It’s not about either or, it’s about how you maximise the general happiness of all. A lot of the hatred that is generated by the so called culture wars has its roots in the ever increasing precarious-isation of working people’s lives, and by that I also include the relatively well off managerial class. The greater the level of insecurity across society the more space there is for othering and blaming the other for your individual and community’s degradation.

Weak labour laws, low pay, abusive employers, poor housing and lowing standards of living are a massive contributor to the increase in racism, sexism and the othering of sexual minorities.

You can do trans rights and increase the minimum wage to a livability level. No human in a modern economy should work a 40 hour week and wonder how they’ll feed their kids or pay the rent or even more utterly evil, in the US get access to medical treatment. And if we include trans people in this as the example, look at their social and health (especially mental) indicators, they’re shocking. You don’t fix that with gender neutral bathrooms.

The base level of economic security in a society directly impacts the lives of minorities, much more than any other group.

The raw horror of modern politics is that the electable centre left have completely given up on any kind of transformative project. They are as guilty as the clowns like Taylor Green in the destruction of our planet, racism and the constant grind sexual minorities are increasingly experiencing after decades of acceptance and increasingly equal rights.

If the left only deal with “culture war” issues generated by the right it distracts and increases the general precariousness resulting in a doom loop.

My native New Zealand is a classic example. Our Labour Party had a once in a generation mandate the election before last. A complete majority in a proportional system. It was completely unheard of in modern politics. What did Ardern do with it? Nothing, absolutely fucking nothing. She’s as guilty as any conservative politician in NZ’s ever increasing poverty and inequality. IMO she is the worst Prime Minister in New Zealand history for her utter Centrist Dad politics that did nothing other than change the tone. Why even vote Labour? I won’t be again.

Gramsci wrote: Sat Dec 02, 2023 3:53 pm My native New Zealand is a classic example. Our Labour Party had a once in a generation mandate the election before last. A complete majority in a proportional system. It was completely unheard of in modern politics. What did Ardern do with it? Nothing, absolutely fucking nothing. She’s as guilty as any conservative politician in NZ’s ever increasing poverty and inequality. IMO she is the worst Prime Minister in New Zealand history for her utter Centrist Dad politics that did nothing other than change the tone. Why even vote Labour? I won’t be again.

This specifically reminds me of my post-Obama hangover. The transformative leader that didn't get around to transforming things.

You made some excellent points and I appreciate your clarifying. I think there's a strong argument that performative ally-ship is a problem when it's a cover for a lack of action on drastically needed fronts.

and here's my silly ass thinking we've all evolved past class reductionism

You only have to look at the enormous list of laws being repealed by the atrocity of a new government to give lie to the accusation that Labour did nothing. Labour gave workers the right to collective pay bargaining, which is a huge deal. Too bad it never stuck around long enough to take effect. Well, that's all gone now. They passed the world-leading smokefree legislation, all on the fire now too. Again, destroyed before it could do any good. Resource management and environmental law reform, all on the fire as well, same thing. Tried to build light rail and social housing, couldn't magically make it happen overnight, all gone. Created the Maori Health Authority to try to address health disparities among Maori, yep, all gone now too.

The new government's entire 100 day action plan is basically trashing everything the last government managed to achieve. And they call that "getting things done". Look, we can smash things a hundred times faster than you build them, losers! Because we're EFFICIENT.

So what difference would it have made for them to pass even more progressive legislation if the end result is just a bigger bonfire? As soon as they went after tobacco companies or property speculators or the supermarket duopoly, the business lobby poured millions of dollars into destroying Labour. The Labour government was demonised by the right wing the entire time they were in government. All of a sudden it was like the country was full of Trump supporters. Then they had to fight an election while being outfunded ten to one. The fucking ACT party got more donations in one day than Labour had to fight the whole election. One single rich cunt gave more money to ACT than the Maori Party's entire budget.

So now what do we get? A new generation of smokers to pay for a multibillion dollar BACKDATED tax giveaway to the property speculators who bought the last election. A government that wants to go to war against the Maori language and dog-whistle to white supremacists. A deputy prime minister who from day one has been spreading Trump-style lies, attacking the media and accusing journalists of taking bribes.

Why just the other week he was spreading the total lie that the most hated woman in New Zealand, former PM Jacinda Ardern, had prior knowledge of the Christchurch terror attack. Oh yeah, they're also going to undo all the gun laws passed in the aftermath of that and bring back AR-15s.

But by all means go ahead and say Labour are just as bad. That is what the far right wants those fickle swing voters to believe.

And yeah, Labour were accused of doing endless consultations and studies instead of passing laws. Because they took their time, got a range of expert opinions, consulted with the public like a democratic government ought to, and tried to write thoughtful legislation that took all sides into account - they are a centre-left party after all, not a radical left party, and they wanted to get the mainstream on board rather than just railroading through unpopular changes. Ha! I mean hell, look at the vitriol that was thrown at them when they tried to reform water infrastructure.

And the new goverment goes, hey fuck all that, all your carefully-considered legislation is all straight in the bin, we're just going to do what we want to do and don't give a fuck about the consequences, so we can pass all our destructive, shit laws in no time. We told you water reform was evil, so we got rid of it! So now we're going to do nothing and ignore the problem again, and everyone can have unsafe drinking water and flooding. Decisive!

Gramsci wrote: Sat Dec 02, 2023 3:53 pmIf the left only deal with “culture war” issues generated by the right it distracts and increases the general precariousness resulting in a doom loop.

What I was objecting to in your original post is that you said "this affects 0.5% of the population". First of all the numerical proportion of the population in total is entirely irrelevant. We're not having a vote on the validity of some individuals, no matter how few their proportional number. In this case also it's not just a minority in number, but people of a specific group facing specific challenges in society. Any movement calling itself democratic makes sure that individuals falling into such groups are still being heard, and their specific concerns taken into account.

Moreover, trans people are not just an abstract concern of the Left, trans people (some of them) are the Left. So any appeal of the type "the Left should..." includes the voices of trans people too. Anyone insofar as we count ourselves on the Left, when we say "the Left should..." we are referring to things directly concerning our own lives. Naturally the specifics of these concerns will vary depending on who we are, at the same time as these concerns can expand or find commonality with others.

Reading this later post, we seem to agree on all of this. But then the question is, if your political vision includes trans people as an essential and obvious part - why talk about priorities?

If your problem is a lack of will or vision on the parliamentary left, I completely agree. But is this lack a consequence of prioritizing certain questions over others, e.g. trans rights over labour rights? Hardly. Even if this was the case, given the haplessness of these parties, given their timidity, their non-content, them being consistently reactive and lagging-behind - would these priorities even matter?

In your earlier post there are separate things being talked about, but not clearly marked out as such. If you call Dave Chappelle meeting with a bunch of RWers a frivolous story I might agree. But then you mention gender-neutral bathrooms as something falling under the same heading, which I can't agree with at all. Not that it's at all a comparable issue, nor that it's a "culture war topic", if by that we mean a frivolous and ephemeral news media item with the capacity to draw disproportionate attention to itself (although in that case I wonder why the "culture war" needs to get as much attention as something to avoid in the first place). Gender-neutral bathrooms are pretty concrete and pretty significant for the everyday well-being of trans people. I know of no one on the Left who has ever suggested that gender-neutral bathrooms, by themselves, would "fix" the situation of trans people, just like I know of no one on the Left who has suggested centering questions concerning trans people or gender at the expense of questions concerning labour rights, etc.

So while people on the hard left are saying Labour didn't go anywhere near far enough (personally, I am to the left of Labour so I vote a Greens/Labour split ticket these days), the centrist voters who decide elections are all saying tsk tsk, Labour tried to be too radical that's the trouble. They didn't get the messaging right. They spooked the middle class white voters (like my mum who came to believe - actual quote - "the Maoris are taking over!")

So now here we are, a new Speak-English-Or-Die government with a mandate to purge the Maori language from its home country, just like they will drive more of our native species to extinction.

This was New Zealand's but-her-emails election.

Anthony Flack wrote: Sat Dec 02, 2023 8:05 pm So while people on the hard left are saying Labour didn't go anywhere near far enough (personally, I am to the left of Labour so I vote a Greens/Labour split ticket these days), the centrist voters who decide elections are all saying tsk tsk, Labour tried to be too radical that's the trouble. They didn't get the messaging right. They spooked the middle class white voters (like my mum who came to believe - actual quote - "the Maoris are taking over!")

So now here we are, a new Speak-English-Or-Die government with a mandate to purge the Maori language from its home country, just like they will drive more of our native species to extinction.

This was New Zealand's but-her-emails election.

I’m happy to get owned on this. I observe from a distance and don’t get the detailed picture of NZ from London.

I can relate to your comment about your mum. Mine is the same despite having Māori grandchildren. To me New Zealand seems broken, possibly beyond repair due in crazy levels of polarisation and inequality.

I think my frustration with Ardern was “vibes vs actions”. It’s all very well telling people to be kind, and make child poverty your guiding principle but you achieve that with macroeconomic changes. Everything you mention can be put into a package of policies that are very hard to undo if there’s big structural changes put in place that improves a lot of people’s daily lives.

NZ’s ludicrous three year parliaments need to be five. Generally you get three National then two Labour in a cycle. Meaning effectively eight years of National, five of labour. Five year terms might swing that more evenly.

But my bigger concern is have ACT and bloody Winston Peters in government. It’s embarrassing. The smoke free legislation was dumped as a part of their coalition requirements. Both Peters and Seymour especially are complete wackjobs.

losthighway wrote: Sat Dec 02, 2023 4:40 pm
You made some excellent points and I appreciate your clarifying. I think there's a strong argument that performative ally-ship is a problem when it's a cover for a lack of action on drastically needed fronts.

This is exactly my point. That the electoral left are the problem. I’m not talking about the amorphous left of voters, activists or just folks with opinions.

The Dems in particular seem to have taken on the roll of gatekeepers of acceptable progress and that does not include any macroeconomic change that would have the greatest impact on the very minority groups they claim to be the champions of.

This isn’t about Bill Maher’s dumbass comments. It’s factually correct to say that minority groups are the biggest beneficiaries of economic policies that de-precariousness-ise the lives of working people. At the same time this improves the lives of the people politicians use othering to drive wedges between folks that are class allies.

It’s not either or, but if you want to improve the lives of minorities you cannot do that without dealing with the underlying economic conditions of most people.

The problem here is this is really hard.

I notice now my earlier post looks a little weird 'cause I was writing it as the convo went on. It's kind of blunt as a reply to something already gone over earlier. Didn't mean it like that.

If you don't mind (Gramsci), what are some more specific ways in which you think attention is spent on what you consider distracting things, in such a way that it gives undue importance to relatively unimportant things, or shifts attention away from where it is needed?