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What is your opinion on left unity?
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this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2024
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In the United States in 2024, the most passionate and dedicated supporters of left unity are the Democratic Party and its supporters.
Most of the American left is in fact unified - behind the Democratic Party.
If your reflexive response is "the Democratic Party isn't actually leftist" and "no compromise with fascists" and blah blah... well, that explains your perception of disunity. Because the leftists who are willing to compromise their principles in order to accomplish some of their goals are already compromising - under the Democratic Party banner. And the ones who reject that banner are the ones who are the most stubborn about holding their principles and refusing to compromise for the sake of unity. Which explains why they can't compromise with each other, either.
I don't think what the democratic party does counts as just compromising. They often expand the awful systems they inherit, or at best just fail to revert the bad policies of their predecessors. There's a reason for the ratchet theory to exist, or the saying that democratic policy is just Republican policy on a 1 election cycle delay. Just look at our foreign policy - Obama massively increased drone strikes under his term, to say nothing of the atrocities Biden has been funding and providing arms for in Gaza. Why did Obama promise to codify roe v wade on the campaign trail, only to make no efforts when in office? Why did Biden do the same? Why are they now calling for voters to vote blue in November so roe v wade can be reinstated when we already did vote blue, and the guy we'd presumably be voting for is already in office? If Biden as president is all it takes to reinstate roe v wade, why the fuck hasn't he done so yet?
Honestly for all the infighting, I think plenty of leftists would agree over common ground and change tons of things so long as they're going in the correct overall direction, despite the specific details being so contested. But they attack the DNC because the DNC is not progressive in any way shape or form, it's neo liberal.
No, quite the opposite. The Democratic Party's strategy is to appeal to leftist unity only when it's time for elections, only for them to give no concession whatsoever and keep on their neoliberal agenda.
And they're not on the left to begin with, they're right-wing. Them being leftists is only an illusion caused by the Overton Window.
Tought Slime - Abolish The Left
There are two different questions going on here:
Is the Democratic Party leftist? Stipulated, no, they aren't.
Does the Democratic Party appeal to leftist unity? Yes. Very aggressively. Mostly by saying "Trump is worse", and, more practically, "if you work with us within the two party political system you are more likely to enact some of your policy goals than if you work outside it".
Which gets to my point: leftists who are willing to compromise their principles and policy goals for the sake of unity typically make that compromise with the large, powerful organization that's already asking for their support.
Which means, if you call for "left unity" outside the Democratic Party, you're speaking to a group of leftists who have already refused to compromise their principles and beliefs in the name of unity. So it's a hard sell from the beginning.
That seems to be more of an argument of why left unity is bad.
Liberals are not only "leftists" in america where the right are litteral fascists. You can gaslight people all you want, anybody with a bit of political knowledge knows that. I grew up in a country where the left were socialists and the right were liberals. Some leftists politicians got killed by your american liberals and their nazi friends.
So I know it's election year but go astroturf reddit, please.
I dont think this is a good way to engage with the position of others, especially when I asked for peoples takes. Also from my understanding of stabbys comment its just an attempt to analyse the current political landscape in the so-called US through the idea of left unity. And tbh i find it pretty interesting.
Fair point. I get a little sensitive because the US point of view is put down our throat as soon as we open the internet. Cultural imperialism at its finest.