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One thing that has always bothered me about progressive politics, is the constant moral framing. As this women does here Along with this comment:
"The left will debate taxes and social programs, not human rights— And why would they engage in conversations intended to reduce personhood. Like Bffr."
But here is what i dont get - why are some issues less "up for debate"? (mainly social issues, such as gay marriage) but others not? & Furthermore, why is it assumed that Democrats & democratic voters are in favor of these Human Rights, even though many of them havent been achieved or been actively worked against?
To elaborate more on what i mean. Im gonna take a handful of things that are often stated to be human rights by liberals & progressives (or at least - could be argued to be) mainly:
A living wage Affordable Housing Healthcare Education
Affordable Housing is a notorious one, and no blue state in the country has been able to tackle the problem effectively. Mainly because locals vote against measures to make it more affordable. Many of these states are also notoriously expensive (part of it is because of housing as well) And the only way to get a living wage would be to go to school (which is arguably still a failure: a living wage as human right would imply all humans are entitled to it - no just those who went to college). No state has universal healthcare. Many states also have poor educational outcomes (Looking at you Maryland).
I bring a lot of this up, because i feel like what a lot of people who think this way dont realize is that many of these economic issues effect people a lot more, and on a lot more of scale than many social issues like gay marriage do. In such way where i think one could effectively "moralize it"
Lets say liberals in a blue state vote against an affordable housing policy, think of the consequential impact of that: The poor single moms and their kids have to stay outside in the heat and the cold & if she cant find a job with a good wage - potentially go without food? Is this supposedly more morally tolerable? Is this hypothetical liberal a "better person" than a hypothetical conservative voter who would vote against gay marriage for instance? Wouldnt they also functionally be against "human rights" as well? Why is "bigotry" more morally unacceptable to these individuals than the economic problems at hand?
For the record im not arguing that being against gay marriage would be "ok". But two guys not being able to get married shouldnt be as big of a deal compared to the hypothetical single mom scenario ive painted above. I think a lot of people (the majority voters) are probably against "human rights" in some way or another - a lot of it is because actually fully realizing the right threatens their self interests (home owner voting against affordable housing, people being against higher taxes, or against poor people moving in next to them to aid with access to education and general social mobility). The apparent lack of those things mentioned arguably creates more suffering for many more people than merely "hating" gay people would (if you wanted to frame it that way).
Because admitting they are up for debate means letting opponents speak and granting them legitimacy. If you can preemptively shut down the debate by declaring any other position beyond the pale, you win.
I find it hard to believe you don't "get" this.
This is correct, but I've been arguing for some time that this isn't necessarily even bad behavior, because endlessly negotiating every facet of your existence with the entire rest of your society is antithetical to anything resembling a peaceful, prosperous existence. Such an existence depends on the personal not being political, and the way that happens is exactly by the formation of "common decency", of a set of norms and rules and behaviors that people conform to without significant argument or complaint, with those who cannot conform being ostracized.
We have to do this, but having done it, we forgot why it was necessary, and so burned down all the mechanisms required, and are now sort of rebuilding them badly, ad-hoc, and in a values-diverse environment they aren't made for.
I don't think that follows, at least not trivially. A liberal's answer - this liberal's answer, for example - would be that, quite the opposite, the personal becomes political because society ie the body politic tries to screw around with people's personal lives. In fact, I rather think that for the personal not to be political, you would need a maximally liberated society, a society where the very idea of taking issue with another citizen's behavior would seem nonsensical, if that behavior is not literally criminal. Then, and only then, can all people live secure in the knowledge that their life is their own, without feeling that their happiness is under siege every waking moment.
I am not a full-on anarchist or libertarian in terms of the political systems that I think can produce good outcomes in the long term, but I do believe that "people can do what they want forever" is an essential component of the Good, and that government is good largely insofar as it gets us closer to that ideal (with the obvious epicycles about the government being empowered to infringe on freedoms in the interest of collective survival, as people need to be alive to be able to do what they want).
Isn't the entire debate about what is and should be literally criminal? Rightists think that it both is and should be literally criminal to enter the country without permission. Leftists don't. In some states it is literally criminal to abort a fetus after a certain length of time, but before natural childbirth, but leftists don't want it to be. There are probably leftists who want it to be literally criminal to state certain opinions or use certain symbols, as it is in Europe. Leftists are often but not always in favor of more rights and fewer laws disallowing freedoms. Maybe not all debates are legal debates, but quite a lot of them are.
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