The Deprogram

I'm hoping that this is at least somewhat coherent in what I'm saying here.

What is the American left? Or the left in general for that matter? And what does it mean for xyz to be at fault or complicit or to "sit them down and tell them to take blame when blame is needed."

Did the American left fail because...it willed itself to fail? I think that's my question, really. We talk about such things in this individualistic sense. Honestly it's very rare to hear about "the left" outside the global north. What is the venezualan left, or the Brazilian left, or the south African left? We don't talk about it like that, we talk about parties and organizations.

I think that's why we talk about "the left" of the global north. It's an easy thing to criticize, because it can be as wide or as narrow as you want. If you said the ANC or workers party in South Africa and Brazil respectively were "the left" and lumped in them with thr EFF and Brazils communists then it'd be laughable. However, here, PSL, FRSO, etc. Get lumped in with the DSA and democratic party as a whole.

There's no...strategy presented, and very little analysis. It's just venting. And that's fine, but what's the point then? If the point is to get someone to do something, then...who exactly is doing what?

This is also my confusion i have in who this is being communicated to. Who? Is it to PSL members? In which case they aren't under the criticisms of supporting Mamdani or whatever. Is it all Americans? Ok....good luck i suppose with that. Is it just anyone who calls themselves a socialist or a leftist? Like I said, broad and vague. When you sit someone down and give them tough love, the person sat down kinda has to be...real? You can't give tough love to a vague ethereal concept.

There's also this game of ping pong with arguments like this. Is it a material issue or moral one? If I say it's a material issue, then they will say it's a moral one, that Americans are psychologically incapable of resisting. If i say it's not a moral issue, then they say it's a material issue. We end up going in circles because, at the end of the day, this conversation doesn't have a solution besides "well they'll just spontaneously get better" or "they'll get glassed" or "the world is doomed" or "it doesn't matter" or, you get the point.

I really feel like you shouldn't be able to eat your cake and have it too. You can't divorce social democrats from the left and then represent them as the western left.