General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: James Carville worried Dems set to lose over social issues [View all]AZProgressive
(29,322 posts)In the 2016 and the 2020 primaries which I believe cost Bernie especially in the Southeast.
I actually strongly disagreed with those Bernie supporters.
Diversity and the Weaponization of Identity Politics
Despite its success in the midterm elections, the Democratic Party continues to be divided, with one faction seeming to focus on the economic plight of working families and the other staking new claims for women and people of color. Along with important structural disadvantages, this story is part of what is allowing an unrepresentative Republican Party maintain control of most of the branches of government.
Although there are new efforts astride to point out that economic justice and racial and gender justice are two sides of the same coin, what hasnt been made as clear is that the choice is not only a false one, but is also the result of a concerted strategy by Donald Trump and his army of right wing pundits to undermine Democrats success in the polls.
(Snip)
This analysis, however, is misleading in that it fails to recognize that the Democratic Party itself has adhered to, in the words of Lily Geismer and Matthew D. Lassiter, a deliberate and long-term strategy
to favor the financial interests and social values of affluent white suburban families and high tech corporations over the priorities of unions and the economic needs of middle income and poor residents of all races. This fixation, they conclude, on upscale white suburbs also distorts policies and diverts resources that could generate higher turnout among nonwhite voting blocs that are crucial to the partys fortunes and too often taken for granted. Among many other things, for instance, it includes supporting the mortgage interest deduction and protecting educational tax shelters like 529 plans that almost exclusively benefit the upper-middle class, and that help consolidate that classs lock on the social and economic benefits of higher education. To put it in a nutshell, the choice between diversity and economic justice is a false one; the Democratic Party fails when it cedes economic justice to the faux-populist right while also failing to improve the standard of living of many minority citizens.
https://thephilosophicalsalon.com/diversity-and-the-weaponization-of-identity-politics/