Does the actual "Left" even exist anymore? - Or, is it just edgy kids LARPing?

[Tardar the Barbarian]

I'm sure that those who've noticed it can attest that, for the past few years now, those claiming to be left leaning and the avowed enemy of capitalism still consoom and suck millionaire dongs if they happen to be hot enough, or happen to hold the right opinion.

You can do blatant human rights violations so long as the one doing them is a transgender woman of color, otherwise, it's not the "right" person doing it. Therefore, it's like the greatest sin ever committed, but when a diversity hire is the one holding the whip, it's suddenly empowering, revolutionary and the greatest thing ever.

I feel ridiculous just typing that, but that's literally what's happening these days. The Right has its share of retards, but heaven forbid that they're not always getting tarred and feathered.

These people don't actually care about human rights, equality, or any of those worthless buzzwords that they toss around so long as it makes them feel powerful.

 

[milk]

I'm not sure agreeing with the status quo and installing ideology from mainstream figure heads is "edgy" at all.

 

[axfaxf]

I didn´t leave The Left, The Left left me. And I suspect a lot of people feel the same way, since it was a meme some time ago.
And it will all come crushing down on their sorry asses, I´m afraid. As spoken by a great white supremacist :
“You can fool all of the people some of time; you can fool some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time.”

TL;DR: Learn to code.

 

[Tardar the Barbarian]

I'm not sure agreeing with the status quo and installing ideology from mainstream figure heads is "edgy" at all.

To them, it is, and that's what's alarming.

 

[TFT-A9]

The simplifications of "left" and "right" have been unhelpful for a while now really.

Edgelords gonna edgelord, they'll take whatever excuse is most appealing or convenient for them

 

[Pimpleking55]

Yes and no, in my opinion the "left"has split in 2 groups:
1. The traditional left who uphold those values and seek improvement through humanism and compassion.

2.The insane woke left who mistake fascism and oppression with progressiveness and have created nothing more than a new religion,
and are guilty of al the things they are saying to be against.

For some insane reason number 2 has become the norm....

 

[Haim Arlosoroff]

If you mean Class-oriented leftism, its scattered to the winds once Occupy Wall Street was destroyed by identity politics. Professors, Press, and Politicians now push Race-oriented politics each for their own selfish reasons and to the worsening of social conditions.

• Democrats want grievance-based voting blocs for the ease of rounding them up and sending them to the polls.
• The press are named after the thing the internet replaced, the printing press, and as such are dinosaurs looking for any way to persist and for them that is getting eyeballs through yellow journalism. Only delegitimization via the conditions of the great depression sobered the public masses against idiot journalists and rewarded smart insight again. So it will be again.
• Academics likewise enjoy the fame that comes from presenting a solution, correct or not, to the public and raking in the social credit score.

This process is now far too escalated to be solved by simple easy solutions but the economic and political cost of internationalist capitalism unquestioned and embraced in the 90s by leftist traitors like Bill Clinton and Tony Blair (if they even ever believed) has not yet fallen on the heads of enough people. Nor are there loud enough voices doomsaying in exact enough detail so that the continuing decline cannot be ignored and the true leftists reluctantly given the political capital to solve the Neoliberal Question.

 

[Megaroad 2012]

Im right here, faggot

 

[Brigada]

I'm sure that those who've noticed it can attest that, for the past few years now, those claiming to be left leaning and the avowed enemy of capitalism still consoom and suck millionaire dongs if they happen to be hot enough, or happen to hold the right opinion.

You can do blatant human rights violations so long as the one doing them is a transgender woman of color, otherwise, it's not the "right" person doing it. Therefore, it's like the greatest sin ever committed, but when a diversity hire is the one holding the whip, it's suddenly empowering, revolutionary and the greatest thing ever.

I feel ridiculous just typing that, but that's literally what's happening these days. The Right has its share of retards, but heaven forbid that they're not always getting tarred and feathered.

These people don't actually care about human rights, equality, or any of those worthless buzzwords that they toss around so long as it makes them feel powerful.

depends on what ''left'' youre talking about. since you said enemies of capitalism im not sure who you exactly mean. do you mean liberals like the democratic party or straight up marxists? all the commie and anarkiddy hangouts ive visited regularly make fun of liberals with phrases like ''MORETRANSWARCRIMINALS'' then again the very same people all celebrate when a celebrity says trans rights so theyre still hopeless consoomers.

a big problem with the anti-capitalist left in america is that they dont properly read the original theory that their ideology is based on instead they supplement their ''revolutionary workers movement'' with queer theory and academic feminism both of which are more of a middle to high class thing and not something the actual working class has any investment in. thats why they seem so insane when their views on class and progressivism clash (some examples being them wanting no borders despite that being incredibly bad for the american physical labourer or hating the rich while having to praise them since rich people are most likely to be pro whatever progressive movement the commies currently support). on the outside they play the big communist revolutionary and have a worker focused aesthetic on the inside theyre nothing more than radical neoliberals who larp about hating the rich.

 

[kadoink]

I think the left got so out of control they split up into groups and the traditional left that most of us got used too in the 90s and 2000s has been replaced by a circus and the DNC has been enabling them as much as possible. They've ruined their own party with identity politics and have gotten a free pass to act as retarded as they want and because they got every braindead retard who supported them that Trump was the second coming of Hitler instead of the generic opportunistic crook he is, everyone was ok with them acting like clowns.

Its gonna come crashing down on them, pretty soon if we're lucky. Should be an interesting show.

 

[Save the Loli]

Left vs right is almost entirely obsolete now, politics are now basically "closed" (nationalists, etc.) vs "open" (neoliberals, multicult stuff, etc). We keep thinking, there are still conservatives and liberals or a right-wing and left-wing but there really aren't because all of those groups fractured into a million pieces and reoriented with the "closed" or "open" system.

Look at the "European far right" for instance. Barely any of those politicians or their supporters are actually "far-right" and are a mix of people disillusioned by how modern social democracy is all about the rapefugees and troons and conservatives actually wanting to conserve something. In most of Europe the "far-right" party is usually one of the furthest left economically (although they're usually just centrist, but the "socialists" are all about neoliberalism in Europe now so they're centrist too).

Your anti-globalists will include Trump-style conservatives, the "European far-right", the actual far-right i.e. neo-Nazis, some black supremacists, some extreme Zionists, but also all sorts of communists and anarchists. Now yes, many communists and anarchists are deep into identity politics but there's still plenty who aren't, mostly outside of the US and Western Europe. There's also a few groups in the West who aren't idpol infested like the Trotskyist group that publishes the World Socialist Website.

Examples where you see this include the WTO protests (Antifa and white nationalists were on the same side) or recently during the GME pump and dump where /pol/tards and Antifa were laughing at hedgefund assholes losing money and the finance media like CNBC or Fox Business simping for said hedgefund managers. You also saw the subversion present in the left when a few Antifa accounts all but praise the hedgefund goons and complain about "fascists" and "alt-right Nazis". Regardless, the fact is your average "fascist" or "commie" has more common cause than they think.

There's a healthy dose of populism vs elitism in this too. Neoliberal ideology doesn't promise much for most people so in a democratic society it has to use identity politics to gain wedge appeal. I'd compare it to classical reactionaries aka the ORIGINAL conservatives. They were the party of the aristocracy and nobles but to truly get their way in an increasingly democratic Europe they needed to ally with the Church against everyone else (and rig elections through rotten boroughs, gerrymandering, and backchannels with the king). They have to establish themselves as the only possible ideology you could support even if you don't like it hence their reliance on what "science" and "trusted sources" say. And just like the original conservatives were opposed by the bourgeois, nationalists, other liberals, and early socialists, the coalition arranged against the neoliberals is pretty diverse.

 

[Lone MacReady]

Not really, sure some classical fruits are still around, but the left killing God has forced them to adopt Regressive marxism as their new religion against the "demon" of White America.

 

[Sexy Senior Citizen]

I'm not sure agreeing with the status quo and installing ideology from mainstream figure heads is "edgy" at all.

I think the left got so out of control they split up into groups and the traditional left that most of us got used too in the 90s and 2000s has been replaced by a circus and the DNC has been enabling them as much as possible. They've ruined their own party with identity politics and have gotten a free pass to act as retarded as they want and because they got every braindead retard who supported them that Trump was the second coming of Hitler instead of the generic opportunistic crook he is, everyone was ok with them acting like clowns.

Its gonna come crashing down on them, pretty soon if we're lucky. Should be an interesting show.

Part of the problem with the Left (and what's quickly becoming a problem with the Right) is the balkanization of the ideology. In ye olde days of yore, each party was united around a set of ideals, and if you didn't like them, you went and started your own party (the Bull Moose Party being a notable example.) However, at some point the Left decided to bring different groups under its umbrella to expand its political power. These groups often have wildly differing ideologies and beliefs, and can turn against each other without a single enemy to unite against (to borrow the Orange Man as an example: troons and terfs could hold their noses and work together against the Orange Man because he was Literally Hitler who would murder troons and grab terfs by the pussy- but even with that common enemy, there was still sniping between the two camps. Look for the conflict to grow now that the Orange Man is no longer in office.)

This has led to what some call "the Oppression Olympics," where each group competes to see who is the most oppressed by the Evil White Man. The most oppressed gets all the goodies: government handouts, fawning media adoration, and the coveted Likes and Retweets on Twitter.

I'm sure that those who've noticed it can attest that, for the past few years now, those claiming to be left leaning and the avowed enemy of capitalism still consoom and suck millionaire dongs if they happen to be hot enough, or happen to hold the right opinion.

You can do blatant human rights violations so long as the one doing them is a transgender woman of color, otherwise, it's not the "right" person doing it. Therefore, it's like the greatest sin ever committed, but when a diversity hire is the one holding the whip, it's suddenly empowering, revolutionary and the greatest thing ever.

I feel ridiculous just typing that, but that's literally what's happening these days. The Right has its share of retards, but heaven forbid that they're not always getting tarred and feathered.

These people don't actually care about human rights, equality, or any of those worthless buzzwords that they toss around so long as it makes them feel powerful.

It hasn't been about human rights in many years. It is only about saying or doing whatever it takes to obtain and maintain power. BLM helped Joe Biden get elected, and expected the keys to the kingdom in return; they were shocked to learn they had been used as pawns. Similarly, illegal immigrants are now being used as pawns in this game of thrones, with the ultimate end being power. We can argue about whether they are Left or Right, but at the end of the day they only want to rule.

 

[Stoneheart]

If you mean Class-oriented leftism, its scattered to the winds once Occupy Wall Street was destroyed by identity politics. Professors, Press, and Politicians now push Race-oriented politics each for their own selfish reasons and to the worsening of social conditions.

Its like history, it rhymes... same happened in Weimar, than the winning leftist faction started to work in the night of long knives.

 

[NormieCasual]

I think there is a strong faction of the actual left that is hidden amongst the modern left. These are people who have always been left or at least left-leaning. I've met quite a few who hates identity politics but they hate the right more. Thus, they will always find an argument as to why they must continue to vote for the left.

 

[Not Really Here]

You know there's more than one axis right?
If you think the 'real left' is only left and down on the political compass I don't know what to tell you.

 

[Autumnal Equinox]

It’s very difficult anymore to find a sane and rational left leaning person. Hell, even JFK these days is being denounced as an alt right Nazi by most leftists. I used to be left leaning as well up to about my mid 20s, but the moment I started questioning all the identity politics, the language fabrications and policing, the altering of history to suit an agenda, etc... I was immediately turned on, called every -ist and -phobe they could think of and treated as “just another inbred stupid republican”

the right wing can be spergy dumbasses at times, but the left has turned into a literal cult that Jim Jones would be proud of.

 

[Drain Todger]

I used to be an anarchist. Not the cunty Antifa kind, but more the Mikhail Bakunin “rich bankers are the problem” kind. Money and stonks didn’t make sense to me. During the crash of ‘08, I saw rich people gambling with derivatives and fiat funny money. Ordinary people were losing their jobs over it while the hedge funds got rewarded with bailouts. Imagine going to Vegas, and you lose everything, and yet, you’re given fat wads of other people’s money so you can keep gambling. That’s Wall Street. Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor. I was justifiably angry about this, and still am. The liberals have absolutely no program to punish the people responsible. On the contrary, they protect and shield them.

The liberal centrists are pressured from both sides; from the left, who want actual communism and can only be stalled by false promises of welfare, and from the right, who are reviled by the center as “angry, selfish, racist nativists”, but are really working-class people who are justly afraid of losing their jobs and their basic human dignity to outsourcing, immigration, and the gig economy. This isn’t a two-way battle, but a three-way one, with the centthird-way corpocrat trash playing the left against the right in the hopes that they can delay them long enough to establish a totalitarian centrist neoliberal state full of technocrats and bean-counters, which is the most unspeakably disgusting thing I can imagine.

The late David Graeber, one of the architects of the Occupy Wall Street movement, had this to say about the matter, in his book, The Utopia of Rules, where he rails against bureaucracy.

What is presented as the “moderate” Left solution to any social problems—and radical left solutions are, almost everywhere now ruled out tout court—has invariably come to be some nightmare fusion of the worst elements of bureaucracy and the worst elements of capitalism. It’s as if someone had consciously tried to create the least appealing possible political position. It is a testimony to the genuine lingering power of leftists ideals that anyone would even consider voting for a party that promoted this sort of things—because surely, if they do, it’s not because they actually think these are good policies, but because these are the only policies anyone identifies themselves as left-of-center is allowed to set forth.

Is there any wonder, then, that every time there is a social crisis, it is the Right, rather than the Left, which becomes the venue for the expression of popular anger?

The Right, at least, has a critique of bureaucracy. It’s not a very good one. But at least it exists. The Left has none. As a result, when those who identify with the Left do have anything negative to say about bureaucracy, they are usually forced to adopt a watered-down version of the right-wing critique.

Back when I was a kid, the Left had their heads mostly screwed on straight. Corporatism and warmongering were the problems of the day. Corporate colonialism, in particular, was an actual thing. Look at where the coltan in our smartphones comes from. Look at the sordid history of Rio Tinto and how they treated villagers around their mines. When I was a kid, the Left railed against the bureaucrats. It was in our fucking music. Radiohead immortalized left-wing alt-globalism in Electioneering. Remember? Riot shields, Voodoo economics, Cattle prods and the IMF. Rage Against the Machine protested police brutality and System of a Down criticized the incarceration of non-violent drug offenders. These were all rational positions to take. Yes, America incarcerates too many druggies. Yes, our cops are too militarized. Yes, our economic policies favor neoliberal consoomerism and debt slavery. Yes, the IMF impoverishes people with structural adjustment policies that allow them to dictate austerity measures to third-world countries and lock them into years of usury and decrepitude. This should be plainly evident to anyone with a functioning pair of eyes.

Then, around the early 2010s, a funny thing happened. All of a sudden, class no longer mattered. The real problem was “whiteness” and “toxic masculinity”. Apparently, straight white men are manifestly awful and responsible for all of the evil in the world. You see how this shit works? The moment you gang up on rich cocksuckers, they reorient the conversation away from them and their unearned wealth using race and gender bugbears. For ten fucking years, the left has swallowed this shit hook, line and sinker, spewing out incomprehensible nonsense regurgitated from their college professors. They claim to be revolutionaries, but they do nothing at all to fight the system. Instead, they are its slaves. Now, if you criticize Wall Street, or the IMF, or the way George Soros funds color revolutions in the Middle East to soften them up for neoliberal invasion and tyranny, they can unironically call you Antisemitic.

Leftists vote neoliberal despots into power. The right-wing, isolationist policy of America First saved thousands of Syrian children from being bombed into fish food. So, who are the real leftists anymore? Politics in America are like those old cartoons where one critter is chasing another and after a while of this, they switch sides so that the chaser becomes the chased. If I told you I was anti-globalist, which side would you even say I was on?

Anyway, I have a brokerage account, now. Fuck it. Give me the loot, too.

 

[Meat Target]

The modern Left has taken Marx's class dichotomy of Bougies vs. Proletariat, and retconned a whole host of "marginalized" vs "privileged" groups onto it.

Thus, a camwhore sex worker or a blogger Journalist who lives in luxury that 99% of the planet would kill to have is "oppressed", while an out-of-work white guy is an "oppressor".

It's a sleight of hand that stacks the deck in their favor; they are always right and good, you are always a racist sexist fascist poopyhead meanie for merely existing.

In addition to this, their recent embrace of corporatism is just using what they did not create to their advantage. Hypocrisy is not a vice to the Left; to them, the ends (acquiring power) justify the means. As MovieBob said, "no bad tactics, only bad targets".

 

[DiscoRodeo]

I used to be an anarchist. Not the cunty Antifa kind, but more the Mikhail Bakunin “rich bankers are the problem” kind. Money and stonks didn’t make sense to me. During the crash of ‘08, I saw rich people gambling with derivatives and fiat funny money. Ordinary people were losing their jobs over it while the hedge funds got rewarded with bailouts. Imagine going to Vegas, and you lose everything, and yet, you’re given fat wads of other people’s money so you can keep gambling. That’s Wall Street. Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor. I was justifiably angry about this, and still am. The liberals have absolutely no program to punish the people responsible. On the contrary, they protect and shield them.

Used to be an anarchist as well, still am.

Hate modern "anarchists". I get called all sorts of things and even anarcho-pacifist has become a dirty word in todays context- and the thing is, I'm not even that, but once I point out "dude, chucking shit at cars, burning down your cities, etc, is fucking stupid" its screams of "pacifism never gets you anywhere, traitor, etc".

I participated in Occupy and found the thing to be a joke, ie, people literally voted on whether we should be democratic where I was- what the fuck? There was also a "free stuff, take one" booth, with a bunch of cds and other shit. You can guess what happened with that and these people's reactions.

Even then, Id say that, while naïve and misguided, these people at least had some of what the old left used to be about, were oriented around class politics, reasonable stuff like opposition to the exclusive bailout for bankers, etc

Now- while I disliked a lot of the lulzy parts of that, with the stuff thats happened over the past few years and especially with idpol, BLM, the troon issues, etc, its just gotten so much worse. Its no longer about anything reasonable, decentralizing power structures, gutting destructive policies, trying to organize food drives horizontally, etc. Its about screeching as loud as possible to pressure public bureaucrats to virtue signal to your crowd. Id argue with people that no, not all cops are bastards, people laughing when that UK cop was paralyzed from falling from her horse were retarded, you can't just try to burn down city hall in Portland and then go "but why da po-leece be arresting us" and get called all sorts of names.

I've just basically given up on the "left" at this point. I actually still do volunteer in a number of things, the main thing I do is help with a food bank for the homeless, but unless I'm talking with some old head who hasn't been infected with this shit, I tend to just completely ignore anyone who is a zoomer and into leftism. The other thing is, left wingers almost never, never, never actually organize anything other than protests where they can yell at people. What happened to filling in potholes and helping out your community? All modern leftists want to do is scream and march in the streets, not actually build anything or help people out.

One revelation that did come to me at the gym a few years back, was that really the stuff I liked doing the Christians often did themselves (organize food drives, charity walks to raise money, soup kitchens, money to send to Haiti, etc), didn't come with half the baggage of the modern left, shut the fuck up about political shite largely focused on the charity aspects (might have a quick prayer at the start), and seemed to keep it on the down low. Of course, there are still evangelicals, to a degree- but I don't think theyre as much the mainstream anymore as the regressive left seems to have taken over the left wing narrative. The Christian demographic, I have grown to appreciate, because while it is full of a lot of normie soccer moms or dads, etc- at least when they get together its somehow considerably much more constructive than a majority of what the left has to offer.