Why are Identity politics so bad?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Why are Identity politics so bad?

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Freddie deBoer wrote a good piece after the election with the idea that it is not the politics of identity that are the problem, but the politics of deference, "that people of a progressive bent have a duty to suspend their critical judgment and engage in unthinking support of whoever claims to speak for the movement against racism and sexism."

This is by no means a rejection of the ongoing struggle to make the American left inclusive of minority groups. Instead, it is a warning against those who respond to reasoned debate and criticism by using their self-asserted participation in that struggle as a bludgeon against those who might challenge them. Though these individuals are hardly representative of their respective movements, they tend to be more ardently vocal in a way that does far more harm than simply pushing away allies with differing opinions on how to move forward—they ward off sympathetic onlookers who might otherwise be swayed to the cause. Though they may honestly have their cause's best interests at heart, their self-righteous zealotry is utterly toxic if we are looking to win at the ballot box.

quote:

This is the tail-swallowing aspect of today�s liberal spaces, not the noble and correct prohibition against engaging in racist or sexist behavior but the meta-prohibition against questioning whether any given accusation is credible or convincing. A political tendency that prohibits its members from questioning each other, or which treats critical examination of its beliefs about bigotry as bigotry itself, has sewn the seeds of its own demise.

If it wasn�t clear before, it�s certainly clear now: progressives have won an unprecedented victory in the culture wars. What they haven�t yet won is tangible, concrete policy gains to go with that cultural domination, a way to turn rhetoric into reality, a way to turn the social force of the call out into material gains for the most oppressed. To do so will take hard work. It will also take real introspection, critical engagement, and a political culture that�s willing to disagree, even vehemently, about goals and tactics and language. And that will take precision in language, the right to sort a jerk from a bigot, and the wisdom to tell the difference.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 19:33

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 15:26

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Deified Data posted:

I agree that this is an observable phenomenon but for the sake of discussion could you share something you regard to be a well-reasoned criticism of inclusiveness or equal rights?

Neither what he nor I wrote suggested in any way that there is 'well-reasoned criticism of inclusiveness or equal rights'. The problem lies in the meta-debate, the internal debate the segments of the left has between its disparate parts over rhetoric and strategy.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 20:28

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

stone cold posted:

Usually dumbass quasi whiteboy cishet leftists get mad about identity politics because they "distract from the class struggle."

But do they ever address the racism, LGBTphobia, and sexism? No, because that has nothing to do with their identity.

Brainiac Five posted:

A pretty good example of why "we need both" is a facile lie is that the people saying it are pushing respectability politics for the minorities. Thus, since LGBT people can't put pressure on society in general because that's "alienating" and can't put pressure on corporations because that's "neoliberalism", what would actually happen in Freddie the Boor's ideal leftism is that LGBT liberation and LGBT people as a class would slowly get strangled into oblivion.

Guys, take a breath. Literally no one in this thread is saying that gender equality, racial equality, or LGBT issues aren't essential to the future we want to build. I can sympathize with your fear and frustration. There remain huge segments of American society that would deny you your right to exist, but the majority of people on these forums and in the broader left have your back. Can we not slap labels on other posters to invalidate their concerns?

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 20:40

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

stone cold posted:

I forgot that check your privilege was phrase uttered outside of tumblr.
it's not amigo

Have you truly never heard someone aggressively brandy the phrase against someone they disagreed with? This gets back to my earlier point, there is a vocal handful of individuals who do wield this kind of rhetoric to shout down others—that you haven't encountered it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Taking them as representatives of all those who struggle for social justice is absolutely the wrong rational response to it, but being attacked for who you are puts you on the defensive. That's just how the human psyche works, right or wrong.

Should we all grow some thicker skin? Sure. But we should also not downplay the toxicity of such rhetoric when we're trying to advance our cause.

Brainiac Five posted:

Dude, I don't care about what you say, I care about what you believe and how you'll act. If you believe that respectability politics is the way forward but also deny that people should interact with the broader society, you quite simply wish to destroy any political movement that isn't the one you believe will win over the residents of Gaylord, MI, pop. 3,645. Because you're closing off both radical politics and the ways respectability politics has any power at all.

I honestly don't know what exactly you mean by 'respectability politics'. Nobody is arguing for winning people over by sidelining LGBT issues (much less pushing them outside the discourse entirely). I don't understand why renewed emphasis on the economic issues need be taken as abandonment of social issues—the whole point of working out our rhetorical squabbles is that we can then come together and have the resources to do both.

Edit:

Brainiac Five posted:

Interesting that you put the "Q" before the "T", Neurolimited.

But here's the thing. There's no loving oppression of white gays going on. None. The most that might happen is them getting their feelings hurt by a 17-year-old kid on Twitter. If that's oppression, what's gaybashing? Super oppression 64?

Are you loving kidding me? This is exactly the problem we're talking about here. "My victimization is greater than yours so shut the gently caress up!!!" Grow up.

Cugel the Clever fucked around with this message at 21:08 on Dec 3, 2016

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 21:02

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Brainiac Five posted:

Since we're talking about not alienating people, we are more or less abandoning radical politics which emphasize the need of the majority to change. But we're also insisting that infiltrating existing power structures is wrong too. So what is being said is that liberatory politics in any direction are unacceptable. Which means that they will die out.

You're projecting your fears into other peoples arguments. I don't know what I could possibly say that would dissuade you that we're not all secretly plotting against you.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 21:11

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Brainiac Five posted:

Interesting that you put the "Q" before the "T", Neurolimited.

But here's the thing. There's no loving oppression of white gays going on. None. The most that might happen is them getting their feelings hurt by a 17-year-old kid on Twitter. If that's oppression, what's gaybashing? Super oppression 64?

Reposting this because it rams the thread's point home: anyone who valorizes themselves for the persecution they face while making GBS threads on other oppressed groups is fundamentally toxic to reasonable discourse. I want to believe that Five is a simple troll, but the problem is that we're at a point in the discourse on the American left that his shtick doesn't get immediately rejected as obviously destructive.

The American left can champion both economic and social justice if it can learn to work together and rise above internecine squabbles. This needn't be a zero-sum game.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 21:26

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Brainiac Five posted:

Yeah dude, gayness is a "label granted by the elite" to divide us. Karl Heinrich Ulrichs is the greatest homophobe of history.

Brainiac Five posted:

But here's the thing. There's no loving oppression of white gays going on. None. The most that might happen is them getting their feelings hurt by a 17-year-old kid on Twitter. If that's oppression, what's gaybashing? Super oppression 64?

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 21:57

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Bip Roberts posted:

Would fighting housing discrimination or hate crimes be ID politics?

No. How many times does it need to be reiterated that social and economic justice are not mutually exclusive?

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 22:33

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Bip Roberts posted:

Would fighting housing discrimination or hate crimes be ID politics?

No. How many times does it need to be reiterated that social and economic justice are not mutually exclusive?

# ¿ Dec 3, 2016 22:33

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

OwlFancier posted:

Which frankly I find difficult to credit as the position of someone who is genuinely interested in the concerns raised by proponents of idpol. Idpol exists because the things it talks about simply are not discussed elsewhere satisfactorily, if you want an economic leftist platform to be accepted by idpol proponents you need to entirely assimilate idpol into it. You need to approach it from a perspective of proper understanding in both areas and without the desire to keep saying "idpol is bad because it distracts from the importance of economics" because that is completely incorrect. Idpol is important because it affirms the importance of things that economics do not cover.

What thread have you been reading? We've stated again and again that we can fight for the two goals simultaneously, hell, that we even need to do so as they go hand in hand, only to be told by you, Five, and stone cold that we are secretly conspiring against the movement toward social justice. You're projecting.

Do you accept Five and stone cold's explicit rejection of the struggle of white homosexuals as valuable allies? You all are so eager to alienate your allies that it is impossible to acknowledge you as anything but alt-right provocateurs.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2016 01:39

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

stone cold posted:

lol five is a white gay person. Just because one goes "I'm a gay socialist" does not make them the spokesperson for gay people. Also glad you only care about white gay men, not all white LGBT, once again betraying your priorities.

Your persecution complex is showing. Stop projecting your own ill-will onto others.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2016 01:42

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Brainiac Five posted:

Let's recap here: I said that white gay men are not oppressed by other LGBT people. According to Dickless here, that means I want to kill all the white gays. I suppose that's a step up from people wailing about white-knighting, in a way.

Not what you said:

Brainiac Five posted:

But here's the thing. There's no loving oppression of white gays going on. None. The most that might happen is them getting their feelings hurt by a 17-year-old kid on Twitter. If that's oppression, what's gaybashing? Super oppression 64?

You are an alt-right troll deliberately provoking internecine struggles on the left while shielding yourself from all criticism by asserting your supposed status as a victimized individual. The problem in the politics of deference is precisely this—it allows individuals acting in bad faith to malign the struggle for social and economic justice.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2016 01:52

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 15:26

Cugel the Clever: Apr 5, 2009; I LOVE AMERICA AND CAPITALISM DESPITE BEING POOR AS FUCK. I WILL NEVER RETIRE BUT HERE'S ANOTHER 200$ FOR UKRAINE, SLAVA

Brainiac Five posted:

Ah, quoting someone out of context, and no link to the original post so people are unable to see that it was in the context of "tumblr" oppressing people.

Here you go. There is nothing in the context that somehow explains away your homophobic attack. This thread has consisted of people arguing that the left must work together and pursue both social and economic justice, except for you and stone cold screaming that we're secretly plotting to abandon LGBT issues and that economic issues have no place in the discourse.

You are an alt-right troll deliberately trying to provoke internecine struggle on the left. The only way the American left can make the progress this country needs is by working together and every word you write is against finding a common cause.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2016 02:08

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Why are Identity politics so bad?