The End of Identity Liberalism

I think more simply, if you think "black" vs "white" is the axis that matters in American politics you'd better be "white", simply because there are more whites and they are going to win when it comes to a vote.

I think of the Jewish people who went down the South to support the civil rights movement, who were people who generalized their own experience of oppression to have emphathy and solidary for somebody else's experience of oppression.

To paraphrase a commenter on the Times, identities aren't a problem, liberalism isn't a problem, but combined they can mutate into a regressive form of political correctness, where the inability to move on from or ignore the identity politics (on either side!) grinds any form of debate or disagreement to a halt.

Kinda like when that college professor (I forget the name) published a paper a while back showing a link between absent parents and stunted upward mobility for their children. He was swiftly accused of racism because there were significantly more absent parents in black families than white, even though the paper said little about the disparity itself.

Decades later, deindustrialization and opiate addictions are causing the same harm to white families and their children, just as predicted. But because of the accusations of racism, the warning went largely unheeded.

The intent of "identity liberalism" (an awful neologism: I'd prefer "identity emphatic") is to try to end otherization of out-groups. But Lilla's point is right on. The result is often divisive rather than inclusive.

My white uncle is famous for saying "You should never discriminate against people because they're different. But why do those people keep coming over here?" o_0

I honestly believe Obama largely steered clear of identity politics, which is why he won the Presidency twice.

He came onto the national scene in the 2004 Democratic National Convention with a lyrical speech about all of the things shared by both people in the "Blue States" and the "Red States".

"The pundits, the pundits like to slice and dice our country into red states and blue States: red states for Republicans, blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19751-2004Jul...

And I honestly believe Obama's "A More Perfect Union" speech will go down as one of the best and most important speeches in American history, for describing the frustrations of both whites and minorities when it comes to discussing race in America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_More_Perfect_Union_(speech)#...

I have also recently noticed Obama and some of his surrogates getting in not-so-subtle digs at Clinton in recent days.

“I won Iowa not because the demographics dictated that I would win in Iowa. It was because I spent 87 days going to every small town and fair and fish fry and VFW hall.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/barack-obama-democrats-l...

Heard similar comments from former denizens of the Obama White House in the Keepin' it 1600 podcast.

https://soundcloud.com/keepinit1600

So maybe even Team Obama is frustrated at Clinton's "identity politics" over reach.