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

[Edie]

Just a quick point. I don't think anybody on this thread is saying this. They are saying that the (class) interests of the female boss are divergent from the workers, whether male or female.

Yes, important point, ta

 

[Humberto]

u75 isn’t a working-class milure for the most part. Look at some of the posts in other forums on here. It’s middle-class guilty lefty professionals a lot of them. I used to be an anarchist but then I got a promotion. Come on, you know it. This isn’t a dig obviously I like it here, ,but let’s not Talk silly. Oh God have I just done a Magnus McGinty.

I don't think I am 'talking silly'.

Athos said:

"Leftists here see it as relationship to the means of production, whereas you appear to see it as more of a social phenomenon."

Its both. That was what I was trying to say at least.

 

[Humberto]

And if you think I'm really too stupid to realise that not every poster here is working class or from a working class background after being on the boards for years then you should stop talking silly yourself.

 

[Sunset Tree]

The main arguments on this thread seems to take for granted that identity politics came about in the late eighties or something, but that does not seem right to me. Why would for instance A Vindication of the Rights of Woman not be identity politics? In my opinion there has been no shift that marks identity politics, that is politics pertaining to issues of identity, such as gender, ethnicity and sexuality

Misunderstanding the term identity politics. I'm sure the very OP of the thread set out a definition to avoid this but most counter arguments have been based on misunderstanding the term (e.g. 'so is any movement for woman's rights bad then?' Obviously not).

This whole idea at the center of Lokis piece is about how men are now deprived of care and resources that should rightfully befall to them, because of feminism. This is by definition reactionary. The kid in his story should obviously be taken better care of than is the case, but that is not the fault of feminism

He blamed poverty and capitalism not feminism - his critique was that the feminist understanding of the issue (toxic masculinity) was inaccurate/unhelpful compared to an understand which looks at the role of poverty/stress.

 

[DotCommunist]

the idea of class primarily as 'social phenomenon' can lead us, and does to absurdities though humberto. Theres a book out, authentocrats by joe kennedy. I mean to pick it up.

As Joe puts it in the book, "A small business owner in Hartlepool is now seen as a more reliable measure of political disenfranchisement than someone from Peckham who works a zero-hour contract in Sports Direct." The book critiques a political culture that purports to speak for people and places, while serving only to turn them into metaphors.

 

[Treacle Toes]

the idea of class primarily as 'social phenomenon' can lead us, and does to absurdities though. Theres a book out, authentocrats by joe kennedy. I mean to pick it up.

Why are you even expanding on this point given that the accusations that anyone on this thread is doing that are untrue?

 

[Sunset Tree]

What he says is that it's important not to exclude men from the process, and that if you do then you feed the far right and anti-feminist agendas, which must go against any form of feminism really (I suppose there are fascist-feminists though). That's very different from saying that the process should be centred on men.

This is exactly it. If you have a style of politic that by definition excludes white men then how do you build a movement. Identity politics assumes someone is progressive or regressive based on identity factors rather than social position - a white man is in the oppressive group by virtue of being a white man. You get cred in the idpol movement for oppression status based on these identities. So where do alienated young men find their political home? Especially if they're thinking: 'hang on a minute, you're a university lecturer and I work in an amazon warehouse but somehow I'm the privileged one?'

 

[Sunset Tree]

Identity politics isn't just any historical movement which has fought for the rights of women or minorities. It is tied in with the development of neoliberalism and an individualisation of class politics. I think danny la rouge made a real effort to be clear what we are talking about in the OP but time and again we go over the same points, having to fight claims that the socialist left doesn't care about minority struggles.

 

[Sunset Tree]

identity politics, that is politics pertaining to issues of identity, such as gender, ethnicity and sexuality

This is not the definition people are using

 

[Odrade]

This is not the definition people are using

The definition is very unclear to me - besides people being wankers on twitter or something. I've read Nagles book, and it just came of as finding an easy target in stupid kids on tumblr, and doing some really reactionary attacs on the feminist, lgbt and anti-racism movement in genereal from this completely unfair position. If someone could tell me how A vindication of the Rights of Women, or The Second Sex, for that matter, is not identity politics, that would be clarifying.

 

[Sunset Tree]

u75 isn’t a working-class milure for the most part. Look at some of the posts in other forums on here. It’s middle-class guilty lefty professionals a lot of them. I used to be an anarchist but then I got a promotion. Come on, you know it. This isn’t a dig obviously I like it here, ,but let’s not Talk silly. Oh God have I just done a Magnus McGinty.

Most (not all) idpol supporters are middle-class, it thrives in middle class spaces like universities. Must be great finding out that despite your comfortable and sheltered life you have all these oppression points.

 

[Sunset Tree]

The definition is very unclear to me - besides people being wankers on twitter or something. I've read Nagles book, and it just came of as finding an easy target in stupid kids on tumblr, and doing some really reactionary attacs on the feminist, lgbt and anti-racism movement in genereal from this completely unfair position. If someone could tell me how A vindication of the Rights of Women, or The Second Sex, for that matter, is not identity politics, that would be clarifying.

Always this argument too - it's just kids on twitter/tumblr. Downplaying a phenomenon which is far more pervasive, widespread and significant.

A vindication of the rights was arguing for women to have an education. Identity politics argues that privilege automatically confers from identity status, so even a highly education woman can claim oppression points over an uneducated man. They are not even remotely the same.

 

[Odrade]

Both Wollstonecraft and de Beauvoir would argue that any man has a level of what you call "privilege" over any woman, on the basis of the world being better adapted to his way of being. Beauvoir even takes it as far as saying that everything is easy for men, because the whole world is adapted to him. I do not agree with her on this - but there it is. They would not deal in points, because that is of course a form of reification of theory that makes it rigid and simplistic. But really, you think a woman doing proto-feminist theory in 18th-century England is going to make finer points about class?

 

[JimW]

IIRC Wollestonecraft didn't think serving girls would need much education, she could have done with a class analysis.

 

[campanula]

C Wollestonecraft didn't think serving girls would need much education, she could have done with a class analysis.

And, as I recall, the entire battle for women's right's for representation (a vote) have been completely ambushed by the privileged few suffragists while somehow erasing over 50 years of intense political activity from Lancashire millworkers, Nottingham lacemakers, Yorkshire weavers (for a range of working rights and protections...not just a vote)...so that only the likes of the Pankhursts and Kier Hardy (plus a couple of token Pankhurst pets - Mary Kenny et al) are seen as the pioneers of women's enfranchisement. In every age, the ideas of the ruling class achieve dominance...while proletarian action is reduced to the scuffles of the unruly, unnamed mob.

 

[danny la rouge]

The definition is very unclear to me - besides people being wankers on twitter or something. I've read Nagles book, and it just came of as finding an easy target in stupid kids on tumblr, and doing some really reactionary attacs on the feminist, lgbt and anti-racism movement in genereal from this completely unfair position. If someone could tell me how A vindication of the Rights of Women, or The Second Sex, for that matter, is not identity politics, that would be clarifying.

This is just a drive-by posting as I'm busy with RL, but it occurs to me that it might be better if I give examples of feminists who don't come from the identitypolitics framework. The first that came to mind was Silvia Federici Precarious Labor: A Feminist Viewpoint (Very much still alive. Member of the influential - on me - Midnight Notes collective).

And the next, Evelyn Reed, whose Women's Evolution had a big impact on me many decades ago.

Women: Caste, Class or Oppressed Sex by Evelyn Reed 1970

 

[Athos]

Should have said Marxist here rather than the left, i think.
IDpol is very definitely a liberal philosophy and not socialist at all so not part of the left imo but class can and should be used in its cultural sense as well as Marxist sense by those on the left.

Yes, I should have been clearer on that.

 

[Athos]

I'd go further than that. A vital part of the principle of solidity is to give it despite any disagreements.

Yes, you're right.

 

[BigTom]

This whole idea at the center of Lokis piece is about how men are now deprived of care and resources that should rightfully befall to them, because of feminism. This is by definition reactionary. The kid in his story should obviously be taken better care of than is the case, but that is not the fault of feminism, but probably your austerity politics and conservative ways. The fight for children’s rights, for public care and institutions to take collective responsibility for the upbringing of children, is at the core of the feminist movement, it has been for more than a century, and it has never excluded boys. To use some idiots on the internet to make an argument pretending that feminism as such has no care for troubled children if they are male, is absurd and completely ignorant.


Women’s emancipation does lead to women not being compelled to submit their resources to taking care of men. We have really just started that process, so the going should be getting tougher if we succeed further. That is as it should be, in the same way that socialism would entail that the ruling class would be deprived of the dominance, care and resources they have been accustomed to, and so on and so on. That is the nature of movements of liberation – if women are not compelled to do all the housework men will have to do some of it. If women are not compelled to put care of men before themselves, men will get less care. This is oviously a hard transition, but hardly suppresion. This being framed as suppression of men is what fuels the MRA-movement, and it is not something feminism can stop doing to apeace men. So you have gotten hold of the wrong end of the stick on this one.

I mean Loki says the following things in his article which I think mean very different things to what you are saying:

Who’ll be there when the free market drops the ball? Surely social justice will be on hand to pick up the slack?

Well not exactly. You see, the last thing a lefty wants to do right now is stand up for young men. In every area of life the very concept of being sympathetic to the plight of the young male (white or otherwise) has become laughable.

So it's clearly capitalism (and yes austerity politics) that is failing, and "lefty" not feminism that is not picking up the slack politically. It's also about standing up for the issues young men have rather than denying they exist (this is not the same as resisting the loss of privilege). Those issues are not necessarily masculinity issues as he clearly identifies economic ones here, then goes on to talking about masculinity later.

This is a natural push back against male dominance and while difficult to traverse at times, is undoubtedly a step in the right direction.

So loki thinks that male dominance should be dismantled. It's not framing it as suppression of men in terms of privilege.

Can we, for example, concede that some feminist activism is unhelpful while also asserting, unequivocally, that society as a whole benefits from gender equality and that it’s the opposite of rational to generalise all feminists based on the misguided actions of a few?

Clearly identifies a particular group/part of feminism and explicitly not all feminism. Unless you are going to say that anything that calls itself feminism is beyond criticism and therefore any criticism of any feminism is reactionary?

With the very concept of masculinity up for renewal it is extremely important that we do not, in our virtuous attempt to make overdue space for marginalised voices, inadvertently set up an esoteric talking shop that sneers at the very thought a man (white or otherwise) may have an opinion on his place in this new plural society.

We cannot allow a small, obtrusive, strain of activism that views the male as an obstacle to progress pervade leftist politics because there is no progress unless a majority of men (white or otherwise) are on-board. This is surely a practical conclusion to draw as opposed to one overly-steeped in idealism. It’s easy to stay in your own conversation and lose sight of how your politics actually plays out in the real world.

Again, clearly identifies one part of feminism he is critical of for excluding men/dismissing issues affecting men, and makes the argument that men need to be included in the process to bring a bout progress. Also explicitly states the space for marginalised voices is overdue. Clearly arguing for a move to a more equal world, and that the issue is not the pain of the removal of privilege but the exclusion of men from the process.

Partitioning ourselves off from the complexity of the male experience and ignoring the implications of pursuing non-rational, ideologically driven, politically correct solutions to male violence and misogyny will only suffice for so long. If we continue engaging in our own exclusive conversations, where people must agree with certain non-negotiable precepts or be excluded, then don’t be surprised when the young men we inadvertently shun eventually find another tribe.

Again, clearly arguing for a more equal world, but that the ideology he identifies will not get us there, and the journey it is going on will exclude these young white men who will get caught up by the alt-right who present some kind of solution to their problems. I can't really see how arguing that the left needs to consider this in the way it works is reactionary - it is about stopping alt-right groups from growing. He is disagreeing with a particular part of feminism because he thinks it cannot produce ideas and actions that will lead to equality. I do not see it as reactionary to think that someone else with roughly the same aim as you has got the wrong idea about how to achieve that aim and to criticise their ideas.

Do you think this article is no different to what is written by MRAs and others on the alt-right when they are attacking feminism/feminists?

 

[SpookyFrank]

And, as I recall, the entire battle for women's right's for representation (a vote) have been completely ambushed by the privileged few suffragists while somehow erasing over 50 years of intense political activity from Lancashire millworkers, Nottingham lacemakers, Yorkshire weavers (for a range of working rights and protections...not just a vote)...so that only the likes of the Pankhursts and Kier Hardy (plus a couple of token Pankhurst pets - Mary Kenny et al) are seen as the pioneers of women's enfranchisement. In every age, the ideas of the ruling class achieve dominance...while proletarian action is reduced to the scuffles of the unruly, unnamed mob.

Very similar story in the US. And of course the same upper class types who take the credit for something that actually came from decades of working class struggle will be the ones who put their feet up and say job done as soon as their one goal is achieved, even when there's still a long way to go as there clearly was with the feminist cause in the early 20th century.

 

[Odrade]

I think the whole premise of "feminism has an image problem", and this is the reason men become anti-feminist, so what is needed is putting those wrong kind of feminist women in their proper place, is a scary, misguided and deeply patriarcal argument. Going on reassuring us that "some feminist are good", is just, very well known to me, and completely misguided. If this was the case - that facisim grows out of the image-problem of certain strains of internet feminism, the world would be very different from what it is. It would not be Hungary, Poland and Russia striding the tide of autoritarian fascism, but Norway, Sweden and Iceland (because we are some mightily annoying feminists, I can promise you that). Facism and reactionary movements are not a result of the internet excesses of feminism, no matter how much they may occur. And men taking upon themself to "tame the shrew" as it were, so that other white men might join the left instead of being scared into fascism by the scary women, it is wholly misguided.

 

[BigTom]

Well, if marxist class analysis just restricted itself to the relationship to the means of production then it wouldn't be much different from sociology would it?

Correct me if i am wrong, but i thought the central discovery of marx was the dictatorship of the proletariat.

I am by no means an expert but I think Marx's theory of labour value / surplus value (too long since studying this to remember if they are separate things!) is quite distinct from previous economic theories of value / labour value and the whole idea of base/superstructure was his, plus on the philosophical side of things, historical / dialectical materialism (dialectics being Hegel's idea but he was ideationalist and Marx introduced the materialism and historicism). I think these are all key ideas Marx introduced, for me the base/superstructure and surplus value stuff is more important than the little Marx said on the dictatorship of the proletariat. Base/superstructure particularly for the topic of this thread.

No idea about your first question

 

[JimW]

I think the whole premise of "feminism has an image problem", and this is the reason men become anti-feminist, so what is needed is putting those wrong kind of feminist women in their proper place, is a scary, misguided and deeply patriarcal argument. Going on reassuring us that "some feminist are good", is just, very well known to me, and completely misguided. If this was the case - that facisim grows out of the image-problem of certain strains of internet feminism, the world would be very different from what it is. It would not be Hungary, Poland and Russia striding the tide of autoritarian fascism, but Norway, Sweden and Iceland (because we are some mightily annoying feminists, I can promise you that). Facism and reactionary movements are not a result of the internet excesses of feminism, no matter how much they may occur. And men taking upon themself to "tame the shrew" as it were, so that other white men might join the left instead of being scared into fascism by the scary women, it is wholly misguided.

I don't think it's that at all though, it's a distaste for a pseudo feminism that won't liberate the majority of the world's women. Critiques of the failings of the left are welcome and necessary.

 

[Odrade]

Critiques of the failings of the left are welcome and necessary.

Sure, that is what I am trying to do to you guys. At the same time I obviously worry that I might be in danger of excluding white mens perspective from my feminism to the point of driving y'all into the warm embrace of Jordan Peterson.

What I see in this debate is a case study fitting for Kate Manne's Down Girl: The Logic of Misoginy. This is a great book, amazing feminist analysis, really not that great on class, but you will never find everything you need in one place. You will have to patch it together, and many of those pathces are lifted diretly from liberal feminism. One simply cannot do without. I do hesitate somewhat in recomending you to read Kate Manne, because it will probably care so little for your needs and feelings that it will make you full fledged MRAs by the end of it.

 

[JimW]

Just find it bizarre you think the concern could only be a white or mens perspective. It's that liberal politics are in and of themself not liberatory for most.
As for this MRA shit that's just dishonest debate. Despise alt right identity politics even more. Afaik the argument isn't that you exclude those perspectives, rather that you give them currency by framing the debate in terms of identity. Some arseholes then think they just need to assert theirs too.

 

[Odrade]

Just find it bizarre you think the concern could only be a white or mens perspective. It's that liberal politics are in and of themself not liberatory for most.
As for this MRA shit that's just dishonest debate. Despise alt right identity politics even more. Afaik the argument isn't that you exclude those perspectives, rather that you give them currency by framing the debate in terms of identity. Some arseholes then think they just need to assert theirs too.

I think the more fruitful approach to the very serious faults of liberalism is to combat it's lack of a class analysis, or even more on point, it's class perspective belonging to the ruling classes. If you take away identity politics from liberalism, class politics will not magically appear. Furthermore, these criticisms are different in the US and in Western-Europe. I really like Adolph Reed Jr., and his approach to identity politics seems relevant when it comes to the US, and their wholly degenerated political sphere. But this kind of approach cannot simply be imported to Western-Europe. If you remeber this sites BFF Marx critique of the German reading of Proudhon: When it is wholesale imported from France to Germany, it ceases to be a materialist analysis, and becomes an idealist analysis, because the material conditions are no longer there. One should sort these things better.

 

[Sunset Tree]

Sure, that is what I am trying to do to you guys. At the same time I obviously worry that I might be in danger of excluding white mens perspective from my feminism to the point of driving y'all into the warm embrace of Jordan Peterson

I have yet to see a defence of idpol that doesn't rely on this sort of wilful misinterpretation and bad faith

 

[Sunset Tree]

I think the whole premise of "feminism has an image problem", and this is the reason men become anti-feminist, so what is needed is putting those wrong kind of feminist women in their proper place, is a scary, misguided and deeply patriarcal argument

Nobody on this thread has said feminism has an image problem. There have been critiques of a certain style of liberal feminism on the basis that it is damaging to left-wing aims.

 

[Odrade]

Nobody on this thread has said feminism has an image problem. There have been critiques of a certain style of liberal feminism on the basis that it is damaging to left-wing aims.

We were discussing a text by Loki, which many on this thread has agreed with, where he says:

The very movement the left adopted to stay relevant is now giving it a bit of an image problem but the sensitivity around some of the issues being discussed, like gender-based violence, mean people are anxious to challenge certain prevailing points of view, even if they disagree. Not only does this stifle the free exchange of ideas but also creates resentment which can quickly escalate to heated accusations.
In particular, advocates of victims of abuse hold more influence than ever before and some feel this can distort discussion of certain issues.

Enemies from all sides can smell blood while much of the left, unfortunately, is too caught up in its own conversation to notice. Those who are more aware are either considering defecting to a more libertarian viewpoint or naively underestimating the threat.

Hence the image problem.

 

[Sunset Tree]

Loki is talking about the idpol left more generally in that article. The entire bad rep feminism has online refers to idpol libfem activism, which is certainly worthy of criticism.