Episode 11, part 1: The Left's Identity Crisis w/Justin Charles
In part one of a monster episode, we sit down with Justin Charles of North Brooklyn DSA and the AfroSocialists and Socialists of Color Caucus. Sean is scarred by a perilous bus journey. Rachel Maddow and the libs freak out about potential peace (oh no!) on the Korean Peninsula. Democrats 'Russia Russia Russia' themselves into becoming the NatSec party. Who cares if 81% of South Koreans want an end to the war? (Not the lamestream media!)
Super deep dive: where does 'identity politics' come from? Does the left foster conflict between racial groups as per weeping moron Jordan Peterson, or is 'race' a historically constructed category with no basis in biology? Jamie explains the Marxist concept of 'real abstraction'.
Justin on how the term 'identity politics' was created by the black, lesbian Marxists of the Combahee River Collective in 1977. The gang then traces — with help from Adolph Reed and the Fields sisters — how this radical conception was watered down into neoliberal diversity capitalism.
How does the left avoid 'bad' idpol? What structures should socialist organizations put in place to ensure that racialized and gendered domination is not reproduced within our movement? Is the AfroSocialist and Socialists of Color Caucus a bourgeois radlib beachhead destined to undermine the Democratic Socialists of America? (Spoiler alert: nah.)
Part two will further the conversation by addressing critiques of the caucus before it degenerates into dragging on Elon Musk's utopian anarchist turn.
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Reed articles referenced:
leftbusinessobserver.com/Antiracism.html
libcom.org/library/marx-race-neoliberalism-adolph-reed-jr
Outro music:
"The Underside of Power" - Algiers