I’m a capital-L Leftist, so I feel like I’ve earned the right to post about this, and I’m just going to let it fly. I don’t even care if I’m “punching up,” or “punching sideways,” or just “punching the air.” Because I don’t feel like this is something that needs to be said nobly. I think this is something that needs to be addressed with sincerity.
As a left-leaning person, I feel like one of the biggest things dissuading (potential/likely/future) working class leftists from embracing the cause is this:
There are so many “well-meaning” neo-liberal academics — many of whom are ▫️ women of a certain (read: privileged) class background — who post ridiculous rants online, or argue online, or bicker online. And because these rants are actually closed-minded, or actually biased, or actually mean-spirited, hard working, open-minded, progressive people don’t want to be associated with these folks.
These people are Ivory Tower schoolmarms, shouting into the void about superficial and pedantic things that most people wouldn’t notice or feel angry about.
I don’t mean that the Ivory Tower Schoolmarms (ITSs) are writing or speaking out of, like, normal and righteous anger. They aren’t posting rants about urgent crises, or about keeping people safe in the face of violence and discrimination.
These people are posting rants that wouldn’t be out of place in the New York Times’ opinion section. These people are writing and sharing Pamela Paul-y and David Brooksian rants about things like Why can’t I talk about my ski trip to Squ*w Valley? and If your son turns out to be trans, then who will my beautiful daughter date?!
There are actually important rants to be posted. I want to make that clear — that sometimes you do need to rant and rave about an issue. It’s one thing to be extremely mad about the situation in Gaza, to call for a ceasefire, to use profanities while you’re writing about the inhumanity and hopelessness of that situation.
But it’s another thing for a grown woman with a bad haircut and hideous glasses to be arguing bitterly about Harry Potter books with trans teens, or Black teens, or disabled teens. They’re punching down, and then they act like they’re the victim when the teens start to laugh at them.
I mention the “bad haircut” thing because it seems like many of them have a certain kind of haircut, meant to telegraph intelligence, coolness, or sophistication. Instead, it seems like they all have the same stylist. A stylist who should’ve retired fifteen years ago.
It’s galling when these angry neoliberal folks are shouting at younger people to be grateful that we stood up to The Cheeto for you, that our pussies grabbed back. These are the type of women who consider wearing a hat activism — which isn’t a stretch for them, considering that (some of) their granddads wore hoods as a, um, different way of making a statement.
I went there. And by “there,” I mean, “I am accusing their grandpappies of being members of a racist organization that could be found under the Ks in the phone book.”
These neoliberal schoolmarms aren’t posting thoughtful rants about how we need to do better for the victims of war, for the victims of famine, for the victims of prejudice. These ISTs are the smug type — the type who have read the Wikipedia articles on Toni Morrison and bell hooks, but have never read one of their books. These are the type of smug academians who pat themselves on the back for retweeting a picture of the March on Washington.
These smug intellectuals only care about theory — not practice. And I …
I don’t have the answer(s). But I think that they need to pull it together.
If they really want progress, then they will also have to take it upon themselves to actively become more progressive.
Jamais Mayville 