what the dirtbag left gets wrong about identity politics
“Our people may be British, but our cows are Irish.”
Those were the words of Ian Paisley, the loyalist politician from Northern Ireland during the mad cow scare in the UK.
Loyalists in Northern Ireland will die just to have the right to fly the Union Jack and call themselves British, but when it starts to affect their bottom line, they often change their tune really quickly.
Materialism always underlies identity politics. Always.
People will hold onto their identity if there is a material, economic reason to do so. Give them a material, economic reason not to and they will reconsider who they are and why it even matters.
The loyalists in Northern Ireland hold onto that identity because they benefited materially from a constructed privilege created by colonialism for so long. And no system or ideology gives them hope for something better.
When a group is losing economic privilege, their natural instinct is to become reactionary - to long for a times in the past that were better for them, even if those times were horrible for other groups.
People almost always fight for their own class interests instinctively.
The nationalists hold onto their identity because they understand the material reality of being from an indiginous Irish family - experiencing the generational consequences of their ancestor’s oppression as well as the remaining structural inequality.
They can be reactionary, but it’s much more likely for nationalists to have forward thinking views. They are more likely to be socialist and hold many other left-wing political positions.
Why is this?
Because they know no system in the recent past has served people like them. They have no stories of economic success passed down from their well-to-do great grandparents to think about. Without those memories of “the good life,” it’s easier to be critical of the current system and open minded about radically changing society.
The same goes for the identity politics of America.
The most vocal racists/xenophobes these days in the US are from petty bourgeoisie backgrounds. These are the farmers and small business owners who have slowly been losing ground for generations due to the consolidation of global capitalism. They long for a time when they not only had more economic security, but they also had economic independence.
Since the past served them and their class well, they become reactionary, longing for the past, even if women and minorities had it worse back then.
You will not gain their support by promising socialist policies. They don’t want socialism. They want their glory returned to them: the unearned economic benefits of being a white male capitalist in a world that perpetuates the myth that white male capitalists earn their money solely from hard work and resourcefulness.
In contrast to this, most of the working class today are from the least privileged backgrounds. The lowest paid working class workers have the most to gain from changing society and are the least likely to hold reactionary views. Even if they do, those views are flimsy and easily changed if there is an economic incentive to let go of those views.
Even more, statistics show that most of the working class in the US are actually minorities and women. This is not an accident. This is how capitalism works.
If you are catering to racists/sexists in the hope of gaining support of some mythical white male working class voter who hates minorities more than their economic interests, or who actually thinks that minorities threaten their economic interests, you need to get out more and actually talk to the working class.
The reality is that dirtbag left in the US is so petty bourgeois and PMC that they don’t even know who the working class is.
They are throwing the identity-related concerns of the actual working class (who have the most left wing revolutionary potential) under the bus for a type of “Strasserism” that caters to the white male petty bourgeoisie.
They are pandering to the same type of people who historically have always chosen to burn down their own business and farms instead of embracing collectivization. The same type of people who murdered working class people like me for simply asking for a little bread and equality.
By the way, most of the people in the dirtbag left are these same white male petty bourgeois. The kind of people who turn on the working class, historically, because they will lose power and wealth in a transition to socialism. It’s not in their class interest to move beyond the most weak social democracy. So good luck with that “socialist” movement. You are going to need it.
