I grew up working class, and proud. My father was a Marxist who was active in the labour movement, campaigned for Canada’s left-wing New Democratic Party, and educated me about the harms of capitalism. Throughout my teen years and young adulthood, I never questioned which side I was on. To this day, I remain steadfast in my belief that everyone deserves access to affordable housing, free health care, and advanced education. I believe that poverty is unacceptable and that wealth is unethical. I believe racism and sexism are embedded within our society. I’m pink, through and through.
But politics aren’t just about words and ideas. They’re also about ethics and action—both personal and political. And though I remain a leftist in my principles, I can no longer stand in solidarity with former fellow travellers whose ethics are dictated by social convenience, who prioritize retweets over free inquiry, democracy, and debate…
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The Intransigent One
Mystro
The Arbourist
3 comments
July 2, 2018 at 3:00 pm
tildeb
“The fear of dissent has made many progressives utterly incapable of self-critique or critical thought. Clannish and gutless, too many betray so-called brothers and sisters in order to preserve their own reputations and political connections. They bleat the same empty mantras back and forth to one another; a game of call-and-response in which everyone is afraid to admit they might not believe—or even understand—the words they’re saying or tweeting. It all helps explain why America’s Left has disintegrated, and Canada’s is moving in the same direction.”
Quite true. This is the Left today, incapable of self-critique or critical thought. And it opens the door to having this vacuum filled by the very worst of people. The recent election of Doug Ford – aka Trump Jr – is just another case in point. What the Left won’t do is… WAKE UP.
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July 2, 2018 at 4:24 pm
bleatmop
The regressive left is basically this now:
It’s become trendy to be PC while not actually examining or thinking about any of the issues. You take your cue, adopt a position and defame and attack anyone that steps a single toe out of line. This is the end result of when neoliberalism takes over a movement. It doesn’t matter what feminism, social justice, or any other movement/discipline were. They’ve been adopted by the neoliberal left and it will be bent and twisted to serve the oligarchy now. Adopting this will be rewarded and deviation will result in doxxing, death threats, and deplatforming. Anything and everything will be sacrificed to the neoliberal left including but not limited to freedom of speech and hard fought gains by previous generations.
The neoliberal right is happy to oblige because its actually the same thing as the neoliberal left with a different suit on.
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July 2, 2018 at 5:03 pm
tildeb
I’m unclear how you link this social justice trend to neoliberalism, which I think is about the dominance of laissez-faire capitalism. I don;t see this in the social demands of equity by SJWs (no matter how much this goal undermines legal equality). It seems to me to be much more associated with Millennial parenting creating the Gen Zeders who are now entering post secondary education and demanding coddling in all ways – especially in language and political views – demanding that their ‘specialness’ to be protected from all manner of ‘harm’ by the brutality of the real world be awarded the highest degree of concern and capitulation especially by non-vertebrate school administrators or they’ll turn violent. And we see the kind of temper tantrums they are willing to exhibit without any degree of shame or concern for the rights of others with whom they disagree. None of that relates in my mind to neoliberalism.
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