Soon after a recent, protracted political discussion that included a number of references to “going back to” some pre-election Eden, the following thoughts came to me—probably voiced elsewhere, but nothing I’ve encountered in my organizing circles, and so I share these ideas in the hope that others will help explore and develop them.
I expect that the “we” in what I write includes few members of long-marginalized demographic groups, who may readily respond, “What’s so great about what we’d go back to?”
That said:
- We [see above] are so dismayed with what we seem to be losing and have already lost that our focus keeps dwelling on reversing post-election horrors and somehow returning to a nostalgic condition, comfortable to us, before the loss.
- As history and psychotherapy (and Thomas Wolfe) have taught us, one can’t go back to an imagined past.
- And of course, “back” had so many problems. But no matter how much we cared about the problems, few of them affected our PERSONAL daily comfort.
- Can we go “forward” as we resist in a way that will include IMPROVEMENTS on at least SOME of the past rather than just blocking (more like tilting at windmills, it often seems) the seemingly never-ending barrage of assaults on our (and others’ we care about) well-being? Where do such niches lie?*
- If only “SOME” of past iniquities, what happens to the rest? How can we possibly prioritize/privilege some oppressions over others?
- We nobly embrace the the slogan, “RESIST,” but doesn’t that suggest holding a line that narrows our horizons about what we can/want to achieve? Doesn’t it focus on the present and not a future other than one cleansed of trumpist atrocities?
- To what extent is defeating Trumpism a social immediacy that justifies setting aside some disagreements on what society should look like? (Cf. #5.) How quickly is widespread sectarianism/factionalism (a great scourge, in my eyes, even though I have my own pet beliefs) going to arise to fragment “the movement” (however we define that right now) and contribute to enabling a reactionary governing elite?
I have no clear answers to these moral-strategic problems amidst all the other problems we are constantly confronting these days. But I think we need answers.
THROUGH THE PRIMARIES AND GENERAL ELECTION SEASON, moderates and many “liberals” say to us progressives and others on their left inside and outside the Democratic party: “We’re all on the same barricades, with a common enemy. We have to get Trump out. Any Democratic nominee is tons better than Trump. Don’t be self-indulgent or vengeful, don’t subject the country to possible fascism. Gag if you must, but it is immoral not to vote Democrat this year.[1]” Etc., etc.
POST-ELECTION: “We won! We won! Thanks to everyone who toed the line and voted to get Trump out!” I did feel an intense wave of liberation when he lost, and I have no question that getting Trump out was crucial for every decent human being here and around the world.
But that is what many of us were doing: voting to get Trump out. That Biden consequently got in is a necessary but not necessarily desirable outcome.[2]
But when realization set in that so many down-ballot Democrats lost, within a day those same moderates and liberals started saying to the same people to their left who had agreed that the priority was to get rid of Trump: “It’s your fault we did so poorly! You were too radical! You were self-indulgent by promoting progressive policies that would only alienate voters! We must tack towards the middle! We must make compromises on our core values!” Etc., etc.
This shouldn’t surprise me: united fronts against an agreed evil have often quickly fragmented when the evil is (or seems) past.[3]
Shouldn’t surprise me…but such double-think self-righteousness still enrages me.[4]
And while we’re at it: exactly what would a compromise look like for the rapid acceleration of climate disasters[5], or about the murder and assault of Blacks and trans folk and other marginalized people, about uniting immigrant families[6] and streamlining their admission to “our” country, about the well-being of people with sexual behavior different from some mainstream standard, about the freedom of pregnant women to decide what to do with their embryos or fetuses,[7] and so on through the litany of progressive and further left stances on social justice? What could possibly be a morally acceptable PARTIAL (i.e., compromise) position be in each of these matters and equivalent ones I’ve left out?
Is it a mere coincidence that so many of those moderates and liberals seem to have reasonably comfortable financial circumstances and personal security in contrast with those whose severely compromised lives they want to “compromise” about? Or that most of them seem to be white?
A great deal more could be said about the preceding, but this is at least a starter in getting across the core anger that I, and I assume many others to the left of compromising Democrats, feel.
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[1] Of course, though this time the difference was palpable, we hear similar pleading in every election.
[2] I hope he’ll be better than I expect, but I’m not counting on it, and I believe we have to be ready to hold his feet to the fire starting yesterday. [Added after original draft:] If accurate this report is encouraging: https://time.com/5910008/joe-biden-climate-change-election/. Cabinet appointments will help gauge Biden’s commitment to key causes.
[3]…though in this case, it is remaining with us for at least two months longer—and of course it will be embedded in much of the country long after that.
[4] Here’s a corresponding commentary from one of my favorite political sources (though sometimes when it pillories an article, it inappropriately condemns the entire journal from which the article came): https://fair.org/home/when-centrists-lose-corporate-media-blame-the-left/. Here is another a thoughtful (to me) examination of the issue: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/progressives-house-races-democrats_n_5fa6981bc5b67c3259aef686. And AOC, whom I highly respect, had this to say a few days ago: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-biden-democratic-party_n_5fa773fbc5b66009569b4349.
[5] Probably including more pandemics.
[6] And getting caged and abused immigrant kids into humane settings in the meantime.
[7] Thanks to my wife, Dr. Barbara Beitch, a biologist, for the following clarification: “[C]oncerning the right of a woman to make the difficult decision about to do when she finds herself with an unplanned pregnancy: Such decisions are usually made in the first trimester, at what we biologists call the embryonic stage. Later in development, when there are changes that make it look more human, we use the term fetus. Richard asked me to make this correction (embryo rather than fetus). And for those who are wondering when we use the term ‘baby,’ biologists refer to the stage after birth, after the umbilical cord has been cut and when nutrients and oxygen no longer come from the mother, via a placental connection.”
*The only ones I’ve seen are related to future elections and by-elections that arise in the meantime. Perhaps this is a realistic limit. Perhaps not. Perhaps it’s more in service of the Democratic Party than a truly progressive country.