5 ms·

Liberals (like the NYT) have done a great job co-opting the actual left and using it to push their pro-corporate agenda. I feel like the right wingers fall righ

Liberals (like the NYT) have done a great job co-opting the actual left and using it to push their pro-corporate agenda. I feel like the right wingers fall right into their plans when they fail to delineate between neo-liberals (a different kind of right wing ideology) and actual leftists. I also think neo-liberal's superficial and opportunistic use of identity politics and intersectionalism has worsened racism in this country. When ABC and The Gap are purporting to be for social justice, people's alarm bells are going to go off, for good reason, and they're going to reject everything associated with what they're hearing. This pro-corporate faux-humanitarian movement turned a lot of people hard right. So many of our philosophies and social movements are tied to the industrial revolution, cold war, early 20th century... We need something new. For me, I've retained my libertarian focus on individual liberty but also layered in more humanitarian thinking. Racism is real. History does matter and we're not all on a level playing field in 2021. But I'll be damned if I'm going to let global corporations and rich liberal arts kids launder real racial injustice through their black square BOGO sales, attacks on technology that empowers individuals and classist articles and employment tactics.

simonh 6y ago
Honestly I found it really hard to figure out what it is that you're trying to say.
- rjbwork 6y ago
  I think he's saying that neoliberals and corporations have co-opted left-wing identity politics while eschewing the underlying economic framework of those politics. They do this in a bid to obscure the reality that they are just another right wing economic system and provide a straw man opposition for more conservative right wing politics. Essentially playing good cop bad cop with the sociopolitics of the US - both still cops though.
  - solosoyokaze 6y ago
    Thank you for the great summary of my comment. This is exactly what I meant.
zwieback 6y ago
Corporate goals might not be as pure as you want but they do have a lot of power and even small changes can have large positive outcomes in aggregate. As an activist you are not their target audience but think about it this way: as an activist you could leverage the corporations' power. You may not like the exact words you'll hear but the end result might be a win-win.
- solosoyokaze 6y ago
  It might be a win-win but it also might be a win-loss. There's a difference between hijacking MSM or corporate power to subversively push your message, and messages that originate within the establishment directly designed to further their goals. Like I said in my original comment, the danger is that because the in-authenticity is so easy to detect, it triggers an aversion that makes people reactionary, and in this case moves people further right.

simonh 6y ago

Honestly I found it really hard to figure out what it is that you're trying to say.

rjbwork 6y ago
I think he's saying that neoliberals and corporations have co-opted left-wing identity politics while eschewing the underlying economic framework of those politics. They do this in a bid to obscure the reality that they are just another right wing economic system and provide a straw man opposition for more conservative right wing politics. Essentially playing good cop bad cop with the sociopolitics of the US - both still cops though.
- solosoyokaze 6y ago
  Thank you for the great summary of my comment. This is exactly what I meant.

zwieback 6y ago

Corporate goals might not be as pure as you want but they do have a lot of power and even small changes can have large positive outcomes in aggregate. As an activist you are not their target audience but think about it this way: as an activist you could leverage the corporations' power. You may not like the exact words you'll hear but the end result might be a win-win.

solosoyokaze 6y ago
It might be a win-win but it also might be a win-loss. There's a difference between hijacking MSM or corporate power to subversively push your message, and messages that originate within the establishment directly designed to further their goals. Like I said in my original comment, the danger is that because the in-authenticity is so easy to detect, it triggers an aversion that makes people reactionary, and in this case moves people further right.