Ideological Purity is Never a Good Idea, be it Right OR Left

[Old Nick]

For one thing, it can blind people to nuance, which comprises 80% of everything in life.

Also, it leads inevitably to certain types self-appointing as political Hall Monitors, Enforcers of the Correct, constantly searching for statements and/or attitudes about which they can become indignant, even enraged, which then leads directly to complaining. Or, to use a less charitable word, whining.

No website, no forum, no discussion of any kind, whether Democratic, Republican, Progressive, Libertarian, Socialist, Authoritarian, Religious or Atheistic ever benefits from such hypervigilance.

[nc4bo]

1. Our D's lost many elections but our DEMOCRATIC POPULIST/PROGRESSIVE down ballot ideals won.

And I think there are going to be quite a few people who are or will be very upset and stressed by that fact.

Now if only the Democrats would just read the damn signs............

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

2. And also doesn't exist.

People who throw around words like 'purity' throw them around so often as to be meaningless. When they talk about 'purity', they mean 'anyone even slightly farther away from the mythical center than myself'. Rather than accept that our leaders can, and even should, be even the slightest bit farther to the left than they are, they proclaim anyone desiring such to be looking for 'purity', and instead proclaim that 'pragmatism' and being 'realistic' demand that we instead move ever further to the right, and that our politicians are superbeings for having realized the need to do so more than the ignorant people who refuse to vote for them when they do so.

Colour me unimpressed by those who deride 'purity' without even knowing what true 'purity' would look like.

[Old Nick]

5. True "purity"? Easily defined!

For what is the truest purity if not murderous extremism?

[MannyGoldstein]

6. You're defining "purity" as "engaging in wholesale slaughter"?

First off, that would make you're OP's hypothesis a tautology.

Second, what about, say, purist pacifists? I don't think that definition of "purity" works.

[Marr]

7. Apparently the new sales pitch is "only Stalin wouldn't want corporate Democrats

running the party".

Being kicked out of the party and not running it are two different things.

[wyldwolf]

19. PURGE the heretics!

[LWolf]

17. +1

[CrispyQ]

24. This is the best response to the purity comment I've ever read.

[Vattel]

3. How would you define ideological purity?

[TheKentuckian]

4. Standards do not equal purity as some folks seem to so feverishly work to conflate.

The boat can only be rowed into so many directions at once and it ain't many apparently, and it seems to all but inevitably break in the same ways.

The everything and yet nothing party is marketing nonsense and you can be damn sure it actually will be about something and that something is a scam for the benefit of the usual suspects, you know the ones sitting pretty, all fat and fucking happy.

Yes, the wicked fucks who have the nerve to turn around and blame the people under the shitpile.

Do you think they will allow some random blob to run around undirected? Of course not. They will buy that shit.

[madfloridian]

8. Purity's been used to make people with passion and beliefs sound bad.

It's a term too often applied to liberals in the party.

Of course there is room for standing up for beliefs and standards.

[madfloridian]

9. Want to know what I think of the word "purity" applied to liberals?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025823760

[silvershadow]

10. That's why I will just stick with my pick. No matter the consequence to party. I'm done playing.nt

[AverageJoe90]

11. I have to agree, mostly.

Unfortunately, the past few years in particular have shown that the Left in general has had a rather significant problem with this, and it doesn't seem to be getting any better.....and, sadly, from the looks of it the feminist and social justice movements may be suffering from some of the worst of it(we've seen that unfold here on DU, btw.). We now have people like Mikki Kendall, Suey Park, Brittney Cooper, and Chauncey DeVega, etc. taken quite seriously by a small, but seemingly increasing number of, well, dogmatists(I'm sorry, but how else can I say it!) even when they're all off base more often than they hit on the truth, simply because the message happens to be in vogue.

I was circling around many of the "official&quot I guess one could say) anti-racist circles several years ago, and very rarely did this stuff get taken to such levels of absurdity we're seeing now. I remember getting some good info, and seeing some good discussions, from folks like One People's Project, Nikki Nichols, and Anti-Racist Action, and several of the Indymedia outlets, amongst others; whatever we might have disagreed on, it was pretty rare that any serious fights followed(and "white privilege" was hardly ever used in the literal context it often is now!). And I also became a bonafide feminist in late 2009, early 2010, and I don't remember "white cis male privilege" or "rape culture", etc. being thrown around much, if at all; now, granted, this was the YouTube community, which hasn't grown much since those days.....which was primarily sex-positive, and more pragmatic. There was some really awesome stuff coming out of there.....even with the occasional disagreements.....not quite like what we've seen in more recent times. It seems that things really were better back then.

And, of course, overdoing purity in regards to the Democratic Party.....is, honestly, way too fracking complicated to even try to discuss. So I've stuck with what I know best.....(and no, I don't claim to know every little thing there is, by the way. Just my own personal experiences and observations.....though I'm certainly not alone)

[AgingAmerican]

12. It's a strawman

Used to attack anyone with any liberal beliefs

[Quantess]

13. Do you agree that "the left" has moved to the right,

and that "the left" in the US would be considered middle of the road, and Obama center-right, in much of europe?

If so, what does ideological purity even mean, when left and right are relative?

[wyldwolf]

20. No, and we're not in Europe.

[Quantess]

22. No, the left hasn't moved ever so gradually to the right?

To me, it is clear that viewpoints that were once considered moderate are now seen as "left" or liberal.

I actually am in europe, partly because american politics piss me off so much.

[wyldwolf]

23. No, the left hasn't moved ever so gradually to the right

All issues considered, I'd say no.

Even Barney Frank said, in 2012, Democrats in Congress were more liberal than any time he'd been there.

As for Europe? My primary concern is American politics.

[Quantess]

25. Fair enough, we are mostly talking about the US.

My point is that ideological purity does not exist in reality, not in a democracy. To suggest that the democratic party is anything close to ideological purity (as the OP implies) is ludicrous.

[wyldwolf]

26. True, ideological purity does not exist in reality, not in a democracy.

But calls for it does, which causes divisions, and that is a problem.

[Quantess]

28. Yeah well those few individuals shouldn't expect to get their way.

I just think the idea that there are large numbers of "purists" having a say within the democratic party is at best a wild exaggeration and at worst a lie.

[wyldwolf]

29. they do exaggerate their numbers, yes. But they actually believe it.

A common belief on DU is there is a secret majority of 'progressives' in deep cover, ready to rise up in red states if they get an ideologically pure candidate. I imagine them as dozens of Linuses waiting for the Great Pumpkin.

[1StrongBlackMan]

31. +1 ...

[IVoteDFL]

15. Idealism has been winning elections for tea party Republicans

Who is to say it wouldn't work for us? Why can't we listen to the idealists to find ways to improve? We can maybe learn a thing or two. Republicans have been blindly following tea party ideals for eight years now and those dumbasses win elections. Why can't it be time to introduce Americans to some liberal ideals? Being middle of the road hasn't gotten us very far.

[wyldwolf]

30. isn't idealism that's made it successful. It's an astroturf movement financed by rich benefactors.

With enough money, simon-pure progressives could also make a splash.

[mmonk]

16. I find Republican economic policies damaging.

So therefore, I don't plan to vote for Democrats that support it any longer. Call it what you will. I call it voting in my best interest.

[wyldwolf]

18. I think we should all accept 'traditional Democratic' ideals

Expanded Suffrage - voting rights should be extended to all white men.

Manifest Destiny - white Americans have a destiny to settle the American West and to expand control from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific and that the West should be settled by yeoman farmers.

Strict Constructionism - a federal government of limited powers.

Laissez-faire Economics - Complementing a strict construction of the Constitution, a hands-off approach to the economy

Who else believes in 'traditional Democratic' ideals?

Jackson - what a great Democratic president who built a coalition of voters and led our party with strength and grace! Everyone fall in line.

[Boom Sound 416]

21. Agreed

[mazzarro]

27. Same goes for unprincipled politicking as well - my friend! -- n/t

[WorseBeforeBetter]

32. Hope you're enjoying those election losses.

I'm not. But I am enjoying the *purist* victories on marriage equality and legalization. And the Democrats who swept every Wake County commissioner seat by campaigning as UNITED Democrats on the very pure and anti-Republican topic of mass transit.

Thanks for the lecture, but you, like everyone else on this board who has attempted to control discussion (and emotion), will fail miserably.

Stand back and let everyone else do the work.

[WinkyDink]

33. It's kind of hard to know what is "purity" any more.

[onecaliberal]

34. I agree in part.

But you've got to stand for something like oh I don't know, the party platform perhaps...

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

35. Or, party purity. As in, My Party, Right or Wrong.

[Old Nick]

36. Kick

Just to let everyone know what the spate of pro-purity threads has been about. I'll let the two other members whose posts have prompted the backlash identify themselves. Or not, as they wish. (And, if they don't, I can't really say that I blame them.)

[Rex]

37. First it was a purge, then it is purity.

Such garbage.