Cross-posted from https://lemmy.ml/post/29943447
I am posting this as a discussion starter. I normally frown upon uncritical usage of the term Identity Politics as a supposedly self-contained ideology. But this is a cool-headed analysis that proposes a very simple process: It is the method of singling out disenfranchised groups that allows autocrats
- to single out the ethnic working class majority as the most disenfranchised
- to other the most downtrodden groups as the root cause of the disenfranchisement
- justify their persecution as necessary for the survival of the group
(Finally the author suggests that the inclusion of the disenfranchised groups as part of the ingroup is essential to overcome this dynamic.)
Part 1. He is right: This is was happened and the Democrats were happy to jump onboard
It is hard to argue with this logic, because this is literally what happened.
Let's not forget what is the big picture here: Similarly to how corporate PR pushed the narrative of individual responsibility for climate change, far and wide, it also pushed the idea of "everyone's equal opportunity to the American dream".
This might explain why this equal-washing resembles so much PR tactics, and fits perfectly with established advertising and marketing practices, starting with Benetton's "anti-marketing".
It is a complete denial of structural violence and intersectionality of exploitation (Benetton's own sweatshops included). In this sense, and contrary to common right-wing wisdom, identity politics is not even "woke", which is supposed to be alert to those things.
Part 2: Historical exploitation is collective, not individualistic - and it casts a shadow despite production mode shifts
This is a passage from one of my own text I linked above. I reiterate it here to clarify the above point:
Then, I don’t even see black, brown, woman, trans, gay, intersex, as identities, rather than inherent features of people. The meanings they have are due to societal groupings alone. And you bet they have been political in the past and they are as hell political now.
Anti-identitarian leftists, leftists who split “identity” from “class consciousness” by default seem weird to me in that effect, because for example slavery was a mode of exploitative production, ownership and enslavement of women was integral in pre-industrial economic systems.
This “laborist” sterilization of the working class definition reduces a snapshot of British 19th century capitalism to the canon of analysis for every historical period and every type of social stratification? How do you even approach other type of societies entirely, like tribal societies?
Like marxist anthropologists tried to and ended up with all kinds of upgrades to marxist theory, but some people do not want to hear about it because of purity.
Part 3: The industrial worker reductionist and the culture war as a "divide and conquer" tactic
The above thoughts are supposed to trigger an understanding of a leftist criticism of identity politics that frames them as a "divide and conquer" tactic, as simplistic and erroneous. In fact, as simplistic and erroneous as seeing the whole climate thing as a distraction from worker rights, because of how aggressively capitalists push "green energy".
We would think a take like this as extremely stupid, but there is a huge double standard with gender, race, and homosexuality. You know why. If you really want me to spell it out, it is because of
- internalized misogyny, racism, and homophobia on the left
- rigid reductionism on the part of those who consider political economy a hard science
"Identity politics", if it has any meaning at all, is a washed down capitalist propaganda, that anyone is capable of living the American dream, regardless of any previously "stigmatized individual features". No mention of the historical context nor collective nature of the "stigma". Just individual variation, erasing centuries of collective attacks on different groups of people, by white heterosexual European colonialists (included but not limited to the slave trade triangle, militarist and colonialist anti-homosexuality laws, and domestic exploitation of women for perpetuating power and property - kinda basic stuff really).
People were not excluded for the color of their skin, they were brought in ships to slave their lives away for a European master. The slave-traders were given reparations when slavery was abolished, the afflicted countries and communities were given none. To understand this and its long reaching aftermath in race politics is woke - alert to systemic violence and intersectionality of exploitation. Therefore
- Woke is a good thing - MAGA has reached a point of conservativism that they think the Pope is a radical leftist, this is just how much the Overton window has shifted, and:
- Identity politics is not woke and was never woke to start with - if so called progressives in Harvard in the nineties thought this was a good idea, well, then they were wildly misled by an elevated standard of living. To say the least.
Part 4: Being anti-woke on the right vs. Being anti-woke on the left
Being anti-woke on the right is to accept that systemic violence and intersectionality of exploitation is natural order. Being anti-woke on the left is to be blind to the whole breadth of exploitation throughout the human history, and push a strictly industrial worker reductionist, that some insist is a straw-man of dialectic materialism. To those I say, to thine own self be true and respect those little arrows you draw from the superstructure back to the foundation. In other words, understand that the ideology of exploitation of the past casts a shadow on the stereotypes and ideological wedges of the present, although the modes of production have shifted, and keep shifting as we speak.
Instead of throwing the baby out with the bathwater, develop an intersectional analysis that empowers historically disenfranchised groups in their own safe spaces, overcome their ongoing survival issues, and instead of fixating on how capitalism dealt with such issues, start thinking how socialism will overcome these bias without removing the rights and dignity of any group of people.
Skimmed over it as well. Using the phrase Identity politics is antithetical to anarchist ideology imho. All I've read after is just explanation. This may work in a very narrow american individualist spectrum but social anarchists dont care if youre black, gay, etc. You deserve equal rights and opportunity, period. Anarchism isnt called libertarian socialism for no reason. Feel free to read the Anarchist faq.
That said, it is no secret that companies and the state are assimilating anarchist and other ideas for themselves and poorly. But the way this is framed has written right wing uboat all over it.
It reminds me something Noam Chomsky said in an interview. The media are designed so the principles of the system never gets questioned. The so called liberal media, which Trumpists nowadays consider as "radical left", are just the most left extreme of an extremely right-wing landscape, which is entirely manufactured. In other words, criticizing exploitation is left out of the discussion completely. "Identity politics" and "equal opportunity" is the only way the media will discuss about minorities, because it perpetuates the myth of individual merit and achievement. Collective oppression and collective action are deliberately outside the public discourse, because it challenges the cornerstone of system justification. This is the long and short of it. If you go back to the roots of racism, you will find exploitation. If you go back to the roots of sexism, you will find exploitation. When too many people in legal studies look too deep into this type of thing, it is time to move the window further right: they then crack down on academia.
I agree on all points.
This doesnt affect my stance that in this situation (non-anarchist, exploitative), we desperately need to counter all discrimination. Of course the goal is to take away the means of exploitation but people need to survive until then and have time to think instead of being bullied into conformism.
Of course, this goes without saying. People fight for prisoners' conditions right here and now in the belly of capitalism. People support improvement of working conditions and compensation right here and now.
This is in fact in the heart of anarchosyndicalism. I don't remember when it was the last time I heard that "I do not support X (worker unions, incarcerated rights, homeless people, etc) because they are reformist, and X's (workers', prisoners', homeless people's) problems will automatically vanish when we reclaim the means of production".
This is like the quickest way to lose your friends in the anarchist movement. But replace those terms with "women/black/gay/trans" rights and the same incredibly void argument suddenly gains traction lmao. Then there are the edge cases, like trans people are more likely to be unemployed, homeless, and/or incarcerated.
So this is outright hypocrisy, because if you frame the question as "anarchist support for prisoners" they go "yay!", but if you frame it "anarchist support for trans women" some go "meh". Well assholes, a trans woman is more likely to become a prisoner, and at that she is more likely to get stripped of her humanity and dignity. So, although there are so many other problems scourging the anarchist movement, I believe in the 21st century an intersectional analysis is essential, an analysis according to which being multiply classed into oppressed groups has a cumulative effect, that can lead to extreme marginalization and even loss of health, and life.
Compared to that even the unskilled blue collar worker of the "ethnic majority" (as per the linked articles terminology) can be seen as privileged, in other words let's make sure that all human beings can have at least the standard of living that they can be exploited for their manual labor, before we say that all issues are labor versus capital dialectics.
And that having been said, better not get started on American exceptionalism and privilege extending to trans issues as well. There are trans people in Africa, Middle East, South America, and everywhere else, where the stakes are life or death, not whether you get hormones before or after puberty. There are so many people who will just say "this is just so fucked up, there is no point in discussing it, say, about trans rights in Egypt, for instance".
All these headlines we read about the christian nationalist crackdown on trans rights have a silent part that reads "in America". There have been tragic crackdowns on trans people in other places and even the trans-focused media won't write much about.
Don't get me wrong folks. The intersectional analysis is essential to include feminist, POC, Indigenous, and LGBTQIA+ voices into anarchism and unionism. But it also has to be internationalist, and have less of a First World constitutional democracies bias. This fits in well with an internationalist humanist understanding of anarchism, that sees human dignity as inalienable, regardless of national borders. At least this is the version of anarchism I grew up with.