Identity Politics: the impasse, the debate, the thread.

[mojo pixy]

Every single one of them.

 

[pengaleng]

they fuckin stink, should be sent to camps imo.

 

[mojo pixy]

 

[pengaleng]

no, not eurocamp. a proper concentration camp. just round em up, no karaoke.

white people need to be eradicated from the planet.

 

[mojo pixy]

TBF it has been tried that other way before. Didn't work out too well IIRC

 

[pengaleng]

thats because white people did it that time, they fucked it up cus they are too stupid and white not to hide it properly.

 

[mojo pixy]

It's a great example of where the Politics of Identity can lead though so worth including here.

 

[pengaleng]

the nazi party are legit identity politics.

still fuck white people tho.

 

[NoXion]

There's no such thing as White people.

 

[friendofdorothy]

the nazi party are legit identity politics.

still fuck white people tho.

FFS! shut up! are you high? not high enough? listen to yourself

 

[killer b]

Fascism is (a form of) identity politics tbf.

 

[friendofdorothy]

I recall when I was young, hetro nuclear family normality was the only option on offered to me. My not wanting to get married when I was young was seen as a bit odd by many of my family and my peers.

In my upbringing being single, unless you had a religious vocation, was not viewed as an acceptable option and was generally considered to be sad. Married women without children were pitied. Unmarried women with children were scandalous and a problem. Intersex children were a medical problem often subjected to surgery. Everyone had to be either totally male or totally female, and being either would limit your life choices. Being a gay male was barely legal, in no way socially acceptable and was a media joke. Lesbians were hidden by total invisibility. I'd never heard of bi or trans then. This was before recent equality legislation, mostly before the equality acts of the early 70s.

A lot of the movements and actions that changed that statis quo have been called here 'identity politics'. or have I misunderstood that? Can someone please explain to me how some other movement or 'structural analysis' could have brought about the change we see in societies acceptance of people like me, other queer people or BME, thats what I don't understand.

I understand neoliberals and libertarians may have joined many organisationa now (where were they when putting your head above the parapet was dangerous - but does is there a need to demonise the whole history of our struggles?

 

[friendofdorothy]

Fascism is (a form of) identity politics tbf.

and you! FFS!

 

[killer b]

it is though. it isn't a particularly controversial point.

 

[mojo pixy]

It has to be, because it needs tightly defined in-groups and out-groups in order to make sense. Identitypolitics is all about in-groups and out-groups.

 

[redsquirrel]

and you! FFS!

Are you seriously denying that (far) rightists use (have used) indentitypolitics as a basis for organising? There are plenty of examples (some already mentioned on this thread) to the contrary.

 

[redsquirrel]

I suppose for me that is the crux of the matter - it's how these important fights around say women's right to be a part of major decision-making processes, or Black people's right to not live under the threat of police brutality, are actually addressed. I mean really addressed - by people taking an active and nuanced look at what needs to be done, and going out and challenging the existing structures.

Don't think there would by too much disagreement with that.

To an analysis where only class-based whole-system-toppling actions are relevant, I can see how much of those developments might seem concessionary and incremental. But these are issues that effect people at the heart of their existence and where action needs to urgently be taken. The problems I have with theorists who don't see the power of people coming together around their own experiences and creating learning and response out of that, is that these campaigns get continually deferred otherwise.

Hang on, that's a strawman. A class based politics approach doesn't mean not fighting for gains in the here and now, hell many of the improvements that workers have obtained have been because socialists* were instrumental in fighting for them.

Of course it's true to say that most socialist groups and individuals are wholly committed to anti-racism, anti-sexism, etc., and I know and have been witness to the bravery of those who have fought and stood up against those forces. But who was organising to go lie down in the street when Black people were being murdered by police? Who is it that is actually going to try to promote an equal space for women's voices in meetings? If we all have to wait for the left to get on board with every action, or for communities to include a class-based analysis in order for protest to be legitimate, then we'll be waiting a bloody long time.
It's pretty easy to say you shouldn't campaign for more Black faculty members, when the issue doesn't effect you in the same way (and you may not even have a complete picture of how that kind of exclusion wroughts its effects). It's easy to say you shouldn't have a women's group whilst simultaneously benefiting from an easier route to speaking platforms, etc.

I certainly don't want people to wait around for "the left" to organise things, nor would I argue that socialists should wait for communities to develop the "correct" analysis before getting involved (in fact in a recent thread when I argued exactly the opposite it was implied that I was excusing racism). But none of that implies that people have to organise on the basis on identitypolitics.

My ideal for grouping and campaigning around identity is that it serves as a university for thoughts and actions around the issues. We'd never of had feminism without women getting themselves the fuck out of shared spaces, getting their heads together, and working out what was unique about their struggle. And the results of that have been, on the whole, brilliant.

But feminism can, and does, exist within a class based framework, see Sylvia Pankhurst and Emma Goldman. And the fight for women's rights (or any other group) are most effective and important when this is the case. Syliva Pankhurst did far more for the majority of women the in the UK than her mother and, especially, her sister.

*I'm using socialist here in a very wide sense, basically all those who consider the class to be the fundamental relationship under capitalism.

 

[redsquirrel]

A lot of the movements and actions that changed that statis quo have been called here 'identity politics'. or have I misunderstood that?

Yes I think you have.

You (and others) seem to be confusing any organising/fighting against racism/sexism/homophobia as identitypolitics. That's not what is being argued, what's been argued against is fighting against racism/sexism/homophobia within an identitypolitics framework because the outcomes delivered do not really address the problems, and can even be counter-productive.

 

[pengaleng]

FFS! shut up! are you high? not high enough? listen to yourself

my point is solid actually.

I love it. I love that people have an obvious problem with people who take drugs. disagree with me > focus on invalidation using the drug habit. such a bait tactic.

-8 liberal points.

you listen to your own self cus I aint really got time to.

 

[BigTom]

Yes I think you have.

You (and others) seem to be confusing any organising/fighting against racism/sexism/homophobia as identitypolitics. That's not what is being argued, what's been argued against is fighting against racism/sexism/homophobia within an identitypolitics framework because the outcomes delivered do not really address the problems, and can even be counter-productive.

Yep, I think this is really important. I'm not sure about sexuality but with sexism and racism, it's about the analysis - why do these things exist? Class analysis gives one set of answers - essentially/crudely based around how capital uses these labels and structures to divide the working class in order to be able to more fully exploit certain sections of it. Identitypolitics seems to have little to say, women are oppressed because they are women and historically have been oppressed and still are (yes of course there is detail at a less abstract level but in the abstract I have found identitypolitics very shallow - intersectionalism not so shallow interestingly). Class analysis then leads to certain things being seen as more important or issues to organise around - unpaid housework & childcare and equal pay at work spring to mind - and that this is workers organising against capital. identitypolitics looks at things in a different way, and leads to a different set of issues and organising, and often this is women organising against men.

So when you organise around getting equal pay for women, class struggle analysis will tend toward attempts to unionise workplaces and take industrial action to force employers to pay equally. identitypolitics will tend to organise around women working together to sort themselves out. At the bad end of this it's about women in the boardroom and the idea that if a women is the CEO then they will pay women equally, about getting legislation in place, and things like the articles saying women have to ask for payrises if they want them and don't get paid so much as men because men are better at asking for more (this is an individual, not collective action - as so often I find the solutions from identitypolitics proponents are). At the same time there's plenty of identitypolitics activists who would see unionising as the way forward, but that's because they see class as an identity and recognise that in the workplace situation, class matters and/or they know it works and it's essentially a tactical play.

Remembered Alexandra Kollontai wrote about this stuff and feel this quote is relevant to this discussion, from The Social Basis of the Woman Question, 1909

The women’s world is divided, just as is the world of men, into two camps: the interests and aspirations of one group bring it close to the bourgeois class, while the other group has close connections to the proletariat, and its claims for liberation encompass a full solution to the woman question. Thus, although both camps follow the general slogan of the “liberation of women,” their aims and interests are different. Each of the groups unconsciously takes its starting point from the interests and aspirations of its own class, which gives a specific class coloring to the targets and tasks it sets for itself . . . however apparently radical the demands of the feminists, one must not lose sight of the fact that the feminists cannot, on account of their class position, fight for that fundamental transformation of society, without which the liberation of women cannot be complete

(note: "cannot be completed" means we can make gains within capitalism, but cannot ever completely liberate women. It doesn't mean revolution or nothing)

I have to admit I'm unsure about how sexuality/gender / homophobia/transphobia relates to this exactly, but I'm sure there must be plenty of class struggle analyses of homophobia, apologies as I'm not about to go looking right now.

 

[Treacle Toes]

it is though. it isn't a particularly controversial point.

As if the nazi comments were the only ones that were irksome/ clearly planned to rub people up the wrong way...ffs really? You have someone trolling the thread with 'all White people are x' comments and you choose to pick on the one person that got pissed off with that? Odd.

 

[killer b]

'pick on'?

 

[killer b]

Are you tone-policing me?

 

[Treacle Toes]

Are you tone-policing me?

Are you trolling this thread too or what? Who mentioned your tone? Twilight zone bullshit.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

As if the nazi comments were the only ones that were irksome/ clearly planned to rub people up the wrong way...ffs really? You have someone trolling the thread with 'all White people are x' comments and you choose to pick on the one person that got pissed off with that? Odd.

How are they planned to rub people up the wrong way? White Nationalism IS identity politics. For sure they're not liberation politics but both the identity politics of the left and right serve similar divisive ends.

 

[killer b]

Are you trolling this thread too or what?

All my posts on this thread have been on topic & courteous, you're the one who keeps trying to pick fights.

How am I 'picking on' anyone?

 

[Treacle Toes]

How are they planned to rub people up the wrong way? White Nationalism IS identity politics. For sure they're not liberation politics but both the identity politics of the left and right serve similar divisive ends.

Read the comments. I am not arguing that White nationalism isn't id politics ffs. Just can't fathom why anyone would get nippy with fod getting pissed off with obvious trolling of the thread and build a non-argument around that.

 

[killer b]

I wasn't building a non-argument, just replying to a post.

This, however...

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Read the comments. I am not arguing that White nationalism isn't id politics ffs. Just can't fathom why anyone would get nippy with fod getting pissed off with obvious trolling of the thread and build a non-argument around that.

I don't understand how killer b pointing out that fascism is identity politics (if I were being picky I'd argue it isn't necessarily, but dividing people by identity is in its toolkit) is trolling the thread.

E2a: actually I was thinking race, but Nationalism always features so scratch that in the brackets.

 

[pengaleng]

jokesssssss

that was worth unignoring

'mnerrrrr trolling' - classic.