What can the Democrats do?

[Lexicus]

@Lexicus this is why I think its more useful to focus on the more recent, more familiar roots of MAGA,

I don't entirely disagree with this but I think Ta-Nehisi Coates was right when he said we need to understand what we're up against.

 

[stfoskey12]

The emphasis should be on preventing crime before it happens. Law enforcement is largely after-the-fact reaction to crime, whereas addressing economic issues like housing prevents it in the first place. So the line of attack is "Why wait for crime to happen to address it like Republicans, when we'll prevent it to begin with?" Of course, like you mentioned, it would require establishment Democrats to actually support progressive policy instead of of the same old triangulation of the Clinton-Obama era that obviously doesn't work in the age of populism.

I do think something along those lines could work. That is where someone like Mamdani seems like he has good ideas, because he's not trying to get rid of the police, but instead have a more comprehensive strategy for crime prevention.

Versions of this take have been brought up often in national political commentary lately and a lot of the time, its a another way/euphemism of saying Democrats should dump the advocacy of lgbtq issues, trans in particular, along with ceasing the confrontation of racism, sexism racial discrimination and similar.

I don't think they should dump it, just not make it their key focus. When discussed, I think Democrats should focus heavily on issues such as nondiscrimination, as affirmative action-type programs are often unpopular or seen as unfair. As an adjacent issue, I think there's a challenge in that a lot of people don't know many or any trans people, so their beliefs can be shaped by whatever right-wing media says about transgender individuals. I think maybe the best thing for Democrats to do when it comes to trans people is talk about them as normal everyday Americans trying to make it in the world, who just happen to be transgender. Republicans sometimes try to demonize LGBT people as sex-crazed freaks, so doing what you can to show they're just normal people is probably best.

 

[Zardnaar]

Versions of this take have been brought up often in national political commentary lately and a lot of the time, its a another way/euphemism of saying Democrats should dump the advocacy of lgbtq issues, trans in particular, along with ceasing the confrontation of racism, sexism racial discrimination and similar.

It pigeonholes people.

Theres only so much oxygen and politely capital to burn.

If you're emphasizing helping minorities vs majority in a democratic system that's a big flaw if you want their vote.

Emphasizing helping everyone economically eg the poor but framed as majority not the rich works better.

The biggest social problem everywhere is wealth divide and being poor. The poor are on the wrong side of every negative social metric.

You're also preaching to the converted with minorities, lgbtq etc. They already support you in over whelming numbers.

In my life time I've seen the welfare state get ground down. Economic woes breeds resentment and extremism. If everyone's more or less comfortable even if poor they can care more about abstract ideas.

 

[Akka]

The problem is that if you're gonna say "it's ultimately racist to favor native born Americans over those who happen to be born elsewhere"...(which it can be argued well it is)...may find difficulties capturing those

Or the problem is maybe even more fundamental, in that saying this is completely mental (because taking care of your own citizen is the very raison d'être of a society) and illustrate the unhinged disconnect of said "elites" from not just their base, but reality itself, and their obsession-fetichism with a performative ideology. Which might explain the rejection.

 

[Ordnael]

Or the problem is maybe even more fundamental, in that saying this is completely mental (because taking care of your own citizen is the very raison d'être of a society) and illustrate the unhinged disconnect of said "elites" from not just their base, but reality itself, and their obsession-fetichism with a performative ideology. Which might explain the rejection.

So much this! Thank you!
This ridiculous virtue signalling obsession from ruling elites and elected mps!
Just like the recent wave of recognising the Palestinian state..for what? Will that feed the starving people there?

 

[EnglishEdward]

So much this! Thank you!
This ridiculous virtue signalling obsession from ruling elites and elected mps!
Just like the recent wave of recognising the Palestinian state..for what? Will that feed the starving people there?

If one recognises a state, exchange of ambassadors normally follows.

And wearing my union jack, I ask

Who will be the Palestinian ambassador to the UK ?

Presumably

Husam Zomlot - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

And who will be the UK ambassador to Palestine, and where would the UK embassy be ?

 

[Akka]

Just like the recent wave of recognising the Palestinian state..for what? Will that feed the starving people there?

Recognizing the Palestinian state is not insane, though - you can agree or disagree, you can think it'll be useless or useful, but it doesn't contradict any fundamentals.
Trying to pretend that it's shameful that a society cares for its own members above non-members, on the other hand, IS insane.
Dealing with disagreements is manageable. Dealing with insanity isn't.

 

[Ordnael]

Recognizing the Palestinian state is not insane, though - you can agree or disagree, you can think it'll be useless or useful, but it doesn't contradict any fundamentals.

Sure. But now!? Only when Israel is about to wipe the place! Why not a year ago?

 

[Lexicus]

Or the problem is maybe even more fundamental, in that saying this is completely mental (because taking care of your own citizen is the very raison d'être of a society) and illustrate the unhinged disconnect of said "elites" from not just their base, but reality itself, and their obsession-fetichism with a performative ideology. Which might explain the rejection.

Given that "society" has existed far longer than the concept of citizenship how can this be true? This is just a circular argument.

 

[GoodEnoughForMe]

Classic members of society moment (UN members)

 

[Gori the Grey]

I mean, maybe you're caring for your future members. If you allowed immigrants citizenship (when a nation does), they would (do) become that.

It's a little shy of "insane," is all I'm saying. There's a way of conceiving of the issue that makes that care make sense.

 

[danjuno]

It pigeonholes people.

Theres only so much oxygen and politely capital to burn.

If you're emphasizing helping minorities vs majority in a democratic system that's a big flaw if you want their vote.

Emphasizing helping everyone economically eg the poor but framed as majority not the rich works better.

The biggest social problem everywhere is wealth divide and being poor. The poor are on the wrong side of every negative social metric.

You're also preaching to the converted with minorities, lgbtq etc. They already support you in over whelming numbers.

In my life time I've seen the welfare state get ground down. Economic woes breeds resentment and extremism. If everyone's more or less comfortable even if poor they can care more about abstract ideas.

You can have more than one thing in your platform at a time, the real problem is controlling the flow of the conversation. Republicans attack minorities as part of the Culture War strategy, so instead of just triangulating (dead letter in the populist age), you criticize them for distracting from bread and butter issues.

 

[Birdjaguar]

its a another way/euphemism of saying Democrats should dump the advocacy of lgbtq issues, trans in particular, along with ceasing the confrontation of racism, sexism racial discrimination and similar.

Oh...become Republicans who bend over.

 

[Lexicus]

I mean, maybe you're caring for your future members. If you allowed immigrants citizenship (when a nation does), they would (do) become that.

It's a little shy of "insane," is all I'm saying. There's a way of conceiving of the issue that makes that care make sense.

In the real world, societies which erect barriers to entry tend to lose, and societies that embrace diversity so they can be bigger tend to win. It is really that simple. Two of the most extreme examples of this are Sparta and Rome. Sparta was a monarchy in which a class comprising about 10% of the whole society (this is a generous estimate, especially for Sparta's later history) were the only "citizens" (full members of the polity - this class was called the Spartiates). The Spartiates basically didn't let anyone else become a Spartiate, and there were strict wealth requirements which if you failed to meet, you were kicked out. This meant that there was a consistent "trickleout" of Spartiates as they died in battle or met with enough misfortune to fall below the wealth line, and no "new blood" to replenish the ranks. Sparta ends up defeated utterly by its Greek rivals and by the time Rome established hegemony over the area Sparta was little more than a backwater tourist attraction.

Rome, by contrast, was formed from ethnically abd linguistically diverse people from its very beginnings. Its polity readily absorbed new peoples and cultures. This continued for centuries, Rome conquered much of the world as it was known to the Romans, and arguably the western empire eventually fell in large part because the culture became too insular, too unwilling to admit those who were looked down on as barbarians.

The claim that the purpose of society is to take care of members of your in-group is a circular claim because it assumes that other people joining your polity is bad, something to be guarded against, and not a benefit to your "citizens", whoever they are. The situation in the West today is objectively that immigration is necessary just to sustain the economy, literally to take care of aging native populations. This is simply objective fact. It is only racism that leads someone to believe that the addition of new people to a society can harm that society.

The diversity of Rome is not some academic footnote, either. It was the willingness of the Romans to incorporate the Italian communities first as "allies" and then later as Roman citizens which gave Rome the massive manpower and resource base that it used to conquer the Mediterranean world. Sparta was probably the purest example of a society designed to benefit its own "citizens" at the expense of everyone else (including the ~90% of Spartan population that was enslaved or otherwise not free). Rome was one of the most diverse societies in human history, to the point that Roman ethnicity is an essentially nonsensical concept and "Roman" can really only be defined through the Roman legal concept of citizenship.

The relevance of this to the US is obvious. The US has also been an ethnically diverse society from its very beginnings, more willing than most other societies to accept new people. The rise of the US was driven largely by immigration, and it's hardly a coincidence that it is being destroyed now by a pack of criminals who got elected by lyingly demonizing immigrants.

 

[Gori the Grey]

The Capitoline Hill had a special section (The Asylum) where people could . . . claim . . . asylum.

The sad part about hardline anti-immigrant stances, for me, is that they cast human beings as fundamentally a liability, rather than fundamentally an asset. Humans come with all sorts of problems, but I still think that on the whole, they're more an asset than a liability.

 

[Lexicus]

The Capitoline Hill had a special section (The Asylum) where people could . . . claim . . . asylum.

The sad part about this, for me, is that it casts human beings as fundamentally a liability, rather than fundamentally an asset. Humans come with all sorts of problems, but I still think that on the whole, they're more an asset than a liability.

From here:

Collections: The Queen’s Latin or Who Were the Romans? Part I: Beginnings and Legends

Who were the Romans? How did they understand themselves as a people and ‘Roman’ as an identity? And what were the implications of that understanding – and perhaps more importantly…

acoup.blog

 

[PhroX]

When I saw your previous post, my immediate reaction was "someone reads ACOUP", and sure enough....

 

[Voidwalkin]

It should be noted that the Roman idea of inclusion was often insanely violent, rather than glossing over it, btw, and resulted in second and third class, well, tributaries for hundreds of years, complete with social strife and predictably civil wars galore over the issue.

 

[Zardnaar]

In the real world, societies which erect barriers to entry tend to lose, and societies that embrace diversity so they can be bigger tend to win. It is really that simple. Two of the most extreme examples of this are Sparta and Rome. Sparta was a monarchy in which a class comprising about 10% of the whole society (this is a generous estimate, especially for Sparta's later history) were the only "citizens" (full members of the polity - this class was called the Spartiates). The Spartiates basically didn't let anyone else become a Spartiate, and there were strict wealth requirements which if you failed to meet, you were kicked out. This meant that there was a consistent "trickleout" of Spartiates as they died in battle or met with enough misfortune to fall below the wealth line, and no "new blood" to replenish the ranks. Sparta ends up defeated utterly by its Greek rivals and by the time Rome established hegemony over the area Sparta was little more than a backwater tourist attraction.

Rome, by contrast, was formed from ethnically abd linguistically diverse people from its very beginnings. Its polity readily absorbed new peoples and cultures. This continued for centuries, Rome conquered much of the world as it was known to the Romans, and arguably the western empire eventually fell in large part because the culture became too insular, too unwilling to admit those who were looked down on as barbarians.

The claim that the purpose of society is to take care of members of your in-group is a circular claim because it assumes that other people joining your polity is bad, something to be guarded against, and not a benefit to your "citizens", whoever they are. The situation in the West today is objectively that immigration is necessary just to sustain the economy, literally to take care of aging native populations. This is simply objective fact. It is only racism that leads someone to believe that the addition of new people to a society can harm that society.

The diversity of Rome is not some academic footnote, either. It was the willingness of the Romans to incorporate the Italian communities first as "allies" and then later as Roman citizens which gave Rome the massive manpower and resource base that it used to conquer the Mediterranean world. Sparta was probably the purest example of a society designed to benefit its own "citizens" at the expense of everyone else (including the ~90% of Spartan population that was enslaved or otherwise not free). Rome was one of the most diverse societies in human history, to the point that Roman ethnicity is an essentially nonsensical concept and "Roman" can really only be defined through the Roman legal concept of citizenship.

The relevance of this to the US is obvious. The US has also been an ethnically diverse society from its very beginnings, more willing than most other societies to accept new people. The rise of the US was driven largely by immigration, and it's hardly a coincidence that it is being destroyed now by a pack of criminals who got elected by lyingly demonizing immigrants.

Theres a difference between insane migration rates and a sane one.

High immigration countries coukd just reduce visas by 50% and that brings them roughly in line with current USA rates.

Alotvof the infrastructure was built to accommodate vastly lower people. That depends on exactly where you live.

It pumps the economic numbers short term but puts pressure on that infrastructure or number of kids per class room things lije that.

High immigration countries coukd cit even deeper than 50% short term to reduce pressure on housing for exampke. 5-10 years.


No one's sat down (politically) and said we need XYZ immigrants to keep population stable (2.1 kids per women). Nor we need XYZ to pay for pensions etc.

That's why people are are getting salty even in more liberal nations than USA. Housing in USA is comparatively cheap.

American friends wanting to flee USA to come here. Sire pay50% more for house take 30% pay cut.

That's how bad it is here post bubble popping. Emigration is up prices are down compkete mystery. Australia and Canada are even worse.

Right wings made it racist and wont solve crap. But there's legitimate concern around prices and infrastructure. Espicially since voters are not voting for more taxes to upgrade water, universities, schools etc or build more of them. Or social housing.

Worlds mostly conservative as well so in places where the local population is 40% foreign born they tend to vote right wing as well.

Im America they exploit illegals. So labour conditions are worse, people don't want to pay more for food to pay higher wages. Or do the work themselves or live where you need to do said work.

Average Democrat (and leftists in general) have no idea what's required in red/rural states/areas.

 

[danjuno]

Average Democrat (and leftists in general) have no idea what's required in red/rural states/areas.

Oh. My. God. The irony is palpable. Imagine telling someone in a different hemisphere you know more about what their state/county/city needs than they do.

Clearly, we need more whining about immigration instead of actually addressing the economic issues that affect us regardless of how many immigrants live here.

My state, West Virginia, has the lowest percentage of immigrants in the country.

And guess what we have to show for it? The Fourth Highest Poverty Rate in the Country.