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

[Treacle Toes]

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.

.

Fod didn't argue that White Nationalism and/or fascism isn't id politics to begin with though. She got rightly pissed off with the bullshit comments/trolling. But you know...accuse her and build an argument all the same.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Fod didn't argue that White Nationalism and/or fascism isn't id politics to begin with though. She got rightly pissed off with the bullshit comments/trolling. But you know...accuse her and build an argument all the same.

The 'trolling', as far as I can tell, was taking the piss out of privilege theory, itself a subset of identity politics.

 

[Red Cat]

I don't think he did accuse her.

 

[chilango]

I don't think he did accuse her.

This.

I didn't read anything like that into killer b 's post either. Just an attempt to discuss.

 

[alsoknownas]

Don't think there would...

Appreciate the post, and I'm enjoying the debate.

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.

I have acknowledged that on this thread (twice actually - I feel compelled to keep acknowledging it just in case people think I don't know and support the role that socialist ideas can have in liberation struggles).

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.

I also don't think that people *have* to organise around identity politics; I just think that it's often both necessary and productive. It would be great if wider movements were perceptive and motivated enough to consistently address the needs of communities in struggle, but unfortunately that just isn't always the case.

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.

I agree, and I think we both have a similar 'ideal case' scenario in mind, but there are other times when feminism has had to, out of necessity, find it's own spaces to operate in. I would not be at all dismissive of the cases singled out earlier in the thread who wanted to vibe with other bi, Black women (iirc), or organise to challenge a lack of Black faculty members, because I think there is definitely a time and a place for that.

 

[Treacle Toes]

This.

I didn't read anything like that into killer b 's post either. Just an attempt to discuss.

Oh yeah, let's discuss something you never said, just because, you know, it'll be fun.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Of course feminism often has to find its own space to operate in but that doesn't mean that all feminism is progressive. And that's the problem with organising around identity alone. I don't share common interests with other English people on the basis I'm English or other men on the basis I'm male. So why would a working class single mother, for example, share interests with a socialite of aristocracy stock, for argument's sake, on the basis of shared gender identity?

 

[chilango]

Oh yeah, let's discuss something you never said, just because, you know, it'll be fun.

*sighs* I don't think anybody is "accusing" friendofdorothy of anything nor suggesting they said something that they didn't. But rather, that it was a good point in the discussion- for whatever reason - to mention the far-right's use of identity politics. I'd contemplated mentioning the "rights for whites" campaign earlier, but hadn't gotten around to it.

It's an interesting angle. Worth looking at imo. I don't see any reason to see any beef in this as it were.

 

[snadge]

Oh yeah, let's discuss something you never said, just because, you know, it'll be fun.

Not everyone that you class as allies need to have the same thoughts as yourself.

 

[Treacle Toes]

It's an interesting angle. Worth looking at imo. I don't see any reason to see any beef in this as it were.

Who said it isn't interesting? The point was that it isn't what fod was objecting to! So yeah, sigh indeed.

 

[Treacle Toes]

Not everyone that you class as allies need to have the same thoughts as yourself.

Fucking hell. You win. I surrender to nonsense.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Can we move past it now then? As it's starting to look convenient for the derailing of the thread.

 

[killer b]

the fuck is this?

 

[friendofdorothy]

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.

This idea of identity politics is doing my head in. I've read this thread, and I obviously still don't know what it really means and no one has yet explained it in a way that I can understand.

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.

Yes I'm really confused. I thought that was what people had said the idea of organising with similar people suffering the same oppression was identity politics, and that was the wrong way to go about it?
What framework should we be fighting within - was what I was asking in my post #282

 

[friendofdorothy]

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.

This is exactly what I'm asking. How do we fight homophobia /transphobia with everyone shouting us down as its identity politics and we are wrong to organise together on those issues.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

This is exactly what I'm asking. How do we fight homophobia /transphobia with everyone shouting us down as its identity politics and we are wrong to organise together on those issues.

Because it can often draw the wrong conclusions. For example, some forms of feminism concludes that Men are the problem. So you've just wiped out a significant proportion of allies in one fell swoop. Or the problem with poverty and/or racism is white privilege. Which presumably includes white people experiencing poverty themselves or have also been subjected to colonialist oppression.

 

[friendofdorothy]

Because it can often draw the wrong conclusions. For example, some forms of feminism concludes that Men are the problem. So you've just wiped out a significant proportion of allies in one fell swoop. Or the problem with poverty and/or racism is white privilege. Which presumably includes white people experiencing poverty themselves or have also been subjected to colonialist oppression.

Is it just me, or does that make no sense, and a repetition of what you said before?

I conclude that for example I gave before of the fight against homophobia /transphobia I need to listen to people who are suffering from ill effects homophobia /transphobia about what is needed and then find to people who are not homophobic or transphobic and organise with them. Is that wrong?

So who are all these 'allies' who will help and how will they help? Didn't notice them taking to the streets against clause 28 or in the fight against AIDS when it was still seen as the 'gay plague'. Are they ready and waiting somewhere now?

 

[Fozzie Bear]

There were a whole bunch of teachers, trade unionists and socialists etc who got out on the streets to oppose clause 28.

 

[friendofdorothy]

There were a whole bunch of teachers, trade unionists and socialists etc who got out on the streets to oppose clause 28.

You may be right, but thats not the way I recall it - will look again at my old photos. But I do remember the manchester clause 28 march was notable by a small number of parents standing on the pavement with banners saying things like 'we love our lesbian and gay children' brought a tear to my eyes. So many of my friends had been rejected by their parents.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

You may be right, but thats not the way I recall it - will look again at my old photos. But I do remember the manchester clause 28 march was notable by a small number of parents standing on the pavement with banners saying things like 'we love our lesbian and gay children' brought a tear to my eyes. So many of my friends had been rejected by their parents.

I was in Manchester that weekend to see a mate and had a lovely train journey back to London in a carriage full of people who’d been on the march.

 

[friendofdorothy]

There were a whole bunch of teachers, trade unionists and socialists etc who got out on the streets to oppose clause 28.

Actually I do recall the SWP used to turn up to anything, everything, every march going, usually with more banners than members. I had forgotten that.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

and it's also fair to say that the trade union movement hasn't always been entirely supportive of 'minorities'

the reluctance of the Bristol Omnibus Company to employ "coloured labour" (that led to the 1963 Bristol bus boycott) was, according to the management, in part due to staff / union resistance

There were at least unofficial strikes at some depots on the buses in London post-1945 against the continued employment / recruitment of women conductors after they had initially been taken on as a wartime emergency measure (bus conductors of military age were liable to conscription, drivers were a 'reserved occupation' as it was broadly thought that women could not do the job)

And then there were the London dockers who struck / marched in support of Enoch Powell in 1968

 

[Fozzie Bear]

I can’t help feeling that if you weigh a few shameful examples of unions being shit in the balance, they still come out on top with this stuff, historically and in the present day.

Maybe that’s just me though.

 

[xenon]

In the UK it was born in the late 1970s and early 1980s in Academe, and quickly spread to the political classes and those who wanted to be members of the political classes.
Back then a friend in Lambeth dropped me after I made a joke questioning the logic of her belonging to a black bi womens' caucus - I basically said "you're spreading yourself a bit thin there, how many of you are there, three, four, more?" (there were two). Intersecting identities should be, can and are used to illustrate the cross-cutting and multiplying effects of numerous oppressions, but if you take those oppressions and represent them as qualifiers - as keys to get through doors - then you generate a new set of exclusivities that could in the future generate their own oppressions.

This is why I favour the class narrative as an over-arching "basket" into which these other oppressions can be placed. Our social and economic relations are the primary front on which we, as the working class, are attacked, and currently all other oppressions are informed by that. I'm not claiming that 10,000 years of patriarchy are subservient to class, or that the history of the triangular Atlantic trade should be set aside, so that class can take pride of place, I'm saying that understanding how we relate to capitalism as a class informs how we can deal with those other oppressions here and now, and to treat class merely as another facet of identity risks missing a very apt tool for dealing with those other oppressions.

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.
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.
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.

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.
I think the left needs to take a more pragmatic (and less dogmatic) approach to these movements. They are ripe for politicising in the best possible way. Look what's happened to Black Lives Matter - true, it was seeped in academic culture from the very start - but this will be the very first time that many of the grassroots activists involved will have seen their own struggles tied up with those of First Nation people (BLM has been active in supporting indigenous land issues), white victims of police brutality, gay and disabled rights issues, etc. That came out of a movement focussed really exclusively on identity at first, but which has a) achieved results, and b) widened its scope.

Both of these are great posts. Not contradictory.

It's that bloody wheel of oppression thing, tick box oppressions. Top trumps , that the phrase ID politics brings to mind. Where as a nuanced understanding and examination of how different groups of people are specifically fucked over, is necessary. I am mostly reading this thread but these two posts stood out. from my own perspective, as a disabled person, allbeit be Working class. Discrimination, in the form of employment prospects, social attitudes, can't really be tackled by deferring to Marxion Analysis. Not on any practical level anyway. Yes I know I put that a bit crudely but I'm sort of thinking aloud.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

The point is 'Marxists' will often champion causes on the basis of solidarity as opposed to generating mutual suspicion. It doesn't claim to be able to answer questions regarding specific oppressions of the individual. It recognises capitalism as the vehicle driving oppression and criticises capital. Identity politics has no such analysis so often just seeks parity within the system as opposed to challenging it.

 

[BigTom]

This is exactly what I'm asking. How do we fight homophobia /transphobia with everyone shouting us down as its identity politics and we are wrong to organise together on those issues.

I'll reply to this and your question above to redsquirrel (i think) when I'm at a keyboard later, maybe tonight if work is busy. To properly explain my issue with idpol i will have to get philosophical about it because the outcomes are mixed, it's in the theory it becomes clear to me where it goes wrong and why class analysis tends to give better answers resulting in better practice.

But i want to say that nobody is saying you shouldn't organise together. The basic concept of solidarity - an injury to one is an injury to all - is a core idea of any practical application of class analysis. Sometimes people need to be shown/reminded that solidarity isn't just a workplace thing.

When i come to post later about the theory you'll see my main objection is based around how idpol individualises things which should be collective.

 

[Treacle Toes]

I am mostly reading this thread but these two posts stood out. from my own perspective, as a disabled person, allbeit be Working class. Discrimination, in the form of employment prospects, social attitudes, can't really be tackled by deferring to Marxion Analysis. Not on any practical level anyway. Yes I know I put that a bit crudely but I'm sort of thinking aloud.

xenon Can you expand on this please? Which approach do you think is more appropriate?

 

[crossthebreeze]

Racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism ARE all structural problems because (while they may have pre-existing oppressions before capitalism) capitalism utilises these oppressions. Sexism/homophobia/transphobia result from the gendered division of labour. Racism is the result of colonialism, slavery, and capitalist expansion (and has been utilised by capitalists to divide the working class and create a stratified labour market (ie workers with full rights, migrant workers with rights but some restrictions, migrant working illegally or the stratifications resultant from slavery in the USA). Ableism results at least partly from class society, the labour market, and the value placed on work (ie if you are working class but you can't work as fast as is needed or you need adjustments, or some you are unable to do some types of work or need care) and the individualisation of society. Where some of these oppressions have reduced in their impact or changed in how they are structured in the last years/decades its is partly because of our organisation (whether anti-oppression or class based) but also because capitalists has found a way to incorporate some of these demands in neoliberalism.

None of us (including the unions, the left, radicals, feminists, anti-racists, LGBT activists) are outside the structure of this society. We are all inculcated with racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic/ableist attitudes because we are socialised into this society - and it takes a process to overcome this. Therefore it is not surprising that despite believing that "an injury to one is an injury to all" some trade unionists and left and radical people have acted or organised in racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, or ableist ways and many have not fully supported the fight against these oppressions. It also means that many working class people who are oppressed in these ways may experience much of this oppression - violence, abuse, bullying, ostracism, harassment - from other working class people - and for this reason autonomous organising with people who experience the same oppression is sometimes necessary. Undoing internalised oppression and forming an identity/the ability to name an oppression is also sometimes a necessary process which also needs autonomy.

This autonomous organising very often is working class people [LGBT people, for example] organising together, and its a bit disingenuous to suggest otherwise. The problem is that there are also parts of the feminist movement, the LGBT movement, etc organised by people who are part of, or wanting to become part of, the capitalist class - and some of the reforms they want might seem to have the potential to change things for the better for women, LGBT people, etc in general - though of course they will never get to the root of the problem. So without a structural analysis that includes class the organising efforts of oppressed working class people can be co-opted into these cross-class movements and incorporated into neoliberalist reforms. This is what I think of as identity politics.

This isn't inevitable however - there's a long history of organising efforts by working class women, LGBT people, black people, disabled people, etc that does follow a structural analysis - aimed at challenging state violence and oppression or violence and oppression from other parts of the working class, aimed at changing unions and other working class organisations to respond to oppression or forming new working class organisations that do that, and expanding autonomous action to give and receive solidarity. This to me is not identity politics in the main (though as none of us are outside of the structures of society of course sometimes organising and analysis is influenced by identity politics, neoliberalism, and oppressive attitudes).

 

[redsquirrel]

Appreciate the post, and I'm enjoying the debate.

Likewise

I agree, and I think we both have a similar 'ideal case' scenario in mind, but there are other times when feminism has had to, out of necessity, find it's own spaces to operate in. I would not be at all dismissive of the cases singled out earlier in the thread who wanted to vibe with other bi, Black women (iirc), or organise to challenge a lack of Black faculty members, because I think there is definitely a time and a place for that.

Yes I don't think we are miles apart. I would support women staff members organising together and challenging gender equity at the professorial level in a university, precisely because I see those fights as mine too. For example the lack of flexible work arrangements and the length of the working day (at the last university I worked at lectures could go on until 8 in the evening) act as indirect discrimination against women. Making progress in these areas would both improve conditions for all and, hopefully, tear down some of the barriers that make it harder for women to progress in academia. Another example in the HE sector is insecure work, where again women are overrepresented, fighting against casualisation is both a fight for better working rights and gender equity at the same time.

This idea of identity politics is doing my head in. I've read this thread, and I obviously still don't know what it really means and no one has yet explained it in a way that I can understand.

Yes I'm really confused. I thought that was what people had said the idea of organising with similar people suffering the same oppression was identity politics, and that was the wrong way to go about it?
What framework should we be fighting within - was what I was asking in my post #282

I'll try to come back to a better "definition" of indentitypoltics later when I've a bit more time but I'd say the examples I mentioned above in reply to alsoknownas are good example of the framework that I support. Or contrast the ways to tackle differences in pay.

For example within the identitypolitics framework there is a fight to increase the pay of women CEOs to those of male CEOs, both because it is unjust that they don't receive the same levels of remuneration and because, it is claimed, by equalising pay at the top that will help women lower down the pay scale.

For my part I see that argument as both stupid and reactionary. Getting the women CEOs of the top FTSE100 companies the same insane sums of money their male counterparts receive not only does nothing for the masses of workers male and female but actually distracts from the main point - why has the pay gap between those at the top and bottom exploded?

Instead it would be far better to fight for an increase in the minimum wage or against the cuts to benefits or tax credits. Changes their would have a far greater impact on millions of women, and the ones most in need too.

 

[Red Cat]

Actually I do recall the SWP used to turn up to anything, everything, every march going, usually with more banners than members. I had forgotten that.

When I was in the SWP, around 1995, I was asked to go to Pride along with my LGBT comrades, sell Socialist Worker on the bus down to London from Manchester. I think it was my most cringeworthy SWP experience, trying to sell SW to people who wanted to party, were already partying at 7 in the morning, but actually I did sell some, and I recall having a few political conversations on the bus and at the event. I may even have had some fun alongside doing my revolutionary duty