So...I've come to expect this from the forward party and they never fail to disappoint. They put out a video about gerrymandering being bad and how voters should have more choice. Now, under normal circumstances, I would agree with them. I understand how the party got to where it is, and I initially supported a lot of its goals. But now, in 2025, they feel tone deaf and out of touch. They're not reading the room. Like, I never liked the "enlightened centrist" vibe the party gave off, and I REALLY dont like it now. In an ideal world, I'd agree with them. Gerrymandering bad, it shouldnt exist. But once again, when texas gerrymanders, blue states have to gerrymander. Or we lose. Period. We gotta fight fire with fire. We're dealing with fascists, and this both sides enlightened centrist BS just isn't cutting it. I expect my politicians to be more like gavin newsom, and while newsom's policies dont align with mine super well, his current vibe does.
We need someone to take the fight to the GOP. We are in an ideological tug of war for the country and, again, this both sides enlightened centrist BS is just missing the mark. You can attack the dems all they want, but for the past 30 years, they've been literally useless themselves. And I've been wanting them to refind their voice, and to take the fight to the GOP, rather than trying to find agreement with them and meet them half way. This isn't a "both sides" thing. This is a "good vs evil" kind of thing. Left good, right bad. I dont like the right. I want an alternative to the right. I want someone who FIGHTS the right.
And heck, since Yang started forward and he popularized human centered capitalism in his 2020 run, let me explain the concept in my own terms in this context. I've been a UBI supporter for longer than Yang. And...quite frankly, I feel like in a way, he copied my ideology. Again, no real hatred against him for doing it. We all stand on the shoulders of giants in developing their ideas. And he got a lot of his ideas from Scott Santens. And Scott Santens used to discuss UBI with me on r/basicincome. And I would like to think that a few of my own ideas rubbed off on him.
One of these ideas is what later became human centered capitalism. Human centered capitalism is basically what the name says. It's humanism. It's literally derived from secular humanism in my view. And why is this important in this context? Because the mainstream economic beliefs in this country, like the protestant work ethic, and stuff related to that, comes from Christianity. As I pointed out, in recent articles, the elites promote fundamentalist Christianity as a way of dumbing down the citizens. It puts them in a box, in a matrix, in plato's cave, where they have a certain conception of life, and it just so happens a major purpose of that life is to serve the wealthy. And rather than have anger at this system, their anger is quelled by religion. As Marx would say, religion is the opium of the masses. Religion keeps them wandering around in circles wondering why life is so unfair, and believing nothing can be changed about it, because blah blah blah sin, and we need to conform to god's word, and this morality, and this means obedience, and this means working hard, and this means not really asking the hard questions in a productive way. Basically, religion puts blinders on. it puts people in plato's cave.
My own belief system is derived from a rejection of this belief system. When I left christianity, I became ANGRY at the state of this world. Because I understand it is F-ed up. I also understand we can improve it. But people dont wanna improve it...because of the religion. This is why for a while I was an anti theist in a lot of ways. I was one of those "imagine" guys who was like "if religion didnt exist, the people would wake up and realize how messed up the world is and change it." And ever since, I've seen MY personal life purpose as waking people of.
Of course, this puts me in a direct ideological battle, a culture war if you will, with the right. The right wants America to be a christian nation "under god" with christian beliefs infused into everything. And I want america to be secular. Dont get me wrong, people have freedom of religion. It's an extension of freedom of thought. But they dont have a right to take over society and run everything according to their religion.
On capitalism. I've said it before, capitalism is rich people creating jobs for poor people, and then doing work for rich people in exchange for money, to buy their basic needs. We shouldn't glorify jobs and work. We shouldnt beg the wealthy for more jobs and work. Thats trickle down economics. That's reaganism. That's the problem with the economy since the 1970s. We need to understand that what we're doing isn't working, and come up with a form of rebranded liberalism to counter conservatism in the modern age. Of course, for me, the modern age was closer to 2015, not 2025, since this was basically before trump, and before yang.
So...I had a couple core principles. I ask, does the economy exist for "man" (or humans, in a more modern PC lingo), or does "man" (humans) exist for the economy? The answer is this. The economy exists for humans, because if humans exist for the economy, we are all slaves. Of course, the right's version of capitalism is de facto slavery, and that's the point. If we exist just to serve rich people, then that's a dismal state of living and we should change it to a more just state of being. But if the economy exists for us, then it should reflect that. And we should strive to constantly improve the economy to make it better for us.
Which brings us to the concept of work. Is work a means to an end? Or an end in itself? The protestant work ethic people will tell you that you exist to work, and that you have a god given purpose on this planet, and that you are to do your job and work, and failure to do so is a refusal to live as god wants of you. It means immorality, it means sin, it means being out of sync with god. But in a humanist worldview, "god" is irrelevant, and if anything, i resent all of this protestant christian nonsense being shoved down my throat. What I want is freedom. It's one thing if work is a necessary evil. It's another if we're all working and "creating jobs" to please a god that doesnt even exist, and to work our lives away to fulfill some weird concept of purpose.
So for me, the economy exists for humans, and not humans for the economy. Work is a means to an end, and not an end in itself.
Now, to be fair, that's much of what my original iteration was. But I would go further and have a third principle, parallel to yang's. Given that the economy exists for humans and not humans for the economy, and given that work is a means to an end, not an end in itself, then perhaps GDP and wealth accumulation shouldnt be the point of life. Maybe we should balance such a concept, with other priorities, like freedom, the ability to pursue happiness, leisure. yang went in his american scorecard direction with this one, but for me, it's an extension of this anti protestant work ethic humanist philosophy. The whole point of this entire philosophy, is to counter the modern right.
Now, I know Scott Santens, the guy Yang got his ideas from, has this idea that basic income "isnt left or right, but forward." He points to basic income's history of being supported both from the right, and the left over time. And that's fair, it has been. HOWEVER, and this is where we gotta be really careful here. In a modern context, basic income is ideologically, a left wing idea. Because the right embraced trickle down ideology. It embraced the love of work, the opposition of redistribution of wealth, and the protestant christian ideology as its underlying belief system. This belief system is fundamentally ANTI UBI. I went with UBI in part to be a foil to the right. To challenge this system of trickle down economic, work oriented economics, and the idea of creating jobs just to employ people. I go all in with "yeah, maybe it's okay to be lazy and not want to work, maybe we SHOULD redistribute the wealth!" My ideas make right wingers quake in fear, and you know what? Like FDR, I welcome their hatred. I don't believe in what I do to make nice with the right. my entire attitude is F the right, the horse it rode in on, and everything it stands for. The right, from 1980 onward, has been responsible for just about everything wrong with this country. And in this era of trump, they've somehow morphed into something far worse. Like they're just flat out evil now. Mask off, evil. At least from 1980-2016 the mask was on somewhat. The mask isn't even on. They're graduating to fascism. And you know what? We should go after them on pure ideological terms with everything we got.
Forward cares about division, and playing nice, and compromise, blah blah blah. Nah nah nah, F that. We need to FIGHT THE RIGHT. The right will never allow us to have good things in this country, until they're soundly ideologically defeated. How do we do that? Party realignment. Which is what I've been angling for since 2016. It's why i supported bernie, why i supported yang in 2016 and 2020. But the dems blew it, and if anything, the right is driving the modern party realignment. They're driving us even further right into fascism, while the left just stands there slack jawed and useless. And then yang's forward party has the gall to act like we're being too partisan and can't we all just come together and sing kumbaya? NO WE CANNOT. We cannot compromise with fascism. Unless you're okay with living under fascism. And if the next party alignment is dominated by fascism, then we have failed as a country and are doomed to a very long dark age.
So...no, forward, no. Get your heads out of you know where and get into the fight. Yes, in an ideal world, i support ending gerrymandering too. But it needs to be a disarmament that is accepted by all sides. As long as the right gerrymanders, and the left does not, we lose elections, and they win. Period. Again, stop trying to hamstring us from fighting the fascists. That's priority #1. Defeating the GOP. Then we can talk about whatever. You guys should know me by now. I dont actually like and approve of the democrats. Too corporate to me. Too centrist. But that's the thing. They're too weak too. And we need them to be strong.
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