Hello to my new subscribers, thank you very much for your interest. As someone who grew up in and of the left, I have been developing this newsletter as a home for the politically homeless.
I had a breakthrough moment yesterday.
I was listening to Brett Weinstein and Heather Heying’s podcast (Dark Horse livecast, episode 69), and he said something that stopped me in my tracks.
He said that there is a powerful contingent among the current American left that wants to "burn it all down." This line of thinking goes: (and he's had up close and personal experience with this), "Civilisation is effectively white. And that whiteness taints it beyond repair. And it must be burned down. Then things will be better."
This extremist position shares a big platform and is allied with mainstream liberal people who are simply fed up with social inequality and the many crises-induced inflection points in American society today. These mainstream but very frustrated liberals may not go so far as to think the police should be dismantled or white children should be held accountable for police violence. Yet they don't seem to be concerned about their extremist allies who do.
Weinstein says: "Tremendous power is being wielded by a movement that is composed of people who have positions that cannot be reconciled," ie the burn-it-down extremists (see the left-wing violence that's been rocking US cities for nearly a year) and the mainstream Democrats.
And therein lies the rub, for everyone on the liberal/left spectrum. Do you continue to overlook the active and ascendent racism (and misogyny, btw) of the left because you fear the latent and historical racism of the right?
The most important questions to grapple with right now are: why is it so hard for liberals to see this and what will it cost them?
For a salutary reminder of just how wrong these alliances can go, we should look to what happened in the Iranian revolution in the late 1970’s, when educated and well-off liberals and left-wing students aligned themselves with extremist Islamists in the name of social justice. Within a few short years, the Islamic regime was announcing the names of heretics and lefties “put to death” by the regime and calling for a “purge of leftist school children” as young as seven.
The liberal/left's inability to confront the wolves among them is why I no longer call myself a Democrat, a liberal or a lefty. That's why I'm politically homeless. If you also feel politically homeless, drop a comment below — then maybe we won’t feel so alone.
There’s just certain people where there’s no common ground because they live in insanity, what do you say to the Yale Art School graduate who paints assholes in dungeons? Nice work? The whole crowd has a very nihilistic/satanic outlook with a heavy slice of synthetic hormones transgendered madness and maybe throw in Transhumanism for good measure. They’re not learning about anything human, they have no morals and generally they’re parasitic. I don’t have anything in common with a guy who dresses as a dog at a Gay Pride parade and enjoys getting large objects jammed in his colon.... I started off “Liberal”, now I’m pursuing being a human being and a man.
It's high decadence and soulless transgression that -- once again -- liberals are too nice to push back against. Even when it's patently creepy. Camille Paglia is great on this.
Hi Robin! That phrase is a quote said by Brett Weinstein in the podcast which is the subject of this post. It's not -- to my understanding -- referring to policies, it's referring to the state aims and actions of the hard-left BLM and Antifa. Brett and his wife have a history being targets of the far left, which give his position a depth and a nuance that might not be conveyed in that single brief phrase. But anyone who want to understand the cleavage on the left right now should listen to them.
I understand why you would, Antifa just seems like Joker's army of misbegotten children, sinister but pointless. And I think it's probably a murky question of "who" BLM is -- folks who (like I say above) are just furious at social inequality and poor outcomes but then also those who have a much more doctrinaire and totalitarian worldview based on race. The pod I link to is about another conversation Weinstein had on Clubhouse that turned ugly in a way that I thought was scary. There are hours and hours of recordings of Weinstein talking about this issue though, and he's very much a left-wing person. His thoughts on this should be taken seriously, he's a good faith actor in this.
And that is why I have spent more time over the past several years worried about what's been going on with those on the left end of the ideological spectrum than what has been going on on the right end.
Same. I have spent a lot of time this last year following the MAGA movement and they are actually what I would have considered a traditional pro-working class, pro-union jobs, movement to be. Far more so than anyone who claims to be left-wing or progressive. And I have yet to come across among them any nasty zealots demanding segregation or women being chained to kitchen sinks. So when it comes to how these groups are being represented, there really is something rotten in the state of Denmark.
There’s just certain people where there’s no common ground because they live in insanity, what do you say to the Yale Art School graduate who paints assholes in dungeons? Nice work? The whole crowd has a very nihilistic/satanic outlook with a heavy slice of synthetic hormones transgendered madness and maybe throw in Transhumanism for good measure. They’re not learning about anything human, they have no morals and generally they’re parasitic. I don’t have anything in common with a guy who dresses as a dog at a Gay Pride parade and enjoys getting large objects jammed in his colon.... I started off “Liberal”, now I’m pursuing being a human being and a man.
It's high decadence and soulless transgression that -- once again -- liberals are too nice to push back against. Even when it's patently creepy. Camille Paglia is great on this.
Hey Jenny, when you say “burn it all down” extremists, to whom and specifically which policies are you referring?
Hi Robin! That phrase is a quote said by Brett Weinstein in the podcast which is the subject of this post. It's not -- to my understanding -- referring to policies, it's referring to the state aims and actions of the hard-left BLM and Antifa. Brett and his wife have a history being targets of the far left, which give his position a depth and a nuance that might not be conveyed in that single brief phrase. But anyone who want to understand the cleavage on the left right now should listen to them.
Okay...I take issue with BLM being equated to Antifa. I’ll listen so I know what you’re talking about.
I understand why you would, Antifa just seems like Joker's army of misbegotten children, sinister but pointless. And I think it's probably a murky question of "who" BLM is -- folks who (like I say above) are just furious at social inequality and poor outcomes but then also those who have a much more doctrinaire and totalitarian worldview based on race. The pod I link to is about another conversation Weinstein had on Clubhouse that turned ugly in a way that I thought was scary. There are hours and hours of recordings of Weinstein talking about this issue though, and he's very much a left-wing person. His thoughts on this should be taken seriously, he's a good faith actor in this.
And that is why I have spent more time over the past several years worried about what's been going on with those on the left end of the ideological spectrum than what has been going on on the right end.
Same. I have spent a lot of time this last year following the MAGA movement and they are actually what I would have considered a traditional pro-working class, pro-union jobs, movement to be. Far more so than anyone who claims to be left-wing or progressive. And I have yet to come across among them any nasty zealots demanding segregation or women being chained to kitchen sinks. So when it comes to how these groups are being represented, there really is something rotten in the state of Denmark.
It’s not left versus right anymore it’s elitists versus the rest. Except the elitists have convinced the younger generation they aren’t elitists.
I couldn't agree with you more.