So, I surfed an anti Bernie subreddit, and came across an article talking about the modern left, specifically in regard to Israel policy. It went into how the far left sees the world through a lens of oppressor and oppressed, where identity trumps everything, including logic, moral principles, etc, and for some reason centrists are attacking the progressive left...for being postmodernist.
But I really have to ask...who really pushed for this ideological lens in the discourse. Was it not originally, the centrists, specifically Clinton supporters? In 2016, I remember being castigated for being racist, for being sexist, for being told that I wouldn't vote for a woman, for being told that I don't get the black vote. Meanwhile here I am, and I just wanted universal healthcare, free college, and a $15 minimum wage from the guy. But no, I wasn't allowed to just be a white dude with economic progressive ideas, if I wasn't "woke", I was bad. I was immoral. How dare I put my own concerns over the concerns of POC, and women, and the LGBTQ+ community, etc.
Well, here we are, the left listened, and since 2016 a lot of them got more "woke" and more concerned with the matters of POC and "oppressed" classes, and now they're anti Israel because they see it as a colonial oppressor state, while seeing palestinian terrorists as "oppressed" simply for being brown people living in a de facto apartheid state.
I'm not going to say Israel's treatment of the palestinians has always been right. It hasn't, but....who were the ones who really pushed for this crap in 2016? It wasnt the actual left. The Bernie left was characterized as a bunch of white college students and educated people who didn't understand the identity BS and didnt' care. Clinton weaponized this stuff, in order to browbeat and bully the left, and because of that, ALL of the left basically got infected with this crap, because it's basically a mind virus similar to fundamentalist religion. And now the Israel issue is basically a huge lightning rod for all of this performative bleeding hearts who can virtue signal on the internet about people being oppressed.
Again, this is all YOU, centrists who supported Clinton in 2016. The democratic strategy a la Hillary Clinton is triangulation. The democrats run to the center in order to appeal to those white suburbanites who fled the inner cities to the suburbs and are fiscally conservative, but might be a bit socially liberal. And then they decided to pad out those numbers with POC, women, LGBTQ+ etc, effectively relying on them voting democratic in massive numbers, while white males were driven to the republican party. And now the republican party is openly becoming a party of white nationalism, lovely.
The fact is, this identity crap did this. It polarized the american public by their identity and demographics, where most people voted democratic if they were either some sort of "oppressed" group, or an "ally" of those oppressed groups (which is how we got "wokeism" on the left), and people voted republican if they were part of the mainstream demographics and didn't care about those people. In effect, the left became a party in which, for "privileged" people at least, voting for one's personal interests was verboten. You're selfish if you do that, you're evil, you're immoral. How dare you...prioritize your own concerns. You ought to be concerned about those worse off than you, and screw you if you aren't. And the right became the party of obnoxious levels of "screw you I got mine." That's another way to view the country's politics right now, at least if you're privileged. Of course underprivileged groups benefit (in theory) from postmodernist politics, and if you're underprivileged, it's fine to be self interested, it's only bad if you're privileged.
I think this actually is a good summation of where our politics are in 2023. And also, it's why the democratic coalition is completely and utterly imploded. You see, these identity politics aren't really good for the groups in question either. I mean, the democrats expect POC, and women, and LGBT+ people to vote in MASSIVE numbers for democrats. But what happens if the democrats slip in those demographics? Well, again, their coalition IMPLODES.
A huge reason the 2020 election ended up being closer than anticipated was actually because of the latino vote. Democrats expected virtually all latinos to go for Biden...but they only did by a margin if 2-1. 1/3 went for Trump. Why? Because unlike what democrats think, these groups arent monoliths. You got cuban americans in florida who are extremely right wing, and that's a huge reason the democrats lost florida. A lot of hispanics also, ironically, like Trump's message of getting rid of illegal immigrants. I mean, a lot of them are legal immigrants and tend to resent people who "cut in line" so to speak. There's the culture of machismo in hispanic cultures which can drive some to authoritarianism and trump's brand of hyper masculinity. You got racism WITHIN different hispanic cultures toward each other in which light skinned latinos may look down on darker skinned ones. And of course, there's the latinX thing, which is basically just cultural appropriation from the left.
It's like...gee, identity stuff actually doesnt work because there's more to politics than that, and people are people, and dynamics are complex.
And then you have black people. Black people tend to normally vote democratic by MASSIVE margins. i think in recent elections it was like 90%+. But if the democrats start losing that support, well...what do you think happens to democratic poll numbers? They implode. And that's what's happening now. Because a lot of POC are like, okay, what has biden actually done for us, our communities are still crap, we're still being murdered by cops, we're still being thrown in prison, we're still poor, we can't get hired for jobs even with full employment, why should we vote for Biden AGAIN?! Ya know? That's where a lot of them are at.
Women tend to be complex and while trump's attitude tends to be offputting to them, and of course, the GOP seems to be wanting to turn the country into a handmaid's tale, again, there's complexity there too. Women tend to think differently sometimes, some vote for Trump because they're inherently conservative.
LGBTQ+ generally vote for democrats too, but again, they could go for trump in some cases. i've seen some get sucked into populist rhetoric and tend to look at other issues than their identity.
It's like, gee, there's more to politics than their identity. I mean, most white males vote republican, but here I am on the "left". Demographics arent destiny. For the democrats, they are. They've cut the country up into these demographics of oppressor and oppressed, and then they get mad when they lose control of the narrative and some performatively moral people decide to support the wrong side in a foreign policy conflict because of that crap. Gee, your politics literally made this.
And your politics also made the deep hole the democrats are in electorally. Lets rewind to 2016. Bernie Sanders supported a platform that was widely supported by the country. He leaned less into identity, and then he leaned more into economics. And his policies were popular...because most people benefitted from them, who knew? And that's the greatest sin i think the modern democrat commits in their politics. They demonize people who are attracted to the left because they support policies that benefit them. I've literally been told once, in rejecting identity politics and pushing my politics of enlightened self interest, that I'm "the worst kind of leftist." I've also been told by some I'm actually "conservative". I mean, I'm an ex conservative and there are some legacy aspects of that ideology that made it into my liberalism so you got me there, but maybe that's why my politics would work, and yours don't?
Really, and this is something people dont understand. People might claim I'm racist or sexist for daring lay bare the actual identity dynamics in this country and discuss the issue in unsanctioned ways, but nothing could be further from the truth. I believe my ideas would not only help me, they would help POC. If POC are so economically underprivileged, wouldn't my ideas...help them? Wouldnt a basic income raise their income? Wouldnt it make them less stressed as they wouldnt have to deal with the oppressive welfare system? And with that, maybe we would see crime go down, we would see business and entrepreneurship go up, we would actually see these devastated communities start to recover. Because they have money, and if there's anything that I've learned about our economic system, and what drives the dynamics in the war on normal people, it's that money attracts money. Wealthy affluent communities get goods and services that make them better off and with that, prosperity increases. Poor areas with high crime get the opposite. A lack of employment, a lack of money, a lack of a customer base, and a never ending cycle that never gets better.
Woke moralists think if we stop obnoxiously pandering to identity politics, that it's the same as throwing these identity groups under the bus. Nay, I say, the people who benefit the most from these policies ARE those groups. And their self interests would be served, and that would make them loyal voters. And you might even win over a bunch of white voters too, even white males.
identity politics is cancer to the left. It's metastasizing. And it's dragging the entire left down. It's one of the reasons the left has gone so insane since 2016. It's one of the reasons why the democratic party's strategy is likely to fail them in 2024. The establishment has this vision of a democratic party driven by multiculturalism vs white supremacy, and women vs men, and economic centrism to win over those educated white suburbanite voters. And it's driving this country mad. And it's failing them. I would argue it actually made trump and the republican coalition stronger. Really, how did we go from the coalition of the ascendant in the obama years to THIS?! Because the democrats blew all their goodwill with the public over performative identity politics and shoving mediocre candidates like Clinton and Biden down our throats, and then failing to deliver even the half measure policies they were for. America is FED UP. And the democrats need to get their crap together, FAST, or we might actually see the republicans win. And given how THEY are ALSO going insane, and turning LITERALLY FASCIST, yeah, that's not good.
I really am a doomer here. I feel like the democrats really dug themselves into a deep deep hole of their own doing. And now the country is gonna suffer for it. Again. They could've had it all. If they ran bernie in 2016, and they won, and they passed the stuff he wanted to pass, he would have gone down in history as the second coming of FDR. Instead, we get the crappy future where America is in serious danger of going the 1930s germany route.
Thanks Obama. And Hillary. And Biden. And Debbie Wasserman Schultz. And Nancy Pelosi. And Chuck Schumer. And Donna Brazile. And Joe Manchin. And Kyrsten Sinema. And basically the entire democratic establishment. THings could've been different. But instead we're living in a real life dumpster fire.
And once again, the centrists don't get it. Again. YOU made this mess. Not us. Not the economic left who actually wanted policies that benefitted us and didn't lean obnoxiously into identity politics.
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