Right now, I'm having trouble giving the benefit of the doubt to liberals when I hear arguments that deploy identity politics against allegations of sexism and racism during this 2016 Democratic Primary. Specifically, I'm referring to this latest scandal detailed here and here about progressive blogger Matt Bruenig's clash with prominent Clinton supporter Neera Tanden (The CEO of the Center for American Progress who has also been named to head the committee who will write the platform at the Democratic convention) in which, among other tweets, Bruenig insulted Tanden, calling her a "scumbag."
Between these two articles, one from a centrist Democratic publication and the other being more left-of-center, you can get a sense of what the nitty-gritty details that show an increasingly widening divide among Democrats and independent-leaning Democrats. The basics go a little something like this -- Matt is known on Twitter, for better or worse, for utilizing inventive language to criticize what he perceives as disingenuous politicking on the part of more powerful voices in the Democratic Party, such as @joanwalsh (a writer for The Nation) and Joy Ann Reid of MSNBC.
Those who believe Matt to be the one being disingenuous, accuse him of merely trolling women of color and acting out of a sense of entitlement as white "Bernie bros" are wont to do. Whatever the reality of each side's intents and purpose, this time, he is being accused of harassing Neera Tanden. Although they could be called uncivil or even downright mean, there's not much there that constitutes legal harassment.
Setting down my stake in this incident is not what I want to explore in detail, but rather there is a wider conversation occurring (unfortunately, at the expense of the Bruenigs whose work has long been part of progressive discourse) about Internet trolling, and what constitutes "Very Serious Political Talk." There is a far more disturbing implication of this entire debacle that is discouraging support from people who want to see America made into a better place. Why are people saying stuff like this?
"I used to believe that if you made a good-faith case to people in the media for why they should reform, some would listen. Not anymore." — Freddie deBaser (@freddiedeboer)
Our best bet is to look at Rania Khalek, a leftist and journalist at The Electronic Intifada, who did an interview on The Benjamin Dixon Show to discuss this precise issue about the politics of dissent and the failure of the Democratic Party to adapt to the shift in their electorate. As she notes, her own voice is inconvenient to the conventional Beltway narrative of painting Breunig and his ilk as "Bernie Bros" intent on tearing powerful women down in a system that has historically been a boys' only club.
Moreover, Khalek's key point is that in deploying harassment as a defense against criticism, Tanden and company are not only cynical but demeaning real and pervasive harassment that disproportionately affect women of color and minorities.
Defending Matt's passion and use of harsh language, Khalek says, "There are some things you just can't be neutral on," citing the issue of climate change as an example in which has been glossed over and / or outright denied by Very Serious People and thus duping the public into ignoring a genuine environmental issue. By extension, liberals who side with the Clintons without criticism are guilty of partisanship and forfeiting their principles in favor of a politics of fear that wields identity politics as a club to silence voices of dissent such as Bruenig and Khalek.
These are heavy allegations from the left, but no matter whether they're invoked with an F-bomb or calling someone a "scumbag," the surge of progressives in the Democratic Party has come with it an indictment of the Party's past actions both at home and abroad. And whether the ruling party elites and their surrogates like it or not, social issues including the language of intersectionality alone are not enough to earn the support of activists and radicals who have been excluded, whitewashed and stabbed in the back many times over.
See me next time for details on how socialists and progressives have been betrayed before by cowards who call themselves liberals and moderates.
"The bosses are pissing on our heads. The media say that it's raining." -- Jacobin (@jacobinmag)
