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I think this emphasis on identity politics will be self-defeating in the long term. Humans are inherently tribal in nature. I don’t see that ever changing. We

I think this emphasis on identity politics will be self-defeating in the long term. Humans are inherently tribal in nature. I don’t see that ever changing. We can mitigate the issues caused by this by emphasizing that we all belong to a bigger tribe than our race/ethnicity. For example by emphasizing we are all Americans or French or even Humans, and as members of this one big tribe, we should be good to each other. However, what we are doing is instead emphasizing tribal identity, and even setting up an adversarial relationship between racial/ethnic tribes. This breeds tribal animosity. If you look at Martin Luther King, Jr, a lot of his appeals to white people were based on “We are all Americans, and this is not how you are supposed to be treating fellow Americans, or we are all Christians, and this is now how we are supposed to be treating fellow Christians” and appealed to shared documents and values (such as the Declaration of Independence, the Bible) etc. Now there is less emphasis of being part of a larger tribe, less emphasis on shared documents and values. As a person of color, I worry that the coming blowback to this will end us up in a worse place that we are now.

FeepingCreature 6y ago
This is why I'm a (classic) liberal - because if liberalism wins, not even its enemies have to be afraid of the outcome.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  Classical liberalism mostly did win in the West, which is why it split into the modern western center-to-center-right which is oriented around protecting the interests of the elites established by implementation of classical liberalism, and the modern western center-left-to-left which is focussed on going beyond the concrete program of classical liberalism to further the outward distribution of power. (Outside of the center-left to center-right are a mixture of ideologies which are often, but not entirely, less closely tied to classical liberalism as antecedents; many that aren’t derived from liberalism are reactions against it. The idea that “enemies” of classical liberalism (or even adherents outside of the mercantile elites) have nothing to be afraid of from it is only true at the level of bland platitudes, not concrete implementation. But that’s not unique to classical liberalism, many ideologies are harmless to anyone, even their opponents, at that level.
  - FeepingCreature 6y ago
    > The idea that “enemies” of classical liberalism (or even adherents outside of the mercantile elites) have nothing to be afraid of from it is only true at the level of bland platitudes I agree that there's things to lose, but I don't think the achievement that the enemies of an ideology should not be put to death should be underestimated! Sure there's things you lose, but there's a lot of things that you were historically at risk of losing when your ideology lost, that you aren't anymore. Like your life, your children, your self-determination. To me that's an achievement well worth protecting and celebrating. I think inasmuch as that's a bland platitude it's because we've forgotten how bad it was. The guillotine is a tasteless internet joke now.

FeepingCreature 6y ago

This is why I'm a (classic) liberal - because if liberalism wins, not even its enemies have to be afraid of the outcome.

dragonwriter 6y ago
Classical liberalism mostly did win in the West, which is why it split into the modern western center-to-center-right which is oriented around protecting the interests of the elites established by implementation of classical liberalism, and the modern western center-left-to-left which is focussed on going beyond the concrete program of classical liberalism to further the outward distribution of power. (Outside of the center-left to center-right are a mixture of ideologies which are often, but not entirely, less closely tied to classical liberalism as antecedents; many that aren’t derived from liberalism are reactions against it. The idea that “enemies” of classical liberalism (or even adherents outside of the mercantile elites) have nothing to be afraid of from it is only true at the level of bland platitudes, not concrete implementation. But that’s not unique to classical liberalism, many ideologies are harmless to anyone, even their opponents, at that level.
- FeepingCreature 6y ago
  > The idea that “enemies” of classical liberalism (or even adherents outside of the mercantile elites) have nothing to be afraid of from it is only true at the level of bland platitudes I agree that there's things to lose, but I don't think the achievement that the enemies of an ideology should not be put to death should be underestimated! Sure there's things you lose, but there's a lot of things that you were historically at risk of losing when your ideology lost, that you aren't anymore. Like your life, your children, your self-determination. To me that's an achievement well worth protecting and celebrating. I think inasmuch as that's a bland platitude it's because we've forgotten how bad it was. The guillotine is a tasteless internet joke now.