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Liberals have opposed and fought against racial integration and labour rights for the last 30 to 40 years as being uncivil and unpragmatic. In hindsight, perhaps this was a bad strategy, even if it did give them a really solid voting block among black pepple. Also the bit about Trump voters being over the median wage on average is kind of garbage, because the only voters that matter to a discussion like this are the ones on the margins. Also the median wage is so loving low that its not surprising that those with the burdens of money but who arent making enough for any sort of financial security and who have probably hit the ceiling of their earning potential and who only see a future things get worse for them would be the ones desperately voting for Trump.
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Jan 21, 2017 13:34
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Crowsbeak posted:I did give an enemy. Big Money makers like the Devoss's. Even class resentment works a lot better for the right than for the left, if you look at rural white working class voting trump as a big gently caress-you to coastal liberal elites, it's pretty much case in point of class resentment. One of the things about American anti-elitism is that Americans hate the cultural elite more than the economic elite, the cultural elite being rooted in caricatures of liberal college professors or Hollywood which today manifests itself as the "PC-Police". The cultural elite are not necessarily wealthy but Americans hate those guys a lot more than some super rich dude going yeah yeah ban abortion while loving social welfare programs over.
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Jan 21, 2017 15:04
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I also think a lot the resentment does come down to the aftermath of the cultural wars over gay rights. In 2004 being skeptical of gay marriage was a mainstream democratic position, nowadays if you have any doubts about gay marriage you are automatically a bigot. This is a very fast change which occured in under 8-10 years. After one side won the cultural wars the losers pretty much permanently assigned to the basketful of deplorable, understandably that pissed a lot of said losers off. And then over the immigration debate post 2010 or so they wondered why they were being called horrible things like racists and bigots because they want to enforce America's immigration laws, or not wanting to compete with low-education low wage workers from Mexico when from their PoV stopping illegals is perfectly reasonable. When we think of populism we tend to think only of economic populism. Trump and Nixon before him really played on this sort of cultural populism against the elite which was incredibly successful.
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Jan 21, 2017 15:14
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You're treating those actions as if they've occurred in a political vacuum, the people you're talking about live in a bubble. That image of the 'elite' was specifically designed and propagated by people who knew what they were doing, it is not the 'inevitable' outcome you make it seem like.Crowsbeak posted:Well it is honest that most of our problems are from people like the Devosses. Also I can make them a perpetual enemy based on how many people have received their money. So their can be a constant hunt for them as "agents". Plus most of that family, and the Kochs would flee. So they can both act as our eternal and external enemies.
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Jan 21, 2017 15:15
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Typo posted:Even class resentment works a lot better for the right than for the left, if you look at rural white working class voting trump as a big gently caress-you to coastal liberal elites, it's pretty much case in point of class resentment. That is probably because a "cultural elite" is a easy target for the traditional media, anger has to be directed somewhere. At the same time largely nothing is done to such a "cultural elite" since the companies that own the media also own movie studios and other cultural outlets. Also, the marginals especially in the Rust Belt are the important group to watch. It is generally expected people with money are more often than not going to vote Republican, this isn't unexpected. The unexpected part was Trump was able to "recruit" elements of the working class to his side through populist rhetoric, especially about trade and immigration. In general, neither liberals or the democratic party seem to have an answer to the switch than to just hoping Trump destroys himself. By and large liberals, such as traditional liberals of the 19th century, are desperate not to acknowledge class. If you acknowledge class then it opens a paradox box of issues that often difficult for liberalism to answer. Obviously, the are still a small number of American liberals that acknowledge this, in reality they would probably some type of moderate socialists in another country. So the question is, are liberals going to acknowledge class or not?
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Jan 21, 2017 15:19
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:There's an appealing logic to that but it's not true. The presence of reactionaries is an inevitability and not evidence of failure. There is no such thing as a leftist action that doesn't get a reactionary response. The myth that there's a "right" way to effect change that would meet no resistance is toxic and should be dustbinned. Evidence- the reactions to this forum.
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Jan 21, 2017 16:30
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Ardennes posted:So the question is, are liberals going to acknowledge class or not? Considering that party leaders are literally paid not to do this I kind of doubt it. Tiny Brontosaurus posted:This isn't true though. Democrats consistently win the lower-income voting blocs (though their voting power is diminished because of mass disenfranchisement). While true I'm not sure it's accurate to say that Democrats currently represent the interests of poor. Yes, they certainly do a lot in the name of the poor, but when it comes to actually doing stuff their solutions are often really just roundabout ways to help the professional class. For example Hillary was big on microloans as a way to combat poverty overseas. Not only did this not work (it actually made people worse off) it also funneled a lot of money into the hands of the banks that held those loans. The liberal obsession with innovation is another great example. Yes, self driving cars are neat and will probably be a good thing long term but right now they threaten to put thousands out of work. The liberal answer to this? Education! Which probably makes sense to them considering they come from backgrounds where education did real good in their lives. However here once again we see a liberal bias against the poor at work. Education is all well and good but degrees don't actually create jobs or raise wages. If anything they can lower wages if a field becomes over-saturated. Hell, even their education solutions are biassed towards the professional class. HRC's grand idea was to let people with certain degrees tweak their interest rates. It was only when Bernie Sanders started talking about free college that actually forgiving student loans was even considered. Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Trump's core voters made above the median income. They were mostly upper-middle income earners in suburbs and exurbs. Sort of. He's popular among the shrinking middle class. People who have stuff and are watching it slowly get taken away. These people may appear well off on paper but often they have more in common with the poor than with people in Silicon Valley. Again, I see no reason we can't sell this crowd on "Medicare for all" or "public ownership of companies" as a way of getting the boot off their necks. If they think you're sincerely trying to help them rather than just pander I think a surprising number would switch sides.
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Jan 21, 2017 17:09
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Ardennes posted:By and large liberals, such as traditional liberals of the 19th century, are desperate not to acknowledge class. If you acknowledge class then it opens a paradox box of issues that often difficult for liberalism to answer. I don't know how they possibly can. I may be channeling a bit of Chris Hedges here, but liberal elites are just as tied to the current (ailing) order of things as the FYGM crowd of astronomically wealthy individuals such as Charles and David Koch. I noticed this during the whole Occupy thing down at Zuccotti Park. I had friends...like crunchy classic socially liberal, from Old Westbury, educated at Sarah Lawrence types that went down there to protest. And I watched the inevitable clash between that group and the legion of guys and gals that originally showed up from the Locals to join them. It petered out pretty fast because...well, trying to mix a bunch of kids with high end degrees from North East Ivy's with a bunch of sandhogs and sanitation guys who casually use the word 'fag' as a noun, a verb and an adjective during a typical shift...is hard as poo poo to do. I don't know if there's a way to reconcile it because that educated liberal segment is, honestly...and this is my own take on this...trying to have it both ways. They have skin in the game. They are educated and have a wide spread of opportunity so they can't 'put it all on the line' and be willing to sacrifice that future for what a unified left's ideal would probably be. Can't get a rap sheet...because that's going to hamper, if not outright destroy, future wealth prosperity. And they want that prosperity. They may not be willing to admit it but they sure as hell want that. I'm in my late 30's so I've watched these people go from crusaders for social justice to unconsciously becoming the things that their parents sculpted them to be. You go to college not to get an education, you go to college to improve your monetary prospects. So now that they have kids, the ones that couldn't quite hack it in NYC's overheated housing market, have started migrating to the burbs right outside the city line. They don't want to send their kids to PS whatever and they can't gamble that their precious are going to hack it at one of the world class institutions that take from all over the city (Bronx Sci, Stuyvesant, LaGuardia..)...and they can't hack the rents (or mortgages) around here and still send them to private school. In a way this also extends to who seeks lower level civic posts as well. A lefty that went to a world class institution and attained a degree...hell even a degree from a good all around university...regardless of whether they come from well-off (but not trust fund territory) land or are the first in their family to go to college are going to look at the potential upside of working in the private sector vs the public sector and the public sector is going to lose almost every drat time. This leaves the democratic bench decimated with the scions of wealth or the legacies of existing political machines and then they seemingly always go on to be the 3rd way people that masturbate themselves endlessly over meritocratic and technocratic ideas. Oh and also it has those liberal types that made a bunch of money in the private sector and then shift gears but they usually caucus in with those same 3rd way types. Meanwhile the guy or gal working for sanitation is just looking to some sort of contract to keep their head above water and not live in poverty in their twilight years....only to get rebuffed and finger wagged by said other group. gently caress man, we're doomed. TyroneGoldstein fucked around with this message at 17:29 on Jan 21, 2017 |
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Jan 21, 2017 17:10
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Convincing people to change their beliefs, there is a lot written about that under the topic of transformational leadership. Most of it is garbage. But the core of the ok stuff is that one has to convince people that one is truly for them and their needs and thier dreams. By really being for others and having the ideas serve them and by subjecting ones self to the mirror of their judgment. It's question of creating meaning and faith.
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Jan 21, 2017 17:10
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rudatron posted:The current distrust of cities is purely economic - firstly, it's not all cities, secondly, it's because they have benefited from the two speed economy while everyone else has been poo poo on. NY is fine, LA is fine, but everyone else is sort of hosed? It's not like everyone has the capital for their own start-up, but they're the only guys actually making it. Okay now this is just wrong. Protestants were city dwellers. Historically it was during the reformation that they were made up of urban middle class types who had the benefit of reading bibles who then launched attacks on rural folks with their ceremonies to the saints that these Protestants deemed to be pagan. https://books.google.com/books?id=d...0cities&f=false rudatron posted:You're treating those actions as if they've occurred in a political vacuum, the people you're talking about live in a bubble. That image of the 'elite' was specifically designed and propagated by people who knew what they were doing, it is not the 'inevitable' outcome you make it seem like. Ardennes posted:
NO. I really doubt many will. I several who will say this election was always going to happen, that America was just too sexist and too racist. They act as though Obama was just an accident. Free Trade had nothing to do with it. People who were poorer not showing up had nothing to do with it. Americans are just too stupid for them. To admit that class conflict created this scenario is just far too painful for them to admit. They would rather write off much of this country as just racist bumpkins then dare admit that there has been a war on the lower classes and in the general election only one candidate (whilst lying) offered a different way forward. I would also add that the total number of liberals is not that large, the people who I would say are actually liberal rather then those who put on liberal affectations when it comes to an issue or two. Is not much more then the total number of people who are libertarian. Of course most conservatives I know are not real members of the American conservative movement. THey will admit that they want universal healthcare, they willa dmit that they would support welfare if it meant you had to pick up trash with a "on welfare" shirt on, the people of this country mostly vote based on their perceptions becuase ther'e not loving nerds live everyone including myself who posts i this thread. So the failure of liberalism is that people have no real reason to be engaged in this political process. Crowsbeak fucked around with this message at 18:28 on Jan 21, 2017 |
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Jan 21, 2017 17:48
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TyroneGoldstein posted:I don't know how they possibly can. I may be channeling a bit of Chris Hedges here, but liberal elites are just as tied to the current (ailing) order of things as the FYGM crowd of astronomically wealthy individuals such as Charles and David Koch. Well the first step is admitting there is a problem in the first place, not only with the obvious outcome that is around us but how we talk about what is happening. I actually really do hope that "liberal" is eventually completely ditched as a catch-all term for "not-conservative." That said, there is the ultimate issue of the fact that upper-middle class (and often well educated) people maybe want to seem "open minded" and compassionate but ultimately there are silent class loyalties at play. These are people that have more or less stayed where they were in income terms or maybe had moderate gains. They feel guilty their country is rapidly becoming a nightmare but in the end they aren't going to stick their neck out for what isn't their fight. It isn't that much generational either, some upper-middle class millennials may be temporarily struggling now but they will eventually (they hope at least) inherit their parents wealth. They aren't necessarily malicious people, but often very poor allies who often will turn very quickly. Also, as you have said, they are people that completely dominate the Democratic Party, local offices and many if not most NGOs. Ultimately, it is going to have to come down to whether people are going to put aside their silent class allegiance or not to keep the country from turning into the authoritarian wreck it is on track to becoming. Either way, it is going to be real ugly but the question is if there really still any hope or not more than maybe we can buy a little more time in 2020.
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Jan 21, 2017 18:30
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Typo posted:Even class resentment works a lot better for the right than for the left, if you look at rural white working class voting trump as a big gently caress-you to coastal liberal elites, it's pretty much case in point of class resentment. Well I have to disagree with you on this because Obama won 2012 mostly because he was able to portray Romney as a member of the economic elite trying to gently caress them over. Rick Nolan my congressman was able to hold on against a rich gently caress by the name of Stewart Mills by playing up the fact the guy had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth. However I would also add that because the dems are nearly at the moment in service of the economic elites as the GOP that the attacking of the economic elite means that it is generally not tried. Except when dems are desperate. Trump didn't just win because he was able to portray HRC as a cultural elitist he won because he was also able to portray her as a member of the economic elite. As funny as that is, it worked. Of course I would also say that the dems should probably not try to get endorsements from liberals who say half this country are idiots. Crowsbeak fucked around with this message at 02:42 on Jan 22, 2017 |
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Jan 21, 2017 18:51
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I think Kurt Eichewald is the perfect example of the type of Liberals we're talking about. And he deserves bad things to happen to him 
KomradeX fucked around with this message at 00:51 on Jan 22, 2017 |
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Jan 22, 2017 00:34
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rudatron posted:This won't work and you're a moron. Tribalism needs an enemy, and that enemy is always present both inside and outside. Tribalism can't stay, it can and has to go.
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Jan 22, 2017 05:26
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rudatron posted:This won't work and you're a moron. Tribalism needs an enemy, and that enemy is always present both inside and outside. Tribalism can't stay, it can and has to go. You're wrong at least four times in one line. That's almost impressive - if you hadn't previously failed to understand why someone would ever pick an option you gave them on a three-answer question where you only added the third answer to be obviously wrong despite it being morally the only choice, this would have been enough to convince me you just straight up don't understand people (but since you did, I already knew that). It would work. He's not a moron (maybe, at least about this) Tribalism doesn't actually need an enemy (it helps, but it's not required - but other things can serve the unifying purpose as well) Tribalism can't "go", at least until you start creating humans in a factory and leave out chunks of their brain. And a tribeless human would probably be way fuckin' worse that's basically a sociopath.
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Jan 22, 2017 06:22
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KomradeX posted:I think Kurt Eichewald is the perfect example of the type of Liberals we're talking about. And he deserves bad things to happen to him https://soundcloud.com/chapo-trap-house/episode-67-the-swordfish-episode-121816 go to 20 minutes and they go off on him.
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Jan 22, 2017 06:36
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Tribalism is good, it helps us empathize with the abstractions all human beings are outside of the 150 or so our brains are capable of thinking of as individuals. If we didn't have tribalism everyone outside that small village's worth of people our brains can grasp would be no more than animals to us, maybe not even living things at all. Only caring about your nation may not be as good as caring about the whole world but it's a shitload better than only caring about your family.
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Jan 22, 2017 06:58
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i care about humanity and life in general, actually, and its not really that hard
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Jan 22, 2017 07:14
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Tiler Kiwi posted:i care about humanity and life in general, actually, and its not really that hard Cool you have literally no idea what I'm talking about, then. Read about it sometime, it's interesting.
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Jan 22, 2017 07:34
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ive read it before, its not that interesting, and people read way too much into it.
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Jan 22, 2017 07:47
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Tiler Kiwi posted:ive read it before, its not that interesting, and people read way too much into it. We're all very impressed. If you don't have anything on-topic to say, get out. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jan 22, 2017 07:54
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KomradeX posted:I think Kurt Eichewald is the perfect example of the type of Liberals we're talking about. And he deserves bad things to happen to him These are the kind of liberals who are actively hurting the leftist cause. These are the type of dipshits who think if we're good enough doormats republicans will eventually start playing nice.
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Jan 22, 2017 08:25
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Slashie(TB), perhaps you might travel outside new york and learn something.
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Jan 22, 2017 08:51
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Tribalism hasn't gone away, tribalism of nations it has been replaced of tribalism of the urban. City livers have more in common with other city livers then the rest of the citizens of their nations. Copenhagen and London has more in common then the rural parts of their own nations. However, this is not some sort internationalist, "the world is one" attitude, it has material prerequisites, like being able to fart about the globe in cheap budget airlines. One can now ignore class, and ignore nationality, if one has the means to, but those things aren't gone. That is a temporary illusion. Nations continue to exist, and the worse the situation the more you will rely on them. If your gonna achieve political goals you have to use class and nationhood to your advantage.
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Jan 22, 2017 13:32
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White Rock posted:Tribalism hasn't gone away, tribalism of nations it has been replaced of tribalism of the urban. City livers have more in common with other city livers then the rest of the citizens of their nations. Copenhagen and London has more in common then the rural parts of their own nations. However, this is not some sort internationalist, "the world is one" attitude, it has material prerequisites, like being able to fart about the globe in cheap budget airlines. One can now ignore class, and ignore nationality, if one has the means to, but those things aren't gone. That is a temporary illusion. Nations continue to exist, and the worse the situation the more you will rely on them. I think it has more to do with the fact that the logistics of living in cities are universal; people are more exposed to each other on a daily basis in urban areas and in order for things to function, people developed compromises and social structures that tends towards the collective needs of the denizens. You're also more likely going to encounter people of many different classes and backgrounds in cities, whereas suburban and rural areas are far more likely to be homogenous in that regard.
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Jan 22, 2017 13:50
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Neeksy posted:I think it has more to do with the fact that the logistics of living in cities are universal; people are more exposed to each other on a daily basis in urban areas and in order for things to function, people developed compromises and social structures that tends towards the collective needs of the denizens. You're also more likely going to encounter people of many different classes and backgrounds in cities, whereas suburban and rural areas are far more likely to be homogenous in that regard.
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Jan 22, 2017 14:21
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rudatron posted:This won't work and you're a moron. Tribalism needs an enemy, and that enemy is always present both inside and outside. Tribalism can't stay, it can and has to go. Honest question: How is class consciousness meaningfully different from tribalism across class lines (rather than race, nationality etc.) ? Is it not perfectly fine to frame the issue as straight-forward "us", the 99%, (for lack of a better term, though maybe it's actually a perfectly fine term) vs "them" , the 1%? It need not be done with the same vulgarity as the right uses. I kinda like Zizek's idea of trying to reappropriate "the moral majority" for the left: Let's start treating issues of class and economic disparity the same way the left has been (actually quite successfully!) treating racism and sexism, bigotry etc. Expressing sympathy for such ideas just isn't an acceptable topic of discussion in polite company and certainly not in the public sphere - and even though Trump's victory has emboldened the alt-right to speak freely about such thing, they are still treated as appropriately outrageous, unacceptable things to say. Look at the (wonderful!) outburst of approval at that neo-nazi getting punched in his face. Yes there's a handful of truly hopeless cases lamenting the failure of disourse and free speach etc, but the vast majority of the public have exactly the right idea: There is no "let's hear them out" with neo-nazis, and to engage them in polite conversation is, above all, seen as "icky" and probably quite shameful. Such people are simply not seen as part of "our" society - they are outsiders and intruders and not to be tolerated. Why not get to the point where defending the capitalist class is equally seen as icky and shameful and not to be engaged with? Not right away of couse - we do need to "hear them out" to start a dialogue, same as hearing out people's concerns at the beginning of the LGBQT movement, but the goal is to get to a point where that is no longer worth entertaining and supporters of the capitalist class are seen as potentially dangerous, somewhat derranged outsiders etc.
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Jan 23, 2017 23:40
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White Rock posted:Trumps ideology and stories are good, but his policies will do little to help the working class. The rust belt has no economic niche, and nobody is willing to bail them out, not even Trump. And when canceling TRIPPS and "standing up to china" doesn't do jack poo poo Trump he will shrug his shoulders and say "i tried". And he will get a lot of goodwill for doing ANYTHING of course, so that could carry him for another term. Why not Trump? He keeps benefitting from people underestimating him. This won't be some sort of explicit FDR-type work program. Picture a huge handout to his chronies (hardly stretching the imagination here) in the form of either a bail-out or a tax break, oh and it comes with a few strings attatched to open up a few factories in the rust belt. So 90% of taxpayer money goes straight to profits, but 10% is used to bail out a select few potemkin villages to show off (though unlike actual the Potemkin village, the livelyhood improvements of these few rustbelt towns will be real). Then he can can just point at them and say "look at what a huge difference we made here and here by turbocharging our local businesses and protecting them from foreign competitors and letting them manage the enviornment according to the rules of the free market. Ask anyone there how much their life is as a direct result of what we did!" (and it wouldn't even be a lie!). "Imagine how much more I can do in 4 more years!". Can you imagine how difficult it would be to fight back on that narative? It has just enough truth to it - you can't just deny the fact that his policies helped, it's a much more nuanced and difficult argument about how much more this benefited the 1% vs the actual people in those towns, but then the right just shoots back with "rising tide, lifts all boats" and worse of all they can follow it up with "the left not only failed to distribute any wealth back to you, but they also failed to actually rise the tide!". Pesonally, I am just straight-up terrified of this scenario. I just don't see any possibility of the left recovering from such a move beyond waiting things out until after whatever calamity follows it. I'm not saying it's the most likely thing in the world, but it's nowhere near as "out of the question" as I'd like it to be, considering the consequences. I'd actually go as far as calling it "somewhat likely"...
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Jan 23, 2017 23:52
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KomradeX posted:I think Kurt Eichewald is the perfect example of the type of Liberals we're talking about. And he deserves bad things to happen to him In this twitter conversation he went on to tell minorities that MLK Jr and Ghandi would agree with his "let's not ask for things too hard and be respectful of authority" strategy. He's absolute trash and pretty much the spirit animal of liberals that have no idea what it's like to actually be affected by politics or even care and the type of shitbird that MLK was talking about in his Letters from Birmingham (while at the same time saying that King would totally agree with him that you just need to ask your oppressors nicely enough and they will stop). There seems to be a real problem with liberals that stopping nazis from oppressing or killing people is much less important than some nebulous moral high ground (that doesn't result in any real benefit) or winning a debate with them. Scent of Worf posted:These are the kind of liberals who are actively hurting the leftist cause. These are the type of dipshits who think if we're good enough doormats republicans will eventually start playing nice. Basically he doesn't REALLY care about people being screwed but he does care about making sure everyone is polite. He's just on team Democrat and doesn't actively want to gently caress over people (at least directly) so as far as he's concerned everything needs to be Sensible and Responsible because he's not first in line when people start getting shot or put into camps. It's why I've stopped believing centrists are actually conserved about minority rights since they are always a lot more motivated to make sure the system is respected and that financial stuff is ok and are willing to lose elections (leaving everyone at the whims of the Republicans) rather than negotiate on those points. Eggplant Squire fucked around with this message at 00:50 on Jan 24, 2017 |
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Jan 24, 2017 00:45
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Tribalism is good, it helps us empathize with the abstractions all human beings are outside of the 150 or so our brains are capable of thinking of as individuals. If we didn't have tribalism everyone outside that small village's worth of people our brains can grasp would be no more than animals to us, maybe not even living things at all. Only caring about your nation may not be as good as caring about the whole world but it's a shitload better than only caring about your family. This is one reason global trade may be one our best bets at stitching the globe into one slightly cooperative non-warring unit.
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Jan 24, 2017 03:11
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Mr. Wynand posted:Honest question: How is class consciousness meaningfully different from tribalism across class lines (rather than race, nationality etc.) ? Rational self interest. If you have a group of people who really are in similar circumstances in important ways, then that means there are rational policies that can significantly improve the flourishing of the members of that group. At the very least at the expense of other groups, but remarkably often in a positive-sum way that benefits much of the rest of society. Whereas if you have groups that are just aggregations of disparate individuals tied together by myths, then you need to leave the terrain of rational fact-based attention to cause and effect in order to find a policy that helps everyone in the group. If you have a political coalition of generals, shopkeepers and farmers, chances are you end up with some fantasy like 'invade Russia and take their stuff, sell it, then farm their land'. Obviously, the tricky bit here is that it is not merely necessary to think you are right, but to be right. You have to identify the real groups involved, and the real causal relations between them. Zoologists get that kind of stuff wrong all the time, finding what they thought was one species is actually 5, and vice versa. If you ever find yourself trying to feed a lion on grass (because that's what most large African mammals eat) you hosed up. On this model, Clinton and the sort-of-left faction of Democrats specifically hosed up by trying to feed a minimal wage increase to retirees. That was the one big policy Bernie got her to accept. She even mentioned it sometimes, when the topic came up, generally because Trump hadn't done anything outrageous for 2 days in a row. The thing is, again and again you would see some interview where some guy living on a coal industry pension would be described as 'working class' based on their clothes and accent. Then the journalist would be mystified to see them voting for coal industry tax breaks over wage rises for the girl bringing them a beer...
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Jan 24, 2017 11:13
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radmonger posted:Obviously, the tricky bit here is that it is not merely necessary to think you are right, but to be right. You have to identify the real groups involved, and the real causal relations between them. Zoologists get that kind of stuff wrong all the time, finding what they thought was one species is actually 5, and vice versa. If you ever find yourself trying to feed a lion on grass (because that's what most large African mammals eat) you hosed up. I find this analogy both fitting and hilarious. *David Attenborugh voice* "The common house liberal is sometimes confused as part of the prole genus, put scientists have for decades know it as part of it's own separate family of "bourgeoisis petititus"" Also great post, recongningtion of common shared material interested is how classes get created. radmonger posted:
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Jan 24, 2017 11:29
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Ytlaya posted:
Yea, rich liberals are hard to reach because they can't really empathize and middle-class/poor liberals have too much to lose/don't have the time to contribute. Kilroy posted:
Experience isn't a huge deal. The biggest problem for further left Democrats is they 1. Don't have elected officials in place 2. There are a paltry number of candidates who represent that view in the first place You want to get somewhere? You need the candidates, people to run on that platform in the first place. I'm not even trying to get into whether or not they want to primary sitting Democrats: the biggest problem is the talent pool is nothing but a puddle at this point in time. TyroneGoldstein posted:I'm in my late 30's so I've watched these people go from crusaders for social justice to unconsciously becoming the things that their parents sculpted them to be. You go to college not to get an education, you go to college to improve your monetary prospects. So now that they have kids, the ones that couldn't quite hack it in NYC's overheated housing market, have started migrating to the burbs right outside the city line. Good points.
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Jan 24, 2017 18:04
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White Rock posted:To clarify what i think your saying here: The coal worker would want to get to keep or get back his steady job with a bit of pride rather then being payed slightly more as a Walmart greeter (if he can even land THAT)? It's more that he, and his wife, needs the coal company to stay a going concern so they keep paying his pension and health care. Whatever the piece of paper says, he doesn't trust Wall Stree to keep doing so in case of bankruptcy. And no green energy startup is going to be taking on the health plans and pensions of a bunch of 50 year olds. Having worked for 30 years in a mine, he is going to spend the rest of his like as a net purchaser of labour. So high wages are bad for him, just as they are for Trump. He has a low, stable and fixed income, so can budget precisely, and see how much is going out in tax, and what inflation would do to his finances. Having worked harder and longer than the average person, he suspects that any welfare system that simply redistributes money is going to be taking from him more than it is giving. In other words, what he actually, objectively needs is what the Republicans promise, and in fact have a record of delivering; low wages and low tax. You could win his vote on objective grounds with, say, socialised health care and Wall Street reform. Or you could appeal to to his solidarity by spending a lot of time and focus on people like him; how what you do is going to help out his nephew and granddaughter. But you can't just say 'go visit this URL', expect him to decide to make those sacrifices if you are not willing to spend the time to even ask.
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Jan 24, 2017 19:09
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An interesting new term is "politiphobia". It seems to sum up so, so many people I know IRL. quote:I think of these people as “politiphobes,” because they see the contentious give-and-take of politics as unnecessary and distasteful. Specifically, they believe that obvious, commonsense solutions to the country’s problems are out there for the plucking. The reason these obvious solutions are not enacted is that politicians are corrupt, or self-interested, or addicted to unnecessary partisan feuding. Not surprisingly, politiphobes think the obvious, commonsense solutions are the sorts of solutions that they themselves prefer. But the more important point is that they do not acknowledge that meaningful policy disagreement even exists. From that premise, they conclude that all the arguing and partisanship and horse-trading that go on in American politics are entirely unnecessary. Politicians could easily solve all our problems if they would only set aside their craven personal agendas.
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Jan 27, 2017 15:28
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Phyzzle posted:An interesting new term is "politiphobia". It seems to sum up so, so many people I know IRL. Chapo Trap House took a guy with this perspective to the woodshed a few months ago--I forget his name, but basically an idiot who writes opinion pieces and thinks that there is a united American People who know what they want and evil politicians simply refuse to do it because they're the ones with the agenda.
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Jan 27, 2017 16:29
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Phyzzle posted:An interesting new term is "politiphobia". It seems to sum up so, so many people I know IRL. Isn't this just another way of describing low information voters? You're really just talking about people who haven't spent enough time researching actual policy to have a meaningful opinion.
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Jan 27, 2017 17:02
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Phyzzle posted:An interesting new term is "politiphobia". It seems to sum up so, so many people I know IRL. These people usually have brilliant "common sense" solutions like "men can't have babies together and marrying is for baby having so don't allow gay marriage". Their entire worldview is based on the most simplistic syllogistic style of thinking.
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Jan 27, 2017 17:10
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readingatwork posted:For example Hillary was big on microloans as a way to combat poverty overseas. Not only did this not work (it actually made people worse off) it also funneled a lot of money into the hands of the banks that held those loans.
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Jan 27, 2017 20:24
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Paradoxish posted:Isn't this just another way of describing low information voters? You're really just talking about people who haven't spent enough time researching actual policy to have a meaningful opinion. Perhaps the term describes the same group of people by coincidence, but the main difference between the two is that the low-information voter knows nothing but doesn't necessarily reject participation in the political process, while the politiphobe does, regardless of their knowledge level. The real tragedy of the politiphobe as described is that rejection of political struggle is in itself a political act, basically a capitulation to the evil professional political class that they fear and loathe. It's crucial to understand that this is not just individual laziness. Depoliticization of the middle and working classes is a part of the neoliberal project. The message goes like this: capitalism is vindicated, we have reached the end of history, no need to concern yourself in public affairs, we have a class of professional politicians who will manage society and advocate for your interests as long as you donate and vote, no need to do anything more. Trumpism is what results from the mass realization by the right that this is a rather obvious deception. I think the left is beginning to catch on as well. The renewed interest in leftist popular politics and mobilization is heartening, because it's exactly the correct response to the politiphobia that's been cultivated for the past few decades.
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Jan 27, 2017 23:26
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