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The behavior of the far-left identity politics crowd has crossed over into outright bullying. I say this as someone who self-identifies fairly left and extremel

The behavior of the far-left identity politics crowd has crossed over into outright bullying. I say this as someone who self-identifies fairly left and extremely liberal. Their central rhetorical tool is extremely effective: if you are not a member of a marginalized identity group (this category itself being fluid), you do not have a right to question anything they say (according to them). This works on thoughtful people who want to do the right thing, because such people tend to take the general concept of social justice very seriously (as they should, it's important). We need to collectively realize how toxic these people are, and start pushing back.

Nuzzerino 7y ago
If you are part of the identity group, and if you question what they say, they'll call you a traitor. It's thinly veiled fascism to say the least.
- caconym_ 7y ago
  I don't really think calling it "fascism" is especially accurate or productive. It stinks of "the other side" which is, frankly, much scarier, whether you think I'm referring to the far-right fringe or the propaganda operations that are working to deepen these divisions. See also e.g. the widely documented fake BLM pages on Facebook. It's just a meme that spreads through its appeal to a certain type of person.
  - smudgymcscmudge 7y ago
    The other side in this case isn’t the far right. The other side are just ordinary people who don’t want to be called names for forgetting to use the right pronoun or even not using a pronoun at all.
    - caconym_ 7y ago
      Yeah, those aren't the people labeling it "fascism" as far as I can tell. GP of this comment was specifically responding to GGP.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  Yes, and that's why this and other people (like the way Codes of Conduct were pushed in the first place) always smelled to me similar to a fascist coup. You suddenly find yourself you've become a part of the identity group, you're judged a traitor, and you're out. (I know "fascism" is the wrong word here, but what's the correct word for "fascism-like, but with $random-issue instead of nationality, and without the far-right"? We need that word.)
  - olalonde 7y ago
    > (I know "fascism" is the wrong word here, but what's the correct word for "fascism-like, but with $random-issue instead of nationality, and without the far-right"? We need that word.) I think Social Justice Warriors is the proper term.
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      That's with $random-issue = something from the bag of things related to gender identity and minorities. I wonder if there's a more general term, partly because I have the feeling that the very use of "SJW" is now perceived by many as association with far-right.
  - Udo 7y ago
    > I know "fascism" is the wrong word here I think the proper word is "authoritarian", which is a classification they would likely agree with. As an aside, I think traditionally political labels like "the Left" are becoming very problematic and are part of the problem. It's generally no longer enough to ask someone whether they're left or right and then correctly assume their stance on things. Instead - and I argue that we should have started doing that before this current upheaval - instead, you have to query a person specifically about their positions on specific things. For example, that way some confusion about the so-called Social Justice Warriors could have been avoided on all sides. They are a heterogenous group, but do tend to represent leftist values (inclusiveness, equality, a belief that society should take care of disadvantaged individuals disproportionately), at the same time they are not liberals in most regards. They tend to believe in progress through force, and they do generally favor strict rules and harsh/permanent punishment. They're authoritarians. One might argue that the SJW movement has more in common with conservatives and reactionaries than traditional leftist liberals, if you disregard their disparate political goals for a moment. Leftist liberals and SJWs often cannot successfully communicate and as a result are often in conflict, despite overlapping goals. This may also be the reason why, as the article describes in one instance, an openly anti-trans moderator was mostly seen as A-OK, whereas the leftist liberal author was fired.
kristopolous 7y ago
That's liberal politics, not left. There's a real, meaningful difference. Liberating identities is a form of liberalism. There's some dogpiling effect where all these terms which deviate from a current conservative are used interchangeably. Leftists and liberals really don't like each other and when the liberal parties need to choose between supporting their conservative opponents or a leftist challenger, they almost without exception, join the conservatives to block out the leftists from power. Many liberals see the left as a far bigger threat than most forms of conservatism and to confuse the these groups is part of the reason people don't think these groups have a coherent vision, because they actually don't like each other and aren't the same.
- caconym_ 7y ago
  That people should be allowed to assume whatever identities they like is a liberal position, but telling people what they cannot say and should not think in relation to identity (or anything else, really) is not. There may be some muddled overlap between those two sets but they are absolutely not the same. The latter is, generally, a leftist thing. The political left is concerned with egalitarianism, often to the extent that they believe specific and deliberate actions should be taken to reduce inequality. See also: social justice. The identity politicking we're discussing here is predicated on the idea that there are marginalized groups, i.e. folks who do not comfortably fit into the established gender binary and/or gender-sex clustering, and that people outside those groups should change their behavior to reduce that marginalization.
  - kristopolous 7y ago
    You actually just crossed the two again. The leftist position is the imposition of the language is yet another form of oppression. Crafting new social hierarchies based on language, like has has existed throughout time, is wildly incompatible with leftism. Anarchism, Libertarianism, these are closer to leftism than liberalism. The liberal would reproduce class hierarchies through language and phrasing virtue signaling, ignoring and respecting people based on their use of language. The left has no such masters which is why they have such a hard time consolidating and organizing - there isn't a central cultural idealism. And just to be clear, I'm perfectly happy with being ahead of the curve on this one and getting the "down votes". I know most people don't currently see or care about this distinction, but it's really important. The two words begin with "L" and sound alike and the liberal party tries to capture the left like the conservatives try to capture libertarians, but these four things aren't really two things and their differences matter.
rtpg 7y ago
The "actual thing" w/r/t pronouns in particular is that people should respect someone else's identity. Deadnaming someone is basically bullying. There's no principled to intentionally do it, and it's almost always done as a power play more than anything. Respecting someone's choice of identity is just baseline "respect for others". It would be like insisting to use someone's old married name after a divorce (or even just refusing to use someone's name after they get it changed, for whatever reason!) I'm a bit agnostic about stuff like "forbidding non-pronoun usage" (how is that intent even seen?) and fights are getting virulent. But I think it's hard to see the principled argument against asking people to respect someone's choice of pronouns or name.
- scotty79 7y ago
  I don't get how this became a thing. 5 years ago half of the people who are railed up about this didn't even know what word 'pronoun' means. Why would using the wrong one be harmful to anybody? You can call me a she but it just would mean that you'd be wrong. It would harm your public image more than mine since there would be no harm to mine. None of my self-worth or my worth to other people relies on people believing me being any specific gender. And if you build your worth on your gender should I really be interested? It was your choice. You could have chosen otherwise. Any harm you might feel when someone misgenders you is self inflicted.
  - K2L8M11N2 7y ago
    > And if you build your worth on your gender should I really be interested? It was your choice. You could have chosen otherwise. Any harm you might feel when someone misgenders you is self inflicted. Would you say the same about a person being called a racial slur for example? “You shouldn’t have built your worth on your race”? Any harm you might feel when someone [calls you the n-word] is self inflicted, of course. > Why would using the wrong one be harmful to anybody? As alexwennerberg said elsewhere in this thread: > The reason that people are so sensitive and strict about this is because the stakes for trans people are very high -- some people don't believe trans people exist, should exist, or should have the same rights as cis people. Refusing to use the right pronouns reveals either a benign misunderstanding about trans people or a willful hostility towards their existence. The latter is extremely common and can be both hurtful and often scary, as trans people, especially trans people of color, are often subject to violence because of their identities.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
einpoklum 7y ago
"identity politics" has very little to do with the left. It's a social diversion tactic from actual left-wing struggles, that is employed by pro-Capitalist political parties (with the US Democratic Party being a prominent example).

Nuzzerino 7y ago

If you are part of the identity group, and if you question what they say, they'll call you a traitor. It's thinly veiled fascism to say the least.

caconym_ 7y ago
I don't really think calling it "fascism" is especially accurate or productive. It stinks of "the other side" which is, frankly, much scarier, whether you think I'm referring to the far-right fringe or the propaganda operations that are working to deepen these divisions. See also e.g. the widely documented fake BLM pages on Facebook. It's just a meme that spreads through its appeal to a certain type of person.
- smudgymcscmudge 7y ago
  The other side in this case isn’t the far right. The other side are just ordinary people who don’t want to be called names for forgetting to use the right pronoun or even not using a pronoun at all.
  - caconym_ 7y ago
    Yeah, those aren't the people labeling it "fascism" as far as I can tell. GP of this comment was specifically responding to GGP.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
Yes, and that's why this and other people (like the way Codes of Conduct were pushed in the first place) always smelled to me similar to a fascist coup. You suddenly find yourself you've become a part of the identity group, you're judged a traitor, and you're out. (I know "fascism" is the wrong word here, but what's the correct word for "fascism-like, but with $random-issue instead of nationality, and without the far-right"? We need that word.)
- olalonde 7y ago
  > (I know "fascism" is the wrong word here, but what's the correct word for "fascism-like, but with $random-issue instead of nationality, and without the far-right"? We need that word.) I think Social Justice Warriors is the proper term.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    That's with $random-issue = something from the bag of things related to gender identity and minorities. I wonder if there's a more general term, partly because I have the feeling that the very use of "SJW" is now perceived by many as association with far-right.
- Udo 7y ago
  > I know "fascism" is the wrong word here I think the proper word is "authoritarian", which is a classification they would likely agree with. As an aside, I think traditionally political labels like "the Left" are becoming very problematic and are part of the problem. It's generally no longer enough to ask someone whether they're left or right and then correctly assume their stance on things. Instead - and I argue that we should have started doing that before this current upheaval - instead, you have to query a person specifically about their positions on specific things. For example, that way some confusion about the so-called Social Justice Warriors could have been avoided on all sides. They are a heterogenous group, but do tend to represent leftist values (inclusiveness, equality, a belief that society should take care of disadvantaged individuals disproportionately), at the same time they are not liberals in most regards. They tend to believe in progress through force, and they do generally favor strict rules and harsh/permanent punishment. They're authoritarians. One might argue that the SJW movement has more in common with conservatives and reactionaries than traditional leftist liberals, if you disregard their disparate political goals for a moment. Leftist liberals and SJWs often cannot successfully communicate and as a result are often in conflict, despite overlapping goals. This may also be the reason why, as the article describes in one instance, an openly anti-trans moderator was mostly seen as A-OK, whereas the leftist liberal author was fired.

kristopolous 7y ago

That's liberal politics, not left. There's a real, meaningful difference. Liberating identities is a form of liberalism. There's some dogpiling effect where all these terms which deviate from a current conservative are used interchangeably. Leftists and liberals really don't like each other and when the liberal parties need to choose between supporting their conservative opponents or a leftist challenger, they almost without exception, join the conservatives to block out the leftists from power. Many liberals see the left as a far bigger threat than most forms of conservatism and to confuse the these groups is part of the reason people don't think these groups have a coherent vision, because they actually don't like each other and aren't the same.

caconym_ 7y ago
That people should be allowed to assume whatever identities they like is a liberal position, but telling people what they cannot say and should not think in relation to identity (or anything else, really) is not. There may be some muddled overlap between those two sets but they are absolutely not the same. The latter is, generally, a leftist thing. The political left is concerned with egalitarianism, often to the extent that they believe specific and deliberate actions should be taken to reduce inequality. See also: social justice. The identity politicking we're discussing here is predicated on the idea that there are marginalized groups, i.e. folks who do not comfortably fit into the established gender binary and/or gender-sex clustering, and that people outside those groups should change their behavior to reduce that marginalization.
- kristopolous 7y ago
  You actually just crossed the two again. The leftist position is the imposition of the language is yet another form of oppression. Crafting new social hierarchies based on language, like has has existed throughout time, is wildly incompatible with leftism. Anarchism, Libertarianism, these are closer to leftism than liberalism. The liberal would reproduce class hierarchies through language and phrasing virtue signaling, ignoring and respecting people based on their use of language. The left has no such masters which is why they have such a hard time consolidating and organizing - there isn't a central cultural idealism. And just to be clear, I'm perfectly happy with being ahead of the curve on this one and getting the "down votes". I know most people don't currently see or care about this distinction, but it's really important. The two words begin with "L" and sound alike and the liberal party tries to capture the left like the conservatives try to capture libertarians, but these four things aren't really two things and their differences matter.

rtpg 7y ago

The "actual thing" w/r/t pronouns in particular is that people should respect someone else's identity. Deadnaming someone is basically bullying. There's no principled to intentionally do it, and it's almost always done as a power play more than anything. Respecting someone's choice of identity is just baseline "respect for others". It would be like insisting to use someone's old married name after a divorce (or even just refusing to use someone's name after they get it changed, for whatever reason!) I'm a bit agnostic about stuff like "forbidding non-pronoun usage" (how is that intent even seen?) and fights are getting virulent. But I think it's hard to see the principled argument against asking people to respect someone's choice of pronouns or name.

scotty79 7y ago
I don't get how this became a thing. 5 years ago half of the people who are railed up about this didn't even know what word 'pronoun' means. Why would using the wrong one be harmful to anybody? You can call me a she but it just would mean that you'd be wrong. It would harm your public image more than mine since there would be no harm to mine. None of my self-worth or my worth to other people relies on people believing me being any specific gender. And if you build your worth on your gender should I really be interested? It was your choice. You could have chosen otherwise. Any harm you might feel when someone misgenders you is self inflicted.
- K2L8M11N2 7y ago
  > And if you build your worth on your gender should I really be interested? It was your choice. You could have chosen otherwise. Any harm you might feel when someone misgenders you is self inflicted. Would you say the same about a person being called a racial slur for example? “You shouldn’t have built your worth on your race”? Any harm you might feel when someone [calls you the n-word] is self inflicted, of course. > Why would using the wrong one be harmful to anybody? As alexwennerberg said elsewhere in this thread: > The reason that people are so sensitive and strict about this is because the stakes for trans people are very high -- some people don't believe trans people exist, should exist, or should have the same rights as cis people. Refusing to use the right pronouns reveals either a benign misunderstanding about trans people or a willful hostility towards their existence. The latter is extremely common and can be both hurtful and often scary, as trans people, especially trans people of color, are often subject to violence because of their identities.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

einpoklum 7y ago

"identity politics" has very little to do with the left. It's a social diversion tactic from actual left-wing struggles, that is employed by pro-Capitalist political parties (with the US Democratic Party being a prominent example).