119

In Defense of Punching Left

I'm a liberal. I've always been a liberal...

[...]

"Don't punch left" is the core tenet of Solidarity, a new book by Astra Taylor and Leah Hunt-Hendrix. In a laudatory interview with the Washington Post, Hunt-Hendrix said the book was aimed not only at progressives in general but also specifically at liberals who criticize the left, naming me and newsletter author Matthew Yglesias as "falling into the right's divide-and-conquer strategy."

I read a couple more paragraphs and I had to stop. I forgot what a terrible writer he is. The article is like reading a textbook that lectures you.

r/neoliberal thread

all 38 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] Wertheimer@hexbear.net 65 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

It would surprise any liberal to learn we have no desire to redistribute wealth, tackle climate change, or advance social justice and care only about corporations and the status quo.

Then what are you doing?

When every cause is framed as a matter of absolute moral urgency, which is the lingua franca of protest politics, then no compromise can be brooked.

yes-comm

[-] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 48 points 4 months ago

When every cause is framed as a matter of absolute moral urgency, which is the lingua franca of protest politics, then no compromise can be brooked.

That was also quoted in the r/Enough_Sanders_Spam thread. What a odd sub that is. It's like I put on "They Live" glasses and all the comity and civility and the rest of the superficial façade of liberals is stripped away and I can see who they really are.

[-] Wertheimer@hexbear.net 43 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Compromise fetishists, with their Henry Clay shrines or whatever, never seem to grasp that if you're not at the table you're on the menu. They like to bring up environmentalism vs. construction, as if the compromise is merely between supporters of the Nature Team and the Development Team, rather than, say, communities who don't want be poisoned and the corporations that want to poison them.

[-] ProletarianDictator@hexbear.net 6 points 4 months ago

You're telling me the poison people might like development under different circumstances?

[-] HexReplyBot@hexbear.net 1 points 4 months ago

A Reddit link was detected in your comment. Here are links to the same location on alternative frontends that protect your privacy.

[-] Gosplan14_the_Third@hexbear.net 26 points 4 months ago

Wealth redistribution is socdem nonsense designed to have a better capitalism.

Tackle climate change

While wanting to preserve the market economy. They probably think it's doable, but if you understand capitalism and the bourgeois state you know it's not.

advance social justice

What does this mean? They can move the goalposts as far as they want and claim they achieved it. Useless category.

care only about corporations

Yes, I know. You like the petty bourgeois too! How nice of you. Fuck off.

and the status quo.

See "social justice" above. They do like the state, capitalism and everything that entails. You are the status quo. The only reason you claim not to be is to differentiate yourself from other supporters of capital.

[-] DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml 53 points 4 months ago

I'd much rather liberals talk to the left with open hostility rather than their usual smug "civility" tbh. Make it abundantly clear to all that if you have any empathy for others at all, you belong on the left, not with the liberals.

[-] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 31 points 4 months ago

You might have seen it alreay but a few days ago I started a George Takei related thread that I can't get out of my head - A lib "how to" on talking about Gaza - Hexbear

Most of it was exactly what I expected. But a surprising word stuck in my craw - "dealbreaker". As if there can be a "deal" made on morality. And - of course - the "deal" is we must change 100% and see things the lib way while they don't change an iota. Quite a deal!

That was 3 days ago and "dealbreaker" still really annoys me.

[-] Sons_of_Ferrix@hexbear.net 40 points 4 months ago

"In Defense of Punching Liberals"

[-] Ildsaye@hexbear.net 18 points 4 months ago

glasses-on PUT ON THE GLASSES
nazi-punching biden-fall

[-] D61@hexbear.net 39 points 4 months ago

hehe...

I'm trying to work my way through Lenin's "What is to be Done". If I'm understanding it so far, it starts out heavily criticizing opportunists and the idea of "freedom of criticism" in the context of members of an organization being wreckers.

What a wacky coincidence...

[-] reagansrottencorpse@lemmy.ml 38 points 4 months ago

I fucking hate liberals

[-] dead@hexbear.net 38 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

♪♪♪ Sure, once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
Ah, but I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal ♪♪♪

[-] Zuzak@hexbear.net 38 points 4 months ago
[-] Hexagons@hexbear.net 34 points 4 months ago

Huh, Jonathan Chait likes charter schools. He says so in this terrible article. Well, he doesn't seem to want to use the phrase "charter schools", instead just talking repeatedly about "school reform". Which is indeed a euphemism for wanting charter schools, as I had to click a link to learn.

Why use a euphemism here? Why not just say you're in favor of charter schools? Is he embarrassed about it? But then why say anything at all? I'm puzzled

[-] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 34 points 4 months ago

Why use a euphemism here?

I'll assume you're serious. His wife is very pro-charter schools and people always needle him about that on Twitter so he's always very evasive on that topic.

[-] Hexagons@hexbear.net 12 points 4 months ago

But then why ever talk about it at all? He didn't need to bring it up in this article. I dunno, I'm sure I'll never get a satisfying answer. Probably even Jonathan Chait doesn't understand why he does the things that he does

[-] InevitableSwing@hexbear.net 16 points 4 months ago

But then why ever talk about it at all?

He can't help it. He's a self-righteous prick.

[-] emizeko@hexbear.net 23 points 4 months ago

Jonathan "bofa deez commie nuts moist boi" Chait

[-] SteamedHamberder@hexbear.net 23 points 4 months ago

Jonathan Taint.

[-] AutomatedPossum@hexbear.net 22 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I find it hard to consider Yglesias even a liberal, he's just the world's most bloodless fascist (and yes, this is coming from the perspective of somebody who is fully aware that liberalism is a bourgeois, right wing ideology). I do not know this dweeb, but when anybody finds it fitting to name him alongside that dingus, i think i'm better off not knowing.

[-] frauddogg@lemmygrad.ml 22 points 4 months ago

Cracker detected, opinion rejected

[-] Cummunism@hexbear.net 20 points 4 months ago

liberals always proud to prove they are right wing

[-] HeavenAndEarth@hexbear.net 19 points 4 months ago

I welcome this, actually. More people should learn the distinction between liberals and leftists

[-] CoralMarks@hexbear.net 18 points 4 months ago

Johnathan Shite kelly

[-] Juiceyb@hexbear.net 18 points 4 months ago

People who know Rosa. seen-this-one

[-] FnordPrefect@hexbear.net 16 points 4 months ago

geordi-no Punching left

geordi-yes Punching left

[-] Leon_Frotsky@hexbear.net 5 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

How tf do people read this, subject matters aside it's just so boringly written from sentence to sentence, it feels like he's literally just typed out white noise

[-] HexReplyBot@hexbear.net 1 points 4 months ago

A Reddit link was detected in your post. Here are links to the same location on alternative frontends that protect your privacy.

this post was submitted on 12 May 2024
119 points (100.0% liked)

chapotraphouse

13418 readers
773 users here now

Banned? DM Wmill to appeal.

No anti-nautilism posts. See: Eco-fascism Primer

Vaush posts go in the_dunk_tank

Dunk posts in general go in the_dunk_tank, not here

Don't post low-hanging fruit here after it gets removed from the_dunk_tank

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS