Though we still tend to see politics in terms of Left vs Right, there really isn't much of the Left anymore. The group most closely identified with the Left in American politics is the Jews, but Jews are the most powerful and privileged people in America. They have vast fortunes to protect and unprecedented control of society. To be sure, leftist ideologues can comprise the establishment in a society--consider Stalin in the USSR or Mao in Red China--, but today's 'leftist Jews' are no more socialist than today's Chinese Communist Party members are communist. Jews are simply too rich and privileged to count as genuine leftists. And if leftism means universalism and equality, that is not what Jews are after in America. Jews seek to safeguard their special privileges and powers, and they prefer multicultural diversity to play the game of 'divide and rule' among the various gentile groups. Though Jews are the richest, they hide as 'whites' and then blame 'white privilege' for the problems of blacks and Hispanics. By 'white privilege', Jews imply wasp or white gentile privilege, not Jewish privilege. Though Jews are richer than white gentiles, Jews pose as the compassionate allies of poor oppressed blacks and Hispanics. This is all just a ploy for Jews to keep the power and privilege. Jews are experts at the con game.
The academia is full of leftist, neo-Marxist, and socialist Jews, but these Jews don't want the end of capitalism. They know that their own privilege depends on it. They critique capitalism in order to extort money and support from capitalists. They are willing to be bought off by the rich, and the rich are willing to gain moral/intellectual capital by allying with 'radical' intellectuals. Similarly, 'radical' and 'subversive' artists want to be bought off by rich art collectors, and rich art collectors want the cachet of 'culture edginess' by associating with 'radical subversives'. It's all a symbiotic relationship.
Jews know history. They know communism didn't go well for Jews. Soviet communism favored gentile machine politics--Stalin was like the Mayor Daley of old of Russia--over Jewish genius and brilliance. For Jews to have to power over gentiles, they need capitalism and individualist meritocracy. But Jews also know that Jewish success can breed resentment among gentiles, and therefore, rich Jews ally with leftist intellectual Jews and together they make a lot of noise about 'social justice'. And so, a billionaire Jewish liberal is more likely to berate a white conservative hillbilly for his greed than vice versa. The Jewish liberal has billions while the white hillbilly is afraid of losing his lowly job to a less qualified black or Hispanic, but super-rich Jew plays Mr. Compassion while the hillbilly is said to have a cold cold heart.
Jewish leftists want to lead a life of privilege by reading and writing books, attending cocktail parties, teaching in colleges, traveling around the world to various conferences, and etc. As such, they must play the role of social critic, and so, leftism is their natural mode. And some do pose as genuine 'radicals'. But in fact, they don't want to live in a real communist or socialist system. In a communist/socialist system, the government has to do all the heavy lifting in commanding the economy. Why not leave all the heavy lifting to capitalists and then soak up some of their wealth through grants, non-profit organizations, think tanks, and etc.? This way, capitalists serve as the goose that lays the golden egg that provides funds to leftists to live their 'life of the mind'. It's like what Richard Posner said about 'success': it should be encouraged so that the 'greedy' will work hard and pay taxes so that intellectuals like Posner can lead the life of a prophet-intellectual.
Since true leftism is dead and since liberals now make up the most of the super rich--and affluent urban class--, what goes by the name of progressivism is mostly trivialities like 'gay marriage' and 'slut pride'. Or empowerment via 'vagina' talk. Since the tradition of leftism is 'fighting against oppression' and since there is no oppression to fight against, the 'new left' cooks up new hysteria to make believe that they are still resisting some great evil. So, if conservatives think affluent women should buy their own birth control pills, it's 'war on women'. If sane people think 'gay marriage' is ridiculous, they are evil 'homophobes' of the new grand inquisition. And if a restaurant chain donates to Christian organization that stands for traditional marriage, cities like Chicago vow to ban the company from operating in the city. In this day and age, the great evil oppressor is some chicken restaurant whose owner believes in traditional marriage. As many gays are part of the new global aristocracy, this drive for 'gay marriage' is really an elite or elite-serving issue. It has no bearing on most people, especially poor people.
Anyway, the amusing thing about the 'new leftism' or new progressivism or whatever you call it is that it's so 'conservative', at least in style. This is why the notion that liberalism finally triumphed over conservatism is partly true, partly false. Even if this was part of the Saul Alinsky trick to sneak in radicalism by the guise of 'conservatism'--like Obama sold as the New Reagan--, the 'radicals' have accumulated too much power, wealth, and privilege to really upset the system.
What goes by liberalism today is so different from liberalism of yesteryear. What goes by 'leftism' has no resemblance to leftism of yesteryear.
Consider gays. Homosexuality used to be seen as a decadent bourgeois disease by leftists, but today, gay issues make up the main core of 'new leftism'. If most gays were poor or oppressed, this might have a leftist ring to it. But gays are the most powerful and privileged people in America after the Jews. If anything, gays have long been favored in many elite positions by other gays and by liberals and Jews. Indeed, Jews, the most powerful people in America, have made gays their #1 allies. Obama and his mulatto crew essentially take orders from Jews and gays.
Most people are, of course, sheep. Though blacks have been among the most anti-gay people, many have almost overnight switched to supporting 'gay marriage' because brotha Obama done it. This is how most people think and act, and this is as true on the Right as on the Left. Look how so many conservatives blindly supported many of George W. Bush's anti- or non-conservative programs simply because a 'conservative' guy happened to be president. American conservatism used to be critical and suspicious of Jewish power, but ever since neocons entered the party, the GOP is a bastion of Jew-love-fest. And if Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity were to come out for 'gay marriage', it will be only a matter of time before most conservatives sheepishly follow along. If you change the head, body will follow. Most people don't know how or what to think. They need others to do the thinking for them. They may initially resist new ideas, but as long as their leaders insist on them, they will follow along soon enough. Today, the likes of Rand Paul and Rich Lowry weep when they listen to MLK's silly pompous speeches.
Anyway, consider the triumph of the 'conservative style' among the new liberals. Gays in the 60s and 70s used to be wild, flamboyant, and scandalous. They used to emphasize how they were different from mainstream conservative square society. They defined themselves by rejecting social norms. Today, gays go for a style that is often more conservative and square than that among many conservatives. Many gays go for respectability, middle-class-ness, green lawns, and tidiness. Partly, this was the result of the AIDS epidemic, but it also had to do with the maturing of the gay movement. Everything goes through a wild youth phase. Eventually, it grows up, and gays today are more into finding a stable place in society than rocking the order. Though 'gay marriage' is ridiculous and undermines fundamental moral principles, the fact is gays want to adopt the conservative style of 'family values'.
And consider feminists. In the 60s and 70s, many refused to wear make up. Some were said to have burned bras though that may be an urban legend. Many wore grungy clothes and tried to look as unsexy as possible. Look at the old picture of Hillary. They refused to be 'sex symbols' or 'sex objects'. This was a time when John Lennon was lauded by feminists for his song, "Woman Is the Nigger of the World". Carole King on the cover of TAPESTRY looked down-to-earth. She sang "Natural Woman", a quasi-hippie sentiment that rejected womanhood as defined by cosmetics and dresses.
Feminism also used to be anti-capitalist and anti-male. It was about the Sisterhood in Overalls. But this hardline radical neo-puritan feminism lost its appeal, and the new feminism defined by Camille Paglia, Naomi Wolf, Susan Faludi, and others emphasized new interests and concerns. Wolf who denounced the 'beauty myth' later came out with a book saying it was great to want to look beautiful and sexy. It was okay to be a sex symbol.
The Anita Hill trial and the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal both undermined old feminism. Most people weren't impressed by Anita Hill, and feminists who'd howled about 'sexual harassment' had egg on their faces as they tried to defend Bill's many sexual abuses in high office. But more importantly, the rise of Rap made it difficult for feminism to bitch about 'misogyny'. It was one thing to denounce white rocker misogynists, but it might be 'racist' to denounce blacks. Also, rap was seen as the vehicle of interracism and pro-miscegenation--as were the likes of madonna. All such things were raw, trashy, and pornographic, and feminists had to make peace with them in order to maintain the alliance with blacks and to pander to new generation of young girls who were into pornographic pop music.
Today, feminists have no objection to shows like SEX AND THE CITY. It's about women as sex objects, but I suppose they are 'empowered' sex objects since they are 'independent' and sleep with lots of men. In the 70s or even 80s or 90s, it might have been racy to erect the Marilyn Monroe statue in Chicago, but there's been no opposition from feminists today.
Of course, pro-sexualism isn't necessarily conservative. Many traditional conservatism have a low opinion of overt sexuality. On the other hand, if 'male chauvinism' and 'sexism' are right-wing, the new feminism has made peace with the 'objectification' of female sexuality. It is to be marketed and sold like meat. There is pride in being a 'slut'. It's okay for women to talk about what to do with their vagina than what to do with their brains. And new feminism is all about looking good, narcissism, make up, and wearing sexy clothes. It's also very pro-capitalist despite the lingering 'leftist-socialist' rhetoric. While the likes of Sandra Fluke want free birth control pills, their real goal is to land a gig in the private sector and make lots of money and get hitched to some rich guy.
Now, consider blacks. Though much of the black community is still dysfunctional--and will likely remain that way forever--, the new black elites have molded themselves on the 'conservative style'. Obama is really the posterchild of this. He is faithful to his wife, indeed even more so than many white conservative males. Though he sometimes plays black politics, he is careful not to fall into the trashy hostile mode of older/other black leaders and politicians. Obama isn't ideologically conservative and hates white conservatives, but his style isn't 'radical' or 'black nationalist'.
Look back to the 60s, a time of the Black Panthers, Muhammad Ali, Stokely Carmichael, the giant Afro, and etc. Blacks back then were going out of their way to show how they were different from white society. While in many ways black community is still divided from the white community, a new leadership of the black community has arisen that is more willing to work with and cut a deal with the white community. Jesse Jackson Jr. is a piece of booger but not the hothead bigshot his father was. Al Sharpton has considerably toned down his style after seeing what 'going along' has done for Obama. Though a lot of blacks are too dumb and backward to take part in this new black privilege, the new 'conservative styled' blackness as defined by Obama is having an impact on the behavior and attitudes of the new black elites. Instead of pitting themselves against all whites, they figure they have much to gain by going along with Jewish elites, gays elites, and SWPL elites. Who would have thought that we'd see a day when even big tough black athletes would get on their knees and apologize to gays for saying 'faggot'? Ironically, the conservative-stylization of blacks is being achieved by the way of 'conservative styled' gay power. Wild crazy gays of the past and wild crazy blacks of the past were happy to be wild and crazy. But the 'conservative styled' respectable gays of today use their power to tame blacks to act more 'conservative' in their demeanor. Black rappers may still talk trash, but they are more careful than in the past about the shit they say. In a way, I suspect all the brouhaha about Don Imus's 'nappy headed ho' remark was a roundabout way to tone down black rappers and the like. By making a big stink about the awfulness of such 'racist remark', the media was sending a message to the black community as well that to talk in such manner isn't very very bad.
And there are the Jews. Jews today may be as liberal as in the past, but they are not radical-liberal in style. We don't see the kind of fireworks once spewed by Dershowitz. The Woody Allen style of the crazy neurotic Jew is out. Instead the big Jew of the 90s was the yuppie-ish Seinfeld. The Jewish style has become more hunkered down, milder, friendlier. Sarah Silverman is more an anomaly than the rule. In this age of political correctness--a form of 'leftist' conservatism to control behavior and enforce 'community standards'--, we don't have free speech loonies like Lenny Bruce anymore. If anything, most Jews are eager for 'hate speech' laws. Such laws are not conservative in substance--if by 'conservative' we mean white conservatism--, but it is conservative in style and spirit. Jews, having gained great power, are trying to preserve/conserve their elite status by creating a new order of ideological conformism and consensus. As Steven Pinker said in his new book, we need ever more social controls to tame mankind into 'better angels'. Cass Sunstein is working in the same spirit with the method of 'nudging'. Whatever happened to the anarchic freedom-loving Jews of old.
But then, none of this should be surprising. Though Jews still profess to hate 'fascism', they've adopted fascist modes for the preservation of Israel, and they've used the fascist aesthetics to formulate the new blockbuster product in Hollywood. Look at all the superhero war porn movies. And 'new leftism' isn't so much about 'fighting the power that be' as 'empowering oneself via the will to power'. Jews are anti-fascist in substance but have adopted fascism as a marketable narcissistic style. Funny world we are living in.
No comments:
Post a Comment