I recall reading an analysis of Right and Left once, but have lost the link. The basic idea was that the Right favors "moralistic" thinking, while the Left favors "ethical" thinking. We're more concerned about doing the right thing. They're more concerned about having justified motives. I think that was the essence of it. Given that they are more concerned about motives, foundational ideals, or justifications, they're more prepared to do dodgy, unethical things in service of their goals. Basically, it isn't really in our nature, at our end of the political spectrum, to be as deceptive, deliberately harmful, or cutthroat as our opponents.
I don't know if any of that is necessarily accurate, but if it is it might go some distance toward explaining why we're not very good at fighting back against underhanded tactics like we've been seeing from the other side.
I also wonder about unifying narratives on our side and theirs, perhaps because it's just on my mind lately. A conservative recently told me that his side had a single goal unifying all of them, while our side only has in common an opposition to the conservative movement. I'm not sure that's wholly true, but there may be something to it. While much has been made of the deep divide in the Republican party lately, almost all of them still share the same social and economic goals, varying in degree but not essential beliefs. That serves as a strong glue to hold together their factions, even when they are divided in one way or another. On our side, we may not have that. Where are we united? It seems like most of our unifying positions or ideas are either defensive or reactive. We're the ones who protect the social safety net, who oppose this or that right-wing stance. From a defensive position, it's hard to try to move forward. We lose the vanguard position in our culture, with the momentum and public appeal that offers. The side pushing for change is the right-wing, while we're stuck trying to maintain and protect what we have; but the change they represent is not progress and growth, but destruction.
So I think we need a unifying narrative, a set of shared and declared goals and ideals, to pull us together and help move us forward. We stand for hope and progress, not fear and hate and diminishment. We need to embrace that and work with it more often. If we counter the dirty dealings of the other side with more of our own, it's a great big race to the bottom.
Umm. Yeah, I didn't start out intending to blather on like that. Apologies if I'm incoherent or if I lost the topic at hand. Me, I may not be the brightest bulb in the brain-lamp.
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