Gee, you sure sounds old. It's not my country even, but as I understand things, Defond the Police was not about abolishment of the police, but rather to demilitarize them and moving some of the...
Exemplary
Their ranks are dominated by white college graduates who, he believes, are more consumed with abstract theories of social justice, policing other people’s language, and broadcasting their own personal virtue than they are in, say, making sure that workers have an affordable place to live. “The progressive conversation,” he has noticed, “is disproportionately made up of people who don’t actually have a lot of experience worrying over how they’ll pay the rent.”
Gee, you sure sounds old.
(A YouGov poll taken just after Floyd’s death found that only 16 percent of Democrats supported cutting—not even abolishing—police funding.)
It's not my country even, but as I understand things, Defond the Police was not about abolishment of the police, but rather to demilitarize them and moving some of the task that doesn't require their monopoly on violence to social workers and the like. Didn't the book touch on that?
Most readers will be familiar with the many absurdities that modern left-wing
I'm afraid I've been too distracted by stuff like transphobia, racists politics and genocide to be outraged over what some teen said on Twitter.
millions of decent white liberals clutching “anti-racist” books on the subway, reading about why they’re wicked and should feel bad
So very stereotypical right-wing. Yes, for right-wingers, this would seem the case, because for them, this would criticize the core of their belief. But for progressives, finding faulty ideas in yourself that you don't actually subscribe to feels liberating.
Defund the police was a widely adopted slogan by many different people who had many different opinions of what it meant. This has led to an unfortunate situation where for most interpretations,...
It's not my country even, but as I understand things, Defond the Police was not about abolishment of the police, but rather to demilitarize them and moving some of the task that doesn't require their monopoly on violence to social workers and the like. Didn't the book touch on that?
Defund the police was a widely adopted slogan by many different people who had many different opinions of what it meant. This has led to an unfortunate situation where for most interpretations, one can find at least one example of a prominent activist claiming it means something else. It’s a problem with most of these loosely organized slogans and movements — Black Lives Matter, the tea party, yellow vest movement, antifa, defund the police, occupy Wall Street, probably others. The chosen interpretation seems to be an effective Rorschach test of the writer’s political views though.
When people say “defund the police,” this encompasses a spectrum of things — from people who are calling to reduce budgets and reallocate funds to social services to others who are calling for the abolition of the institution itself.
Activists who use the phrase may do so with varying intentions; some seek modest reductions, while others argue for full divestment as a step toward the abolition of contemporary police services.
While many activists (maybe even most?) claim that they have only ever wanted to reallocate funds, this is clearly not universal. The goal of totally abolishing the police has in some cases led to rather dramatic plans, which didn’t ultimately come to fruition.
In the immediate wake of the homicide of George Floyd under the knee of a city cop, a veto-proof majority of the city council vowed to disband the Minneapolis PD and to replace it with new systems for public safety. Instead, the city council has now voted to trim just 4.5 percent from the police budget in 2021, a move that will not change the number of cops on the street.
The term "idpol" itself is one of these Rorschach tests, as this thread shows with all the people opining their rants about how complaints about idpol are themselves right-wing idpol. IMO, idpol...
It’s a problem with most of these loosely organized slogans and movements — Black Lives Matter, the tea party, yellow vest movement, antifa, defund the police, occupy Wall Street, probably others
The term "idpol" itself is one of these Rorschach tests, as this thread shows with all the people opining their rants about how complaints about idpol are themselves right-wing idpol. IMO, idpol is an attitude or an approach, rather than a set of policies or beliefs. For example, addressing police brutality through comprehensive police reform is a material issue that will disproportionately help the Black community if it's fully implemented; changing your MySpace pic to a black square in the aftermath of cops shooting yet another unarmed black man, and then picking fights over the capitalization of the B in black is idpol.
The problem is that the vast majority of times people complain about idpol like this, they're not just complaining about the latter, but anything remotely intended to improve the lives of minority...
The problem is that the vast majority of times people complain about idpol like this, they're not just complaining about the latter, but anything remotely intended to improve the lives of minority groups at all. I raise a major eyebrow at any unironically using the term idpol for this reason, as whether they're left or right they're almost always hugely transphobic and/or homophobic and/or racist (and it's more often "and" than "or").
The stuff you describe as idpol is definitely worth criticizing, but I personally would advise anyone criticizing it to use a different term than idpol (something more descriptive like "performative online activism" for instance) due to how often that term is used to delegitimize real struggles.
"Performative" has the added benefit over "virtue signaling" in that it directly points out the reason why such activism (or behavior in general) is counterproductive and/or useless. It's a...
"Performative" has the added benefit over "virtue signaling" in that it directly points out the reason why such activism (or behavior in general) is counterproductive and/or useless. It's a behavior old enough to be discussed at length in the Bible. A performative action is purely that; sometimes, an action meant to signal virtue will inadvertently help the group it claims to support.
One of the few benefits of online discourse is that the euphemism treadmill now runs so fast that new terms never catch on before being vocabulary non grata among the in-crowd.
Lexicographers are generally descriptivists, with dictionary definitions intended to capture the way people are using words rather than dictating how they should be used, so it's not particularly...
Lexicographers are generally descriptivists, with dictionary definitions intended to capture the way people are using words rather than dictating how they should be used, so it's not particularly surprising.
That said, "performative" was coined in the 1950s (so it's always been newer) by a philisopher of language to describe what would later become speech act theory. When it was coined, a "performative speech act" was defined as one that was structured as an indicative sentence but that was not uttered to express the truth of some proposition, but instead to perform some action by the act of uttering itself. While this definition is pretty technical from a linguistics perspective, it's surprisingly close to the modern way the word is used if generalized in some ways and made more specific in others.
I think that the fact that we all are still having this conversation trying to pinpoint what it even means is proof in of itself that it's not a very good slogan.
It's not my country even, but as I understand things, Defond the Police was not about abolishment of the police, but rather to demilitarize them and moving some of the task that doesn't require their monopoly on violence to social workers and the like. Didn't the book touch on that?
Defund the police was a widely adopted slogan by many different people who had many different opinions of what it meant.
I think that the fact that we all are still having this conversation trying to pinpoint what it even means is proof in of itself that it's not a very good slogan.
“Fascists are trying to destroy entire identity groups and claiming they can assassinate rivals with impunity but the real problem is CoLlEgE StUdEnTs with ViEwS I DoNT liiiiike, more at 11 Tom”
“Fascists are trying to destroy entire identity groups and claiming they can assassinate rivals with impunity but the real problem is CoLlEgE StUdEnTs with ViEwS I DoNT liiiiike, more at 11 Tom”
The article starts with a question why there has been a lot of cultural changes after the protests following George Floyd's murder, but not a lot of policy changes. The writer than tries to answer...
The article starts with a question why there has been a lot of cultural changes after the protests following George Floyd's murder, but not a lot of policy changes. The writer than tries to answer that question, but I don't think they are saying the real problem with the country is college students or people reading books. I think he is arguing the current strategy is not effective for actually helping people who need the most support.
For example there are a lot of comments in this thread about what calls for "defund the police" are actually proposing. It seems like it's unclear to a lot of people. Maybe that's a problem? Looking at how the movement has actually changed policing in America seems pretty valid regardless of personal political views.
I’ll be honest, I stopped reading a few paragraphs in because it was nothing but right-wing trollbait, anecdata and contradictions that plague pretty much all reactionary ‘discourse’ about social...
I’ll be honest, I stopped reading a few paragraphs in because it was nothing but right-wing trollbait, anecdata and contradictions that plague pretty much all reactionary ‘discourse’ about social justice
Just a few salty examples:
ticks through many of them, such as the University of Southern California’s School of Social Work banning the use of the word field to refer to an academic discipline out of a supposed concern that it might cause Black students and staff to think of slavery
Ok, so a department of 114 staff, plus’s 3k post docs made a weird decision. But it wasn’t even a unanimous vote, it was one fucking office in the school that sent out a memo. Was it official policy? Is the office bigger than like 5 staff? Who knows. Also: who fucking cares? Anyone who’s ever been at a university knows you get a million dumb memos from all over the place. Does this really merit dozens of national news stories? No, of course not… it’s just another rightwing troll bait.
Ok, maybe that’s one example, right?
In Minneapolis, they surrounded and booed the mayor, Jacob Frey, when he wouldn’t get behind it. DeBoer points out that defunding the police was purely an elite fixation that ignored the desires of Black community members, most of whom ardently wished for more—and better—policing in their neighborhoods, not less. (A YouGov poll taken just after Floyd’s death found that only 16 percent of Democrats supported cutting—not even abolishing—police funding.) In other words, the reform that the most vocal element of the activist left chose to pursue in the wake of Floyd’s death was destined to fail, and, in doing so, foreclose other, more promising alternatives.
In this paragraph we have:
people actually protesting because an ‘elite’ wouldn’t support defund, idunno how many but it looks like a lot. Maybe protesting is performative now? But like: the fuck else we supposed to do?
an unlinked poll, with unknown wording taken an unknown time after George Floyd with unknown demographic breakdowns, and yet this “proves” black people didn’t support defund (gasp, other polls disagreed), but <inserts logical leap> wanted more policing. Like sure man, but show your fucking work.
and blame on our “performative justice folks” for not… somehow… getting elites to go along with this , and blocking out unnamed “better” alternatives. All of this while not once reckoning that half of the political system of America is fash-curious
Because he’s a member of the activist left and aims to influence his allies, DeBoer sometimes writes as if he’s defusing a bomb. Even the most reasonable assertions are prefaced with lengthy reassurances that his political views align with those whom he is criticizing, even if his strategic preference differs:
Of course, white liberals should remain cognizant of the way that their voices can dominate the conversation
My dude: this entire piece so far has been you inserting your opinions in place of fact.
But DeBoer still thinks it’s silly that organizers at many left gatherings determine the order of who should be allowed to speak based on the perceived degree of marginalization of the group they identify with—that is, Black women, transgender, and disabled people should always speak before the able-bodied, white, and male.
HOW COMMON IS THIS MY GUY? Can you like, cite a fucking handbook for any major fucking organization that calls for this? Hell I’ll even take some 10 member org in Missoula so long as I can stop taking your word. Edit: I just realized he’s literally complaining about “elites” prioritizing the voices of non-elites here, which is fucking gold, even if I still doubt it’s anything in reality
I felt reading this that roughly once per paragraph I was switching between agreeing and disagreeing with the opinions being expressed. Yes, there are bigger goals that I think that leftists...
I felt reading this that roughly once per paragraph I was switching between agreeing and disagreeing with the opinions being expressed.
Yes, there are bigger goals that I think that leftists should be targeting. Particularly things regarding healthcare and labor rights. But at the same time I feel like blaming the lack of progress on identity politics is very shortsighted. I've got a coworker who will believe just about anything when given a sufficiently tasty anecdote, and this feels like the same thing, like it's missing out on important details that explain the whole, or that there's some data point that was misrepresented.
But it's really hard to criticize someone when I haven't actually heard what their opinion is. This article is certainly not explaining the author's entire point.
In politics, you have a limited amount of political capital to spend, particularly if you don’t have control of government. You can make a credible argument that the political capital spent on...
In politics, you have a limited amount of political capital to spend, particularly if you don’t have control of government. You can make a credible argument that the political capital spent on defund/abolish the police-type movements prevented real reforms that were needed or would have been more impactful. What’s tricky is that Dems couldn’t just ignore it, they had to respond lest they face primary challenges from further-left candidates.
I'm not really convinced that responding to defund the police-type movements couldn't entail reforms that were needed, though. There were a shitton of different voices in those movements on the...
I'm not really convinced that responding to defund the police-type movements couldn't entail reforms that were needed, though. There were a shitton of different voices in those movements on the ground since they weren't generally all that centrally organized, and it was not hard to find reasonable concrete suggestions for reform from prominent voices in the movement if you were listening.
Dems shouldn't be able to ignore demands from swaths of their voter base without getting challenged in the primaries. The further left candidate who would be challenging your hypothetical Dem would almost certainlyhave these concrete policy proposals or at least promises for them as part of their campaign. One route for Dems would also be to implement lesser reforms among those being demanded -- there was a lot of variety in how radical the reforms being called for actually were and most of the "real reforms that were needed" were being called for openly by that movement.
I feel like it expresses a sentiment consistent with the kind of worldview of "class conflict is the main problem, and things like race or gender politics are manufactured divisions that the elite...
I feel like it expresses a sentiment consistent with the kind of worldview of "class conflict is the main problem, and things like race or gender politics are manufactured divisions that the elite use to keep people divided" that some people subscribe to.
I dont know if that's the author of the book's intention, since I havent read the book. It seems cohesive at least.
Personally no, I am of the opinion that there are different subcultures with different motivations, some of which are rooted in class conflict, others rooted in nationalism and racial conflict,...
Personally no, I am of the opinion that there are different subcultures with different motivations, some of which are rooted in class conflict, others rooted in nationalism and racial conflict, etc.
I dont think there is a unified root problem other than the general tendency of people who want power and control over others appealing to whatever combination of ideals will net them the biggest following of passionate supporters, which often results in a common overlap between different ideologies of bigotry.
But all those independent ideologies are actual things, not subordinate distractions.
No amount of suppression of """identity politics""" would even slightly improve healthcare and labor rights, anyway. The article is a fallacy upon fallacy because "stop trying to improve YOUR lives!"
No amount of suppression of """identity politics""" would even slightly improve healthcare and labor rights, anyway. The article is a fallacy upon fallacy because "stop trying to improve YOUR lives!"
Your findings and opinions may very well be valid, but please be substantive when attacking someone's character. I find myself agreeing with some of this article, and as such I'm feeling a bit...
Exemplary
Your findings and opinions may very well be valid, but please be substantive when attacking someone's character.
I find myself agreeing with some of this article, and as such I'm feeling a bit more defensive when the author is ad-hominemed. Let alone without so much as actually telling us what he has done wrong enough to invalidate his ideas.
Genuinely please do tell if it is not worth digging deeper to understand his opinion. My own quick searches on Fredrik find it very hard to differentiate between political vitriol and rational criticism.
Well, first off - my completely-biased opinion is, a white man that went to Purdue shouldn't be in the business of trying to tell people of color what is and isn't worth their time to...
Exemplary
Well, first off - my completely-biased opinion is, a white man that went to Purdue shouldn't be in the business of trying to tell people of color what is and isn't worth their time to protest/organize around.
I say that as a similarly milquetoast upper-crust white man who went to university and graduated without debt, so take it as you will.
In How Elites Ate the Social Justice Movement, Fredrik deBoer explores why these passionate movements failed and how they could succeed in the future. In the digital age, social movements flare up but then lose steam through a lack of tangible goals, the inherent moderating effects of our established institutions and political parties, and the lack of any real grassroots movement in contemporary America. Hidden beneath the rhetoric of the oppressed and the symbolism of the downtrodden lies the inconvenient fact that those doing the organizing, messaging, protesting, and campaigning are predominantly drawn from this country’s more upwardly mobile educated classes. Poses are more important than policies.
What does he think Black Lives Matter was? It's the definition of a grass-roots movement. What about the protests around the Dakota Access Pipeline? Those weren't led by elites, nor were they overtaken by them.
The tone of the synopsis reads that if people had chosen to organize around only the specific framework he lays out, that it would have been successful. Only the identity of class matters; nevermind the history of this nation, past and present, and its treatment of anyone that isn't explicitly white (which changes definition constantly).
Keep in mind, the author himself holds no claims to leading or being a member of any such social movement. He's not an active academic, by his own admission:
Though I have not been employed by an academic institution in a long time, I will always be an academic at heart.
He seems to write from an outside opinion, rather than from any actual experience, interviewing, or study.
His previous book. "The Cult of Smart", has been criticized (long article, but worth your time):
[T]he central argument of the book is not just wrong, but wrong in the strongest possible sense of that term. It is based on fallacious reasoning. It is a mistake. An error. The whole argument falls apart completely the moment you touch it.
The criticism continues:
It’s a book-length case that intellectual inequality is demonstrably innate, therefore merit is a lie, therefore socialism is good. And of course, I agree that “merit” is a lie and socialism is good but since the first point is false for very clear reasons, those “therefores” never get to carry us logically to the egalitarian utopia.
And ...
DeBoer calls the book a “plea for the untalented,” and the gist of it is: Student abilities are substantially genetically inherited and therefore it is a fool’s errand to try to achieve equal educational outcomes. If that claim is not demonstrated to be true, we’re left without the centerpiece of his case against meritocracy, and therefore the case for our beautiful socialist utopia.
Further ...
DeBoer knows everything I’m saying. He says explicitly: environments where everyone is treated identically will bring out genetic correlations, and he critiques the philosophy of “equal opportunity,” saying it doesn’t recognize individual different predispositions. But:
Having a philosophy of equal opportunity does not actually result in real equal opportunity, as we see in the case of women and minority students who are systematically drummed out of STEM by subtly (or unsubtly) bigoted professors.
Even if equal opportunity could and does exist, the correct conclusion is the opposite of what deBoer thinks. He thinks the “genetically caused” inequalities of outcome, which emerge within a system he believes will magnify those inequalities, reveal the upper limits of a student’s natural aptitude. They do nothing of the kind. All they show is that without building each student the personalized school system that fits them best, whatever small genetic differences exist (which may have nothing whatsoever to do with intellectual capacity) will determine the rank order of “aptitude.”
It is a very long article, one I am still reading now. But suffice it to say, DeBoer's writing appears to fail quite dramatically at simple logic. His first book does, anyway. I can't speak for the second as I am not inclined to read it.
He gets a lot of criticism and also deals it out. There's plenty of vitriol in some of his blog posts (which is why I eventually unsubscribed), but not always, and his first book took a more...
He gets a lot of criticism and also deals it out. There's plenty of vitriol in some of his blog posts (which is why I eventually unsubscribed), but not always, and his first book took a more serious tone.
He's also more or less admitted that he does it to get more attention and more subscribers; he's been admirably transparent about the writing business. (Which doesn't mean he isn't also sincere.)
I'll still sometimes read something by him because I find surprising or contrarian arguments more interesting than the same old stuff. But if you read him every day, he does tend to repeat himself.
I have a number of kind-hearted friends who definitely mean well, and they post leftist/activist content to their Instagram stories essentially every day, which is fairly common in my social...
Most self-proclaimed activists are just slacktivists. The sum total of their activism may be interacting on social media, policing language and backing slogans. Ultimately all very superficial actions - ripples in a vast ocean that will soon fade away.
I have a number of kind-hearted friends who definitely mean well, and they post leftist/activist content to their Instagram stories essentially every day, which is fairly common in my social circles. The content relies quite heavily on shame: "You are fatphobic if you believe _____," or "If you think _____, then you are blatantly participating in racism," etc. I don't necessarily disagree with all of the sentiments, but I'm just pointing out that the content often seems based in shame. The people I know who post like this are not involved in volunteer efforts with any charity organization or political organization, and some of them have stated to me that they are ashamed of that fact.
Another sentiment common in my social circles is: "I've been too embarrassed to post anything fun/random on social media recently, because it feels selfish and tone-deaf to post anything while people are dying in a war," so they just don't post anything at all. Fair enough, they're not stating anything incorrect, and it's not inherently bad to refrain from posting on social media - I'm just sensing the shame involved in this dynamic, again.
I also have friends who are heavily involved in community council meetings, volunteer efforts, or have even based their whole career on making tangible political change, working for the city government. Those friends almost never post on social media about politics or activism. They don't seem to carry shame, or they at least don't broadcast it or share it with anyone.
I feel like there's a lot to unpack there.
I'm not an activist and I don't claim to be. Maybe my friends who live in the Midwest and post about the Israel/Palestine conflict every day are making a more positive impact on the world than I am. I wouldn't be surprised, honestly, because I essentially do nothing to help. But sometimes I do wonder about what impact the neverending churn of "social media activism" really has at the end of the day. Am I just projecting my own shame onto these people? To be honest, I'm not sure if I am or not.
I recommend reading the Kindle sample for a better idea of his target audience. It seems to be from one activist to another: I'm regretting sharing this review because people seem to have gotten...
I recommend reading the Kindle sample for a better idea of his target audience. It seems to be from one activist to another:
I am now some twenty-five years into a career as a part-time organizer. Some years I've organized more, some I've organized less, and I took a break during grad school, but I've tried to get involved one way or another since I first became politically conscious as a teenager. Over that time, I have watched the same dynamics play out again and again [...]
I'm regretting sharing this review because people seem to have gotten the wrong idea from it.
The questions of how the political left, which seemed to have unstoppable momentum, failed to produce reform on this and other issues, and who is to blame for that failure, is the subject of Fredrik DeBoer’s new book, How Elites Ate the Social Justice Movement.
I've deleted this comment more times than I'd like to admit but basically this is just the current right wing scapegoat. "Gosh, I'd be progressive if they just focused on workers rights! Instead...
I've deleted this comment more times than I'd like to admit but basically this is just the current right wing scapegoat. "Gosh, I'd be progressive if they just focused on workers rights! Instead I'll vote for the anti-worker authoritarians, that'll make my life better!"
Shamelessly cribbed from his Wikipedia
DeBoer identifies himself as a "Marxist of an old-school variety".
Well, it's a shame he took that bait but it's also not entirely unexpected.
From what I've read he actually is a leftist (though he disagrees with many leftists), and I doubt very much that he ever voted for any Republicans. I don't know where you're getting that from. (I...
From what I've read he actually is a leftist (though he disagrees with many leftists), and I doubt very much that he ever voted for any Republicans. I don't know where you're getting that from.
(I subscribed to his Substack for a bit over a year and read his first book.)
Well if he is a leftist, he's one that is doing a great job of parroting right-wing points and attacks (which this author himself amplifies). Both the author of this article and the author of the...
Well if he is a leftist, he's one that is doing a great job of parroting right-wing points and attacks (which this author himself amplifies). Both the author of this article and the author of the book could have potentially had a valid point but burying and surrounding it with things like
millions of decent white liberals clutching “anti-racist” books on the subway, reading about why they’re wicked and should feel bad
just completely loses the plot. Even leftists at all sorts of varying levels of leftism often recommend to each other to read various books and become more educated and informed on various things (not just the "white liberals" called out here). What, do we argue instead for white liberals to avoid literature that may help them move left and further see things in society that they need to help root out? A lot of work on racism, sexism, etc all stems from trying to root that out of yourself- so some self-work is involved.
I also don't like the false dichotomy of "marching" vs "reading books". You can have both.
I also don't like the thought of "identity politics" (I hate this phrase, often used by the right to dismiss what are REAL human rights issues) as some unimportant "side issue" to labor rights or whatever- and attributing all of this to white liberalism is also BS. We are really going to go down the path of just erasing the experience of people of color and LGBTQIA+ (and those that fall at the intersection of those) as "identity politics" now?
I do think there should be some/plenty of focus on class but that does not mean we throw out race/gender/sexuality/etc as a concern with it. They're not, and don't have to be, mutually exclusive things.
And don't get me wrong, I think there can be problems of the "white liberal" becoming a main voice instead of amplifying the voice of others- there can be issues where one's approach to left-wing ideals unfortunately gets corrupted by ego, privilege, unnecessary toxicity, infighting, etc.... but it appears easy for people to turn valid internal leftist criticism into really bad takes that just amplify right-wing ideas further
There are ways the farther-left can criticize the social justice movement without pushing it through a right-wing lens. As an example, queer liberation is not just "identity politics" and I bristle at and am extremely skeptical of anyone pushing that rhetoric.
Yes, it’s a cheap shot (and deBoer tends to make lots of those) but I think we could turn it into more serious questions: what are the demographics of people reading these books and what else do...
Yes, it’s a cheap shot (and deBoer tends to make lots of those) but I think we could turn it into more serious questions: what are the demographics of people reading these books and what else do they do? Does reading these books make white people more awkward around black folks, or does it encourage connections?
I can imagine scenarios, but I’m out of touch and don’t know. Maybe there’s evidence in the book? I did download the Kindle sample, but I don’t know if I’ll read it.
My first response is with another question - what does that matter? deBoer has already insisted upon a response - "decent white liberals" and "reading about why they're wicked". I would be counted...
what are the demographics of people reading these books and what else do they do?
My first response is with another question - what does that matter? deBoer has already insisted upon a response - "decent white liberals" and "reading about why they're wicked". I would be counted as one of those, given that I've been cutting my teeth on books by Ibram X. Kendi (yes I know he has baggage now) and Ijeoma Oluo. I read those books and did not come away with the feeling that I'm "wicked". I came away with a better understanding of systemic injustice and racism and how I, as well as (likely) most of us here, have benefited from it.
The point I took from the books I've read is less "white people are inherently bad" and more "white people are generally oblivious", along with "the obliviousness is built-in by those in power".
Does reading these books make white people more awkward around black folks, or does it encourage connections?
In my opinion, that's a question with no meaningful answer, because it will be different for everyone.
That's a pretty wild interpretation on what the author involved is saying. From the article directly,
Gosh, I'd be progressive if they just focused on workers rights! Instead I'll vote for the anti-worker authoritarians, that'll make my life better!
That's a pretty wild interpretation on what the author involved is saying.
From the article directly,
That kind of progress will require electing more Democrats. DeBoer is characteristically clear-eyed and sensible about the need for leftists to get behind this important (but ideologically unsexy) effort, even when it entails supporting moderates like Joe Biden. He has good ideas about how to do so.
Right, there's always the people that claim you're just an "idpol" and you should stop focusing on race/sex/gender/sexuality/etc, and start focus on class. Well that's all fine and dandy, but...
Right, there's always the people that claim you're just an "idpol" and you should stop focusing on race/sex/gender/sexuality/etc, and start focus on class.
Well that's all fine and dandy, but politicians aren't directly removing the rights of poor white men away like they are for minorities. It's hard to focus on economic reform when there are direct attacks on minorities at the same time. Should we let their civil rights be stripped away so that we can make sure they get healthcare? The problem is, republicans see really good at messaging (and their constituents believe pretty much anything) so there is always a new culture war they can start to derail actual reform. But without defending those attacks on minorities, democrats won't have support from their constituents. Which leads to this weird standoff.
Gee, you sure sounds old.
It's not my country even, but as I understand things, Defond the Police was not about abolishment of the police, but rather to demilitarize them and moving some of the task that doesn't require their monopoly on violence to social workers and the like. Didn't the book touch on that?
I'm afraid I've been too distracted by stuff like transphobia, racists politics and genocide to be outraged over what some teen said on Twitter.
So very stereotypical right-wing. Yes, for right-wingers, this would seem the case, because for them, this would criticize the core of their belief. But for progressives, finding faulty ideas in yourself that you don't actually subscribe to feels liberating.
Christ.
Defund the police was a widely adopted slogan by many different people who had many different opinions of what it meant. This has led to an unfortunate situation where for most interpretations, one can find at least one example of a prominent activist claiming it means something else. It’s a problem with most of these loosely organized slogans and movements — Black Lives Matter, the tea party, yellow vest movement, antifa, defund the police, occupy Wall Street, probably others. The chosen interpretation seems to be an effective Rorschach test of the writer’s political views though.
https://www.ualberta.ca/newtrail/ideas/defund-the-police.html#:~:text=These%20are%20things%20like%20education,need%20for%20criminal%20justice%20intervention.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defund_the_police
While many activists (maybe even most?) claim that they have only ever wanted to reallocate funds, this is clearly not universal. The goal of totally abolishing the police has in some cases led to rather dramatic plans, which didn’t ultimately come to fruition.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/what-happened-disband-minneapolis-police-1102763/amp/
The term "idpol" itself is one of these Rorschach tests, as this thread shows with all the people opining their rants about how complaints about idpol are themselves right-wing idpol. IMO, idpol is an attitude or an approach, rather than a set of policies or beliefs. For example, addressing police brutality through comprehensive police reform is a material issue that will disproportionately help the Black community if it's fully implemented; changing your MySpace pic to a black square in the aftermath of cops shooting yet another unarmed black man, and then picking fights over the capitalization of the B in black is idpol.
The problem is that the vast majority of times people complain about idpol like this, they're not just complaining about the latter, but anything remotely intended to improve the lives of minority groups at all. I raise a major eyebrow at any unironically using the term idpol for this reason, as whether they're left or right they're almost always hugely transphobic and/or homophobic and/or racist (and it's more often "and" than "or").
The stuff you describe as idpol is definitely worth criticizing, but I personally would advise anyone criticizing it to use a different term than idpol (something more descriptive like "performative online activism" for instance) due to how often that term is used to delegitimize real struggles.
"Performative" has the added benefit over "virtue signaling" in that it directly points out the reason why such activism (or behavior in general) is counterproductive and/or useless. It's a behavior old enough to be discussed at length in the Bible. A performative action is purely that; sometimes, an action meant to signal virtue will inadvertently help the group it claims to support.
One of the few benefits of online discourse is that the euphemism treadmill now runs so fast that new terms never catch on before being vocabulary non grata among the in-crowd.
It's been interesting to see dictionaries add this newer meaning.
Lexicographers are generally descriptivists, with dictionary definitions intended to capture the way people are using words rather than dictating how they should be used, so it's not particularly surprising.
That said, "performative" was coined in the 1950s (so it's always been newer) by a philisopher of language to describe what would later become speech act theory. When it was coined, a "performative speech act" was defined as one that was structured as an indicative sentence but that was not uttered to express the truth of some proposition, but instead to perform some action by the act of uttering itself. While this definition is pretty technical from a linguistics perspective, it's surprisingly close to the modern way the word is used if generalized in some ways and made more specific in others.
I think that the fact that we all are still having this conversation trying to pinpoint what it even means is proof in of itself that it's not a very good slogan.
“Fascists are trying to destroy entire identity groups and claiming they can assassinate rivals with impunity but the real problem is CoLlEgE StUdEnTs with ViEwS I DoNT liiiiike, more at 11 Tom”
The article starts with a question why there has been a lot of cultural changes after the protests following George Floyd's murder, but not a lot of policy changes. The writer than tries to answer that question, but I don't think they are saying the real problem with the country is college students or people reading books. I think he is arguing the current strategy is not effective for actually helping people who need the most support.
For example there are a lot of comments in this thread about what calls for "defund the police" are actually proposing. It seems like it's unclear to a lot of people. Maybe that's a problem? Looking at how the movement has actually changed policing in America seems pretty valid regardless of personal political views.
I’ll be honest, I stopped reading a few paragraphs in because it was nothing but right-wing trollbait, anecdata and contradictions that plague pretty much all reactionary ‘discourse’ about social justice
Just a few salty examples:
Ok, so a department of 114 staff, plus’s 3k post docs made a weird decision. But it wasn’t even a unanimous vote, it was one fucking office in the school that sent out a memo. Was it official policy? Is the office bigger than like 5 staff? Who knows. Also: who fucking cares? Anyone who’s ever been at a university knows you get a million dumb memos from all over the place. Does this really merit dozens of national news stories? No, of course not… it’s just another rightwing troll bait.
Ok, maybe that’s one example, right?
In this paragraph we have:
My dude: this entire piece so far has been you inserting your opinions in place of fact.
HOW COMMON IS THIS MY GUY? Can you like, cite a fucking handbook for any major fucking organization that calls for this? Hell I’ll even take some 10 member org in Missoula so long as I can stop taking your word. Edit: I just realized he’s literally complaining about “elites” prioritizing the voices of non-elites here, which is fucking gold, even if I still doubt it’s anything in reality
And that’s how far I got.
Sorry for all the salt.
Fuck.
I felt reading this that roughly once per paragraph I was switching between agreeing and disagreeing with the opinions being expressed.
Yes, there are bigger goals that I think that leftists should be targeting. Particularly things regarding healthcare and labor rights. But at the same time I feel like blaming the lack of progress on identity politics is very shortsighted. I've got a coworker who will believe just about anything when given a sufficiently tasty anecdote, and this feels like the same thing, like it's missing out on important details that explain the whole, or that there's some data point that was misrepresented.
But it's really hard to criticize someone when I haven't actually heard what their opinion is. This article is certainly not explaining the author's entire point.
In politics, you have a limited amount of political capital to spend, particularly if you don’t have control of government. You can make a credible argument that the political capital spent on defund/abolish the police-type movements prevented real reforms that were needed or would have been more impactful. What’s tricky is that Dems couldn’t just ignore it, they had to respond lest they face primary challenges from further-left candidates.
I'm not really convinced that responding to defund the police-type movements couldn't entail reforms that were needed, though. There were a shitton of different voices in those movements on the ground since they weren't generally all that centrally organized, and it was not hard to find reasonable concrete suggestions for reform from prominent voices in the movement if you were listening.
Dems shouldn't be able to ignore demands from swaths of their voter base without getting challenged in the primaries. The further left candidate who would be challenging your hypothetical Dem would almost certainlyhave these concrete policy proposals or at least promises for them as part of their campaign. One route for Dems would also be to implement lesser reforms among those being demanded -- there was a lot of variety in how radical the reforms being called for actually were and most of the "real reforms that were needed" were being called for openly by that movement.
I feel like it expresses a sentiment consistent with the kind of worldview of "class conflict is the main problem, and things like race or gender politics are manufactured divisions that the elite use to keep people divided" that some people subscribe to.
I dont know if that's the author of the book's intention, since I havent read the book. It seems cohesive at least.
Is that a view you hold? I noticed you framed it as something other people think, but I'm curious where your (or anyone else's) mind is on the topic.
Personally no, I am of the opinion that there are different subcultures with different motivations, some of which are rooted in class conflict, others rooted in nationalism and racial conflict, etc.
I dont think there is a unified root problem other than the general tendency of people who want power and control over others appealing to whatever combination of ideals will net them the biggest following of passionate supporters, which often results in a common overlap between different ideologies of bigotry.
But all those independent ideologies are actual things, not subordinate distractions.
No amount of suppression of """identity politics""" would even slightly improve healthcare and labor rights, anyway. The article is a fallacy upon fallacy because "stop trying to improve YOUR lives!"
I think reading up on the author explains everything I needed to know about him.
Your findings and opinions may very well be valid, but please be substantive when attacking someone's character.
I find myself agreeing with some of this article, and as such I'm feeling a bit more defensive when the author is ad-hominemed. Let alone without so much as actually telling us what he has done wrong enough to invalidate his ideas.
Genuinely please do tell if it is not worth digging deeper to understand his opinion. My own quick searches on Fredrik find it very hard to differentiate between political vitriol and rational criticism.
Well, first off - my completely-biased opinion is, a white man that went to Purdue shouldn't be in the business of trying to tell people of color what is and isn't worth their time to protest/organize around.
I say that as a similarly milquetoast upper-crust white man who went to university and graduated without debt, so take it as you will.
Bias out of the way, a synopsis of the book states (emphasis mine):
What does he think Black Lives Matter was? It's the definition of a grass-roots movement. What about the protests around the Dakota Access Pipeline? Those weren't led by elites, nor were they overtaken by them.
The tone of the synopsis reads that if people had chosen to organize around only the specific framework he lays out, that it would have been successful. Only the identity of class matters; nevermind the history of this nation, past and present, and its treatment of anyone that isn't explicitly white (which changes definition constantly).
Keep in mind, the author himself holds no claims to leading or being a member of any such social movement. He's not an active academic, by his own admission:
He seems to write from an outside opinion, rather than from any actual experience, interviewing, or study.
His previous book. "The Cult of Smart", has been criticized (long article, but worth your time):
The criticism continues:
And ...
Further ...
It is a very long article, one I am still reading now. But suffice it to say, DeBoer's writing appears to fail quite dramatically at simple logic. His first book does, anyway. I can't speak for the second as I am not inclined to read it.
He gets a lot of criticism and also deals it out. There's plenty of vitriol in some of his blog posts (which is why I eventually unsubscribed), but not always, and his first book took a more serious tone.
He's also more or less admitted that he does it to get more attention and more subscribers; he's been admirably transparent about the writing business. (Which doesn't mean he isn't also sincere.)
I'll still sometimes read something by him because I find surprising or contrarian arguments more interesting than the same old stuff. But if you read him every day, he does tend to repeat himself.
How so?
https://tildes.net/~books/1dgc/how_social_justice_activists_lost_the_plot#comment-bpmj
Is his name Almost Every Human Being Ever?
I have a number of kind-hearted friends who definitely mean well, and they post leftist/activist content to their Instagram stories essentially every day, which is fairly common in my social circles. The content relies quite heavily on shame: "You are fatphobic if you believe _____," or "If you think _____, then you are blatantly participating in racism," etc. I don't necessarily disagree with all of the sentiments, but I'm just pointing out that the content often seems based in shame. The people I know who post like this are not involved in volunteer efforts with any charity organization or political organization, and some of them have stated to me that they are ashamed of that fact.
Another sentiment common in my social circles is: "I've been too embarrassed to post anything fun/random on social media recently, because it feels selfish and tone-deaf to post anything while people are dying in a war," so they just don't post anything at all. Fair enough, they're not stating anything incorrect, and it's not inherently bad to refrain from posting on social media - I'm just sensing the shame involved in this dynamic, again.
I also have friends who are heavily involved in community council meetings, volunteer efforts, or have even based their whole career on making tangible political change, working for the city government. Those friends almost never post on social media about politics or activism. They don't seem to carry shame, or they at least don't broadcast it or share it with anyone.
I feel like there's a lot to unpack there.
I'm not an activist and I don't claim to be. Maybe my friends who live in the Midwest and post about the Israel/Palestine conflict every day are making a more positive impact on the world than I am. I wouldn't be surprised, honestly, because I essentially do nothing to help. But sometimes I do wonder about what impact the neverending churn of "social media activism" really has at the end of the day. Am I just projecting my own shame onto these people? To be honest, I'm not sure if I am or not.
I recommend reading the Kindle sample for a better idea of his target audience. It seems to be from one activist to another:
I'm regretting sharing this review because people seem to have gotten the wrong idea from it.
From the article:
I've deleted this comment more times than I'd like to admit but basically this is just the current right wing scapegoat. "Gosh, I'd be progressive if they just focused on workers rights! Instead I'll vote for the anti-worker authoritarians, that'll make my life better!"
Shamelessly cribbed from his Wikipedia
Well, it's a shame he took that bait but it's also not entirely unexpected.
From what I've read he actually is a leftist (though he disagrees with many leftists), and I doubt very much that he ever voted for any Republicans. I don't know where you're getting that from.
(I subscribed to his Substack for a bit over a year and read his first book.)
Well if he is a leftist, he's one that is doing a great job of parroting right-wing points and attacks (which this author himself amplifies). Both the author of this article and the author of the book could have potentially had a valid point but burying and surrounding it with things like
just completely loses the plot. Even leftists at all sorts of varying levels of leftism often recommend to each other to read various books and become more educated and informed on various things (not just the "white liberals" called out here). What, do we argue instead for white liberals to avoid literature that may help them move left and further see things in society that they need to help root out? A lot of work on racism, sexism, etc all stems from trying to root that out of yourself- so some self-work is involved.
I also don't like the false dichotomy of "marching" vs "reading books". You can have both.
I also don't like the thought of "identity politics" (I hate this phrase, often used by the right to dismiss what are REAL human rights issues) as some unimportant "side issue" to labor rights or whatever- and attributing all of this to white liberalism is also BS. We are really going to go down the path of just erasing the experience of people of color and LGBTQIA+ (and those that fall at the intersection of those) as "identity politics" now?
I do think there should be some/plenty of focus on class but that does not mean we throw out race/gender/sexuality/etc as a concern with it. They're not, and don't have to be, mutually exclusive things.
And don't get me wrong, I think there can be problems of the "white liberal" becoming a main voice instead of amplifying the voice of others- there can be issues where one's approach to left-wing ideals unfortunately gets corrupted by ego, privilege, unnecessary toxicity, infighting, etc.... but it appears easy for people to turn valid internal leftist criticism into really bad takes that just amplify right-wing ideas further
There are ways the farther-left can criticize the social justice movement without pushing it through a right-wing lens. As an example, queer liberation is not just "identity politics" and I bristle at and am extremely skeptical of anyone pushing that rhetoric.
Yes, it’s a cheap shot (and deBoer tends to make lots of those) but I think we could turn it into more serious questions: what are the demographics of people reading these books and what else do they do? Does reading these books make white people more awkward around black folks, or does it encourage connections?
I can imagine scenarios, but I’m out of touch and don’t know. Maybe there’s evidence in the book? I did download the Kindle sample, but I don’t know if I’ll read it.
My first response is with another question - what does that matter? deBoer has already insisted upon a response - "decent white liberals" and "reading about why they're wicked". I would be counted as one of those, given that I've been cutting my teeth on books by Ibram X. Kendi (yes I know he has baggage now) and Ijeoma Oluo. I read those books and did not come away with the feeling that I'm "wicked". I came away with a better understanding of systemic injustice and racism and how I, as well as (likely) most of us here, have benefited from it.
The point I took from the books I've read is less "white people are inherently bad" and more "white people are generally oblivious", along with "the obliviousness is built-in by those in power".
In my opinion, that's a question with no meaningful answer, because it will be different for everyone.
I think sodliddesu is riffing on the ol' "classical liberal" canard that modern right-wingers throw out.
That's a pretty wild interpretation on what the author involved is saying.
From the article directly,
Right, there's always the people that claim you're just an "idpol" and you should stop focusing on race/sex/gender/sexuality/etc, and start focus on class.
Well that's all fine and dandy, but politicians aren't directly removing the rights of poor white men away like they are for minorities. It's hard to focus on economic reform when there are direct attacks on minorities at the same time. Should we let their civil rights be stripped away so that we can make sure they get healthcare? The problem is, republicans see really good at messaging (and their constituents believe pretty much anything) so there is always a new culture war they can start to derail actual reform. But without defending those attacks on minorities, democrats won't have support from their constituents. Which leads to this weird standoff.