There's another element to the democrats upcoming demise, their routine inability to materially deliver on their promises. Obama was profoundly guilty of this: squandering a supermajority in the house and senate to pass a conservative health care plan that was a windfall for private insurance, appointing timothy geitner as treasury secretary; forgiving the banks, but foreclosing on homeowners. I really struggle with the near universal deification of Obama of pretty much every single liberal person I know and I would ask, why exactly did you love him so, beyond that he made you feel good? Our relationship to politicians as a sort of friend/boss/celebrity proxy is unhealthy and irrational. Every year with almost unanimous support the defense budget increases by hundreds of billions of dollars. The democrats are so far from even the most conservative actions on climate change as to make their "better" position almost irrelevant. Republicans are of course in the process of reversing Roe v Wade across the country, but I hold tremendous resentment to RBG for not retiring in 2014 and for Obama for not at least attempting to appoint a supreme court justice in recess and then daring McConnell to impeach them. We both hate the democrats, but for different reasons.
ugh...been waiting for your next installment bc it's been a minute...this one did not disappoint, BUT it did discourage me...and I am not sure what to do...as in a past comment I'd made, I'll reference the trans activist, Buck Angel again, who I follow on IG and love...and he is known as a loose friend by a close friend of mine...I've known his journey for many years and wow talk about forging a very rough path...yet he is attacked viciously on every post and has been in and out of being banned on IG...the majority of attacks come from young trans ppl...his post today had several rude but mild comments from young ppl in the "queer" community...I'm flabbergasted bc if someone like him, with his far reaching life experience, is accused of trans hate, yes the far left has lost the thread...i've been living out (as a bisexual) since the community was still called the "gay and lesbian community" and lesbians were angry about being second...I attended the Pride parade in SF the first year the bisexual community marched and it became the "LGB community"...I am NOT queer...the term queer was not used respectfully when I was younger and it was used as part of theory or art discussions in my time as an art student at SFAI...queer was a loaded term for use in spaces (those ivory towers) where we could dissect it...and even being bi, I received more than my share of eye rolls...but as you said in your post, we fucked who we wanted and transgression was explored as a response to conservative mores we wanted to show as hypocrisy...think Ron Athey or Karen Finley...now, maybe being "transgressive" means being ultra-conservative?...I enjoy reading and also posting comments in your space bc it's a pretty mellow and educated group here, who seem to mostly hail from Gen X (as do I) and rather than sitting around circle jerking about the "good ole days", you remind me that shit is really terrifying these days and we won nothing really...and we have to do something...I did say on the night Obama was first elected (while sitting in the Bluestocking Bookstore cafe) if Obama makes it out alive through his entire presidency, I would be shocked...and I read in his first month of office, he got 3x as many death threats as any other president before him...I knew shit was off the rails, but I didn't know how far off the rails...I am curious though, do you have any suggestions for us "elders" or just as thinking and feeling humans who find the GOP and it's plans for the future terrifying?
Freedom of speech is being suppressed by fear and loathing, which leads to reactionary politics. Politicians feed off of it, and journalists make their living from it. Truth lies in the eddies, soaking their feet, drinking a beer.
I came here from a link Andrew Sullivan posted on your most recent article and immediately subscribed. I then read this post and knew right away I would not regret it. This post says EVERYTHING I have been wanting to say about our current state of culture and politics, but couldn't find the right words to express it. I am your new #1 fan and can't wait for your next article.
It is significant how the creative cadre has been delegated the "liberal" duty of fulfilling any or all hope of a "great society" via narrowly- defined activist aesthetics. The free-range potential of artistic disinterest is increasingly impressed into the duty of being way too interested. Its visionary potential is therefore neutralized by being preoccupied with window dressing a larger house that progressive political ambition was/is supposed to get in order. At the same time the radical right wing has made an art form out of regressive argument, thereby appropriating disinterest ( in this case argument for argument's sake) in the guise of conservative progressivism. A so- called "deplorable" majority are the fastest growing art audience, in this regard. If art has ever had any "common" sense, that sense is currently being most effectively weaponized by the far right.
I'm going to try not to re-hash any old arguments here, but I just wish there could be a little distinction between the "post-marxist/Foucault/Identity politics" left and the "marxist/materialist/economic progress" left. The two overlap, but they aren't monolithic. I'm glad you mention social media as a big culprit though, because certainly people have been reading Foucault and Judith Butler for a long time now, and the mobilization of shame as a performative "political tool" is a pretty recent phenomenon... I've been told by readers of Robin DiAngelo that it's racist to even bring up class issues...
Also, I'd point to how comfortable mainstream politicians in the democratic party are with identity politics, and how allergic they are to economic redistribution. I don't feel like the "far left" (at least economically speaking) is the problem here.
Couple of weeks ago Andrew Sullivan wrote the essay below which may interest you alot. And this week he and Barri Weiss discuss trans questions vis a vis gays/lesbian. I think much about them will resonate.
(BTW, I find alot of trans/queer theory....which isn't the same as trans people...to be implicitly misogynist and homophobic. In fact trans ideology is alot like a new gay conversion therapy: in the past the homosexual mind was pushed to change to match the body, whereas today the body is encouraged to be changed to accord with the trans mind.)
"Who Is Looking Out For Gay Kids?
The risks of imposing critical gender theory on young children"
Ok, I love what you’re saying and disagree with most of what you’re saying. Need some time to think. Coming from a queer: what the hell is an allosexual
As with the most of my post-apocalyptic nightmares, most tribalism just paves the way for more shitbirds to put themselves in charge. This is a harrowing read!
I know Vonnegut said it first, but librarians and libraries are really the America that functions, and even those are censored, book bans, etc. and not just from the right. Schools have dropping texts all around. Pretty soon it will just be all palatable, feel good baby food learning. Numb numnumnum.
ooof that last sentence...a gut punch that forced out a big laugh...I'll start planning my post "Pocylypse" wardrobe...the shoes are critical...thank you for the thoughts and the laugh...
There's another element to the democrats upcoming demise, their routine inability to materially deliver on their promises. Obama was profoundly guilty of this: squandering a supermajority in the house and senate to pass a conservative health care plan that was a windfall for private insurance, appointing timothy geitner as treasury secretary; forgiving the banks, but foreclosing on homeowners. I really struggle with the near universal deification of Obama of pretty much every single liberal person I know and I would ask, why exactly did you love him so, beyond that he made you feel good? Our relationship to politicians as a sort of friend/boss/celebrity proxy is unhealthy and irrational. Every year with almost unanimous support the defense budget increases by hundreds of billions of dollars. The democrats are so far from even the most conservative actions on climate change as to make their "better" position almost irrelevant. Republicans are of course in the process of reversing Roe v Wade across the country, but I hold tremendous resentment to RBG for not retiring in 2014 and for Obama for not at least attempting to appoint a supreme court justice in recess and then daring McConnell to impeach them. We both hate the democrats, but for different reasons.
ugh...been waiting for your next installment bc it's been a minute...this one did not disappoint, BUT it did discourage me...and I am not sure what to do...as in a past comment I'd made, I'll reference the trans activist, Buck Angel again, who I follow on IG and love...and he is known as a loose friend by a close friend of mine...I've known his journey for many years and wow talk about forging a very rough path...yet he is attacked viciously on every post and has been in and out of being banned on IG...the majority of attacks come from young trans ppl...his post today had several rude but mild comments from young ppl in the "queer" community...I'm flabbergasted bc if someone like him, with his far reaching life experience, is accused of trans hate, yes the far left has lost the thread...i've been living out (as a bisexual) since the community was still called the "gay and lesbian community" and lesbians were angry about being second...I attended the Pride parade in SF the first year the bisexual community marched and it became the "LGB community"...I am NOT queer...the term queer was not used respectfully when I was younger and it was used as part of theory or art discussions in my time as an art student at SFAI...queer was a loaded term for use in spaces (those ivory towers) where we could dissect it...and even being bi, I received more than my share of eye rolls...but as you said in your post, we fucked who we wanted and transgression was explored as a response to conservative mores we wanted to show as hypocrisy...think Ron Athey or Karen Finley...now, maybe being "transgressive" means being ultra-conservative?...I enjoy reading and also posting comments in your space bc it's a pretty mellow and educated group here, who seem to mostly hail from Gen X (as do I) and rather than sitting around circle jerking about the "good ole days", you remind me that shit is really terrifying these days and we won nothing really...and we have to do something...I did say on the night Obama was first elected (while sitting in the Bluestocking Bookstore cafe) if Obama makes it out alive through his entire presidency, I would be shocked...and I read in his first month of office, he got 3x as many death threats as any other president before him...I knew shit was off the rails, but I didn't know how far off the rails...I am curious though, do you have any suggestions for us "elders" or just as thinking and feeling humans who find the GOP and it's plans for the future terrifying?
Freedom of speech is being suppressed by fear and loathing, which leads to reactionary politics. Politicians feed off of it, and journalists make their living from it. Truth lies in the eddies, soaking their feet, drinking a beer.
I came here from a link Andrew Sullivan posted on your most recent article and immediately subscribed. I then read this post and knew right away I would not regret it. This post says EVERYTHING I have been wanting to say about our current state of culture and politics, but couldn't find the right words to express it. I am your new #1 fan and can't wait for your next article.
It is significant how the creative cadre has been delegated the "liberal" duty of fulfilling any or all hope of a "great society" via narrowly- defined activist aesthetics. The free-range potential of artistic disinterest is increasingly impressed into the duty of being way too interested. Its visionary potential is therefore neutralized by being preoccupied with window dressing a larger house that progressive political ambition was/is supposed to get in order. At the same time the radical right wing has made an art form out of regressive argument, thereby appropriating disinterest ( in this case argument for argument's sake) in the guise of conservative progressivism. A so- called "deplorable" majority are the fastest growing art audience, in this regard. If art has ever had any "common" sense, that sense is currently being most effectively weaponized by the far right.
I'm going to try not to re-hash any old arguments here, but I just wish there could be a little distinction between the "post-marxist/Foucault/Identity politics" left and the "marxist/materialist/economic progress" left. The two overlap, but they aren't monolithic. I'm glad you mention social media as a big culprit though, because certainly people have been reading Foucault and Judith Butler for a long time now, and the mobilization of shame as a performative "political tool" is a pretty recent phenomenon... I've been told by readers of Robin DiAngelo that it's racist to even bring up class issues...
Also, I'd point to how comfortable mainstream politicians in the democratic party are with identity politics, and how allergic they are to economic redistribution. I don't feel like the "far left" (at least economically speaking) is the problem here.
Couple of weeks ago Andrew Sullivan wrote the essay below which may interest you alot. And this week he and Barri Weiss discuss trans questions vis a vis gays/lesbian. I think much about them will resonate.
(BTW, I find alot of trans/queer theory....which isn't the same as trans people...to be implicitly misogynist and homophobic. In fact trans ideology is alot like a new gay conversion therapy: in the past the homosexual mind was pushed to change to match the body, whereas today the body is encouraged to be changed to accord with the trans mind.)
"Who Is Looking Out For Gay Kids?
The risks of imposing critical gender theory on young children"
https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/who-is-looking-out-for-gay-kids
"Bari Weiss On Saving Liberalism From Right And Left
I chat with the MSM apostate about critical queer theory and the right-wing backlash."
https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/bari-weiss-on-saving-liberalism-from
Ok, I love what you’re saying and disagree with most of what you’re saying. Need some time to think. Coming from a queer: what the hell is an allosexual
As with the most of my post-apocalyptic nightmares, most tribalism just paves the way for more shitbirds to put themselves in charge. This is a harrowing read!
I know Vonnegut said it first, but librarians and libraries are really the America that functions, and even those are censored, book bans, etc. and not just from the right. Schools have dropping texts all around. Pretty soon it will just be all palatable, feel good baby food learning. Numb numnumnum.
ooof that last sentence...a gut punch that forced out a big laugh...I'll start planning my post "Pocylypse" wardrobe...the shoes are critical...thank you for the thoughts and the laugh...