything through the lens of race, and seems to be incredibly divisive. He's done some good, but he seems to be very extreme to me, reading a bit about him.
I mean, I'm going to be honest. I sympathize with Black Lives Matter. I understand that Eurocentric culture has crapped on black people for hundreds of years, and I understand that there is still a legacy of that even today, despite efforts to fix the more overt aspects of these problems.
However, given the reduced overt nature of these problems, I think that the biggest issues remaining are class issues. African Americans are so badly off because our capitalistic system does not allow them to succeed decades after the overt racial discrimination was abolished. How can you get ahead when there aren't any good jobs available, when the welfare system is full of perverse incentives, when you have to play the game of the "job creators" who have no interest in your survival? The problems with this system come from the fact that the rich have no obligation to look after their fellow human beings, whether they be black, white, whatever, and have a screw you I got mine mentality.
Now, I admit, blacks have it worse. They are underprivileged. They're starting lower on the ladder, they're not getting the best education, they're not getting good jobs. The areas in which they live in don't provide jobs because there's no financial incentive, and there's no financial incentive because they have no money. Their schools are poor because funding is short funding is short because there is no money. In our system, wealth is the key to more wealth, and poverty tends to beget more poverty. Rich people can ensure their kids are fairly well off, while children of poor kids have no chance. Areas and environments which provide good outcomes do, areas that don't have those kinds of support don't. It's a vicious cycle, and can only be broken by large scale ECONOMIC reform that goes beyond just letting capitalism do its thing.
Racial animus still exists, and many problems that exist today are, in some ways, remnants of colonialism and racial oppression. And admittedly there's a lot of subconscious racial biases in our minds many of us may or may not be aware of. HOWEVER, these problems can never really be solved as long as we have a system that is ultimately built on social darwinism and survival of the fittest, which is exactly what capitalism is.
Like always, I'm not saying we need to totally do away with capitalism to solve these problems. However, we do need to think more seriously about hardcore progressive reforms like guaranteed income, universal healthcare, free education, etc. The market will only function properly if proper counterweights exist, and currently the ones that do exist are inadequate.
The green party, as the largest alternate left wing party in the US, should focus on this, much like Sanders did. Not choose divisive black activists with a skewed perspective of the world likely to alienate a lot of people. You have one job, green party. Offer an alternative to the democrats that scratch the progressive itch many of us are lacking in the democratic party. Stop running on pseudoscience and choosing extremist vice presidents. You're almost making me consider voting for Hillary or staying home.
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