This definitely deserves its own thread.
Although what do you mean by perception problem?
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What's the difference between liberal and left / liberalism and leftism if there are any?
- Thread starter Iloelemen
- Start date
This definitely deserves its own thread.
Although what do you mean by perception problem?
There are always people like this on the left, from both liberals and the left. On the left there are those who view social justice through a class lens, thinking once the class are fixed social issues like racism will be fixed in the aftermath. What's amusing is that through events like primaries elections, and the aftermath, I've noticed patterns which correlate between both occasionally and come up with similar flawed conclusions. For example, leaning to the right to get the white vote. This sentiment appeared in both camps after Hillary lost. Despite being so different the two are more similar in how they approach things than they realise.
White people don't think black people have it "that bad" on average because the black people they interact with are their coworkers who are in a similar class to them. So when they hear stuff like "reparations" they think "but they're doing fine!"
Sure they are, the reason why many liberals choose incrementalism isn't because they love the system so much or capitalism it's that that's the only method to get results. Economic justice only happens when a group has control of the government, and that's something liberals are very good at doing while the left typically works outside the government. Leftism never fully recovered when the government crushed them in the 20's when they were avid participants in the government for being against joining WW1.
I'm specifying the public's perception being detached from reality.
The wealth gap itself is obviously a problem in and of itself, but the perception issue ends up making it even more difficult to address it because so many people think things are close to fine. (This is a factor that affects many more people than the ones with direct racial animus.)
Always nice to have data and stats
I hear the opposite. A lot of white people when you tell them about the struggles of black communities and such would just default to "but they don't work hard enough" or something like that. You can look at debates surrounding affirmative action to see how this plays out. people generally subscribe hardcore to the idea of American meritocracy and if you fail in this country it's your own fault. I've notice this from liberal identifying people too despite them being socially progressive.
Basically what I said to sphaghum applies here. The American meritocracy myth is a big factor in all this.
It's not the only method, especially when these small gains can be easily erased.
Debatable
When you think of how they'll see, say, their deadbeat idiot stoner brother failing at life despite being a top 10% school district, you can see how this perspective is easy to get fall into. It goes back to people not understanding just how stark the basline disparities are.
I think this is also true but it wouldn't surprise me for both reasons to coexist in a given individual's mind.
It does have flaws, but something is better than nothing. They would have done more but they were handcuffed by the system and when the GOP got congress in his grip. Wth Obama too many people thought he could change Washington over night, so when he wasn't able to they stopped believing in him entirely, so congress fell into Republican hands. Had a leftist been elected under those conditions the same would have happened to them.
What other methods do you propose?
They are able to do more than the Left has at this juncture. The Leftist movement has never been able to execute their plans on that scale to begin with.
Free-Market capitalistm/Free trade does not mean Lassez-Faire ideology. Stuff like reducing international tarrifs is uncontroversial mainsteam thinking.
Adult steps instead of baby ones. For leftists and even some liberals, the increments are just compromised positions that end up getting compromised further during negotiations. We're fine with compromises, but we'll keep agitating for more.
I don't disagree with you there. The leftist movement right now is not that big, but we're working on it.
If you're unable to get past baby steps adult steps is not happening. Negotiation is unavoidable in politics, that's why plans which are built on incrementalism are more common than big sweeping bills. The problem isn't asking for more per se, it's being able to convince the people opposing you that they will sign on to your bill. If politicians aren't willing to sign on to small ideas, big ideas are DOA.
Hopefully it works. The movement still needs to improve on a lot of things, like producing wonks and getting people out of the activist mind set. It's fine to do that when it's about activism, but that thought process is hurting your movement in the political sphere. There needs to be significant skills transfer to make a difference in congress.
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In that Laissez-Faire is more extreme? To use your example, rather than reducing international tariffs, if I understand correctly, Laissez-Faire ideology would say to eliminate them altogether.
Correct. It's a dumbass extreme idealogue version of them.
Anti-dumping protections so that developing countries can actually develop an internal economy are an example of where economists would back trade protectionism, for example.
