Free Speech and Creepy Liberalism

Sarahell you just made me lol very hard.

i am glad i am useful in some small way

When the revolution comes this will be the thread we end up hanging from

Collaboration in the sense that taking seriously concerns about the left/cancel culture silencing centrist/conservative views is in fact ignoring much more drastic concerns of the continued rise of the right-wing if not actually abetting it.

I am still confused who is collaborating with whom on this thread.

i read this thread mostly as a variant of "ok boomer" ... like it strikes me mostly as a generational shift of values and ethics and politics, which as a card-carrying middle-aged person, I am aware that I have to step back a bit and really think and listen because I have some of those older generation instincts.

Being old is bad not good and being young is good not bad iirc.

Re-forming social norms around acceptable speech is really an attempt to reject and marginalize the ideas conveyed in such speech. I'm fine with making harmful ideas socially unacceptable by exposing them to ridicule, scorn, and shows of mass solidarity against them.

For me the major bright line that ought not be crossed, except in the most dire cases, is attempting to define speech into a criminal activity subject to incarceration. The hard right wing is far more likely to enter any openings in that direction and occupy that space.

The hard right are already actively testing strategies to use current civil rights laws to force every institution of learning that receives federal money in any form to allow fascists free access to propagate their ideas. They're gleeful at the thought that liberals will be gored by their own legislation. They may well succeed.

The old saw about fighting bad speech with better speech and bad ideas with better ones yields extremely uneven results and is a weak bulwark against fascism, racism, and oppression. But using the force of law to regulate political speech has dangers untold. There are no easy answers here.

I think most of the cancel culture events mentioned in this thread make leftists look like a bunch of morons, but sure let’s not talk about it on ilx because some impressionable kid might stumble upon this thread and turn into a fash

And I think most cancel culture events mentioned on this thread are a bare ripple in the fascist ocean lapping at the shores of this country.

PBKR otm, at this stage if you’re still whining about the left, just say that the fascists don’t bother you that much.

I don’t let my enemies dictate what i’m allowed to find annoying

Arguing politics right now is probably a bad move for me. Apologies. Be well everyone.

wait i am still confused whether PBKR is pro-cancel or anti-cancel ?

PBKR, do you not understand that the right has hi-jacked ideas of free speech to push fascist ideas into the realm of public debate and popularity, and that many so-called liberals have gone along with the hi-jacking of these ideas...and moved into realms of fascist speech policing in the process, namely the silencing of more radical voices on the left? That's what I see pretty much everywhere I go, on ILX in particular. It's like being an actual leftist is seen as 'not reasonable.'

Like a lot of conversation in this thread has recently revolved around liberals in power being complicit in these waves of fascism lapping at our shores.

And so if that isn't cool to you, then maybe think about the thread yr posting in and who you're calling a collaborator.

It would probably be advisable to have a forum called I Hate Fascism where we could check in everyday and tell other posters that we still don’t like Nazis in case anyone was wondering

PBKR, do you not understand that the right has hi-jacked ideas of free speech to push fascist ideas into the realm of public debate and popularity, and that many so-called liberals have gone along with the hi-jacking of these ideas...and moved into realms of fascist speech policing in the process, namely the silencing of more radical voices on the left? That's what I see pretty much everywhere I go, on ILX in particular. It's like being an actual leftist is seen as 'not reasonable.'

― healthy cocaine off perfect butts (the table is the table), Saturday, September 19, 2020 9:02 PM (fifty-six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

table, I think you are making the exact point I am trying (poorly, apparently) to make. I think we are in total agreement that the backlash against cancel culture is an insidious right wing ploy.

If this isn't the case, I apologize and will bow out.

so i'm late to this but uhh

Class reductionism is the supposed view that inequalities apparently attributable to race, gender, or other categories of group identification are either secondary in importance or reducible to generic economic inequality. It thus follows, according to those who hurl the charge, that specifically anti-racist, feminist, or LGBTQ concerns, for example, should be dissolved within demands for economic redistribution.

I know of no one who embraces that position. Like other broad-brush charges that self-styled liberal pragmatists levy against “wish-list economics” and the assault on private health insurance, the class reductionist canard is a bid to shut down debate. Once you summon it, you may safely dismiss your opponents as wild-eyed fomenters of discord without addressing the substance of their disagreements with you on policy proposals.

I'm going to say the big problem w/ this Reed excerpt is that he's basically accusing a position i see replicated all the time of not existing at all -- there are dozens of ways in which ppl who do not *intend* to replicate that logic do so in ways they don't even realize, before you get to the people who outright believe in class reductionism

not *accusing ... *Characterizing

I personally have not encountered "class-reductionist" activism in meatspace, and I used to go to *a lot* of pretty different types of actions, back when those were happening in meatspace. "class-forward", sure, that would be fair. the local Trots I no longer run with, for example (they are, like all local far-left formations I've encountered, tactically woeful and aesthetically alienating, and ironically incapable of change), are explicit about the ultimate demand being class solidarity and political representation by and of the working class (it's like...their entire deal at the end of the day), but are also *extremely* vocal about racism, trans rights, and other hypothetically "non-class" issues. you could, if you wished, accuse them of caring about these issues more because they undermine class solidarity than because they're a moral horror, but I'm not sure there's a meaningful difference in terms of actual behavior.

of course I'm sure you can find all kinds of mutations on twitter etc. but I purposely avoid that shit.

not to be unduly paranoid (or to make excuses) but I have long strongly suspected that at least a decent % of the most extreme Twitter eccentrics and loony hardmen are right-wing ops. it's not like it's hard to do.

I've definitely encountered it in meatspace, but many years ago, and continue to be surprised that it's still a tendency.

The idea that class shd take precedence over other “identity” concerns doesn’t just still exist, it’s pervasive on the white left and explains how people like Lee Fang get propped up by large audiences until they say something really obviously stupid about identity and ppl start to back away slowly from them — bc for many ppl they believe themselves to be “on the right side” w/r/t issues of identity but don’t see how their actions and advocacy run against the grain of people with different interests

The idea that class shd take precedence over other “identity” concerns doesn’t just still exist, it’s pervasive on the white left

otm -- the response to RBG's death brought out a lot of this yesterday. It definitely isn't doing much for progressive solidarity.

Looking at it purely as a white & left person, there's nothing more "pervasive" than having to live as a Black person in the USA on a daily hourly basis. Racial identity drives even deeper into one's existence here than class or gender and it is only the bland comfortableness of white identity that allows that fact to recede in importance in white perception.

The only rational purpose in elevating class politics and emphasizing class identity over racial identity in trying to remedy the many social ills is the wholly pragmatic argument, that the insensitivity of white Americans to white privilege is so difficult to overcome compared to their sensitivity to class privilege that an appeal to class solidarity can be used as a Trojan horse for initiatives to narrow racial disparities. iow, it is a fallback position that is achievable within the context of US electoral politics, even though it is a diversion from attacking the tap root of the problem.

Seems like another round of being mad at some amorphous idea of “white left Twitter” - the only name referred to as thus far is Adolph Reed. Who is, uh, not white. Might be on Twitter though.

i'm actually referring to people i know irl ... I don't keep up with the pundit class nearly enough

This seems like a useful reminder:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/19/upshot/race-class-white-and-black-men.html

cops also don't give a fuck about the class status of black people (esp. men) when they are profiling "suspicious" or "threatening" behavior

It's definitely a tendency that I see all around me in academia and plenty of other radical spaces... probably because like me, many of the people in those spaces are white and grew up middle class, even if they're working class now.

Seems like another round of being mad at some amorphous idea of “white left Twitter” - the only name referred to as thus far is Adolph Reed. Who is, uh, not white. Might be on Twitter though.

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z), Sunday, September 20, 2020 2:55 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Lol please. You want me to just list people’s names who do this?

Honestly that kind of shit is pointless anyway bc it’s specific actions, positions, ideological approaches that are the problem and as easy as it is to name certain ppl who embody this approach, cf red scare hosts or lee fang or whoever else, the pervasiveness of it is due to the fact it’s not about individual people being “bad actors” as much as it is the class-first approach being applicable to people who don’t even know they’re doing it in certain circumstances

Less 'names' than, like, actual tweets and evidence, but yeah. Otherwise it's pretty pointless?

as in, when you do name names, ie "Red Scare and Lee Fang" it's hardly a representative body. You can play that game with a million MORE clapemoji WOMEN clapemoji ICE clapemoji AGENTS liberals.

Jacobin has a huge huge readership and does this shit ALL THE TIME

so first its no people, but when you name people, no it needs to be 'representative bodies' ad infinum

how about bernie sanders' actual platform punting on reparations, for one extremely perfect example

Jacobin certainly privileges class, but that's a pretty wide gap from there to Red Scare.

Which was a point I wanted to quote but was on my phone - there's a world between a complete disavowal of 'identity politics' and the 'precedence' of class. Like...

This seems like a useful reminder:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/03/19/upshot/race-class-white-and-black-men.html

― pomenitul, Sunday, September 20, 2020 3:11 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

cops also don't give a fuck about the class status of black people (esp. men) when they are profiling "suspicious" or "threatening" behavior

― sarahell, Sunday, September 20, 2020 3:24 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I have never encountered a leftist who would disagree with either of these posts? It's a weird stick with which to beat the left.

no one said "major left platforms completely disavow identity politics", you're reversing the argument to make us the absolutists when it's the reed quote that asserts absolutely that no one prefers to prioritize class!

so first its no people, but when you name people, no it needs to be 'representative bodies' ad infinum

how about bernie sanders' actual platform punting on reparations, for one extremely perfect example

Finding a handful of assholes and attacking an entire spectrum because of them (despite that entire spectrum having little to do with the assholes) is not particularly useful.

Sanders was bad on some things (though, uh, got some bad news about Biden and reparations) - but to take another body that has been name-dropped, Jacobin has published pieces calling for reparations IIRC?

The idea that the left is primarily an agent in a class war, defined by economics, is about as uncontoversial as you can get. Identity politics are a minor part of mainstream left wing politics.

are you speaking of worldwide politics or about the more parochial politics of the USA? because in the USA identity politics are far more influential than the politics of class.

Ah, good point. The two party system barely has a spectrum for economics, does it?

Identity politics are a minor part of mainstream left wing politics.

Liberal identity politics, certainly - but that's kind of the point.

The charge that D-40 seems to be levying is that the American left is insufficiently concerned with anything but class, ie it's not anti-racist, anti-misogny, pro-LGBTQ enough. He's not being very specific (other than Red Scare and Lee Fang) but this is usually charged because the left doesn't engage in those liberal identity politics for a variety of reasons (such as, yes, privileging class and economics) - but it's all pretty ridiculous in the face of what American liberalism itself actually offers, like Joe Biden - who very evidently has never given a flying fuck about identity politics and has to be strong-armed into not reminding people of his openly racist friends.

Lol @ you attacking joe biden under the assumption I’m concerned w this from a liberal POV ... take a break from the podcasts dude

the left doesn't engage in those liberal identity politics for a variety of reasons

The inherent assumption that identity politics are “liberal” (while the left is, of course, to the left of liberal) shows exactly how class-first leftism is pervasive; it posits any opposition to prioritizing class as being not sufficiently left (aka liberal) bc anyone critiquing the left must be doing so from a place of (liberal) identity politics. The notion there might be a “left” that doesn’t prioritize class is discounted

And notice I’m saying “prioritize” not bc I dont think class is important — quite the contrary and there are plenty of circles where I’d argue it needs to be prioritized to a greater degree— but it certainly doesn’t outnumber the amt of chapo fanboys I seem to encounter (& I’m not characterizing their podcast as I don’t listen to it) who seem determined to characterize any critique along “identerian” lines as being “liberal”

... or it's about specifically referring to liberal identity politics, in which representation in and of itself is a primary goal and class and economy are stripped from the equation.

The point is to recognize the radical socialist origins of the very phrase and that when you strip it of the liberal part, you necessarily recognize that class and identity cannot be separated.

the amt of chapo fanboys I seem to encounter

This is back to the mad at an amorphous Twitter blob issue - which, fine, if you keep running into assholes you keep running into assholes. I don't see anyone mention Red Scare at all and Lee Fang only recently because he publicly shit himself. But it's an enormous stretch to turn the assholes you run into into a question of what is "pervasive on the white left." Or the left in general, for that matter.

was deej even talking about “liberal identity politics” to begin with or did you contort the conversation to be about it

i am looking forward to the lucy football metaphor in your next post