General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: It would be nice if the centrists in this party did some introspection, too. [View all]Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)(BTW, this thread was not about arguing that we should have had a different nominee OR posted in any attempt to minimize those failings in the Sanders campaign-that happened, it should not have happened, and lessons have been and are being learned. But I'll addressed this since you've brought it up here. For whatever its worth, I have no personal preference about who we should nominate in 2020 and am not campaigning for ANYONE in this thread).
I think most Sanders supporters DO acknowledge the validity of your critique of the campaign, out in the non-cyber discourse, and I apologize for that failing having occurred in the campaign.
We're past that campaign, though now, at least in chronology...at this stage, is it really necessary to STILL assume that social justice and economic justice are opposed causes?
It's one thing to say we need to make it clear that the anti-racist fight is centered...but is the ONLY way to do that to KEEP saying "oh no you don't!" to economic justice advocates?
In your mind, is it STILL not possible to move from call-outs towards dialog? Towards at least the possibility of giving people you disagreed with in the primaries the benefit of the doubt in the current situation? Towards at least being open to the possibility of eventually accepting them as allies or, if nothing else, as at least being teachable?
Most of us, even if this wasn't expressed online-and who knows who the online "bros" even were or are? It's likely a lot of them were actually right-wing trolls in disguise-were and are personally committed to the fight against institutional and grassroots racism, and a lot are taking a more active role. Some of us have joined groups like SURJ(in the chapter I'm in in Olympia, I'd guess that probably two-thirds of the people in the organization are Sanders primary supporters, just from the way they speak about things).
Those who want a more general appeal on class issues aren't calling on the party to say LESS about racism. And we aren't trying to get the votes of people who are anti-diversity. Instead, we're trying to get the votes of people who voted for other candidates or didn't vote because they felt neither party addressed their economic condition.
Why is there this assumption that the party can defend diversity, OR it can speak out against class exploitation, but that somehow it cannot do BOTH?
And as we call for trying to reach THAT sector of voters(the desparate, not the bigots)we JOIN everyone else in fighting back against voter suppression. In my experience
Why assume that saying more about class and greed HAS to mean saying less about race? Why assume that is has to be "either/or"?
What Bernie said about "identity politics" after the election was poorly worded and I'd have advised him not to say it if I'd been o his staff...but that's Bernie-it's not the ENTIRE economic left. And Bernie probably won't run for president again.
For the rest of us, I think we agree with you that "there is no revolution possible without black, brown, woman, and LGBTQ liberation".