2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: The Rise Of Bernie Sanders And The PANIC Of The Third Way Democratic Centrists [View all]cascadiance
(19,537 posts)... because they are more directly affected by it. I think I understand completely how so many POC feel like they need higher priority on the racial bigotry that is going on and trying to solve that, when they have to deal with it so much personally and in a way that people who aren't POC can't really understand. I try to. I mentioned the other day that the people I worked with as store detectives though seeming like decent people had lived in a culture that had POC looked upon more suspiciously, even though some of our security guards were also POC too. It was a cultural thing, that I didn't care for at the time, but probably had I known more POC's experience, I would have tried to work to help deal with more than I did. That doesn't mean I don't care, but as I've always indicated here, I want to interact with and have many POC friends that I talk to to try and understand it as much as I can. Can you really expect more of us when we can't experience this directly? Yes, there's always new things and ways to deal with it to try fixing the problem, but I don't think it is an attitude problem amongst progressives, as much in some cases as it is an awareness problem.
I myself have an issue I talk about here a lot that I'd like to see get more attention in how the H-1B Visa worker program has been put together and still works to take away American workers' jobs (particularly tech workers). I have personal experience with that over the last two decades that probably many others can't understand the depth I have experienced it, and I don't claim to understand how those who actually work within this program also deal with it, but I have many Indian friends who I've talked with about this, and I've seen articles to that note that many of them resent how they are treated by this program too as indentured servants.
But just because many others don't experience it the way I do, and I at times wonder how many others care (Hillary seems to want to work against our interests on this issue by supporting H-1B - at least when she talked about it in 2007). But I welcome the many who do talk about it here, and most that support Bernie and populist movements are sympathetic too.
As for social justice issues, though I'm not someone of middle eastern descent, I lived in Turkey for five years when I was a kid growing up, and have had many Turkish friends over the years, and have worked closely with good Armenian friends too, and we've talked about the many issues surrounding their difficulties too, and I feel I have more sympathies for them and other Persian friends some of whom are my closest friends who in many ways today are treated worse in many instances than POC with the anti-Muslim hatred that exists now. I try to help them with their plight, and I would like to think many POC would also work a lot with them to help them find justice too. Do you? I love how Keith Ellison as a Muslim POC works in our congress to push progressive solutions for many different issues, and at the same time is also conscious of these social justices issues for both POC and Muslim Americans too.
In general, I think we should all push extra hard to bring attention to the issues that we feel more personally affected by, since we are more of a voice of knowledge and experience of those issues, and it does personally affect us too. But I like to try and put issues I care about a lot in context with a lot of other issues and try to help bing people together where we can all work together on the different issues we face when we can find common ground with them. I think those who support Bernie I've found most willing to take this approach, which is why I get concerned when others try to demonize them for reasons that don't seem very obvious to us. Like every crowd, there's always going to be a few that don't work with others well, and perhaps are out of step at times with the notion that we should all be working together and lash out at others when they shouldn't. But they are a minority, and I think we all should be careful not to identify so many others with the actions of a few people that don't try to represent an image of those working with others to solve problems mutually.
Many of us didn't like how we were categorized in that way by a few individuals in Seattle, but I and most of those others tried to make the effort that we didn't identify the whole group of BLM with the mistakes made there, and that I have nothing but admiration and support for many in that movement standing up to cops dressed up as military with their hands up risking their lives to try and force some change. I just hope that many of you see that we all want to help support that happening. Please don't push us away and please let's get beyond categorizing each others with names and labels.