Party as idpol
Republicans have gone all identity politics on us.
At this point, the best — and probably only — way to stop Trumpism would be for a significant share of Republicans to align with the Democratic Party, at least temporarily. But here’s the problem: For many Trump-skeptical Republicans, both elite and rank-and-file, being a Republican, and definitely not a Democrat, is a part of their personal identity. And so far, too few have been willing to prioritize the health of the country over this attachment.
That’s odd though, because what has Republican identity now become? It’s deeply entangled with Trump and trumpism and Trump’s revolting character and temperament and smashed moral compass. If you’re Trump-skeptical why would you cling to an identity that’s soaked in trumpism?
I’m pretty sure that people such as Bush, Cheney and Romney know that the pre-Trump Republican Party isn’t coming back. They can see that the GOP of 2021 is less about keeping the government small than, say, making it harder for Democratic-leaning Americans to vote and stopping Americans from learning about the lingering effects of slavery.
Not to mention cheering on Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz and Mitch McConnell and stop I can’t take any more.
The term “identity politics” has become a pejorative, deployed to suggest that Democrats are too focused on people of color and women.
You know, if you combine women and people of color that turns out to be a lot of people. Why not be focused on such a massive demographic? When it’s the demographic that has less of a head start than white men? Just a thought; sorry to interrupt.
But political scientists say that one of the strongest identities in America today is which of the two parties a person supports and, perhaps even more so, which one they don’t.
That’s odd. I on the other hand am always sharply aware that though I vote for Democrats I’m not a Democrat. The Dems are generally too “moderate” for me, aka too conservative; I’m on the left as opposed to being a Dem. That’s part of my idenniny I guess.
Back when I lived in a state with party registration*, I registered as Unenrolled. When I started getting campaign literature and calls from Republicans, and I saw what they were pitching, I switched my registration to Democratic, in part because I didn’t want the Republicans to think I might possibly be one of them. In that sense, my identity as a Democrat was for the purpose of being “definitely not a Republican”.
The idea of attaching to something to spite something else seems strong. A couple of examples spring instantly to my mind:
Sports fans in an area where there is a heated rivalry, one must be a fan of one or the other, not both, and one must not only root for the favored team but root against the other.
My nominally Jewish life when raising kids involved very pointedly celebrating Hanukkah and Pesach, and just as pointedly not celebrating Christmas and Easter; I sometimes referred to Hanukkah as “not Christmas”.
* I would register as a Democrat if I could now. I favor a two-party system, and the Democrats are closest to my views. I am also rather irritated with a number of people who declare themselves independent for reasons I find silly and petty, irritated enough that I don’t wish to be associated with them, either, which is probably silly and petty of me.
Sadly, Ophelia, as we discuss here, being “on the left” means believing nonsense on a lot of topics. I don’t know what to call myself anymore if being “on the left” means I have to agree with some internet basement dweller that “Yes, dear, you really are spiritually a mighty fire breathing dragon from the Thrones series.”
It doesn’t mean that to me though. Trans nonsense isn’t the whole of the left, though way too much of the left does uncritically cheer it on, probably mostly because of not knowing much about it.
And by isn’t the whole of the left I mean demographically. In terms of ideas or values or causes I don’t think it has anything to do with the left at all, I think it’s a mutant that wandered in from New Age self-help self-actualizing channeling horseshit.
I consider myself on the left, though I am aware many of the woke would not. I think there are still useful distinctions, but yeah, I can’t comprehend that Republican thing. My husband is registered Republican, but hasn’t voted that way in many years. He is waiting until we move after my retirement, then he plans to register Democrat. I think he just doesn’t want to go through the hassle of City Hall.
There’s this tweet from T. Greg Doucette…
He’s one of the minds behind A Call For American Renewal – basically a refugee group of non-Trump Republicans. I can’t see them gaining any significant traction, but I’d be delighted if they did. partly because it would torch the GOP in marginal seat races and partly because a functional democracy requires a healthy and competent opposition. The GOP is neither.
Definitely a good reason *not* to have the thought experiment of replacing the Republicans with a divided Democratic party: the wokies are neither healthy nor competent.
In a recent election I voted for a Lib Dem for my first choice and a Conservative for my second choice. It felt ‘weird’ to do the latter, but both of these candidates supported a position I agreed with and thought was important.
#2 Brian
That’s the woke left, a subset of the general left.
I have no idea why Americans have to register as a party voter, seems quite anti-democratic to me.
As for the Left – I have been Left almost my entire life, today I identify more with the Marxist Left where the focus is on economics and improving the material lives of the workers. My “spiritual home”, the Australian Labor Party has moved too close, too comfortably to the big end. They are now more like the US Democrats than a revolutionary labour force.
Roj:
I was going to comment about that, too. Then I decided to find out a bit more about it first. Then I forgot to do both.
But the idea seems very weird indeed to me.
Roj @#9:
My maternal grandfather was a bushman who could typically turn his hand to anything. He was a stockman, shearer (holding ticket No. 46 in the Shearers Union, of which fact he was very proud) and a horse-breaker. I have good reason to believe that he was one of that crowd of shearers who gathered under the legenday ‘Tree of Knowledge’ at Barcaldine Qld, in 1891 after the collapse of the great shearing and maritime strike, at which by legend, the Australian Labor Party (ALP) was born.
The ALP formed its first Federal Government under the leadership of Andrew Fisher in 1910. It was the first Labor government in the history of the world.
By 1924, that same ALP had been moved in on and taken over in the key state of Victoria by the crime syndicate and network of crooks and spivs known as the Wren Machine. You can read all about it in Frank Hardy’s novel Power Without Glory (1950). There followed in the takeover stakes by an outfit called the Catholic Church. The Catholic faction was led in the key state of Victoria by BA Santamaria, giving rise to the Democratic Labor Party (DLP) when it split out, and which always preferenced the Liberal Party (aka conservatives) ahead of the ALP in federal.elections.
In NSW and other states the ALP Right (led in NSW by Keating and Richardson) became the ‘stay-in’ section of the DLP.) But it was a Catholic Mafia none the less.
From all this history I have derived The Blowfly Theory of Political Economy.. Analogy: a cow empties out in a paddock in high summer. Within 5 minutes every blowfly downwind knows all about it, and is heading for that very same dollop of cowshit. In no time at all, the dollop (read the party) is crawling alive with blowflies. Much the same fate befalls all organisations; even some commercial ones. A cycle of corruption-renewal-corruption-renewal overtook the monastic orders of Catholicism in the Middle Ages.
I dare say it will continue until the end of time. The only salvation from it is a development of widespread consciousness of its operation. And a preparedness to call it out as it happens.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Fisher
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Without_Glory
We don’t have to register as a party voter.
(After looking for more info) – you may have to check a party box on your vote in a primary election, but you don’t have to register (much less vote) as a party member.
What the U.S. Republican Party is good at is stoking grievances and motivating voters to vote not so much for them but against the Democrats. The identity politics the GOP rails against plays well with working class whites who don’t feel all that privileged themselves. The GOP is also now trying to do more of the same with the recent spate of bills aimed at transgender use of public toilets and transgender women competing in public school athletics. They’re doing it not because there’s a dire threat there but because suburban voters with kids who aren’t into queer theory find the whole trans debate to be weird. Combine that with the usual overreaction coming from trans activists and there’s another grievance stoked. For now at least the Democrats are being quiet and letting Republicans look mean, but they can’t evade coming down on one side or the other on the issue eventually. If Democrats let trans activists on Twitter set their course, I expect some swing districts in purple states to flip to the Republicans in either 2022 or 2024.
Re party registration:
Here in Alabama (and in several states) you can’t register as a member of a party.
Parties hold primary elections. In theory, these are opportunities for members of a party to select their party’s nominee for the general election. One is a member of the party by way of party registration. Things have changed up a lot over time, with open primaries, instant switch of party, primaries that ignore party, and so on, so the concept has become completely muddled, but that was the original purpose as I understood it. Party registration also simplifies things when a party wishes to contact its own members, but that’s the government doing the work of the party.
I would rather do away with primaries entirely. Let the party figure out its own nominee, and provide means of joining for people who want to help do that. Under those circumstances, being a member of a party would be like being a member of any organization: send in your form, pay any necessary dues. Whatever it is that makes people members of parties in most democratic countries.
Re. the meaning of being “on the Left”, or “on the Right” for that matter, it might be interesting to spell out exactly what we are talking about. Saying that the Left is pro while the Right is anti “change”, the way I was told as child, doesn’t seem to capture it. Even the Right is in favor of some changes, and even the Left isn’t in favor of all changes. After all a society can change to become less rather than more equal or just.
To me the defining characteristic of “leftism” is that leftists tend to side with the underdog, the under-privileged, the disadvantaged, the marginalized, the poor, the powerless, the oppressed, the downtrodden, the have-nots, the underclass. At least that’s their self-image. In practice, this can, and often does, lead to some very paradoxical results, especially when two groups are making competing claims of discrimiation. Still, it remains the case that leftists tend to side with the underdog as they see it, even if the way they see it should often be taken with an ocean of salt. They tend to see the world, or the prevailing political system, as inherently unjust, as a place where some people – simply by accident of birth – start out at a major disadvantage and never get a fair shot at getting ahead in life, while others – again by accident of birth and no thanks to anything they especially did – get an almost insurmountable head-start. To create a more egalitarian and just society, Leftists generally favor some degree of redistribution, affirmative action etc. By this standard, it’s hard to see how e.g. Soviet-style communism was “leftist” at all, since the Soviet Union and its allies were never even meant to become classless societies in which no group held dominance over another. They were always meant to be permanent tyrannies with the party elite as a permanent new upper class.
The people on the right, on the other hand, tend to side with the elite, the privileged, the advantaged, the rich, the powerful, the dominant, the overclass. Or, as they prefer to see it, the “deserving”, the winners, the strong, the smart, the capable, the accomplished, the competent, the achievers (as opposed to the losers, the weak, the stupid, the lazy, the incompetent, the useless, the bums, the deadbeats). They tend to see the world, or the prevailing system as inherently just*, as a place where the cream rises to the top while the residue sinks to the bottom, and that’s just the way it should be. They like to speak of “equality of opportunity” as opposed to “equality of outcome” while defining “equality of opportunity” in the broadest possible way: basically, as long as there are no laws explicitly discriminating against specific groups, we have real equality of opportunity, and any talk of “cultural biases” or “stereotypes” is just an excuse for laziness, incompetence, bad attitudes, and professional victimhood. Others are social darwinists who dismiss the very idea of “justice” and “fairness” as a bunch of politically correct hippie-talk: There is only the Law of the Jungle and the Biggest Bully Wins, and if that’s not you, that’s your problem. You should have thought of that before being born as you.
As I have previously written elsewhere, it also seems to me like there’s always been a tension on “the “Left” between a mindset that said “we’re all the same on the inside”, emphasized equal treatment and universal rights, and sought to get away from boxes and labels on the one hand and a mindset that said “it’s ok to be different”, emphasized diversity and tolerance, and sought to de-stigmatize marginalized identities on the other. As I said at the time, I think both mindsets come in both healthy and pathological versions, but what seems to have happened more recently is that the pathological version of the second mindset has won. To me this is what distinguishes “Identity Politics” or “Wokism”, or “alt-leftism” in particular from a general commitment to social justice. I also think there is a similar tension on the Right between those who (rightly or wrongly) define the “deserving” or the “elite” in meritocratic terms and those who define these concepts in terms of group membership (“We are the deserving by virtue of being us”). And this is where it does indeed make sense to speak of “right-wing Identity politics”.
One common denominator is the valorization of victimhood**. The idea that “the oppressed are virtuous” is usually associated with the left, but as people like Timothy Snyder have pointed out the fascist (or “not even fascist” or “fascist-ish”) sense of self-righteousness is also inextricably linked to a notion of being perpetually under attack from hostile outsiders. This is very much the prevailing narrative in places like Russia, Hungary, and Turkey today, just like it’s the prevailing narrative in the American red states. And once you have Certified Victim™ status, anything you do, no matter how sociopathic, is either “self-defence”, “righteous indignation”, or “punching up”, and hence virtuous.
*Or, if there is anything unjust about it, it’s mainly unjust towards the winners who are constantly held back by burdensome taxes and regulations and keep having the fruit of their accomplishments confiscated and redistributed to the undeserving losers.
** It’s only professional victimhood, excuses, whining etc. when others are doing it…
Ophelia –
My thinking on “the left” is in line with yours in comment #3.
I tend very left in most issues, but still within a capitalist system. As I read Marx, socialism and communism can’t be imposed but need to evolve as humanity evolves. China is a weird example of what happens when communism is imposed. To fend off counterrevolutionaries, they use totalitarianism and capitalism, and it’s more in service to maintaining power than it is to hailing the New Communist Man. The social support system is necessary in capitalism to ensure that people have at least the basic needs filled in a capitalist society and this is due both to the cyclical nature of markets as well as the rewards that capitalism provides to the greedy and powerful. I think even FDR stated this, that the New Deal was not intended to bring in socialism, but to stave off impending revolution (which would have been disastrous.)
Relevance?
Genderism has nothing to do with any of that, and is a mysogynistic and homophobic mutant (yes, mutant is a good word for it) function of backlash by patriarchal forces. I am still of the left, my opposition to genderism does not change that, and I think that most people who are generally leftish don’t recognize the functionally conservative nature of transgender identity.
@ Omar, read all Hardy’s work, I especially enjoy the “Legends of Benson’s Valley” and “The Outcast’s of Foolgarah”.
Frank’s sister, Mary, paid a brief visit to my High School c 1968. My father was a unionist and I first encountered “Power Without Glory” as one of the white cover editions that were passed from member to member while the authorities were trying to suppress it.
Hardy’s own tale is in “The Hard Way: The Story Behind Power without Glory” which covers his research, attempts at publishing, criminal libel trial, and the aftermath.
Roj: I have read them all, years ago now. As a student, I attended a talk he gave denouncing Stalin at the Waterside Workers’ Hall in Sussex St, Sydney years ago. He introduced himself as “a battler from the bush.”
It’s all ancient history now. As the old Arab saying puts it, ‘the dogs bark, and the caravan moves on.’