Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
African American
Related: About this forumIt’s not about you, white liberals: Why attacks on radical people of color are so misguided
With anti-racism politics flaring up on the left, too many are making it personal -- when it's really about policy
BRITTNEY COOPER
In her recent post at the Nation, Michelle Goldberg attempts to place the dust-up over #CancelColbert into a broader frame of what she calls radical anti-liberalism. She writes:
She concludes that this most recent rise of anti-liberal sentiment on the left will lead to a situation in which politics contract.
I want to respond to Goldbergs arguments as part of the broader set of debates that have been taking place between Ta-Nehisi Coates and Jonathan Chait in the pages of the Atlantic and New York magazine, respectively. Those debates while mainly about the role, if any, that black culture plays in explaining widespread and continued poverty within black communities have as an additional and important thread the role of liberal values in contemporary anti-racism politics on the left.
There are more than a few problems with Goldbergs analysis, not the least of which is that nothing about her view seems even remotely expansive or visionary enough to halt the contracting or retrenchment of leftist politics. As noted in the excerpt above, Goldberg tellingly reduces legitimate objections to endless war (which we find ourselves in yet again) and to conservative welfare reform like that of the Clinton era, to indictments not of liberalism but rather of white liberals themselves. She makes it personal, when the arguments are clearly about policy.
http://www.salon.com/2014/04/08/its_not_about_you_white_liberals_why_attacks_on_radical_people_of_color_are_so_misguided/
BRITTNEY COOPER
In her recent post at the Nation, Michelle Goldberg attempts to place the dust-up over #CancelColbert into a broader frame of what she calls radical anti-liberalism. She writes:
One of the most striking characteristics of 60s radicalism was its aversion to liberalism, wrote Alice Echols in Daring to Be Bad, her history of radical feminism. Radicals repudiation of liberalism was not immediate; rather, it developed in response to liberalisms defaultsspecifically, its timidity regarding black civil rights and its escalation of the Vietnam War. Something similar, albeit on a much smaller scale, happened after Bill Clinton ended welfare as we know it, and its happening now, as economic misery persists under Barack Obama. Theres disenchantment not just with electoral politics, but with liberal values as a whole. White liberal has, once again, emerged as a favorite left-wing epithet.
She concludes that this most recent rise of anti-liberal sentiment on the left will lead to a situation in which politics contract.
I want to respond to Goldbergs arguments as part of the broader set of debates that have been taking place between Ta-Nehisi Coates and Jonathan Chait in the pages of the Atlantic and New York magazine, respectively. Those debates while mainly about the role, if any, that black culture plays in explaining widespread and continued poverty within black communities have as an additional and important thread the role of liberal values in contemporary anti-racism politics on the left.
There are more than a few problems with Goldbergs analysis, not the least of which is that nothing about her view seems even remotely expansive or visionary enough to halt the contracting or retrenchment of leftist politics. As noted in the excerpt above, Goldberg tellingly reduces legitimate objections to endless war (which we find ourselves in yet again) and to conservative welfare reform like that of the Clinton era, to indictments not of liberalism but rather of white liberals themselves. She makes it personal, when the arguments are clearly about policy.
http://www.salon.com/2014/04/08/its_not_about_you_white_liberals_why_attacks_on_radical_people_of_color_are_so_misguided/
InfoView thread info, including edit history
TrashPut this thread in your Trash Can (My DU » Trash Can)
BookmarkAdd this thread to your Bookmarks (My DU » Bookmarks)
2 replies, 1093 views
ShareGet links to this post and/or share on social media
AlertAlert this post for a rule violation
PowersThere are no powers you can use on this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
ReplyReply to this post
EditCannot edit other people's posts
Rec (4)
ReplyReply to this post
2 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
It’s not about you, white liberals: Why attacks on radical people of color are so misguided (Original Post)
MrScorpio
Apr 2014
OP
HereSince1628
(36,063 posts)1. It's not about you...why are attacks on the mentally ill -SO- common?
I suspect it's nothing but fucking hypocrisy
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4850870
JustAnotherGen
(31,828 posts)2. This - from the article
She makes it personal, when the arguments are clearly about policy.
Off to find someone else taking things personally a 'bro hug'.
Off to find someone else taking things personally a 'bro hug'.