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In recent years, it has occurred to many people that America's left (primarily under the Obama presidency) had radically changed platforms/policies and moved much farther left than they had historically been.
Starting as late as 2013, the platform of the American left began quickly changing and shifting when Obama and Hillary Clinton (who are highly praised by a lot of leftists) had all the sudden began to support gay marriage and rights for homosexuals despite them and many Democrats being clearly objected to them right before that point.
Another thing that came into fruition around that time was the concept of identity politics - where it was meant to form political stances and laws around the wants of people belonging to certain "identities" but rather equated into endless shaming and harassing of people who simply disagree with somebody else's ideology and equating them to hating entire groups of people for simply disagreeing.
Economically, the Democrats had often generally operated on a fiscally centrist or center-left before 2015, however with the rise of Bernie Sanders (a self-proclaimed socialist), the Democratic Party had shifted its platform to adopt more socialist policies with a good number of followers pushing communism.
Many of these factors with the addition of the extremely biased left-wing MSM (Mainstream Media) spewing out divisive and often untrue articles and opinion pieces are creating an environment where one or two scenarios either take place. The first scenario is that many Democrats abandon their party and either become Independent or Republican. The other scenario that is taking place is that the people who stick with the Democratic party are being pushed farther left until the point where they are becoming radicalized - with Black Lives Matters, Antifa, and other similar organizations pushing violence against people who don't agree with their often times broken and false ideologies.
The radicalization of leftists mentioned above has been the most prevalent in this country after Donald Trump's victory in November with many activist groups bringing violence out into the streets (i.e punching "Nazis" or people who don't agree with them), bringing divisiveness to the country over non-existent or uncertain issues (i.e Woman's March, Black Lives Matter), or disrupting democracy and (unsuccessfully) preventing the new administration from working like usual (i.e Senate Democrats, Leakers, Activists).
Apart from continually losing support from the public, Democrats risk many things from doubling down on their newly founded platform and policies. With enough division created by them and the MSM, they create the probability that right-leaning people could be pushed further right and although the current Republican party is actually more centrist and liberal than it had ever historically been, people discontent with the radicalization of the left may look towards the far-right for an answer - which that in itself if not a good scenario by any means.
So if the left wants to really "save this country", they need to look at themselves first instead of the Republicans, tone down their rhetoric and stop becoming radicalized, and this country will eventually be united and not bear similarities to Pre-Nazi Germany.
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(Further Reading)
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/02/12/jim_webb_democratic_party_has_moved_very_far_to_the_left.html
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/the-fuehrer-myth-how-hitler-won-over-the-german-people-a-531909.html
http://www.dailywire.com/news/6964/leftist-fascists-are-coming-beat-you-and-media-are-ben-shapiro#
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/dec/13/stephen-moore-the-fascist-left-in-america/
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/12/02/liberals-get-hysterical-over-alt-right-but-are-living-in-their-alt-left-world.html
Interesting quote, but from the perspective of the left and those who want social and societal change, the right is making it impossible. The alt-right is seen more or less as a counter revolution and therefore some people in the left feel they have to meet, with even more force. The radicalization of any people is brought on by frustration, it pushed people to the extremes in Weimar Germany and people now. There are people on the right who are frustrated at the upset of the status quo and people on the left who are frustrated by the lack of change. If both sides want to save this country, they both need to embrace democratic tradition, have a dialogue, and understand the concerns of the other.
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DeleteI think Ethan brought up a really important point. There are extremists from both sides and we could spend the entire day pointing fingers at one another, but if our goal in the end is to thrive as a country we need to have a productive discussion. That being said, I think you need to rethink your tactics if the goal is to change the minds of liberals. Preaching that liberals are divisive and oversensitive probably won't do anything but make them more anti-right. Know your audience, and for the love of god, PLEASE cite your sources when you make an outrageous claim like the one in the second paragraph.
ReplyDeleteThere was one thing in your post that stood out me , "Starting as late as 2013, the platform of the American left began quickly changing and shifting when Obama and Hillary Clinton (who are highly praised by a lot of leftists) had all the sudden began to support gay marriage and rights for homosexuals despite them and many Democrats being clearly objected to them right before that point."
ReplyDeleteI was just curious as to where you got that information. I do not seem to see the same drastic shift from intolerance to tolerance when Obama was elected that you claim to see. Even so, are you saying that a move towards equality of all the people in America is a "dangerous" one?
I also wanted to touch on the fact that you referred to some issues as non-existent or uncertain such as the Black Lives Matter Movement or the Women's March. While you are entitled to your own opinion I would to point out one thing. If roughly 400,000 men and women came out for the Women's March following Trumps inauguration, maybe it's because people see this as a problem and not just a ploy to add “divisiveness” to the country.
I am curious to see further sources of your information otherwise you may as well be making up your own history.
To be fair, Obama definitely didn't support same-sex marriage initially. However, it feels really gross to point to something as basic as deciding that maybe queer people should have rights as this horrible, tide-turning event. That's just bad phrasing.
DeleteAlso you said, "Many of these factors with the addition of the extremely biased left-wing MSM (Mainstream Media) spewing out divisive and often untrue articles and opinion pieces are creating an environment where one or two scenarios either take place." But then you used a Fox News opinion piece in your sources? Seems hypocritical.
ReplyDelete