What the left also needs is a realization that some of its beliefs are akin to extremism. And some of the left inspired policies have really really hurt and isolated a significant population. The left needs to soften it's stand on such issues.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26432620.
It's such a generic statement that it's meaningless and could apply to any group of opinions.
Usually I've seen forms like this
"I strongly believe in (basic description of X)"
"You know that's X, right?!"
"I'm not X"
"Alright, would you say you believe in (wikipedias first paragraph on X)?"
"Oh yes! You really understand!"
"You know I just lifted that from wikipedia article on X"
"Let me hear it again. Ok, that's not exactly right." Etc...
Try it yourself next time, it's pretty remarkable. They're not acting in bad faith or trying to deceive.
It's like an addict who believes they smoke cigarettes not because they have an addiction but because they enjoy the taste.
Most people want to believe they've made the right decisions (https://grist.org/article/80-percent-of-humans-are-delusiona...). They think racism is wrong so therefore their beliefs can't be racist.
I don't know a lot (any?) racist right folks, but I know a shitload of racist left and they ALL publicly, verbally, in writing, rail against racism in one breath, and then shit on white people in the next.
I acknowledge that this is anecdotal, but still...
Not necessarily.
Even Richard Spencer, proud Hitler-saluting Neo-Nazi, essentially the founder of the "alt-right", denies being racist.
People know that racism is bad, but a lot of racists will deny being racist while very explicitly saying they don't want to live next to a black person or will call the police just because they saw a black man walking through the neighborhood.
He knows that racism is not socially acceptable, so he makes bad faith claims of not being racist while expressing obviously racist views. And the problem is, it works. It doesn't take much searching to find racists that don't think they're racist. The fact that people don't think Donald Trump is racist, despite a long list of racist remarks and actions [0], is proof of that.
And of course, later, Milo Yiannopoulos later released an audio recording of an explicitly racist rant. [1]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_views_of_Donald_Trump
[1] https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/11/4/20947833/richard-sp...
The youtube algorithm suggested this to me the other day, posting it here because it's pretty relevant.
When Wokes and Racists actually agree on everything: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ev373c7wSRg
this is a good breakdown https://youtu.be/m0ZDHgD9084?t=950
Emphasizing race as the most important determinant of an individual is regressive, not progressive.
It's possible for a reactionary agenda to fall prey to the errors of its foe, and that's exactly what's happening with anti-racism today.
The only way to move forward is to tackle racism with explicitly non-racist policies, not anti-racist ones.
It would help, if you would the issues the left should soften up on.
The official right wing position towards the left is "your outcome would be lovely, but it isn't worth the excessive cost to getting there".
There isn't a sizeable lobby who is "against environmentalism", for example. There is a huge lobby who just doesn't see how a comfortable living standard can be achieved without fossil fuels.
Can you give me one right-leaning healthcare or environmental "plan" that anybody in congress is pushing that will cover every American 100% for healthcare, drugs, mental health, dental, etc?
Single-payer is the best plan I've seen because it negotiates rates for drugs in bulk - one price for all of America and the government can choose different companies if they won't play ball but it's a huge ass market so they'll play ball.
Likewise for the environment - the right tends to deny climate change is even happening, so how do they support environmentalism?
Why do the right also think it's okay to spend 700 billion per year on the military (that's more than the next ten countries combined, China for example only spends 200 billion), and the DOD is the only government agency never to pass a fiscal audit. If they're worried about "costs" then maybe they should start with the defense budget.
> There isn't a sizeable lobby who is "against environmentalism", for example. There is a huge lobby who just doesn't see how a comfortable living standard can be achieved without fossil fuels.
How comfortable a standard of living will we have when we have wars over water, and species of animals becoming extinct at ever faster rates (including the very species we eat and rely on for food)?
That answers itself - if someone doesn't believe in a threat, it doesn't make sense to invest in stopping it.
> Can you give me one right-leaning healthcare or environmental "plan" that anybody in congress is pushing that will cover every American 100% for healthcare, drugs, mental health, dental, etc?
If there were exactly 2 choices, maybe there'd be a point there. But there is a spectrum of choices and no possible future where everyone has enough healthcare. None of the plans on the left or the right are pushing for the extreme scenario of 100% of the economy is devoted to healthcare.
The right wing would prefer the arbitrary standard trades off a little less against the economy, the left a little more. Both those positions are pro-healthcare, and both are arbitrary. You're welcome to your opinion on where the line should be drawn, but someone drawing the line differently isn't anti-healthcare.
> Why do the right also think it's okay to spend 700 billion per year on the military...
US's high military spending basically only goes up. If the left wanted to reign that in, they've had their chances and not taken them. It is a tragedy.
But you're the one claiming they're not anti-environmentalism! This is literally what anti-environmentalism is [1]. You might claim that they're not anti-environment though: I doubt anyone would actually choose to destroy the environment if it had no other effect. (Other than the small minority that's in it just to own-the-libs.)
All the resistance to the actual policies is people observing that they will have markedly lower quality of life and that the overall strategy of environmentalism is explicitly to dismantle big chunks of the west's way of life. That is why there is substantial organised resistance to the environmental policies the left wants, and why the resistance is more sustained. It is very damaging policy. That is why it is so unpopular. The people it is damaging aren't going to bear any consequences otherwise.
The premise of the question is that more=better, without acknowledging more=less of something else. The argument over what gets given up is exactly the political process, and that isn't going to be fun to rehash. People throw out "what if we trade off [thing I don't like]" and the whole argument becomes divorced from what will actually happen in the actual policy implementation.
The more productive response is to lay out the viewpoint, without delving in to the theoretical justifications. The view is pithy and might help a few people understand what the thinking is.
It's pretty straightforward, everything else is frantic hand waving.
Which makes even less sense, because the right since Regan have nearly continuously run up the deficit.
> The right supports environmentalism
You cannot simultaneously deny climate change and support the environment. They are mutually exclusive.
They aren't. Eg, Germany has an energy policy shaped by an acceptance of global warming and their electricity grid is a hot mess compared to France that has better outcomes on pretty much every axis including emissions if you care about that. The French policy was shaped by military concerns about energy security.
And air/water/etc quality in the major US cities were off the charts good compared to the major Chinese cities, for a long period if not currently, and it has nothing to do with climate change.
Plus, the obvious way for the US to get knocked down to the #3 emissions producer from #2 is for India to industrialise, lifting the living standards of a billion people. I'd bet the actual environmental outcomes in India would improve if they burned fossil fuels like the US and China, then they'd tighten up environmental standards like the west has. In that instance that is a direct conflict between believing in climate change and actual observed environmental outcomes. There isn't really a question in hindsight that India should have done the same things as China in the 80s/90s and built up their coal fired power plants. That would have left them in a better position to tackle environmental issues today.
> Eg, Germany has an energy policy shaped by an acceptance of global warming and their electricity grid is a hot mess compared
They don't, because they don't build nuclear power plants. Simply put, if you don't build nuclear power plants, you don't (fully) understand climate change. Unless you have a plan for your country to use dramatically less energy (which I don't believe is tenable), its the only feasible option in the time frames we need as far as I know.
> I'd bet the actual environmental outcomes in India would improve if they burned fossil fuels like the US and China, then they'd tighten up environmental standards like the west has.
I believe there is not enough time for that process to happen.