So the last article seemed to do a good job explaining 2019 at least. But, looking more into the defeat a few days ago in local elections seems to challenge a lot of what I wrote previously. Could it be that I got it backwards?
I really don't know. Again, I'm not british, and I don't understand British political history super well like the US. I don't necessarily understand all of the forces at work. But the UK seems...weird. At first glance it seemed to be like the US, but the way the 2021 losses seem to be spun by a lot of people, is...odd.
All in all, there seem to be two camps as far as what's going wrong with labor. More moderate types are arguing the party is suffering from "long Corbyn", the idea that Corbyn's still influencing the party after he resigned, and that the baggage associated with him is still associated with the party.
However, another narrative seems much more likely, looking at the evidence, and that's that the people are rejecting his replacement, Keir Starmer. Starmer seems to have tried to take the party in a more moderate direction, focusing on "electability", and we all know how well "electable" candidates work, often times they don't get elected.
A poll recently seems to bolster this narrative. And this seems to be the most direct way to understand what's going on.
Starmer is the #1 cause. People hate the guy. And I guess they hate his moderate direction. The general feel from comments I read seems to be "Corbyn sucks but at least he tried to do stuff, Starmer just sucks".
The second cause seems to be not agreeing with policies/policies not clear. This could be a repudiation of Starmer's direction, or a larger repudiation of labor in general. I'm not sure.
One person wrote: "A London-based bourgeoisie, with the support of brigades of woke social media warriors, has effectively captured the party. They mean well, of course, but their politics – obsessed with identity, division and even tech utopianism – have more in common with those of Californian high society than the kind of people who voted in Hartlepool yesterday,”
This is kind of cringe to me, being a tech utopian, but I actually understand what they're getting at. Basically, it does imply that they moved too far center and strattled ideas. They focused on social justice crap, sold out the working class, and it cost them. The tech utopian thing is interesting but I understand how old school lefties think so I can explain it based on my interaction with Bernie Bros and socialists. Basically, they think that a lot of stuff like basic income are tools by the elites to preserve capitalism and sell out socialist interests. So, you have silicon valley billionaires making fancy technologies that automate jobs away, and the old school left looks at this through their 19th century lens and is like ERMAHGERD THIS IS HORRIBLE, THEY'RE TRYING TO SAVE CAPITALISM AND SCREW WORKERS.
The US isn't exactly the same politically, but we have a lot of luddites here, both left and right. Trumpers wanna go back to how things were and traditional socialists, while they mean well, get way too ideologically wrapped up in their old school solutions.
But the UK is different, it's Europe, and their left is WAY left of our left here. Labor says things that in the US you would only see in the green party and among rose twitter. They're to MY left, being one of those tech utopians who lean capitalistic. And it's possible, in trying to triangulate, they created backlash against themselves. I see what a lot of these guys are saying. The idpol is a turn off, social justice is a turnoff, focus on tech stuff is a turnoff. I mean a lot of the people in the UK who are leaving labor are 50+. They're old. They're socially conservative, and their version of labor is old school. They like socialism, their history is probably in the tradition of Bernie Sanders and Howie Hawkins, and Eugene Debs (to make American comparisons), and they kind of see these social justice issues as landing like lead balloons, and they see tend to see shifts toward new solutions as a betrayal of traditional labor.
I won't judge more than this, it's not my country, or my history, but I think that going forward they're gonna struggle. I'm sorry, but I kind of think old school socialism is a luddite ideology in this context much like trumpers, they wanna go back to how things were, rather than understand the economy and solutions moving forward. But I digress.
Back to that poll, bad economic record for #3, yeah that goes into what I said. Generally oppose, that's vague and can mean anything. Don't trust/can't keep promises. These guys have problems maintaining people because they don't deliver. Poor candidates, could be vague and can speak to the larger systemic issues. Don't share values. Hmm, not sure if this is all Brits, or just labor leaning ones, but that could either mean they are on the other side, or it could have to do with that shift away from old school labor. No chance of winning, that's dumb. Incompetent, eek.
Funny thing is both "not radical enough" and "too far left" both had 4% of the vote. So the issue isn't really too much about their core ideology. It seems to be more the prevailing issues of lack of trust, lack of clear path, and a dislike of the candidates.
Very few said it had anything to do with wokeism or anti semitism though directly. So maybe that above quote is wrong? Also, only 1% said it was Brexit this time. So while that might've been the prevailing excuse in 2019 under Corbyn, in 2021, the problem seemed to be that they muddled their direction, had no clear policy agenda, weak leadership and the people didn't trust them. It's interesting.
All in all the more I delve into this the more I don't envy them. I also don't envy the US though. Both countries seem screwed.
In the US, we got a moderate democratic party that won against the conservatives because the conservatives were insane, and Trump was insane, and still barely pulled it off. The conservatives are luddites, complaining about lost jobs, but unwilling to support any solutions to fix that. The democrats try in a half baked way but have no real solutions long term that have teeth. And the left is screwed and while some version of leftism could offer a better path, the UK shows that perhaps traditional leftism would not serve people better.
Because the UK also has a luddite problem. They are living the dream. They have candidates so far left we can't even dream of such candidates in the US, but they're unhappy too. Labor policies seem popular among the people, but they don't seem to be really solving problems either. And attempts to moderate like the US are backfiring hard. The rejection of "techno utopianism" concerns me. It reminds me of how stupidly rigid the old left is and how they think any 21st century solution that isn't "socialism" is bad. But they're howling at the moon and clamoring for an era that is long gone, much like the Trumpers.
It's amazing how the two countries act the same way despite being on polar opposite sides of the spectrum. In the US the white working class is insanely right wing, but in the UK, they're basically literal socialists. Both are suffering from deindustrialization, and both are clamoring for the past, and for solutions that may no longer work.
I guess the UK is a good example showing that even if Bernie came in and fixed everything as he wants to, it wouldn't fix everything, because these people are still unhappy and those kinds of socialism don't seem adequate in my opinion.
But at the same time much like the US they don't want actual solutions that would work.
I guess I get it, reminds me of that Bob Black quote about how all ideologies, right and left, are conservative. They're all pro work, and merely differ on how it is carried out. Left, right, it doesn't matter a ton. Screwed either way. I do think the left is better than the right, at least they wanna take care of people. but they don't offer solutions. And to some extent, ironically, no, the problem with labor isnt they're too far left to win. They're not left wing enough, and their rigidness with socialism is a problem if anything. Idk. Just my neophyte interpretation based on my unique American perspective.
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