Rhetoric and why the left will lose

I never give much thought to “the left.” I have little interest there, and I’m way further left than “the left” so generally it just doesn't apply or I assume we're just talking about the center. However, a professor of mine I admire greatly gave a talk before an interactive discussion on social justice as a pillar of social work, and I was thrust into this conversation. In fact the first comment made after my professor concluded his talk about critical social work and how to balance social justice and advocacy with obligations to the social work profession was about what if “they” turn social worker into a word like feminist, with the negative connotation.

I can’t be sure how long this conversation droned on because I give zero fucks. And I give zero fucks because rhetoric is used to silence people. Let them call you whatever they want; sure, there will be some bruised egos (and I’m obviously not talking about words with a charged history). A good example of this silencing is when the right called Obama and his supporters a communist because they were trying to instill fear in the uneducated masses who have no idea what a communist or a socialist is.

But this discussion of rhetoric is what people training in a profession that has social justice in the code of ethics are concerned with, to which I ask, what the fuck? Sure, the powerful control the narrative for the masses, but you know how to get that back? Appeal to the masses’ interests. Sure at first they won’t come around, but eventually when those protecting the status quo have left everyone in poverty, I think we’ll win the hearts and minds of the people. But instead of focusing on the problems, we focus on the language. No one wants to seem threatening. No one wants to identity with a word that is controversial. This is what we’re concerned about? I’m more concerned with poverty and the systematic oppression of vulnerable populations.

This led us to the next topic of conversation, how do we fund social justice after all people with money have a vested interest in the status quo. (It is amazing I didn’t hurt someone.) And so began a discussion on using the current system to procure funds to improve the current system. THIS DOESN’T WORK. As Audre Lorde said, “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.” Now, yes sometimes we’re stuck working within the flawed system. However, to firmly put all our resources there to procure funding and then be limited by those funders is idiotic. For example, 1996 Welfare Reform changed AFDC because AFDC was broken according to the powers that be. However, TANF is just as if not more problematic. We should have scrapped the current system, well we should have left AFDC in place until we had a new system not rooted in racism, sexism, and classism. But Lorde is right, if we use the master’s tools then we’re bound by the master’s rules and limitations. We have to play by their rules. This point didn’t go over well with my peers who are apparently completely unaware of Audre Lorde. Neither did my suggestion that we pay for the revolution by redistributing the wealth of those in power. However, a friend of mine suggested Kickstarter so there is always that.

But if this is all those in a progressive profession care about—how to pay for social justice and social change and what people are saying about agents of change—then  we’re going to lose.

God save the left-wing from themselves…a swansong on whiteness.

Michelle Goldberg, as you remember is afraid of diversity and decided to blame women and feminist of color for everything as far as I can tell because FOR THE MOVEMENT! This time Goldberg wants to weigh in on #CancelColbert, which again is all the women of color’s fault. I’m shocked, shocked I say.

“It’s increasingly clear that we are entering a new era of political correctness. Recently, we’ve seen the calls to #CacelColbert because of something outrageous said by Stephen Colbert’s blowhard alter ego, who has been saying outrageous tings regularly for nine years. Then there’s the sudden demand for ‘trigger warnings’ on college syllabi, meant to protect students from encountering ideas or images that may traumatize them…

First, this paragraph really stuck out to me because I’m in a class where I would love trigger warnings before this one kid speaks. Jesus Christ, he can’t shut the fuck up about how wrong suicide is and how those people who would kill themselves are selfish, or oh, yeah his rape joke in class because that’s appropriate. And there is totally no overlap as to people who have suffered sexual trauma and suicide. Pardon my tangent, but this seems way more like preserving the status quo than considering the best interests of the left. Additionally, the complete indifference and dismissal of the concerns of the people saying this is racist is very telling, because yes Virginia, liberals can be racists too.

Goldberg goes on to explain that it is happening overseas too because CENSORSHIP! She continues:

“Call it left-wing anti-liberalism: the idea, captured by Herbert Marcuse in this 1965 essay ‘Repressive Tolerance,’ that social justice demands curbs on freedom of expression. ‘[I]t is possible to define the direction in which prevailing institutions, policies, opinions would have to be changed in order to improve the chance of a peace which is not identical with cold war and a little hot war, and a satisfaction of needs which does not feed on poverty, oppression, movements, and exploitation,’ he wrote. ‘Consequently, it is also possible to identify policies, opinions, movements which would promote this chance, and those which would do the opposite. Suppression of the regressive ones is a prerequisite for the strengthening of the progressive ones.”  *for those not aware, Marcuse is a philosopher who immigrated from Germany to the US, and someone Noam Chomsky knew and liked, but didn’t care for Marcuse’s work.*

Without reading the whole Marcuse essay, I can say no one is censoring anyone. Colbert and god help us, Goldberg can say whatever the fuck they want, but there are consequences for the things you say. I’m so fucking tired of people thinking you can say whatever the fuck you want and walk away. Check your privilege. Goldberg goes on to cite a scholar of radical feminist, which is fine, but I think people who read this blog will be able to identify the importance and the shortcomings of radical feminism so we won’t review that, if necessary I’m happy to, but I doubt it is necessary see McKinnon and Dworkin.

Goldberg continues:

“There’s disenchantment not just with electoral politics, but with liberal values as a whole. ‘White liberal’ has, once again, emerged as a favorite left-wing epithet.

“At times like this, politics contract. On the surface, the rhetoric appears more ambitious and utopian that ever—witness, for example, the apparently sincere claim by Suey Park, creator of the #CancelColbert hashtag, that Twitter activists intend to ‘dismantle the state.’ But at the same time, activism becomes less about winning converts and changing the world and more about created protected enclaves and policing speech.”

Pro tip: let’s not use the word policing as if a subjugated group has the power to police anyone but themselves. Particularly, when there is a system of policing people of color and women that is institutional policy and then the self-policing that goes on in these communities as an active protection against more discrimination. Secondly, to me changing and being more aware of the language we use, our action, etc., and how they contribute to the systematic oppression of others is changing the world. But Goldberg seems much more interested in having her swansong about whiteness being oppressed as if expanding the rights of others is somehow a zero sum game. I also have to reject Goldberg’s definition of liberalism which seems to be Clintonlike Democrats, well that is liberal, that is center. Want to join the liberal left? Let’s throw out The Electoral College and overturn McCutcheon and Citizen’s United.

Goldberg cites Ellen Willis about how the left-wing is anti-liberal, 

“’It’s the general repressiveness of the social climate that encourages moves to ban offensive speech or define any form of sexual oppression in the workplace as sexual harassment. The main effect of these maneuvers is to foment confusion, cynicism and sexual witch-hunts, trivialize sexual violence, and legitimize conservative demands for censorship—while at the same time ceding the moral high ground of free expression to the right.’”

Goldberg then descends into a well, they’ll learn their lesson when the right comes to power and we realize how important free speech is…Like with Occupy? Or sex work? Or the NSA? Oh, wait these are things happening when the “left” is in power. You know I must have missed Goldberg’s piece railing against the use of the NSA as an invasion of privacy and an infringement of free speech. And obviously, Goldberg just wrote a piece about the importance of diverse views in feminism, when she misrepresented the statements made by black feminism, and pretty much told women of color to sit down and shut up. That wasn’t a form of censorship at all.

See the argument Goldberg is making is the sit down, shut up, and wait your turn argument. Sure, stop-and-frisky is a thing, but we have to defeat the Republicans, so wait. Sure, hipster racism keeps being a thing, and we’re not sure who benefits from these jokes, but wait your turn. Sure, women’s rights are being attacked across the US, and a disproportional number of these bills disastrously impact low-income women, but that can wait, we have to pledge unyielding support of President Obama and Obamacare, even if we lose the birth control mandate. So I ask, what is the left Goldberg is trying to save? Because without women and people of color, but mostly women of color, the left is looking a lot like the right.

Men on the left "are timid and apologetic..

they no longer say I think I am, but instead quote some saint or sage." Emerson. Well, some version of a line from Emerson's "Self Reliance". It was always one of my favorite essays.

I’m trying this thing where I don’t just read things to enrage myself, but naturally that is failing. So I clicked on the ProgressiveNews feed on Twitter, I know my first mistake. But I was looking for something uplifting after reading about how poor women are having their children taken away in Milwaukee for prolonged periods of time because of a broken child welfare system, I needed this. Now, sure the text on the link should have tipped me off, but I’m all for non-violence and pacifism, and the more men on the left who embrace these characteristic and women the more likely my mom will stop worrying about my relationship status on facebook. So win-win.

However, color me surprised when I click on the link and I’m taken to a magical place of misogyny and advocating of violence. Ok, I know those words might seem a little harsh, but not really. Kevin McCullough is an idiot, and writes for some right-wing crazy town website. And this is when I should have stopped reading, but I never stop reading, I have to finish it is like a sickness.

I’ll briefly summarize McCullough’s argument, which is kind of incoherent and full of conservative propaganda, which doesn’t need repeating.

• Men on the left are effeminate because they are pacifist, but I think he means passive.
• This is evident because they “hide”  behind the womenfolk and children; he is talking about the gun laws here.
• The women getting to be in combat roles get thrown in, because women don’t want to be in combat with anecdotal evidence. I’m not sure how we got from the last point to this one.
• Then Roe v. Wade comes up, where women are all forced to have abortions by the men in their lives. I’m not sure how we get from leftist men letting women speak for them to women being forced by partners into having abortions against their will, but who can follow this shit show anyway.
• Now, we’re into where men shouldn’t speak on behalf of women…for real I’m not making this shit up.
• He also talks about March for Life having more people than the Inauguration, which is wrong. Also, what happened to not letting children speak for the menfolk? Because so many kids at March for Life. Really, I yelled at a few for being rude to DC homeless (because all life is sacred and littering).
• Then he’s back to this, “but it is clear that the men of the political, theological, and cultural left have become weak of mine, will, and temperament.”
• The devolves into God-speak.
• Closing in a “think of the children” manner.

So clearly, someone brought the crazy. And aside from the blatant inconsistencies in his argument, the most glaring of which being where he jumps from the womenfolk and kids talking too much to the menfolk talking for them both of which is an affront to the baby Jesus, is the weird idea that men on the left are weak or effeminate and that there is something wrong with them. There is also this weird women are speak for the men which emasculates them, but the women’s voices aren’t authentic thing going on here, which seems either crazy or really impressive.

Let’s be clear, McCullough’s argument is stupid, see above, but for me the idea that effeminate and pacifist are being used as insults is the real problem. Pacifism is not an insult, it is an ideological outlook and seriously hard. It might be the opposite of weakness. For real, take a few punches to the face and don’t retaliate, plus I’m in favor of almost anything Sam Harris dislikes. The idea that you will die for your beliefs and not fight back is awe inspiring, though arguably not for everyone. Also where are all these pacifist leftist guys? And will someone give them my phone number?

The word effeminate annoys me to no end. Essentially, the argument is the menfolk are too much like the womenfolk there must be something wrong with them. Lies! There is nothing inherently less valuable about women and the feminine other than connotations shaped by the patriarchy. 

I supposed this is just the same old arguments dressed up for a new day. The left is weak blah, blah, blah. I agree the left folds like a napkin rather than engage on any issues of substance, but all of McCullough's arguments are essentially, if you don't hold his point of view then you throw like a girl. And there is nothing worse to the hyper-masculine than being told you hold feminine characteristics. I always find this entertaining because some of the greatest men I know have embraced aspects of themselves that are traditionally considered feminine in nature.

Less of the post: the Internet is where hope and happiness go to die.