Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

But I've found that this issue doesn't seem to resonate with many people of any color or background.

People are so focused on their own hectic lives they don't have time to discuss this stuff or think about it deeply. This place is an anomaly. People who have jobs like we do which allow them time to focus on this stuff are an anomaly. The progressive politics that is creating friction within the Democratic Party right now is a tail wagging the dog.

There is a huge disconnect happening inside your head which I don't think I will be able to fix.

Maybe I don't know what you're referring to as identity politics (even though I have explained to you more than once that whenever a person of color asks for a political fix it is for a problem that is aimed at that group of people as a group). But I can't believe that you think that people don't think that their race is part of their treatment. What you're saying doesn't make any fucking sense.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

While we debate this stuff and the media feeds stories about division, it just might be that the rest of the country is ignoring the identity politics of Donald Trump and those against him.

You have it completely backwards and inside out. Trump is pitching to white people exclusively. He does this by pointing to people of color who are asking to be treated fairly and saying, "See? These people are all about identity politics."

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

No one said they were. There are endless groups engaging in identity politics right now. Pick a unique background and you'll find a group of people who take it as their identity and have policy requests based on it.

Are you serious? You pick a group of people and tell me why they shouldn't be upset about how they're being treated. Transgendered people can't serve in the military? Muslims are fucking banned? When laws and social norms treat you less than what the fuck are you supposed to do? Just because you don't have their problems doesn't mean those problems aren't important to those people. Identity politics are thrust on you. People don't jump into groups who have problems for fucking fun.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Being black is freighted. There's systemic racism throughout the country. No one is disputing that.

Can you not see that I am picking out one group to use as an example? Can you not apply the same analysis to any other group you keep castigating for using identity politics?

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

This is where the rubber meets the road. Both of those demands are eminently reasonable and should be accepted and addressed by society. It is not at all controversial to say "Black people have been fucked over, are treated unfairly still, and this needs to be recognized." Where I think people say, "Oh fuck... Here comes more identity politics" is when something like BLM is hijacked by the fringe. And it was.

What are you talking about? How? By whom?

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Do you hear about BLM anymore? No. Why? Progressives (of all colors) grabbed the movement and turned it into "Wokeness."

This is so fucking stupid. Really. Please stop it.

BLM didn't go away. It wasn't hijacked. The press stopped covering it because everything in our country is currently on fucking fire. Wokeness. If you're railing against that term it's because you don't want to deal with what it actually means--and being in tune of the types of unfairness that different groups have to endure is all it means.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Wokeness is so large and can mean so many things people don't know how to deal with it. One can offend a woke sensibility in any number of ways. Reasonable people are exhausted by the concept.

I know. It's terrible. How will straight, white people ever deal with having to hear about all the issues they've never had to pay attention to before! Oh, the humanity!

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Messaging matters. Wokeness rings to many as amorphous grievances. BLM, with its elegant and blunt message - Stop shooting us - did exactly the opposite. That message stuck in white America's throat. They couldn't ignore that. Eventually, even Trump signed a bill (too weak, but a start) addressing justice reform. Voting can and should be the next step. But when the message becomes wokeness rather than "Stop precluding us from voting," it becomes weak. Wokeness sounds trendy. It gets mixed up with #metoo, and as these things roll along, there's a snowball effect where all sorts of complaints get attached to it. It becomes muddled, confused, and that's where people start using terms like "identity politics" against it.

Needless to say, this whole paragraph is stupid. There are surely multiple complaints. You and most white people don't want to deal with multiple complaints. Only the really big things should count. The rest is just whining. So you fixate on a shorthand description of people standing in solidarity and understanding of the many issues this country has with those who have been historically marginalized and dismiss it all. The reason why that works is because you want to dismiss the stuff you don't think is important.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Agreed 100%. Trump is the king of identity politics. He's wrapped up all sorts of grievances under one angry banner.

It's weird to hear you say that because whenever you mention identity politics, it's always aimed at other people.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

It's confusing as all fuck and totally alienating to most Americans outside his base. The only reasonable voters he'll attract in 2020 are those who figure the economy is good, so why fuck with it?

So, you.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I think if we play Trump's game, we lose.

If transgender people want to fight in the military, how is saying, "Hey! This ban isn't fair!" playing his game? He instituted a policy that affects people. They are pushing back. Others support them. What the fuck is the alternative?

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I think things should be dealt with on an issue by issue basis.

Oh, well, let me alert all my woke friends!

Here's what you've done. You have prioritized what should be important. You have dismissed a bunch of other shit. You have inflated people like AOC to the position of leader of the Democrats. You ignore everything but what annoys you and you have labeled what annoys you and what you have deemed unimportant as "wokeness" and have told everyone that that term has swallowed everything thus rendering it overbroad and useless. But here's the truth: You do this because you don't give a fuck about almost all of it. And that's the magic of people, like you, who scream and yell about identity politics, and playing Trump's game, and whatever other bullshit gets you out of actually looking at the issues that matter to people who aren't like you.

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

We need to rollback a predatory justice system. We need to make election day a national holiday so everyone can vote. These are real concrete fixes following which many of the smaller concerns will disappear. The last thing we need is a Progressive Woke Identity Politics Machine, where a microaggression is as important as a police murder, fighting Trump's Identity Politics Machine, where every crazy concern of marginalized whites is gifted utterly unwarranted credibility.

The last sentence is only occurring in your head (and people like you). You are dismissing the actual asks you've listed (some of which are being proposed by actual House leadership) and blaming that dismissal not on the McConnells of the world, but on groups of people who also have asks for fair treatment. It's sickening.

It's the same analysis as when white people were up in arms over political correctness. Group a bunch of complex issues that are really affecting people into one term, cite an example of what you have deemed the most frivolous one, dismiss it all.

TM