Right is the new Left

[Anonymous No.6348323]

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/22/right-is-the-new-left/

I think this article raises some good points. With a society that's increasingly becoming leftist - isn't the only way to differentiate yourself from that society to become right? Isn't the left as dogmatic today as the right was in the 1950s? Instead of hunting communists, today it's the racists and the homophobes that get hunted. You won't get far in Academia if you're not on the political left.

Any thoughts on this? Picture not really related

[Anonymous No.6348354]

>>6348323
Can't read the article right now as my phone is a bitch, but I don't understand your questions OP. Is the point of being a leftist being non-dogmatic and different? Is hunting commies the same as hunting racists and homophobes? Granted, replacing the CURRENT "majority" (white, male, patriarchal, cis, etc.) in terms of thinking is what many leftis are trying to do, it is as retarded as saying "let's be racist against the racists".

[Anonymous No.6348366]

Get this shit back to /pol/

[Anonymous No.6348371]

>>6348323
crypto-reactionary bullshit
there is no pendulum, annoying, uptight academic types with sticks jammed up their ass have always been so, whether it be some faggot defending Marshall plan A and invading Vietnam, or this SJW bullshit, whitemans burden, obligation to patronize people who you think are less able than with fake sincerity

[Anonymous No.6348377]

>>6348354
Assume you’re a hip young intellectual in the 1950s. You see all these stodgy conservatives around you.You see Mrs. Grundy, chattering to her grundy friends about how scandalous it is that some people read books about sex, lecturing to the school board on how they had better enforce her values on the children or she will have some very harsh words to say to them.

And you think “Whatever else I am, I’m not going to be a mediocrity like Mrs. Grundy. I’m not going to conform.” Which, in the 1950s, meant you became a leftist, and talked about how stodgy society was fundamentally oppressive, and how you were going to value different things, and screw what Mrs. Grundy thought.

And gradually this became sufficiently hip that even the slightly less hip intellectuals caught on and started making fun of Mrs. Grundy, and then people even less hip than that, until it became a big pileup on poor Mrs. Grundy and anyone who wanted even the slightest claim to intellectual independence or personal integrity has to prove themselves by giving long dissertations on how terrible Mrs. Grundy is.

But when Mrs. Grundy herself joins the party, what then?

I mean, take that article on Dartmouth. A group of angry people, stopping just short of violence, invade a school building and make threats against the president unless he meets their demands. Every student must be forced to attend moral instruction classes inculcating their (the protesters’) values. Offensive terms must be removed from the library. And the school must take care to admit people of the right race. When was the last time you could hear a story like that and have it be even slightly probably that the mob was rightist?

It’s hard to argue that Mrs. Grundy is not a proud leftist by now, still chattering about how scandalous it is that people read books with the wrong values, still giving her terminally uncool speeches to the school board about how they had better enforce her values on the children (and if she can get the debate society on board as well, so much the better).

There must be overwhelming temptation among hip intellectuals to differentiate themselves from Mrs. Grundy by shifting rightward.

[Anonymous No.6348378]

>>6348354
It will never become edgy cool to be a reactionary like it was edgy cool to be a commie in the sixties. Reactionary kids only find themselves cool and the few other stunted boys like themselves, but there is no 'wow he's a neo-nazi' mystique that will allow for romantic posturing.

The cool kids nowadays keep an ironic distance from blatant ideology. Any sincerity will not be in the sense of becoming a serious monarchist again or something like that but more like really committing yourself to growing bell peppers on your balcony. We're the Candide generation, tending to our gardens and scoffing at the court.

[EvolaKid !vKJYJAzBlI No.6348382]

>>6348366
go back to reddit.

[Anonymous No.6348383]

it's kind of true, it's part of why Million Dollar Extreme appeals to me so much, they realize that the left is not as rebellious as they once thought they were and give them a much needed satirizing.

[Anonymous No.6348389]

>>6348371
In 1960, only a handful of low status people were arguing that “sodomy laws” should be repealed, and they were all insisting that c’mon, obviously it would never go as far as gay marriage, we’re just saying you shouldn’t be put in jail for it. Meanwhile, fifty years later people are enforcing a rule that if you’re not on board with gay marriage, you shouldn’t be allowed to hold a high-status job.

Of course, many leftist views, even leftist social views, don’t spiral out of control like this. Support for abortion and gun control have stayed pretty stable for decades, radical feminism seems to have leveled off, and aside from global warming environmentalism has kind of faded into the background. But it’s impossible to predict which ones are going to spiral – to a 1960s conservative homosexuality would have seemed just about the least likely thing to catch on.

So now every time I read an article about horrible conservatives – like that South Carolina mayor – I can dismiss it as a couple of people doing dumb things and probably the system will take care of it. If it doesn’t take care of it by punishing him personally, it’ll take care of it by making people like him obsolete and judged poorly by posterity.

But every time I read an article about horrible leftists – like the one with the debate club – part of me freaks out and thinks – in twenty years, those are the people who are going to be getting me fired for disagreeing with them.

And every time I want to talk about it, I freak out and worry that soon they’ll start firing people for disagreeing with the idea that you should be able to fire people for disagreeing with ideas. Like, this could go uncomfortably far.

[EvolaKid !vKJYJAzBlI No.6348395]

>>6348389
>radical feminism seems to have leveled off
uhh

[Anonymous No.6348398]

>>6348323
Yeah, I'm right wing now and supported communism for a while. What of it?

[Anonymous No.6348401]

>>6348389
difference being, the owner of Chick Fillet isn't thrown in a cage for having an opinion, while being thrown in a cage for anal sex was possible little more than a decade ago
and environmentalists were burning down hummer dealerships back then too

but it seems your only complaint is "I'll get fired for having an opinion," in which case, welcome to the workplace dipshit, you can get fired for any reason an employer feels like, so long as its not because your a part of some "protected class"

[Anonymous No.6348403]

>>6348377
the original Mrs. Grundy is called a fascist today by the leftist, without the opportunity to explain herself .

[Anonymous No.6348404]

>>6348354
'Hunting' anybody who disagrees with you and trying to get them fired is as bad as firing someone for being a communist.

[Anonymous No.6348407]

>people are this concerned with being hip and cool and doing the opposite of what's popular

I'm really starting to wonder if the majority of 4channers are all in high school

[Anonymous No.6348416]

I remember when this board was about literature.

Sage.

[Anonymous No.6348425]

>>6348416
cry more bitch nigga

[Anonymous No.6348428]

Why does everyone act as if people in the right side if the spectrum don't do this as much as people on the let?

[EvolaKid !vKJYJAzBlI No.6348429]

>>6348428
because they don't

[Anonymous No.6348433]

>>6348323
>a society that's increasingly becoming leftist

Where 'leftist' should be read as 'neo-liberal'. I don't mind the funny threads, but shit like this needs to fuck off back to /pol/.

[Anonymous No.6348434]

>>6348416
>articles aren't literature

hurr durr

>>6348428
see this comment >>6348377

[Anonymous No.6348436]

>>6348407
they are.

[Anonymous No.6348437]

>>6348436

But surely if they are, they must not know that EVERYONE is. Or the very inclination you allege would incline them not to be.

[Anonymous No.6348444]

>>6348323
>isn't the only way to differentiate yourself from that society to become right?
That's fucking retarded.

Politics aren't an accessory or a snazzy tattoo you get to stand out in a crowd.

Doing stupid shit just for the sake of being different makes you retarded.

[Anonymous No.6348482]

A better question is why people think all your views have to be left OR right wing like some kind of package deal.

[Anonymous No.6348486]

>>6348482
because everything else doesn't matter

[Anonymous No.6348515]

>>6348486
>what is third positionism

[Anonymous No.6348530]

>>6348515
>muh not left or right

[Anonymous No.6348531]

>>6348444
For many it's just a means of staying safe and unchallenged. Telling peers at your university that you don't agree with they're transgender shit, for example, would likely lead to be you ostracised.

[Anonymous No.6348542]

>>6348530
Centrism is the dominant political stance in most of the civilised world, so it's pretty important.

[Anonymous No.6348556]

>>6348542
no, everybody is on what was the left a century ago.

[Anonymous No.6348558]

>>6348531
>I dont agree that you think you are a woman
why is this opinion so important you needed to express it? what are you challenging here?

[Anonymous No.6348561]

>>6348556
The left a century ago was literally killing all the rich people and bombing police stations and such. Everyone is just lukewarm centrist today, where they don't really feel like going through the trouble of killing the rich but don't feel like it's very pleasant to make the poor starve either.

[Anonymous No.6348566]

>>6348378
>The cool kids nowadays keep an ironic distance from blatant ideology. Any sincerity will not be in the sense of becoming a serious monarchist again or something like that but more like really committing yourself to growing bell peppers on your balcony. We're the Candide generation, tending to our gardens and scoffing at the court.

This. Ideologies in general aren't cool now, even among those who aspire to political positions. I've even heard people describe themselves as "post-ideological", which seems to give them a nice uplifting smugness - they're above all that ideological rubbish and enlightened by their own lack of one. Or something.

Modern politicians seem to avoid making reference to any kind of political ideology, even if the policies they pursue are textbook socialism/conservatism/liberalism etc. To take an example from my own country's politics, at the SNP conference last November Alex Salmond made a reference to the #sexysocialism tag on Twitter - but he couldn't bring himself to use that word. He said "sexy social-democracy", because social-democracy implies this level of moderation which makes it less scary. But the fact that he was willing to say it at all is unusual, and it strikes me as one of the features that makes him a (relative) radical and a bit of a loose cannon. I can't imagine any other political figure in the UK namedropping an ideology, even those which have one in their party name (e.g. Conservatives).

[Anonymous No.6348572]

ITT: people circlejerking over meaningless and undefinable idealistic terms 'left' and 'right'

[Anonymous No.6348576]

>>6348389
You're a paranoid nancy boy.

[Anonymous No.6348580]

>>6348428
Because the online reactionary right is desperately trying to push a narrative that they are "hip" and "cool."

[Anonymous No.6348581]

>>6348558

(Not him, nor a reactionary) My read of the hard right's cant over the last 15 years or so is of a crystalisation of Hofstadter's observation that '[the paranoid] is always manning the barricades of civilisation'. The issues that really grind their gears, basically, are always spoken of as 'last straws' - really, there's at least a half-dozen 'last straws' in the mix at any one time.

The self-image implied is of begrudging, put-upon acceptance finally (FINALLY!) pushed too far etc. It's tempting to read that as indicative of the death-throes of that breed of intolerance (but I'm less optimistic).

So basically, if you want my opinion (despite not having asked for it), there really isn't any specific reason why that issue is "so" important. All that matters is that it IS an issue, and because it's an issue - well, it's the last straw. There's a parallel universe somewhere where transgenderism went mainstream before gay rights, and in that universe, repealing anti-sodomy laws (or whatever) is the last straw.

[Anonymous No.6348589]

>>6348572
>i personally am unfamiliar with the history of certain terms
>they are therefore meaningless and undefinable

I don't think that dog's gonna hunt, bud. Everyone else ITT seems to know what they mean.

[Anonymous No.6348592]

>>6348531
I get the feeling that you don't actually talk to people. I live in THE SCARY LIBERAL GHETTO of NYC, and I talk about things like this with people. I'm generally a social democrat (not party-wise), but there are inevitably some things I'm not always in agreement on with these SCARY FASCIST LEFTISTS, like gun control.

The truth of the matter is, I will disagree with people on things, and they with me, but I've never been ostracized for an opinion.

[Anonymous No.6348606]

>>6348592

But Anon - I've read otherwise in op-ed pieces published by online tabloids. Are you suggesting they are sometimes less than accurate?

[Anonymous No.6348626]

>>6348580
>would you like me to direct you to video clips of of anyone whos running for a political office

[Anonymous No.6348631]

>>6348626
Would you like me to teach you in which situations it is appropriate to greentext?

[Anonymous No.6348637]

>>6348407
Why do you think there's so much religious stuff on here?

[Anonymous No.6348648]

>>6348323
people arent leftist just to be edgy
there are plenty of "edgy" right wingers

[Anonymous No.6348673]

How comes you haven't been banned for posting your own click bait?

[Anonymous No.6348679]

>>6348383
Strangely enough the post-takedown stuff has been rather apolitical

[Anonymous No.6348692]

The sad part is, I dont think that either position holds any weight anymore when you are seeing it applied. The gritty differences are becoming either too murky and undefinable or too extreme to ever be a part of global politics beyond simply being loud.
Populist fads will wave back and forth as they always have, but the distance they are bouncing is becoming less and less as political ideology (or lack thereof) becomes more global.

[Anonymous No.6348702]

>>6348482
The irony of this statement is that such a cleavage doesn't even exist anymore; both sides actually tend to merge into a neo-liberal capitalist society. The right handles its economic agenda without too much supporting activities that can't convert Americans into consumers (exempli gratia, the corruption of faith into a business-like church, with strong devaluation of anti-capitalistic thoughts, like the condemnation of wealth and usury) while the left pushes mass-immigration, self-disenthralment or sexual liberation (which is good for the business; more materialistic consumers, less decently-paid workers), plus economic views advantaging capitalism, meanwhile staying quite on actually useful and historically leftist measures (the tax reform B. Obama never did nor will never do, taxing financial transaction, ruling against trusts or re-nationalizing vital sectors). Both parties are slowly giving up the core of their respective ideologies, and Americans keep voting against the current president without realizing that politics never change.

[Anonymous No.6348715]

>>6348323
>Any thoughts on this?
Both the PODEMOS and SYRIZA leaders have been studenfs of the leftists Schmittdians.

[Anonymous No.6348729]

There's no conspiracy lads, decadence is just winning because it's fun.

[Anonymous No.6348730]

>>6348389
>In 1960, only a handful of low status people were arguing that “sodomy laws” should be repealed, and they were all insisting that c’mon, obviously it would never go as far as gay marriage, we’re just saying you shouldn’t be put in jail for it. Meanwhile, fifty years later people are enforcing a rule that if you’re not on board with gay marriage, you shouldn’t be allowed to hold a high-status job.

I despise the structure of that sentence. "Meanwhile, fifty years later" is the most retarded opening to a sentence I've ever heard.

[Anonymous No.6348745]

>>6348730
>I despise the structure of that sentence.

Which sentence?

>"Meanwhile, fifty years later" is the most retarded opening to a sentence I've ever heard.

Oh, that sentence. You didn't hear it, btw - you read it.

[Anonymous No.6348763]

>>6348745
Haha, you clever bastard, that's wrong. Poor eyesight; My brother narrates posts for me. Idiot.

[Anonymous No.6348793]

>>6348763
Tell your brother I concede his point and snicker inwardly in the knowledge that I actually don't. Our secret.

[Anonymous No.6348813]

>>6348323
>X is the new Y
Only if the meaning of X and Y is simply "to be contrarian", which it clearly isn't. Simply being contrarian is desperately expressing one's alienation that they do not understand. This is the essence of reactionary politic, which is a Rightist phenomenon. (Yes, child, Identity Politic is not a leftist but a rightist position.)

[Anonymous No.6348816]

>>6348763
ask him to post ferg.jpg from your frog and feels folder.

[Anonymous No.6348822]

>>6348763
>Poor eyesight; My brother narrates posts for me. Idiot.
>le epic frog repost

[Anonymous No.6348828]

>>6348822
Stop being such a useless cynical retard all of your worthless life

[Anonymous No.6348834]

>>6348592
And in other places people have been accused of being privileged violent shitlord racists for asking for a DEBATE on the subject.

[Anonymous No.6348888]

>>6348395
Butter plz.

[Anonymous No.6348899]

>>6348813
>Yes, child, Identity Politic is not a leftist but a rightist position.
lmao

[Anonymous No.6348900]

>>6348395
>greer
>sex-negative

[Anonymous No.6348908]

>>6348395

As long as there are rich or upper middle class woman there will always be feminism.

[Anonymous No.6348920]

>>6348378
What you may not realize is mass disengagement from the body politic is exactly what actual reactionaries (not 'neo-nazis') desire.

[Anonymous No.6348932]

>>6348323
>With a society that's increasingly becoming leftist
the fuck are you smoking
>isn't the only way to differentiate yourself from that society to become right?
How about you drop the archaic illusory distinction and focus on the particulars? No one gives a shit about your ideologies.

[Anonymous No.6348993]

>>6348932
Where the hell do you live that is becoming more right wing?

[Anonymous No.6349008]

>>6348993
The West is clearly moving to the right as nations are losing their political power.

[Anonymous No.6349012]

>>6348993

The left is, broadly speaking, winning on social issues. Economics still belongs to the neoliberals. The post-crash austerity craze showed us what was what in terms of social policy, money-wise, though.

>sure, let the fudgepackers have their own fruity little weddings, who gives a shit. watch our pronouns? fine, fuck it. btw we're cutting jobseeker's and disability payments again and putting a tax on spare bedrooms etc but YAY GAY MARRIAGE AMIRITE HUZZAH