"End of Identity Politics?"

 Here we are in early December, almost a quarter of the way through the 21^st Century. Growing up in the mid-part of the 20^th Century, I thought I was living in the future. The 19^th Century – the past – was ever-present in grandparents, great aunts and uncles, and older neighbors. The “future,” foretold in books like The Time Machine, Brave New World, 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 and movies like The War of the Worlds and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, provided fanciful entertainment, but hardly accurate predictions.

 

But the world does move on, and change is one constant we can count on.  Politically things change. The Party of Lincoln lost the black vote. The Party of segregation became the party of civil rights. Today we are going through another political change, as the Party of the working class is becoming the Party of elites, and of those dependent on government, and the mindless woke. And the Party of Lincoln, the Party of opportunity, is beginning once again to make inroads among the nation’s minorities.

 

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

 

Thought of the Day

“End of Identity Politics?”

December 2, 2024

 

“If I would not vote against someone on the grounds of ‘race’ or ‘gender’ alone, then by the exact

same token I would not cast a vote in his or her favor for the identical reason. You see how

this obvious question makes fairly intelligent people say the most alarmingly stupid things.”

                                                                                                  Christopher Hitchens (1949-2011)

                                                                                                  Letters to a Young Contrarian, 2001

 

Mr. Trump’s victory on November 5^th may have marked the end of identity politics as we know it. Economic class, the election showed, mattered more than ethnicity, race or gender. Identity politics is based on the natural tendency for people of a specific race, ethnicity, gender, cultural, or religious group to band together, in friendship and to rectify past injustices. But that tendency has been employed and advantaged by politicians who, with the assistance of allies in the media, have divided people into oppressors and oppressed. Identity politics has led to an absence of focus on issues more relevant to individuals. 

 

The election showed that the American public is receptive to merit being the determinant to earned rather than “deserved” reward. DEI and ESG have fallen from favor. With the election, they fell further, defeated by common sense and real-world issues like the border, inflation, crime, disarray overseas, and excessive government intrusion and spending. Victor Davis Hanson, a classicist historian, wrote in the November 21 issue of American Greatness of culture wars: “The age of flashing pronouns, renaming iconic landmarks, statue toppling, trashing the dead, vandalizing with impunity the campus library, or spouting anti-Semitic venom is passing.”

 

But the going is sluggish. While a CBS News/YouGov poll found 59% of American adults approve of how the Trump team is preparing its return to the White House, the Progressive Left is in denial about the election, as they continue to genuflect at the altar of Wokeness. Many believe that America remains racist, a society divided between victims and victimizers – that its history must be expunged and re-written; and that, for the nation’s redemption, taxpayers should continue to fund government departments of diversity, equity and inclusion. And they feel convinced that Mr. Trump symbolizes all that is wrong with the nation. But who is out of touch with America’s electorate? Mike Gonzalez and Armen Tooloee wrote in last Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal: “Donald Trump’s most effective campaign ad featured the tagline, ‘Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you.’”

 

In any event, is it accurate to call Mr. Trump a racist, sexist, bigot? Piers Morgan, in the November 23 issue of The Spectator, noted that he received “so many new votes from black, Latino, female, Jewish and Muslim voters, and celebrates by dancing on stage to the Village People’s gay anthem ‘YMCA’.” Empirical evidence suggests the answer to the question is no.

 

Democrats have created a bell-bar approach toward their Party – the elite (the media, the entertainment world, college professors and administrators, coastal tech and Wall Street billionaires) on one side, and those financially dependent on government on the other. It is a policy that ignores working class people, including legal immigrants, those who had once been the backbone of their Party. It is policy that downplays the role of aspiration, dedication, and effort – traits that lead to economic success. Having lived in Connecticut for almost sixty years, I have witnessed this change – wealthy enclaves and country clubs that were once dominated by Republicans have become bastions of Democratic group-think.

 

Politicians have long campaigned by compartmentalizing the electorate. The Marxist Left Review, a semi-annual publication, in August 2021, defined the term: “Identity politics is a set of ideas and practices that aim to build recognition of and expand representation for particular identity groups” to elevate them “to moral and political pre-eminence.” The second half of the 20^thCentury saw the emergence of such large-scale political movements: women’s rights, Black Civil Rights, gay and lesbian liberation, native American movement. They were all, as the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy puts it, based on claims about injustice having been done to them. And their claims were, largely, valid. 

 

But while these issues were imperative sixty years ago, the world has moved on. Those legitimate arguments have morphed into demands that male athletes be allowed to compete in women’s sports, that tampon dispensers be placed in men’s rooms, that school children should be allowed to take hormone-altering drugs without parent permission, and universities where students are fearful of expressing conservative opinions because of retaliation from professors and other students.

 

Despite what we read, see and hear in and on mainstream media and despite claims by Progressives of disinformation from conservative social media outlets, misogyny, racism, xenophobia, and homophobia have been in retreat. Are there still bigots? Of course. There always will be, but they are less ubiquitous than before. Given that the percentage of votes cast for Mr. Trump among blacks, Hispanics and youth increased suggests that the United States is approaching the goal which Martin Luther King sought – that the color of one’s skin is less important than the content of one’s character. The election was an affirmation that merit, aspiration, effort and ability are critical to success, and that affirmative action is yesterday’s answer to yesterday’s problem. The election’s outcome found that economic class was more critical to voters than race, gender or ethnicity. The U.S. is becoming more of a melting pot.

 

People should be judged by ability, effort and their accomplishments. We are each an individual. Today’s identity politics has led to racial and gender discrimination. It was the excuse Nazis used to persecute Jews in the 1930s and ‘40s, and it is what Chinese Communists do today to tyrannize Uyghurs. Its ugliness is seen in anti-Semitism on college campuses. And it is what led the ICC (International Criminal Court) to issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant. 

 

I hope my optimism about witnessing the dying embers of identity politics is not pollyannish – that its setback is not just temporary. On February 18, 1958 Senator John F. Kennedy spoke at Loyola College Annual Alumni dinner in Baltimore: “Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our responsibility for the future.”

 

Read and re-read Christopher Hitchens’ wise remarks that preface this essay. Once anger over the election’s outcome has subsided and common sense returned, cooler heads should prevail. In an interview with Jason Riley in last Wednesday’s The Wall Street Journal, Shelby Steele said, the election was “…a vote for individualism over group identity.” And that it was “… a real note of progress for black America politically.” Aspiration, ability, effort are not characteristics exclusive to one’s gender, race, or ethnicity. But they have not been meted out equally, which explains differences in outcomes. Each of us is unique. Government should support the concept of equal opportunity, and individuals should be encouraged to take advantage of their God-given talents. Merit, regardless of who the individual is, should be the deciding factor in college admission and job offers. If we do, we will put “paid” to the belief in identity politics, at least as we know it; and then we can concentrate on today, the future and new problems that confront us.

"Victimhood"

                                                                     Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

 

Thought of the Day

“Victimhood”

August 15, 2022

 

“There is a difference between victimization and victimhood. We are all likely to be victimized in some

way in the course of our lives. At some point we will suffer some kind of affliction or calamity or

abuse, caused by circumstances or people or institutions over which we have little or no control…

In contrast, victimhood comes from the inside. No one can make you a victim but you. We become

victims not because of what happens to us but when we choose to hold on to our victimization…”

                                                                                                                                Edith Eger (1927-)

                                                                                                                                The Choice: Embrace the Possible, 2017

 

 

Too often, we accept victimhood, which can come in myriad guises: A college student cowers under a torrent of “hurtful” words; a banker worries an employee will be offended by the wrong pronoun; a comedian is booed by those claiming victimhood, for humor deemed racist, sexist, or homophobic. The American people were told by elitist Democrats, and “never-Trumpers,” that we were victims of a “fascist-like” Donald Trump.  Doing so, freed his political opponents to pursue any means to destroy him: false accusations of Russian collusion; a two-year, multi-million-dollar (and futile) Mueller investigation; two impeachments, and the recent FBI raid on his home at the Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach. No matter one’s view of the egotistical Mr. Trump, has not he become a victim?

 

In this surrealistic world, who is the victim and who the victimizer depends – not on facts – but on political ideology. When Twitter or Facebook censor news reports from conservatives to “protect” readers or viewers from “fake” or “malicious” stories, are not they promoting victimhood? If a corporation does not comply with DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) protocols, it is accused of victimizing its employees. Should investment managers seek to maximize portfolio returns, or should they find investments that are ESG (environmental, social, and governance) friendly, regardless of the comparative investment return potential? Have not some pensioners and mutual fund holders become victims to the political aspirations of portfolio managers? The acceptance of victimhood affects the way we value meritocracy and perceive equal opportunity – that past inequities and unequal outcomes make necessary the racial bigotry inherent in affirmative action, which accentuates the divide among people. Is it fair, for example, to lower college admission standards based on race, but not on economic class? 

 

Victimhood subordinates the individual to the group, which is a problem for democracy that depends on individual freedom. This is especially true in the black community. Shelby Steele, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute wrote of this situation twenty years ago in a Harper’s Magazine essay (“The Age of White Guilt and the Disappearance of the Black Individual,” November 30, 2002): “Right after the sixties’ civil-rights victories came what I believe to be the greatest miscalculation in black American history…we were faithless with ourselves just when we had given ourselves reason to have such faith…To go after America’s liability we had to locate real transformative power outside ourselves. Worse, we had to see our fate as contingent on America’s paying off that liability. We have been a contingent people ever since, arguing our weakness and white racism ignite the engine of white liability. And this has mired us in a protest-group identity that mistrusts individualism because free individuals might jeopardize the group’s effort to activate this liability.” It is demeaning to the individual when we do not ascribe success (or failure) to that individual, no matter their color, sexual orientation, or gender.

 

The consequence of these, (perhaps) well-intentioned but personally degrading, policies is that victimhood is claimed even when victimization never took place. The result is a nation of H.G. Wells’ Eloi controlled by his bureaucratic Morlocks. Victimhood results in dependency, especially dependency on government. Gone are self-reliance, dignity, and independence. Acquiescence to victimhood means avoiding personal responsibility. An unjust accusation of being a victimizer means having to apologize for actions of others, even when those actions took place hundreds of years ago. And, of course, it belittles real victims, like Salmon Rushdie.

 

The assumption of victimhood means a failure to look within. Craig D. Lounsbrough, a licensed counselor in Colorado, is quoted: “I decry the injustice of my wounds, only to look down and see the smoking gun in one hand and a fistful of ammunition in the other.” A failure to take responsibility injures society, because we live in a world where some people, regardless of color or gender, are victimized. Those that are deserve our help and support. But we should avoid the mantle of victimhood. We should look back on the life of Edith Eger, for an understanding of the difference between true victimization and imagined victimhood.

 

Edith Eger, whose quote in the rubric that precedes and gives direction to this essay, was born on September 29, 1927 to Hungarian Jewish parents in the Czechoslovakian town of Košice. In May 1944, with her family, she was deported to Auschwitz and then transported to Mauthausen and Gunskirchhen, from which she was released in May 1945 by American troops. Her parents did not survive. In 1949, with her husband and daughter, she emigrated to the United States; she received her PhD in clinical psychology from the University of Texas in 1978. I doubt anyone reading this essay ever suffered victimization to the extent did Ms. Eger during the final year of the Second World War, yet she never declared victimhood.

"When Means Become Confused with Ends"

Sydney M. Williams

swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“When Means Become Confused with Ends”

October 22, 2018

“Perfection of means and confusion of goals seem,

in my opinion, to characterize our age.”

                                                                                                Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

                                                                                                Out of my Later Years, 1950

Most days, I read or skim five newspapers. Like many, I strive for some sort of balance. But it is difficult. Families and friends avoid politics for fear personal animosities will subsume relationships.  Partisanship is everywhere, especially in the media. Either we, as a people, have become reflective of the them, or they of us. We read and listen to one side; we ignore (and condemn)those who think differently. Think of our universities, network TV and late-night comedians. The consequence is that real news is hard to discern. We all have examples of a news item picked up by The Wall Street Journalthat is ignored or exaggerated by The New York Times, or vice versa. Editorial pages smack of hypocrisy, sanctimony, mendacity and schadenfreude, depending on which side of the story the editor finds him or herself. Often, I find myself – and I am sure I am not alone – tossing the papers aside in frustration and picking up a novel, a Wodehouse for its comic relief, or a Times crossword puzzle for its mental stimulation. I am not without prejudice, as you all know, so find myself wondering:why is the Left so consumed with hate? I know many of these people and many are friends. And I know they wonder:why am I so stupid, insensitive and obtuse? I don’t think I am, and my guess is that most of my friends are not filled with hate. But we have allowed extremists to define our opinions; and politicians, watching which way the clouds move, sail with the wind. 

The problem, as I see it, is that both sides fail to recognize that we, generally, have the same ends – life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness (and all that encompasses). It is in the means to achieve common goals where we differ. In recent years, as rhetoric has amplified, a desired political end has justified not only nasty words but acts of violence, “whatever it takes,” as one Democrat put it. We saw it in the Senate Visitor’s Gallery during the Kavanaugh hearings and in restaurants that forced out Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Ted Cruz, among others. Listening to the bickering of Senators last month reminded one of Matthew Arnold’s poem “Dover Beach,” “…where ignorant armies clash by night.” “Never argue with a fool,”my father used to say, “for a passer-by could not tell which was the fool.” Like a lover’s quarrel, both parties may be at fault, but both parties are not equally at fault. Despite a mainstream media that would have us believe otherwise, it is the left that has elevated hateful discourse to new levels.

In a Wall Street Journalop-ed last September titled “Why the Left is Consumed with Hate,” Shelby Steele of the Hoover Institute explained what he thought was the answer: “The great crisis for the left today – the source of its angst and hatefulness – is its encroaching obsolescence.” Perhaps? I don’t know. In my opinion, part of that angst stems from the failure of the progressive Presidency of Barack Obama to leave a lasting legacy. Despite being elected President twice and remaining popular as an ex-President, Mr. Obama, over the course of his eight years in office, saw Democrats lose the House in 2010 and the Senate in 2014.  Worse, Democrats lost heavily in state and local elections. In 2008, there were twenty-eight Democrat governors and twenty-two Republican governors. Eight years later, Democrats had lost twelve governorships and Republicans had gained eleven. (Bill Walker of Alaska is an Independent.) During those same years, Democrats lost over a thousand state legislative seats. Mr. Obama may remain personally popular, but he destroyed the Democrat Party.

Nevertheless, with expectations high in 2016, Democrats felt their time had come. Mrs. Clinton tilted left, endorsing Pyrrhic victories, such as gender equality, transsexualism, abortion on demand, identity politics and liberalizing marijuana, while ignoring the economy, jobs and middle America’s, “deplorables.” Tasting victory, Mrs. Clinton tweeted that Mr. Trump must be a good loser. Results turned out otherwise. While Mr. Trump may not have been the most gracious of winners, Mrs. Clinton did turn out to be one of the sorest of losers. It would have been one thing to have lost to a mainstream Republican, like Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio, but to lose to a reality-TV star with orange hair and whose speech did not carry strains of the ivy league was too much for progressives who believed it was their destiny to transform America.

Gutter tactics, once the choice of a few, have gone mainstream. Mr. Trump is a fighter. He had witnessed what happened to those who acted civilly – like George W. Bush who was reviled and Mitt Romney who was splattered. Offering good counsel, Michelle Obama said, “When they(Republicans) go low, I go high,” but others in her Party ignored that advice. Eric Holder recommended kicking them if they went low. Mrs. Clinton said civility among Democrats would not return until Democrats regained control of Congress. And, remember how Mrs. Obama’s husband once said he would bring a gun to a knife fight? Such incivility is not new. In 1856, South Carolina pro-slavery Representative Preston Brooks (a Democrat) bludgeoned abolitionist Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner (a Republican) with a cane. Nevertheless, there have always been those who stood for decency: “I could never divide myself from any man upon the difference of an opinion,” so wrote Sir Thomas Browne, on the eve of the English Revolution, in 1642[1]If only a Sir Thomas would appear today. 

While many of my generation grew up in ethnic neighborhoods, we were proud to be Americans. We had common goals regarding marriage and families, but we took different paths, and most of us ended in a place where we were content – sometimes after more than one marriage! We had differing goals regarding jobs and careers, reflecting differences in ambition, intelligence, athleticism and looks. But we had common beliefs in what America stood for – liberty, self-government, rule of law, freedom to express opinions and to worship, and respect and tolerance for those with whom we disagreed, and to do all this in a fiscally responsible manner. This faith in America was based on what we had studied in school. We read history. We studied people and events and learned of how thousands had died that others could live in freedom – that a Civil War had been fought to free enslaved Americans, but also for “a governmentof the people, by the people, for the people.” We were told civility and thrift were good and rudeness and indebtedness bad. We were taught that evil exists and that even good men can do bad things. We read of how our government came into being and how it works, and that it was – and is – not perfect, but unique, the best the world has yet devised. We learned that different people believed in achieving common goals – gender, racial and religious equality, freedoms to express opinions, better living standards, financial stability – but through different means. We learned that if we agree on the ends, we should be able to civilly debate the means.

Extremists on the left, however, say our goals are not the same, that conservatives lack compassion, that they want to put women back in aprons and Blacks back in chains. If that reflects the true feelings of Democrats, we are lost. If the refusal to accept election outcomes, is greater today than what the Country experienced in 1861 or 1933, then I fear we are lost. But I suspect that such naysayers are only a noisy fringe. There is a tendency to assume we live in unique, extraordinary times, that, for example, the 2018 midterm election is the most momentous of our lifetimes. Not to make light of the current elections (or even of the witches in Brooklyn who placed hexes on Donald Trump, Justice Kavanaugh and Mitch McConnell), I question the assumption. For together we have lived through a lot: The American Revolution; the War of 1812; the Mexican War of 1846; the Civil War; the panic of 1907; World War I; the stock market crash of 1929 and a decade of depression; Pearl Harbor and World War II; the Cold War; Vietnam; 1968, with its race riots and assassinations; the stock market crash of 1987; 9/11 and ensuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; the credit collapse of 2008, and the assassinations of four Presidents – Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley and John F. Kennedy. Today’s concerns pale in comparison to what we have experienced and overcome. In his first inaugural, Abraham Lincoln, facing a far more divisive time than what we face today, wrote: “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”     

That, it seems to me, should be our goal. Let loose the better angels of our nature. You are not filled with hate, and I am not insensitive. Don’t be sure that your Party has all the answers. Don’t assume that your political opponents want to destroy democracy. Discover and decide on what and where we agree, then debate how to get there. Martin Luther King once wrote, “In the final analysis, means and ends must cohere because the end is preexistent in the means, and, ultimately, destructive means cannot bring about constructive ends.” Amen. 

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[1]To be clear, I have never read anything by Sir Thomas Browne. The quote appeared in a delightful book I am reading, The Unexpected Professor: An Oxford Life in Books, by John Carey.