I like the spirit of this meme, but I don’t think that caring about people and the planet is sufficient to define a political philosophy? (IMO it is necessary though!) I.e. there are lots of social democrats who care about people and the planet just as much as we do but there’s still a massive difference between our politics.
It’s possible that the differences among those wanting to do good for everyone is what bottlenecks progress. While we all fight over HOW to make the same goals we share happen and not much gets done, the ones who don’t care about what their actions do make their own progress because it’s easier for them to agree on how to take and destroy.
People don’t even agree on what good is, so there’s no way everyone can agree on what to do in order to do good. Many conservatives oppose progress because they don’t even agree that it is progress. They see a very sick society where the family has all but disappeared, social institutions have fallen apart, and the government can no longer be trusted.
Check it out, even including the partisan dimension of people trusting the government more when their party controls the White House, the overall trend is strongly negative. Just compare! Republicans trusted the government of LBJ — a Democrat in the White House for the immediate aftermath of the Kennedy assassination — far more than they trusted the government during Trump’s first term!
Democrats have also lost faith in government and not even Obama was able to rekindle it for them. This is a very disgruntled, low trust society!
Yeah, but that’s like comparing apples to fish. Those same type of Republicans convinced Nixon to leave because what he had done was dishonorable. Compare that to today’s GOP of anything goes as long as they win.
I don’t buy the argument that Republicans are good in a certain point of view, solely because when they complain about someone doing something, it’s often projection for them already doing it. There’s no values there, it’s cutthroat to win and prosper on top of other people’s suffering.
I do agree with your general point, things are very broken.
While we all fight over HOW to make the same goals we share happen and not much gets done, the ones who don’t care about what their actions do make their own progress because it’s easier for them to agree on how to take and destroy.
I very carefully picked social democrats and not someone closer to anarchists like council communists because I would argue that, except for the really broad strokes, we actually don’t have the same goals as social democrats. Like okay, if I gave you and a social democrat a survey with the question “Do you support an equitable and just society?” I’m sure you’d both check “Yes”, but you and the social democrat are going to have wildly different views on what constitutes “equitable”, “just”, or even “society”.
IMO the bottleneck comes from the fact that the various non-right-wing movements have organic differences that will result in different material realities depending on which groups succeed.
But this statement is about people. Not society. It kind of puts those boubdaries on how you define society. Has to be a thing that’s for people and the earth.
I have had some extremely terse disagreements with people who pretty much agreed with me down to like five adjectives/significant figures, as pillow talk, even. Shit happens, especially when youre doing the kind of vivid and visceral imagining a better world you do as you work to make it; i know it soubds like sort of a cop-out, but there really is nothing like it.
But i can work with pretty much any if it, if the foundation is ‘i care about people and/or the planet’.
But i can work with pretty much any if it, if the foundation is ‘i care about people and/or the planet’.
For sure I can work with them too, but we have to be ready to have these debates and work through these issues. My point is that good vibes are not enough to do good politics. Of course, people with good vibes are going to be much more agreeable to anarchist ideas, and any debates we do have will be more productive than people with bad vibes. But we still need to have clear ideas and good praxis with a solid logical and historical basis.
Perfectly reasonable. I don’t disagree with that. But we still need to prepare for the day when disclosing that coherent worldview is needed. And more importantly: a coherent anarchist worldview can inform what you give to the movements you contribute to, and you can give an honest justification for why.
That’s a good point. It’s not only how to get there, but where the hell are we going? We’re all going west, but there’s a lot of variance in that direction.
I like the spirit of this meme, but I don’t think that caring about people and the planet is sufficient to define a political philosophy? (IMO it is necessary though!) I.e. there are lots of social democrats who care about people and the planet just as much as we do but there’s still a massive difference between our politics.
Something that defines you 100% will require a lot more words.
This is a pretty good foundation though.
Yeah I’m with you there.
I think caring about those two things foremost pretty well defined the green movement of the 80s and 90s.
I simply care even harder /j
Ppl my take is basically “good vibes ≠ good politics”, why is this controversial?
This is a meme, homie.
It’s possible that the differences among those wanting to do good for everyone is what bottlenecks progress. While we all fight over HOW to make the same goals we share happen and not much gets done, the ones who don’t care about what their actions do make their own progress because it’s easier for them to agree on how to take and destroy.
People don’t even agree on what good is, so there’s no way everyone can agree on what to do in order to do good. Many conservatives oppose progress because they don’t even agree that it is progress. They see a very sick society where the family has all but disappeared, social institutions have fallen apart, and the government can no longer be trusted.
Check it out, even including the partisan dimension of people trusting the government more when their party controls the White House, the overall trend is strongly negative. Just compare! Republicans trusted the government of LBJ — a Democrat in the White House for the immediate aftermath of the Kennedy assassination — far more than they trusted the government during Trump’s first term!
Democrats have also lost faith in government and not even Obama was able to rekindle it for them. This is a very disgruntled, low trust society!
Yeah, but that’s like comparing apples to fish. Those same type of Republicans convinced Nixon to leave because what he had done was dishonorable. Compare that to today’s GOP of anything goes as long as they win.
I don’t buy the argument that Republicans are good in a certain point of view, solely because when they complain about someone doing something, it’s often projection for them already doing it. There’s no values there, it’s cutthroat to win and prosper on top of other people’s suffering.
I do agree with your general point, things are very broken.
I very carefully picked social democrats and not someone closer to anarchists like council communists because I would argue that, except for the really broad strokes, we actually don’t have the same goals as social democrats. Like okay, if I gave you and a social democrat a survey with the question “Do you support an equitable and just society?” I’m sure you’d both check “Yes”, but you and the social democrat are going to have wildly different views on what constitutes “equitable”, “just”, or even “society”.
IMO the bottleneck comes from the fact that the various non-right-wing movements have organic differences that will result in different material realities depending on which groups succeed.
But this statement is about people. Not society. It kind of puts those boubdaries on how you define society. Has to be a thing that’s for people and the earth.
I have had some extremely terse disagreements with people who pretty much agreed with me down to like five adjectives/significant figures, as pillow talk, even. Shit happens, especially when youre doing the kind of vivid and visceral imagining a better world you do as you work to make it; i know it soubds like sort of a cop-out, but there really is nothing like it.
But i can work with pretty much any if it, if the foundation is ‘i care about people and/or the planet’.
For sure I can work with them too, but we have to be ready to have these debates and work through these issues. My point is that good vibes are not enough to do good politics. Of course, people with good vibes are going to be much more agreeable to anarchist ideas, and any debates we do have will be more productive than people with bad vibes. But we still need to have clear ideas and good praxis with a solid logical and historical basis.
I can still work with people i disagree with. You’re being too online; it’s not 1917.
Me too 1000%. All the more reason why we need to come up with our own coherent worldview 😁
Im not going to communucate every single thing i believe to everyone who asks. Thats absurd. Hell i barely tell people i actually like much if it.
Perfectly reasonable. I don’t disagree with that. But we still need to prepare for the day when disclosing that coherent worldview is needed. And more importantly: a coherent anarchist worldview can inform what you give to the movements you contribute to, and you can give an honest justification for why.
That’s a good point. It’s not only how to get there, but where the hell are we going? We’re all going west, but there’s a lot of variance in that direction.