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There’s an assumption underneath the Gawkersphere snark (that this piece is a part of) that the correctness of one particular far left political worldview is un

by cjf4 7y ago

There’s an assumption underneath the Gawkersphere snark (that this piece is a part of) that the correctness of one particular far left political worldview is unassailably true. This assumption undermines the entire article, because it leaves no room for dissent. Fortunately, most non partisans recognize the complexity of the world reaches far beyond the limits of what one political viewpoint is able to encapsulate.

lonelappde 7y ago
Gawker is not "far left".
- twic 7y ago
  Effectively nobody in the US is "far left".
  - newen 7y ago
    https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll > Communism is viewed favorably by more than one-in-three Millennials (36%), up 8 points from 2018. > About one-in-five Millennials (22%) believe that “society would be better if all private property was abolished,” compared to 1% of the Silent Generation. Also, far left is a relative term.
    - buzzkillington 7y ago
      Talk to anyone who claims to support 'communism' and you get liberalism. In the majority of cases where people tell me they self identify as communists it just means "super extra not republican" instead of any concrete ideology. I hear a lot about minorities, I don't hear much about the abolishment of private property. LGBT rights are orthogonal to communism, you can have a state that murders anyone who is gay and one that enforces universal gender reassignment and both could be equally communist. Nationalizing the electricity grid and ISPs isn't orthogonal, but the 'far leftists' in the US either don't mention it at all, or mention it so far in their list of demands there will be no political capital left for it even if world revolution happened tomorrow.
      - twic 7y ago
        Right - i believe "communist" is mostly a fashion statement among US millennials. Stick a hammer and sickle emoji in your Twitter name and retweet AOC memes, bam, now you're a communist.
        newen 7y ago
        Seems more like you are expecting too much from normal people who are just trying to get by in life. Supporting communism doesn't mean you are going to join the local communist party and actively try to establish a dictatorship of the proletariat. That is orthogonal and depends on how politically active a person is. What supporting communism means is when a communist shows up on the ballot box, you are likely to vote for them. That in itself is a huge shift from the older generations.
        icebraining 7y ago
        Sure, but even voting for a communist candidate doesn't mean you're a communist or even far-left.
        newen 7y ago
        Okay, then 90% of Americans aren't moderate, centrist, neoliberal, socialist, socdem, demsoc, neonazi, fascist, far right, far left, etc.
      - rayiner 7y ago
        Even if that’s true, it says something horrific about our society that it’s socially acceptable to wear that label: https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/11/20/nicolae-one-hundred-million https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/11/20/nicolae-one-hu.... It’s like self-identifying as a Nazi because you’re “super extra not Democrat.” And I question whether your premise is true. About 22% of millennials surveyed stated that “it would be better if all private property was abolished.” https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll
  - haberman 7y ago
    Kshama Sawant was just elected to her third term on the Seattle City Council. Here is the Wikipedia section about her economic policy: > Sawant has advocated the nationalization of large Washington State corporations such as Boeing, Microsoft, and Amazon[62] and expressed a desire to see privately owned housing in "Millionaire's Row" in the Capitol Hill neighborhood turned into publicly owned shared housing complex saying, "When things are exquisitely beautiful and rare, they shouldn't be privately owned."[63] During an election victory rally for her City Council campaign, Sawant criticized Boeing for saying it would move jobs out of state if it could not get wage concessions and tax breaks. She called this "economic terrorism" and said in several speeches that if Boeing moved jobs out of state, the workers should take over Boeing facilities and bring them into public ownership. She has said they could be converted into multiple uses, such as production for mass transit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kshama_Sawant#Economic_policies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kshama_Sawant#Economic_policie...
    - twic 7y ago
      Those nationalisations are like things that Labour governments in the UK actually did in the '40s through '70s. At the leftmost edge of the mainstream, sure, but hardly far left.
      - haberman 7y ago
        How many of those nationalizations involved the workers "taking over the factories"? https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/seattle-councilwoman-urges-boeing-workers-take-over-the-factories-end-profits https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/seattle-councilwoman-urge...
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/06/12/7-things-to-know-about-polarization-in-america/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/06/12/7-things-to... In particular, look at two aspects of the animation for "Political Polarization of the American Public, 1994-2014": First, notice that the line for Median Democrat moves only to the left. Second, put your pointer or your finger over where the line for Median Democrat is in 1994 and compare that to where it ends up in 2014. Then do the same for Median Republican. edit: Here's the version of it that goes to 1994-2017 -- you can clearly see what happens from 2015 to 2017 as well: https://www.people-press.org/interactives/political-polarization-1994-2017/ https://www.people-press.org/interactives/political-polariza...
    - icebraining 7y ago
      Becoming more "consistently liberal" is hardly the same as being far-left. Hell, even moving more to the left isn't necessarily, depending on where one starts from, and the early 90s are not exactly known to be a left-wing era in the US: the liberal President of the time won on a campaign on a promise of cutting down welfare - “Two years and you’re off”; you can move quite a bit from that without becoming a socialist.
      - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
        > Becoming more "consistently liberal" is hardly the same as being far-left. Becoming more "consistently liberal" and less "mixed" is essentially the definition of moving to the left. > Hell, even moving more to the left isn't necessarily, depending on where one starts from, and the early 90s are not exactly known to be a left-wing era in the US As opposed to what preceded that, i.e. Bush/Reagan? Arguing that Democrats aren't far to the left of where they were 25 years ago because at that time they were much closer to the center than where they are now is just conceding the point by rephrasing it.
        icebraining 7y ago
        Eh, sorry, I guess we're using different definitions here. I'm not saying "Democrats aren't far to the left of where they were 25 years ago" (nor is twic saying that, I suspect). "Far-left", at least everywhere I've seen the term used, is not relative to a previous position the same population held, but relative to the overall political spectrum. It's essentially "in the subset farthest to the left one can possibly be". Who exactly fits into the far-left is arguable, but generally abolition of large-scale private property tends to be a requisite.
- meowface 7y ago
  What they probably meant instead was "modern US 'woke' culture". The term "far-left" has become overloaded in the past decade.
charlesism 7y ago
I don’t know about ideology. I know Gawker alerted Torontonians to the fact that their mayor was off his gourd on drugs, hanging out at a crack-house. That seems like a public service to me.
cm2187 7y ago
And "rude" an is euphemism for a website that was publishing lists of gay people to out them.
- meowface 7y ago
  Only gay people who hold views they disagree with, to be clear. Sexual orientation outing is just one of the many weapons available in their arsenal for use against the "up". If they were to out someone they agree with, it would be punching down, and that's a no-no.

by cjf4 7y ago

lonelappde 7y ago

Gawker is not "far left".

twic 7y ago
Effectively nobody in the US is "far left".
- newen 7y ago
  https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll > Communism is viewed favorably by more than one-in-three Millennials (36%), up 8 points from 2018. > About one-in-five Millennials (22%) believe that “society would be better if all private property was abolished,” compared to 1% of the Silent Generation. Also, far left is a relative term.
  - buzzkillington 7y ago
    Talk to anyone who claims to support 'communism' and you get liberalism. In the majority of cases where people tell me they self identify as communists it just means "super extra not republican" instead of any concrete ideology. I hear a lot about minorities, I don't hear much about the abolishment of private property. LGBT rights are orthogonal to communism, you can have a state that murders anyone who is gay and one that enforces universal gender reassignment and both could be equally communist. Nationalizing the electricity grid and ISPs isn't orthogonal, but the 'far leftists' in the US either don't mention it at all, or mention it so far in their list of demands there will be no political capital left for it even if world revolution happened tomorrow.
    - twic 7y ago
      Right - i believe "communist" is mostly a fashion statement among US millennials. Stick a hammer and sickle emoji in your Twitter name and retweet AOC memes, bam, now you're a communist.
      - newen 7y ago
        Seems more like you are expecting too much from normal people who are just trying to get by in life. Supporting communism doesn't mean you are going to join the local communist party and actively try to establish a dictatorship of the proletariat. That is orthogonal and depends on how politically active a person is. What supporting communism means is when a communist shows up on the ballot box, you are likely to vote for them. That in itself is a huge shift from the older generations.
        icebraining 7y ago
        Sure, but even voting for a communist candidate doesn't mean you're a communist or even far-left.
        newen 7y ago
        Okay, then 90% of Americans aren't moderate, centrist, neoliberal, socialist, socdem, demsoc, neonazi, fascist, far right, far left, etc.
    - rayiner 7y ago
      Even if that’s true, it says something horrific about our society that it’s socially acceptable to wear that label: https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/11/20/nicolae-one-hundred-million https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/11/20/nicolae-one-hu.... It’s like self-identifying as a Nazi because you’re “super extra not Democrat.” And I question whether your premise is true. About 22% of millennials surveyed stated that “it would be better if all private property was abolished.” https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll https://www.victimsofcommunism.org/2019-annual-poll
- haberman 7y ago
  Kshama Sawant was just elected to her third term on the Seattle City Council. Here is the Wikipedia section about her economic policy: > Sawant has advocated the nationalization of large Washington State corporations such as Boeing, Microsoft, and Amazon[62] and expressed a desire to see privately owned housing in "Millionaire's Row" in the Capitol Hill neighborhood turned into publicly owned shared housing complex saying, "When things are exquisitely beautiful and rare, they shouldn't be privately owned."[63] During an election victory rally for her City Council campaign, Sawant criticized Boeing for saying it would move jobs out of state if it could not get wage concessions and tax breaks. She called this "economic terrorism" and said in several speeches that if Boeing moved jobs out of state, the workers should take over Boeing facilities and bring them into public ownership. She has said they could be converted into multiple uses, such as production for mass transit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kshama_Sawant#Economic_policies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kshama_Sawant#Economic_policie...
  - twic 7y ago
    Those nationalisations are like things that Labour governments in the UK actually did in the '40s through '70s. At the leftmost edge of the mainstream, sure, but hardly far left.
    - haberman 7y ago
      How many of those nationalizations involved the workers "taking over the factories"? https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/seattle-councilwoman-urges-boeing-workers-take-over-the-factories-end-profits https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/seattle-councilwoman-urge...
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago
  https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/06/12/7-things-to-know-about-polarization-in-america/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/06/12/7-things-to... In particular, look at two aspects of the animation for "Political Polarization of the American Public, 1994-2014": First, notice that the line for Median Democrat moves only to the left. Second, put your pointer or your finger over where the line for Median Democrat is in 1994 and compare that to where it ends up in 2014. Then do the same for Median Republican. edit: Here's the version of it that goes to 1994-2017 -- you can clearly see what happens from 2015 to 2017 as well: https://www.people-press.org/interactives/political-polarization-1994-2017/ https://www.people-press.org/interactives/political-polariza...
  - icebraining 7y ago
    Becoming more "consistently liberal" is hardly the same as being far-left. Hell, even moving more to the left isn't necessarily, depending on where one starts from, and the early 90s are not exactly known to be a left-wing era in the US: the liberal President of the time won on a campaign on a promise of cutting down welfare - “Two years and you’re off”; you can move quite a bit from that without becoming a socialist.
    - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
      > Becoming more "consistently liberal" is hardly the same as being far-left. Becoming more "consistently liberal" and less "mixed" is essentially the definition of moving to the left. > Hell, even moving more to the left isn't necessarily, depending on where one starts from, and the early 90s are not exactly known to be a left-wing era in the US As opposed to what preceded that, i.e. Bush/Reagan? Arguing that Democrats aren't far to the left of where they were 25 years ago because at that time they were much closer to the center than where they are now is just conceding the point by rephrasing it.
      - icebraining 7y ago
        Eh, sorry, I guess we're using different definitions here. I'm not saying "Democrats aren't far to the left of where they were 25 years ago" (nor is twic saying that, I suspect). "Far-left", at least everywhere I've seen the term used, is not relative to a previous position the same population held, but relative to the overall political spectrum. It's essentially "in the subset farthest to the left one can possibly be". Who exactly fits into the far-left is arguable, but generally abolition of large-scale private property tends to be a requisite.
meowface 7y ago
What they probably meant instead was "modern US 'woke' culture". The term "far-left" has become overloaded in the past decade.

charlesism 7y ago

I don’t know about ideology. I know Gawker alerted Torontonians to the fact that their mayor was off his gourd on drugs, hanging out at a crack-house. That seems like a public service to me.

cm2187 7y ago

And "rude" an is euphemism for a website that was publishing lists of gay people to out them.

meowface 7y ago
Only gay people who hold views they disagree with, to be clear. Sexual orientation outing is just one of the many weapons available in their arsenal for use against the "up". If they were to out someone they agree with, it would be punching down, and that's a no-no.