Is The Left Dividing into Two Again and the Right Encouraging It?
Has the divide in the Left between the socialists and the pluralists risen again since the the midterm election? And has the Right been taking advantage of this rift to split them, especially in attempt to make them unattractive to the Center? Been asking myself that for the last week. Then I realized that Trump doesn't want to let anyone in (unless they're rich & white). that’s not true typical name calling when no valid facts present themselves you socialists are evil and too stupid to realize that what happens after socialism is mass murder always
Social media provided me an initial glimpse with an out of proportion reaction to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and me:
Other than beng a reaction against Ocasio-Cortez, raising the topic of socialism gives an incongruous impression. What does socialism have to do with the border? Also, the statement about socialism leading to mass murder comes off as specious and misunderstanding that differences exist between the Democratic Socialism that we see in Europe today and Cult of Personality Communism of Lenin/Stalin, Mao, the Kim family, and various other instances in the past. Socialism and Communism don't equate to totalitatarianism, dictatorship and mass murder.
This incongruousness sent me to the Internet try finding an explanation to this kind of reaction. I think I glimpsed a whole bunch of other remarks like this about socialism on social medias over the last few weeks. Articles like these resulted from the searching:
Apparently I've been behind on seeing attempts at the Rightist rhetoric against Obama by the Right that tried to paint Obama as some evil socialist that threatened America.
Last night I walked into a gathering of friends that were obviously talking about politics from how the conversation ended. The one black guy among a bunch of white guys said, "Yeah, I get what you're saying, but I'm a black guy and I'm scared of the Right."
The conversation ended there, but as someone who puts Pluralism first and am experimentally supportive of more socialist schemes, I was confused. Not by the black friend, but by all the other friends in the room. I believe they are anti-Trump and that they appreciate the balance that the new House will bring. . .but I don't know, it's confusing to me. Once politics regress to the mean, how much people with privilege have the willingness to entertain a path that could lead to more control y a political party willing to support a fatuous demagogue, voter suppression, confirming the nominations of judges willing to all drastic change and disrespect of people, confirmation the nominations of cabinet members and department heads looking to destroy their departments, engage in corrupt spending of money, mangle facts and ignore scientific data, and willing to allow the destruction of human civilization, violation of human rights, and destruction of the Affordable Care Act with a million more little cuts?
Why would anyone be OK with enabling this destruction and disrespect?
I wracked my brain. Considering my friend based his argument to vote liberal on a social issue, that left another major issue that could scare people tending to the Center: the economic/socialist platform that has become associated with the Democrats through the Democratic Socialist wing. This article does an interesting job riling up the fears of Democratic Socialism: Democratic Socialism Threatens Minorities. I don't agree with this guy's argument, but it does illustrate the attempt to divide the socialism and pluralism sides of the Left.
Remember Steve Bannon saying "The longer they talk about identity politics, I got ’em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats"? Did Bannon plan to divide the Left between pluralism and economic issues, or did he think that the Democrats would turn off the American public by talking about pluralism issues while his side tried to push for an economic plan?
Articles exist out there about how "identity politics" leads to people adopting group identities and destroying equal-rights individualism, of which this nation is based on. I found them randomly before, but I took hours to find this one: It Is Time to Debate-And End-Identity Politics at The Heritage Foundation. Interestingly enough, this article makes a connection between racial activism in the past with Marxism, which feels like a deep dive.
The Right, in its desire to hurt the Left, and the Center Left, in attempts to appeal to the Center, have taken some multi-pronged attacks. The Right has both united the pluralism/socialism stances into a unitary threat AND has also pegged them as separate menaces. Uniting the stances scares their supporters and those in the center inclined to triggering. Pegging them as separate menaces divides the Left, setting the Left to argue with itself over which issues will supposedly win elections and the hearts of the American people. The Right divides and conquers the Left while scaring the Center and their own Right the both pluralism and socialism are threats.
If the Right is pulling these rhetorical flourishes that divides the Left, how can the Left do better to realize what Ocasio-Cortez once said that economic justice and social justice aren't separate things? And once the Left can unite these issues and unite itself under multiple causes for justice, how can it demonstrate and convince the People that the Left will be able to address the issues that the nation faces?
I don't have any clear answers. This essay focused more about raising questions. My next essay might have something to add to the issues to connect with the People, though: National Pride.
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