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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   28294 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 4, 2024

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where exactly is the conservation of direction here?

I could describe your allies back then, and the people who you agree are going to far now, in the same way: They're trying to advance the cause of oppressed groups, especially racial and sexual minorities.

I admit it's a matter of framing, but it looks from my point of view that it's all the same direction, even if they expanded their definitions of "oppressed groups" and "advance the cause". It's true that they've gone from supporting free speech to opposing it, but that's a change in tactics, not a change in principles, even if you have principles.

If you squint hard enough, isn't any political movement that has not already won "trying to advance the cause of oppressed groups"? That description applies increasingly well to most facets of the American Right as it fully realised the position it is in, too. I don't think racial and sexual minorities were a big focus in my environment (but consider that I lived in Germany back then). The main focus was on curtailing the powers of classical power centers like police, military and banks, and the grift and self-serving laws constructed around them. There was also a large environmentalist streak, but I was opposed to them from the start and there seemed to be enough room for a "non-environmentalist left" that could be for, say, individual gas-guzzling while expropriating big oil executives.

If you squint hard enough, isn't any political movement that has not already won "trying to advance the cause of oppressed groups"?

True, but it seems to be the same sort of oppressed groups as before. They didn't shift from blacks to Star Trek fans or anything like that and while you could argue they shifted from gays to trans people, the gays and trans people are part of the same coalition.

I would agree that opposing banks or military is deemphasized nowadays and I don't know how different it was in Germany.

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