I don’t believe it’s fair to liken what I’m talking about to “college students behaving like college students”.
Why not? Your example was literally the behavior of college students.
Because you’re stereotyping college students based on a more loony subset of them? Maybe?
You’re essentially saying that the left’s problem is that “young adults” at colleges–i.e., teenagers and folks in their very early twenties–are not thinking as strategically as older people. Democrats can’t win because teenagers are acting their age.
This is not a solveable problem. If you explain Democrats’ losses thusly, you’re dooming Democrats to losing as long as young people act like young people.
Young Republicans are also playing the fool, if you haven’t noticed. 4Chan (and its descendants) is primarily a hangout of young white supremacists. How has the Republican party been winning?
By imitating them.
I’m blaming the adults who should have the good sense not to encourage young adults when they turn themselves into laughing stocks.
That video is indeed a hilarious illustration, but the illustration is of how right wing infotainers and grifters have successfully manipulated and deceived a great many people on what progressive people actually believe. These made up “woke” that have nothing to do with my beliefs or those of the great majority of progressive people I know are indeed bad, stupid, dishonest, evil people.
Effective politicking is not beyond the reach of college students. The Civil Rights Movement depended on politically savvy young adults who made the effort to study and understand the principles of civil disobedience. They turned what they learned into effective action precisely because they could and did work strategically. The anti-war protests against the Vietnam War also reflected intelligent leadership among college students.
Youth-led social justice movements have long been recognized as a bedrock of progressivism. So I laugh at the idea that wanting students to pick their battles and play politics smartly is somehow incompatible with expecting them to “act their age”.
Some college students sometimes do pointless things. This has always been the case. Are you saying this is a new problem that’s unique to modern “wokeness”?
If we only had some idea why young adults think “die-ins” for David Chappelle shows are appropriate then we might have a clue why this is a new problem that’s unique to modern “wokeness”.
I’m saying there is an epidemic of problematic “wokeness” among liberal adults that is keeping them from effectively engaging with the political system. The younger generations are most afflicted because 1) they are online more and 2) they have been encouraged toward more showy displays of activism rather than more strategic ones.
I think there’s definitely a problem with some liberal adults engaging with the political system. I don’t think it’s due to wokeness.
I don’t think you’ve made this case. All you’ve shown, at most, is a few anecdotal cases of dumb behavior. That proves nothing except that there are indeed some dumb progressives, and some dumb people who claim to be “woke”.
What does that have to do with abortion? What does it have to do with any other policy losses for Democrats?
ISTM that what you’ve shown most of all is that the lies of various right wing grifters have been very successful for many Americans - such as the creators of the video you linked. That didn’t show actual progressive beliefs (except for maybe a few random dumb progressives), but it was spot on for the lies that Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson say about progressives.
And you’re saying, as near as I can tell, that that’s why Democratic politicians don’t win enough elections, and therefore were unable to make appointments to the Supreme Court.
So give us some specific examples of this behavior by Democratic politicians. Examples of that behavior by other people aren’t relevant.
Or else explain how the behavior of college students affects who gets appointed to the Supreme Court.
Curious as to what you think the issue is?
I don’t think “wokeness” explains everything either. I see it as a mindset that is counterproductive both from the standpoint of opportunity costs and optics. But I think other social factors are at work too.
I think the answer is that RBG should have retired under Obama while the Democrats had the Senate. Further, when Democrats were in power, they should have better protected Roe. Manchin and Sinema should support killing the filibuster, making DC a state, and expanding the court. And many other individual strategy and political decisions that were made that affected the issue.
The issue is twofold:
- Republicans have become very, very good–much better than they were a half-century ago–at distorting what leftists are doing, and at highlighting the least strategic behavior of any leftist.
- Folks who are somewhat on the left but who disagree with leftists on some key issues–like you–have become too willing to amplify the Republican lies and distortion in order to undercut other people on the left, instead of standing against those lies and distortion.
The solution is twofold:
- Stand up to Republican lies and distortion.
- Stand up to leftists who amplify those lies and distortions in order to undercut other leftists.
Yes, and Greta Thunberg is revolutionizing the environmental movement. I’m not disputing that some youth are savvy activists. What I’m disputing is that all youth are savvy activists, and that we should pay outsized attention to those who are less savvy. The right certainly wants us to do so, because paying attention to them advances their interests.
Why are you cooperating with them, if not to cynically advance your own disputes with the left?
I think the issue is people with a great deal of money trying in some cases to establish a theocracy, in other cases trying to establish a plutocracy, and in some cases trying to establish white supremacy; and quite possibly in some cases thinking they’re all the same thing; and willing both to play a very long game to get there, and in many cases to tell as many lies as they think useful in order to get there.
They find it a very useful lie to say that anybody trying to point out any of the above is talking nonsense. And accepting, and pushing, their definition of “wokism” is part of the problem.
I know! Dave Chapelle is very open about his marijuana use. Clearly these kids are part of the “straight edge” movement and are protesting Chapelle’s advocacy of the devil’s lettuce, a gateway to harder drugs which could result in fatal overdoses. Hence the “die-in.”
I think it’s that Democratic candidates just aren’t as good at speaking plainly as Republicans. Take the infamous elections of 1994 and 2010 as the best examples. Clearly there were a large number of Democrats staying home. Presumably it was because of some sort of “The Democrats have been in charge for two years, but my life isn’t getting any better, so why should I vote for them again?” type of thinking. Democrats need to acknowledge those problems and point out, in easy to understand terms, why they haven’t yet been able to fix those problems.