White Flight Redux: Self Segregation out of Irrational Fear.

[Akka]

Look at the Sanders campaign: as limited in scope as it ultimately was, it mostly side-stepped both the quagmire of "SJW" politics and accusations of "SJW-ism" simply by starting with a strong economic platform.

Seem to me that it precisely proves my point - Sanders somewhat distanced from the identity politics platform and was much better received. So these politics are not just a symptom of the problem but a cause.

 

[Hygro]

Seem to me that it precisely proves my point - Sanders somewhat distanced from the identity politics platform and was much better received. So these politics are not just a symptom of the problem but a cause.

You know, this could be true. But he lost some of the very liberals on CFC who were preaching his core policies. I don't know how many of us there were. How can we know what the effects were?

 

[plarq]

Had Sanders made it to the candidacy, I would assume people will be red-scared to death, how he's part of Judeo-Bolshevik conspiracy and such. All Christian churches would be mobilized and many social liberals would refrain of supporting him. Trump would not take on the whole establishment, but candidate Sanders would be subjected to that kind of battle.

And he would be accused to be connected to Sandinista, Chavez, and Castro brothers.

 

[Traitorfish]

Haha. Hahaha. Warpus thinks being mean is bad. Warpus thinks thinking that institutional racism exists and should be addressed is racism.

I try to see the best in people, more fool me.

As a long term trend, the lost of left-wing credibility could be attributed to the collapse of Soviet Union, as the left-wing after that was worth less to be "bribed" out.

I think the credibility was already gone, the collapse of the Soviet Union was just the collapse of the illusion. The post-war left had been in retreat for over a decade by this time, because it had constructed its entire program around economic circumstances which did not prove to be so long-term as they had expected. The collapse of the post-Stalin Soviet Union, an entire social, economic and political order built on this premise, made it clear that the retreats of the 1980s weren't tactical withdrawals but routs; capitulation rather than consolidation. Socialism was a dead letter before Lenin came tumbling from his plinth, it just took the crunch of marble against paving-stones for us realise that. They'd built too much of their willingness to make concrete economic and political demands on the assumption of roughly linear progress towards an idealised society which had now been shown to be impossible.

Sanders, despite flirting with labels of socialism and social democracy, side-stepped this by addressing concrete issues: taxation, wages, social services. Whatever ideological framework you placed these demands in, they made sense prior to that framing. They didn't have to be building blocks for socialism, or even simple steps towards social justice, they were obvious and self-evident goods. The possibility of the ideal was still there, and that is important, nobody can whip up a campaign like that with the promise of slightly-greater scraps from the masters of table, but you didn't have to buy into any great historical narrative to buy into the program.

Seem to me that it precisely proves my point - Sanders somewhat distanced from the identity politics platform and was much better received. So these politics are not just a symptom of the problem but a cause.

But the alternative to Sanders has never been a raving blue-haired foxkin with a sackfull of Steven Universe headcannons. Most immediately, it was a grey, technocratic dynast. More generally, more fundamentally, it was a liberal establishment that saw poverty and unemployment as the price of doing business, a liberal establishment whose sense of social justice was limited to promoting diverse faces among the ruling elite. He didn't even make a clear choice to "distance" himself from "identity politics"; rather, because his campaign lacked the sort of institutional ties that Clinton's had to the hierarchies of "community leadership", it couldn't rely on entrenched communitarian structures to ensure a minority turnout in his favour, so he had to reach out to those demographics where he was strongest, on a pro-working class economic platform. Sanders bypassed "identity politics" not by rejecting race as an important factor, but by undercutting the noise of bourgeois anti-racism with direct appeals to working class solidarity across racial lines.

 

[Akka]

But the alternative to Sanders has never been a raving blue-haired foxkin with a sackfull of Steven Universe headcannons. Most immediately, it was a grey, technocratic dynast. More generally, more fundamentally, it was a liberal establishment that saw poverty and unemployment as the price of doing business, a liberal establishment who's sense of social justice was limited to promoting diverse faces among the ruling elite. He didn't even make a clear choice to "distance" himself from "identity politics"; rather, because his campaign lacked the sort of institutional ties that Clinton's had to the hierarchies of "community leadership", it couldn't rely on entrenched communitarian structures to ensure a minority turnout in his favour, so he had to reach out to those demographics where he was strongest, on a pro-working class economic platform. Sanders bypassed "identity politics" not by rejecting race as an important factor, but by undercutting the noise of bourgeois anti-racism with direct appeals to working class solidarity across racial lines.

I don't really see where this disagrees with what I'm saying ? Sanders was less making noise about race and communitarianism, and more about tackling the problems by uniting people on common problems ? That's pretty great, that's exactly what I support.

Unless you're saying he only did that because he lacked the institutionnal support of the Democrat Party ?

 

[Traitorfish]

I don't really see where this disagrees with what I'm saying ? Sanders was less making noise about race and communitarianism, and more about tackling the problems by uniting people on common problems ? That's pretty great, that's exactly what I support.

Unless you're saying he only did that because he lacked the institutionnal support of the Democrat Party ?

I'm saying that being anti-racist is not the same thing as using the language of bourgeois anti-racism. Sanders ran on an explicitly and emphatically anti-racist platform, it's simply that his policies were directed at the socio-economic conditions that both perpetuate racism and represent its greatest harm, rather than at the lack of black CEOs. He didn't make a big show about providing opportunities for the ethnicky bourgeois, because he didn't have to, because that sort of thing is a substitute for authentic anti-racist politics.

We agree that Sanders' campaign side-stepped the pitfalls of bourgeois identity politics. Where we differ is, you believe that it is because he ran a race-blind campaign, but I contend it is precisely because he ran the most race-conscious campaign in decades.

(Some commentators have suggested that Sanders' failed to engage race and racism enough, and that's a valid criticism, but hardly explain why he lost to Clinton. I think the reason is much more practical: Clinton seemed like a safer bet, and minority voters don't have the same luxury of voting with their conscience that white voters do. It's more important for black and brown Americans to have a president who doesn't overtly despise them than to feel that they backed the most moral horse. The tragedy, of course, is that they ended up with neither.)

 

[Akka]

I'm saying that being anti-racist is not the same thing as using the language of bourgeois anti-racism. Sanders ran on an explicitly and emphatically anti-racist platform, it's simply that his policies were directed at the socio-economic conditions that both perpetuate racism and represent its greatest harm, rather than at the lack of black CEOs. He didn't make a big show about providing opportunities for the ethnicky bourgeois, because he didn't have to, because that sort of thing is a substitute for authentic anti-racist politics.

Sounds exactly my point so far. Were you just agreeing with me but providing further details, or was it actually unclear that it was my position all along ?

We agree that Sanders' campaign side-stepped the pitfalls of bourgeois identity politics. Where we differ is, you believe that it is because he ran a race-blind campaign, but I contend it is precisely because he ran the most race-conscious campaign in decades.

If he offered to tackle the problems without referring to race, then it's textbook colourblindness. If your argument is that such tactics are much better at tackling racism, then, well, gratz, it's been my point all along too.

(also, I can't help but chuckle about how you circle around not using "SJW" by using "bourgeois anti-racism")

 

[Traitorfish]

Sounds exactly my point so far. Were you just agreeing with me but providing further details, or was it actually unclear that it was my position all along ?

If he offered to tackle the problems without referring to race, then it's textbook colourblindness. If your argument is that such tactics are much better at tackling racism, then, well, gratz, it's been my point all along too.

But Sanders did refer to race, explicitly and emphatically. He asserted very clear stances against the prison-industrial complex, against police brutality, against the War on Drugs, against disenfranchisement of black and brown voters; his website offers a lengthy manifesto on racial justice, explicitly identifying issues which disproportionately impact black and brown people, and offering policy-solutions that disproportionately favour them. Just because he doesn't talk about this in the terms of bourgeois anti-racism, of distributing narrow, racially-tested bonuses to the black and brown upper-middle class, doesn't mean he isn't talking about race. Just because his policies are colourblind doesn't mean that his politics are.

It still baffles me that people on both sides of the aisle have somehow gotten it into their heads that a man who marched with Dr King is somehow less "woke" on racial issues, whether they think that's a good thing or a bad thing, than a woman who helped construct the modern prison-industrial complex.

(also, I can't help but chuckle about how you circle around not using "SJW" by using "bourgeois anti-racism")

I mean, I may be posting on a video-game forum, but I'm a grown adult. You've got to have a baseline of self-respect.

 

[metalhead]

But Sanders did refer to race, explicitly and emphatically. He asserted very clear stances against the prison-industrial complex, against police brutality, against the War on Drugs, against disenfranchisement of black and brown voters; his website offers a lengthy manifesto on racial justice, explicitly identifying issues which disproportionately impact black and brown people, and offering policy-solutions that disproportionately favour them.

The issues that affect minorities in general, but often African-Americans the most, are equality issues. Equal access to credit. Equal access to education. Equal access to employment. Black (and Latino) unemployment is persistently higher than it is for white people, and wages for the employed are persistently lower. His policy solutions on those issues are not only non-existent, but the policy he does offer would likely exacerbate the economic and educational attainment gap in this country.

If you talk about paying for college for everyone, but don't offer a guarantee that Black students will go to college in similar numbers as white students, and more importantly that Black students will have the support they need to finish college at similar rates as white students, you are ignoring a very serious problem facing Black people across the country. To say nothing of predatory student lenders and disgusting for-profit college scams, which also disproportionately target minority students. Like Trump University.

If you offer a higher minimum wage and increased stimulus spending to create jobs, but don't offer guarantees of equal access to employment, you are merely going to give the benefits of those proposals disproportionately to white people. And that problem gets exacerbated when you continue to allow disproportionate access to credit.

Bernie never talked about these issues in a way that demonstrated he even thought about them, let alone that he understood them or that they were important to him. There are real economic, "kitchen-table" issues that specifically affect Black and Latino people in this country, that merit discussion and consideration from presidential candidates. Every time I brought this up the response was always Clinton whataboutism, which in the context of a campaign is an understandable response, but that doesn't change the fact that Bernie's campaign was woefully deficient in this area. And I think that was absolutely on purpose - Bernie knew his base, and he calculated that tackling race head-on would do more harm than good to his electoral chances.

Whether he is personally "woke" or not is immaterial. What matters is that his campaign not only ignored the politics of racial equality, it trafficked in policies which on their own would likely make it worse. Obviously criminal justice and disenfranchisement issues matter a great deal, but that was the low-hanging fruit. Both candidates talked about that freely, because it's easy politically and the ideas are ones that most people, and the vast majority of Democrats, support, at least in the abstract. Neither put out anything I'd consider to be the slightest bit progressive when it came to the issues of racial inequality, and I can only assume it was an intentional choice.

 

[warpus]

People tend to forget that I think because Sanders always seems to stand on the right side of the issues. He never quite goes into berserk (stereotypical) SJW mode and starts spewing nonsense, he's always level headed. He focuses on the problems and how to solve them at their root, so it's easy to forget that a lot of the problems he's trying to fix are in the U.S. race based

As for what I mean by "stereotypical SJW", you can figure it out. I'm not going to figure out a new way to say that, I'll stick to that quote and most people should know what I mean.

 

[Akka]

I mean, I may be posting on a video-game forum, but I'm a grown adult. You've got to have a baseline of self-respect.

If you think that using "bourgeois anti-racism" makes you more of an adult than "SJW", more power to you, man.

 

[Lexicus]

Bernie never talked about these issues in a way that demonstrated he even thought about them,

Honestly, I have no idea what you're talking about. He brought up all the issues you mentioned and his solutions were moreover better than Clinton's.

the policy he does offer would likely exacerbate the economic and educational attainment gap in this country.

How would massive job programs, federal support for labor unions, increased minimum wage, do this? Assuming you're talking about free college, I also highly doubt that this would increase the racial education/economic gap.

There are real economic, "kitchen-table" issues that specifically affect Black and Latino people in this country, that merit discussion and consideration from presidential candidates.

From where I'm standing Bernie was the only one who addressed any of this, while Clinton supplied vague cultural platitudes. Bernie's policies would have materially benefited people of color in this country a great deal more than Clinton's would have (I'm talking about what they wanted to do, not what they likely actually would have been able to do).
For example, Bernie was the only candidate who pointed out that Wall Street had effectively robbed the wealth of millions of black families, while Clinton was going to cynically set class at odds with race with the line "Wall Street doesn't gun down young black men."

The problem with Bernie's campaign on the race dimension was not his stump speech (which improved markedly after he listened to the BLM protesters who "disrupted" his event near the start of the campaign) but the fact that his campaign was a bunch of clueless white people and he made only halting efforts at actually reaching out and organizing in non-white communities. I heard a lot of stories from folks of color that I know about ludicrously racist stuff that happened to them at Bernie campaign events. This was bad and there is no excuse or defense for it, and it's ultimately Bernie's responsibility.

 

[metalhead]

Honestly, I have no idea what you're talking about. He brought up all the issues you mentioned and his solutions were moreover better than Clinton's.

Once again, I'll ask you to refrain from whatabouting and comparisons. Was he offering specific solutions to racial inequality? I don't believe he was. Talking about race is empty absent any will to actually address racial inequality. I went back and looked at his website and saw no policy prescriptions to tackle racial inequality outside of the justice system. Which again, is crucially important, but both candidates were in strong agreement on those issues. That is the low hanging fruit.

How would massive job programs, federal support for labor unions, increased minimum wage, do this? Assuming you're talking about free college, I also highly doubt that this would increase the racial education/economic gap.

On the issue of "jobs programs" and support for labor unions and the increased minimum wage - Black unemployment is twice that of white unemployment. So any jobs programs that do not specifically focus on employing Black people will not address this pressing economic problem affecting Black people in America. It's the same fundamental problem with any "rising tide lifts all boats" argument - some boats are starting off much higher. Lifting everyone still leaves people at a comparative disadvantage. And that's without getting into the very troubling problem that some labor unions have with race to this day. And it also completely fails to address other economic problems affecting Black Americans, such as access to credit, and access to housing.

As for free college, Black students fail to finish their degrees at more than twice the rate of white students. So if you send everyone to college, the end result is going to be that a much higher percentage of white people are going to end up with degrees. The proliferation of degrees means that employers can now more widely require degrees for employment, leaving people who don't have degrees at an even greater disadvantage than they are at currently, competing for the lowest wage jobs with the fewest job protections and the lowest amount of economic prospects over the course of their lives.. This would greatly exacerbate problems of Black unemployment, and cut many Black people off from employment entirely. In this scenario, who is going to be left to bear the brunt of the coming automation boom first?

From where I'm standing Bernie was the only one who addressed any of this, while Clinton supplied vague cultural platitudes. Bernie's policies would have materially benefited people of color in this country a great deal more than Clinton's would have (I'm talking about what they wanted to do, not what they likely actually would have been able to do).

In absolute terms, maybe. In relative terms, Bernie's policies would have benefitted white people far, far more. Racial inequality would continue to get worse, leaving Black people even more vulnerable to economic downturns than they already are, limiting their economic mobility to a greater degree, etc.

Either inequality is a problem, or it isn't. Only offering to tackle it along one dimension isn't good enough, and runs the risk of unintended consequences. I don't think Bernie Sanders is unaware of this, I think he was doing what Trump did, trying to ride a narrow base to a primary win and then using the broader general election base to win. Had he faced a crowded field like Trump had, he might have been able to pull it off. But I don't think you can fairly look at the history of racial politics in America and then try to claim that Bernie Sanders was somehow not intentionally ignoring racial politics in appealing to the white working class. That just isn't how this works.

 

[Kyriakos]

I'm saying that being anti-racist is not the same thing as using the language of bourgeois anti-racism. Sanders ran on an explicitly and emphatically anti-racist platform, it's simply that his policies were directed at the socio-economic conditions that both perpetuate racism and represent its greatest harm, rather than at the lack of black CEOs. He didn't make a big show about providing opportunities for the ethnicky bourgeois, because he didn't have to, because that sort of thing is a substitute for authentic anti-racist politics.

We agree that Sanders' campaign side-stepped the pitfalls of bourgeois identity politics. Where we differ is, you believe that it is because he ran a race-blind campaign, but I contend it is precisely because he ran the most race-conscious campaign in decades.

(Some commentators have suggested that Sanders' failed to engage race and racism enough, and that's a valid criticism, but hardly explain why he lost to Clinton. I think the reason is much more practical: Clinton seemed like a safer bet, and minority voters don't have the same luxury of voting with their conscience that white voters do. It's more important for black and brown Americans to have a president who doesn't overtly despise them than to feel that they backed the most moral horse. The tragedy, of course, is that they ended up with neither.)

Hillary and the 'super-predators' thing would connote that -if anything- she was the candidate despising black people, before nominally changing view for political gain. Sanders also had to run the primary against the ridiculous threat by that NY billionaire ex-mayor, that he would run too if people dared vote Sanders as their candidate. Only in Merica