Whatever happened to the left?

[Deepflow]

btw, please dont bother questioning my usage of the word "left" in this thread, i know that its hard to define, and ill be stretching the meaning somewhat. However, it would be counter productive to bother discussing it here. Just consider it opposed to the current capitalist hegemony if you want.

Now i consider myself almost as liberal as you can get, where social policy is involved at least, but I am finding myself more and more put off by the "left" as it is represented (or at least what there is that remains of it). The main problem i find with others who hold similar ideals is that people are simply violently anti american whoever the other side are. Whilst being anti american isnt always "wrong" it seems to me that people take the other side without even thinking about it these days.

Another thing is this whole "pull out of Iraq" thing. Again, whilst I wasn't for the war in the first place, I certainly don't think it would be a good idea to leave now. From what i have heard/seen/read the country would be left in complete anarchy if the US and Britain were to leave now; whether it is going to be "another Vietnam" or not.

One more point, and perhaps the most distressing one, is the complete dearth of likeable, high profile standard bearers. If the people who i should be "following" are the like of George Galloway and Michael Moore then I would prefer not to personally. Why can we not have another Orwell? It's really most depressing.

I don't know if others have had the same thoughts, but it is certainly something that has been annoying me recently. When I can no longer even read the Guardian without grimacing at their bias, something is really wrong

[Yahwe]

Firstly American and British politics are entirely different things.

Stop mixing them up or you will go cross eyed.

Secondly being Liberal has nothing to do with Socialism or the 'traditional left'.

you really are getting yourself wound up over nothing

[JonnyBGood]

People proposing alternatives to the popular globo-cultural (I just made this word up, maybe I didn't but I think I did) standpoints must appear more reasonable in order to get their points heard. I'm sure once we've all abolished social welfare I'll start coming out with bizzare randian views on private ownership of roads and health services.....wait. Oh shit

[Deepflow]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

Firstly American and British politics are entirely different things.

Stop mixing them up or you will go cross eyed.

Secondly being Liberal has nothing to do with Socialism or the 'traditional left'.

you really are getting yourself wound up over nothing

Firstly i meant globally rather than anything else.

secondly, i thought I addressed that bit at the start. I hoped people would know what i meant anyway, perhaps i'll edit it later, i can't be bothered right now though.

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by Deepflow

One more point, and perhaps the most distressing one, is the complete dearth of likeable, high profile standard bearers. If the people who i should be "following" are the like of George Galloway and Michael Moore then I would prefer not to personally. Why can we not have another Orwell? It's really most depressing.

But we have Blair! (lolling my heart out onto the keyboard whilst trying to hold my sides together)









PS I'll shoot you if you suggest it.

[Yahwe]

Originally Posted by Deepflow

Firstly i meant globally rather than anything else.

you can't analyse global politics in that way.

Originally Posted by Deepflow

secondly, i thought I addressed that bit at the start. I hoped people would know what i meant anyway, perhaps i'll edit it later, i can't be bothered right now though.

you can't say that you addressed it just because you asked people not to question you on it while you then went on to contradict yourself.

If you want to edit it remove the bit where you say you are liberal.

[Nodrog]

I find most of our culture, including most major figures/commentators, to be rather left wing, so I suppose a large amount of it depends on where youre standing. But the radical (academic) left became an absurd parody of itself several decades ago with the birth of postmodernism/structuralism/feminism/lol, and nothing seems to have replaced it. I remember reading something by Chomsky where he moaned about this at length, but then hes hardly an example of credible politics himself (hey lets disband society and live in communes!!!)

I hear that Habermas is the current posterboy for the radical-but-not-completely-insane left, but I havent read anything by him (and have no desire to), so I cant say. Maybe you could check him out or something.

[acropolis]

Western society tends to push the competent, intelligent, and capable toward medicine, law, and science.

This leaves not much for thinking and leadership. But to be fair, the dearth is at least as bad as the right. Try this sentence on for size: "Sean Hannity is my intellectual leader"

[Deepflow]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

you can't analyse global politics in that way.



you can't say that you addressed it just because you asked people not to question you on it while you then went on to contradict yourself.

If you want to edit it remove the bit where you say you are liberal.

Of course im over simplifying. This is just how it seems to me often, a lot of those who have the same ideals (to some extent) and the same "enemies" tend to disgust me with their methods and attitudes. In fact, scratch "a lot", its more like "almost all".

Secondly, i AM liberal.

[Deepflow]

Originally Posted by Nodrog

I hear that Habermas is the current posterboy for the radical-but-not-completely-insane left, but I havent read anything by him (and have no desire to), so I cant say. Maybe you could check him out or something.

He has been mentioned a fair deal in my lectures and i remember thinking he had "the right idea" a few times. Never actually read anything though, perhaps i shall.

[Yahwe]

Don't Post While On Drugs

[Deepflow]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

Don't Post While On Drugs

Dont Post While Being Unneccesarily Confrontational

oh wai...

P.S

not on drugs.

[Yahwe]

You're waffling nonsense at the rate of DM at a supermarket check out

You: "This is just how it seems to me often, a lot of those who have the same ideals (to some extent) and the same "enemies" tend to disgust me with their methods and attitudes. In fact, scratch "a lot", its more like "almost all"."

Tracy from Essex (for yes it is she): "Errr sorry did you say you had a coupon?"

You: "The main problem i find with others who hold similar ideals is that people are simply violently anti american whoever the other side are. Whilst being anti american isnt always "wrong" it seems to me that people take the other side without even thinking about it these days."

Tracy: "That's £19.40"

You: "If the people who i should be "following" are the like of George Galloway and Michael Moore then I would prefer not to personally."

Tracy: "Just follow the man from security dear."

[Nodrog]

lol

[Nodrog]

Originally Posted by acropolis

Western society tends to push the competent, intelligent, and capable toward medicine, law, and science.

This leaves not much for thinking and leadership. But to be fair, the dearth is at least as bad as the right. Try this sentence on for size: "Sean Hannity is my intellectual leader"

On the right there's (eg) Cato and the Austrian economists who sometimes produce sensible output, along with people like Walter Williams and (very occassionaly) Thomas Sowell. 'Public intellectual personalities' tend to be full of shit no matter where you go on the political spectrum though, but I think this has more to do with their populism than their ideology. Similarly, most positions have their associated loons; I wouldnt want to be the person in charge of ranking (eg) Ann Coulter, Luce Irigary, Fred Phelps and Jean Baudrillard in order of sanity.


edit: I obviously mean 'right' as in lolbertarian rather than conservative here.

[Weeks]

I find anyone on either the far left or far right pretty repugnant. All hail mass parties! Centre-left/righties are ok. Basically it's a choice between being optimistic or pessimistic about society.

[Deepflow]

Originally Posted by Yahwe

You're waffling nonsense at the rate of DM at a supermarket check out

You: "This is just how it seems to me often, a lot of those who have the same ideals (to some extent) and the same "enemies" tend to disgust me with their methods and attitudes. In fact, scratch "a lot", its more like "almost all"."

Tracy from Essex (for yes it is she): "Errr sorry did you say you had a coupon?"

You: "The main problem i find with others who hold similar ideals is that people are simply violently anti american whoever the other side are. Whilst being anti american isnt always "wrong" it seems to me that people take the other side without even thinking about it these days."

Tracy: "That's £19.40"

You: "If the people who i should be "following" are the like of George Galloway and Michael Moore then I would prefer not to personally."

Tracy: "Just follow the man from security dear."

well ok then.

[Dante Hicks]

The "left" started going horribly wrong several decades ago when they started either being obsessed with defending the Soviet Union (or other similar states) or reforming capitalist democracies in the West via some sort of Keynesianism.

At a stroke they became associated with either totalitarian politics or big government fantasies. Most of the latter camp (the "Eurocommunists" in Italy and elsehwere) in the absence of a fundamental critique of society gradually floated to the right to join the mainstream Social Democrats while the former group either formed irrelevent sects (the Trots) or stale beaureacratic parties (the Stalinists). Most of these lots (Trots or otherwise) have dissolved even further since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Some of them from personal experience I can tell you are totally 100% insane.

Historically obviously the term "left wing" originated in the French assembly and there it meant reformers vs the old order (who sat on the right). The right were for privilidge, authority, tradition and lack of freedom. This is still as I see the distinction but others prefer developments like the political compass which subdivides things further. I don't really care much, whatever def works for you.

But using the version of the word I favour I'd say "the left" is intellectually in a good position in an odd way. No-one (intelligent) seriously defends authoritanism anymore, and I think egalitarianism is in a fairly good state in some senses (racism, homophobia, sexism, cast-ism are all on the serious decline, intellectually speaking).

However the left (as it is) suffers from a familiar problem which you mention. For a long time there were a lot of leftists who were totally domestically orientated. They knew labour politics but very little else, and were ignorant to international politics. An old Marxist once said that Ken Livengstone and his cardres (back when he worked for Lambeth) were totally ignorant about anything south of Dover. They understood bread and butter politics like trade union negotiations, council housing, etc - but ask for analysis of Latin America and they'd be befuddled.

Well the problem these days is somewhat reversed; you have plenty of "anti-Imperialist" leftists who are totally divorced from working class realities - they've probably never been in a union and may not have even visited the local council estate. But they buy fair-trade tea and know all aobut the struggle in Bangladesh over clean water supplies or whatever. These are the people who are full of Anti-American nonsense from time-to-time. Because to them America (or Europe) is the only evil, that if only America was vanquished everything would be OK. Which is rot.

Being ignorant of either domestic politics or international politics is unforgivable. If you are then it's very easy to become prey to whatever the trend the media are playing this week. I've heard honest, intelligent "left-wing" people rant about how evil George Galloway is that when pressed confess they know very little about his politics and are just quoting the nonsense that's being spouted everywhere ("OMG he loves Saddam!!!").

The left will only be meaningful when these two "strands" are educated. When both international and domestic politics are one. When the left dumps the statist reactionary bullshit they've picked up over the years and realise their platform is the practical realisation of liberty, equality and fraternity. Until then they (we) will remain what we've been for years : an irrelevance.

[G.K Zhukov]

I agree with Dante on almost everything he wrote.

Let me just add that alot of this comes from a these peoples inability to learn basic marxism (and apply it) and learn from history.

[Deepflow]

yeah, dante pretty much said what i was trying to (but with lovely snippets of information i was unfamiliar with).

god bless you D

also, ive always wanted to go to a "crazy lefties" meeting. Let's hope i get the chance some day.

[the_dastardley_chihuahua]

re: george galloway. on another forum i use, mostly full of people on the 'left' (anarchists, stalinists, various shades of socialism basically) really dont like gorgeous george. check out www.urban75.net/vbulletin (uk politics) and try searching for 'galloway' 'respect' or 'swp'. oh yeah, dont tell them you consider yourself a liberal, they aint fans of those either!

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by Deepflow

also, ive always wanted to go to a "crazy lefties" meeting. Let's hope i get the chance some day.

I'm not sure if you'd want to. I remember being told an anecdote (hopefully apocryphal) of how one party (which actress Vanessa Redgrave was involved with at one point) which in the middle of a meeting made everyone lie on the floor so the "MI5 scanners couldn't detect us". So everyone lay on the floor and then continued the meeting for a half an hour as normal, just from the vantage point of the floor.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by the_dastardley_chihuahua

re: george galloway. on another forum i use, mostly full of people on the 'left' (anarchists, stalinists, various shades of socialism basically) really dont like gorgeous george.

I did not mean to imply that it's impossible to be left-wing and still dislike Galloway. I'm sure he's beastly on a number of levels. He is reasonably wealthy (which some people seem to get annoyed about), he is personally against abortion as I understand, he visited Iraq under Saddam and didn't condemn them. All of these things mean he misses out on the 'greatest bloke ever' award by a considerable margin. However in a world where America & Britain have thousands of troops in other countries, where hundreds of millions of people lack basic food supplies, where environmental degradation is potentially accelerating, where the gap between rich and poor is rising, etc, etc it seems to be a somewhat waste of time criticising someone like Galloway. Too often the left wishes to find some sort of whiter than white hero. Such people do not exist.

The in-fighting on the left is always amusing but the thing is that they realise this. Most of the people I have talked with on the far-left have indeed seen 'Monty Pythons Life of Brian'. They are aware of the nonsense that comes from seeing the "real enemy" as the People Front of Judea (or whoever). But they just can't help it.

[G.K Zhukov]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

I'm not sure if you'd want to. I remember being told an anecdote (hopefully apocryphal) of how one party (which actress Vanessa Redgrave was involved with at one point) which in the middle of a meeting made everyone lie on the floor so the "MI5 scanners couldn't detect us". So everyone lay on the floor and then continued the meeting for a half an hour as normal, just from the vantage point of the floor.

I never experienced anything like that in the parties Im member off! Why should I miss out on the fun stuff?
(But I heard there was crazy stuff going on in the 70's)

[the_dastardley_chihuahua]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

I did not mean to imply that it's impossible to be left-wing and still dislike Galloway. I'm sure he's beastly on a number of levels. He is reasonably wealthy (which some people seem to get annoyed about), he is personally against abortion as I understand, he visited Iraq under Saddam and didn't condemn them. All of these things mean he misses out on the 'greatest bloke ever' award by a considerable margin. However in a world where America & Britain have thousands of troops in other countries, where hundreds of millions of people lack basic food supplies, where environmental degradation is potentially accelerating, where the gap between rich and poor is rising, etc, etc it seems to be a somewhat waste of time criticising someone like Galloway. Too often the left wishes to find some sort of whiter than white hero. Such people do not exist.

The in-fighting on the left is always amusing but the thing is that they realise this. Most of the people I have talked with on the far-left have indeed seen 'Monty Pythons Life of Brian'. They are aware of the nonsense that comes from seeing the "real enemy" as the People Front of Judea (or whoever). But they just can't help it.

you missed out his willingness to ally himself with reactionary islamic groups

[Nodrog]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

Well the problem these days is somewhat reversed; you have plenty of "anti-Imperialist" leftists who are totally divorced from working class realities - they've probably never been in a union and may not have even visited the local council estate. But they buy fair-trade tea and know all aobut the struggle in Bangladesh over clean water supplies or whatever. These are the people who are full of Anti-American nonsense from time-to-time. Because to them America (or Europe) is the only evil, that if only America was vanquished everything would be OK. Which is rot.
.

The idea of the average anti-war college student going on a day-trip to the 'local council estate' in order to display his solidarity with the working man is hilarious, thanks.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by the_dastardley_chihuahua

you missed out his willingness to ally himself with reactionary islamic groups

And the fact he scratches his arse in public, he's rude to his wife or stole money from the blind. Does it matter?

[KoeN]

Originally Posted by Nodrog

I find most of our culture, including most major figures/commentators, to be rather left wing.

lol???

tbh i find it hard to come up with a country that has a more right wing culture than the UK.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by Nodrog

The idea of the average anti-war college student going on a day-trip to the 'local council estate' in order to display his solidarity with the working man is hilarious, thanks.

As stupid as it may seem, a group called 'Red Front' used to do something similar ; community work on sink estates to fight fascism (on estates where the NF would be leafleting or whatever).

[JonnyBGood]

Originally Posted by KoeN

lol???

tbh i find it hard to come up with a country that has a more right wing culture than the UK.

Rather unsurprisingly you have different definitions of left wing. When nod says left wing he means anyone who supports taking a loaf of bread from bill gates without his consent and then giving it to some homeless people (or at least I hope he does because otherwise his opinions are not really that interesting ).

[SilverSmoke]

Originally Posted by KoeN

lol???

tbh i find it hard to come up with a country that has a more right wing culture than the UK.

Conservative in a general sense doesn't always correlate with right wing policy.

[the_dastardley_chihuahua]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

And the fact he scratches his arse in public, he's rude to his wife or stole money from the blind. Does it matter?

well yes, no wonder the 'left' looks bad when that **** is held up as its poster boy.

[Dante Hicks]

Originally Posted by the_dastardley_chihuahua

well yes, no wonder the 'left' looks bad when that **** is held up as its poster boy.

"Poster boys" are for children. I'm not aware of many people who are saying Galloway is any sort of saviour for mankind but there are a lot of people wasting their time denigrating him when there's much more worthy targets.

[Marilyn Manson]

Whatever happened to Leon Trotsky?

[Dante Hicks]

He got an ice pick
That made his ears burn.

[Marilyn Manson]

Originally Posted by Dante Hicks

"Poster boys" are for children. I'm not aware of many people who are saying Galloway is any sort of saviour for mankind but there are a lot of people wasting their time denigrating him when there's much more worthy targets.

I think you're understating the two-fold aspect of the problem; people can (and do) put too much faith in people like Galloway, because more often that not they are the only radical lefties to 'break through' and gain some sort of prominance. People often disregard the negative aspects of such people as a result, because there is no-one else for them to really 'invest' in

[Marilyn Manson]

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Rather unsurprisingly you have different definitions of left wing. When nod says left wing he means everyone

Edited for truth.

[the_dastardley_chihuahua]

Originally Posted by Marilyn Manson

I think you're understating the two-fold aspect of the problem; people can (and do) put too much faith in people like Galloway, because more often that not they are the only radical lefties to 'break through' and gain some sort of prominance. People often disregard the negative aspects of such people as a result, because there is no-one else for them to really 'invest' in

very true. he's got a massive profile in the us right now among the democrats. if you read the democraticunderground forums they see him as the new messiah following his appearance before the senate committee.