Idea: The Left has been a victim of its own success. The most talented members of previously disadvantaged groups don’t need it anymore, so political activism on the Left has been taken over by average people
Think of the women you know that are smart, confident, and energetic? Now imagine these women being expected to be submissive and told what role they are allowed to have in life. Sounds like they’d be trouble? And they were. Over the last century in the West, women fought for equal rights and they achieved this goal.
An important thing to notice is the strength and depth there would have been in this movement. As above, just think of all the women who would be trouble if they were told what to do. There’s lots of them, no? So, we can imagine that at the beginning of the feminist movement there would have been a very large number of talented women to support it. But where are these women now?
There are pursuing whatever individual interests they have. And this is where the problems begin for modern left-wing political activism. It was probably a frustration at not being allowed to pursue individual interests that was one of the motivating factors for early feminists. Without that barrier, one of the major reasons to be an active feminist is lost. This then has knock-on effects. I’ll use the example of a business woman.
Women working within the world of business can be very time-pressured. Just the job itself can fill every hour of the day if they let it but then maintaining a normal personal life, family etc, will fill whatever time is left. Even if these women want to be involved in supporting feminist causes, there simply won't be enough time to give it the standard of input they’re capable of. This then allows less talented women to have more influence on feminist activism. And this is where the real problem begins.
To perform well within any organisation, you need more than just academic type skills. That is, a good memory, ability to process complex information, etc. Emotional and social skills are essential. You can recognise people with this combination of skills when you meet them. They will be knowledgeable, rational, articulate, and socially skilled. The latter of these can present as funny, good at resolving conflicts, maybe even a little manipulative to achieve some goal. They will have a track record of performing in diverse, challenging environments.
It follows that less talented people will present as uninformed, irrational, inarticulate, socially inept, and ineffectiveness at achieving whatever goals they have. To go back to the example of a successful businesswoman who might be interested in feminist activism. For someone that is intelligent and time-pressured, the motivation to be involved in activity that is controlled by people that aren’t performing at their own level is, I suspect, very discouraging. And, seeing as they are free to pursue their own individual interests anyway, why would they bother?
This process may be at work across all areas of left-wing activism. For example, working class people now have equal opportunity, so trade union and left-wing party politics has lost access to its most talented members. Race and LGBT political activism will be affected by the same problems. Everywhere and every time left-wing activism opens doors for disadvantaged people to succeed, it reduces the human resources available to maintain the quality of that activism.
This idea can also contribute to making sense of other aspects of modern left-wing politics. I’m essentially saying that progressive politics has been taken over by people that aren’t behaving intelligently, so what kind of thinking and behaviour do you find when people aren’t being smart?
One of the key skills our brains have is to generalise information we’re exposed to. We categorise based on this. Apples and oranges become fruit, for example. It follows therefore that when people are being less intelligent their generalisations will be crude, and lack nuance and insight to deeper connections. One of the criticisms of modern progressive politics is that its focus on identity is regressive. That is, dividing people based on superficial characteristics such as race and gender etc misses what people have in common. Identity politics then could simply be average people framing social relations based on their limited ability to perceive commonalities between superficially diverse people.
Another common criticism of modern left-wing politics is that it can be intolerant, hateful, and authoritarian, etc. When people are being less intelligent, they are more likely to experience fear and anger because the world will seem confusing, difficult to predict, and frustrating. So, is it any surprise that progressive politics has begun to reflect the emotions and behaviour found in people when they are being less intelligent?
A seemingly obvious criticism of the idea in this post is that progressive politics is often associated with students and academics at universities, and people who in general are more ‘educated’ or ‘smart’. In fact, I think this gives insights into many other topics that I’ll discuss in other posts (one hint is that I describe people as ‘being’ less intelligent rather than they are less intelligent). For now, though, I'll leave this post here. I’ll be returning to this idea many times.