social justice vs economic justice. The vs. is the problem
Throughout 2016, and to some extent, the past 20 years there has been talk of "social justice" versus "economic justice", and in 2016 that boil truly erupted. You had some Sanders voters out right counting down the concerns of minorities, because economic matters mattered to them. On the other hand, he did have some Hillary voters who were outright dismissive of the fact that the economy has left many people behind, and focus only on the fact that Hillary would be seen as a boon for social justice.
What I'm about to say here may alienate some people, but it needs to be said. This is not a matter of putting one on the back burner while putting another on the front burner. The fact that many,many of us were able to get divided this way is the sort of self-inflicted wound that Republicans were not clever, skilled nor smart enough to do. The fact is, you cannot address social justice and economic justice separately, because if you do the GOP will attack on both fronts and simply wait to see whether one wall falls first or another. They will simply wait to see if we are too poor to fight them, or to socially divided to fight them, and then they will attack with either a lot of money, a mob of bigots, or both.
History will show this idea in action. For example, while many Jews in Eastern Europe were poor, some of them were wealthy. Not nearly as much is the stereotypes would describe, but there were some wealthy Jewish businesspeople. When all their wealth get them against the Nazis, nothing, nothing but being targeted and plundered first. Keep in mind, in Europe right now, there are still billions of dollars of assets that the grandchildren of the former plunderers refuse to give back, which of course means that is right wing movements rise in Europe, some people be encouraged to repeat the process that after all did work for them, and was never fully punished.
You can insert a number of variables into this equation and get the same result: let's be blunt, how many Catholics have been president of the United States of America? How many Jews? We had one black president, no women. The Hillary folks had every right to make a point that if Brazil, England, France, Liberia, Canada could actually have a woman in office, the fact that we could not do that was a sign of weakness.
Now, you can point to a rich minority member, but even the richest among the minority members will always be more vulnerable to attack that members of the good old boy network. Martha Stewart did a white-collar crime that ranged in the few hundred thousand dollars bracket. Yes, she did need to go to jail, but compared of that with folks who not only got away with billion dollar fraud, but some of them are on Trump's cabinet.
Now, let's go ahead and take a look the other side Coin; what happens when civil rights are fully written into law but economic power is not there. Sadly America has plenty of examples of this: on paper black Americans should have the right to vote, and indeed also writes any other citizen has. We know damn well that because black people did not have the economic power to fight in court's, the law feels free to deal them a nastier hand. It is the same reason why so many people are still angry about the O.J. Simpson case. You had someone who could afford a good lawyer, and the prosecutor lost.
Of course, you can feel the O.J. Simpson did it, or did not do it, but the fact is if he didn't have his money, he would've been found guilty. I could plug a number of variables in this equation: the fact that American Indians supposedly own their land, which is enforced by treaty, go ahead and tell that folks standing rock, or videos whose reservation was invaded by Bundy.
The point is, as long as we're fighting to see whose pet issues get on the front burner, all we're going to do is leave a mess and neither of those issues will get the attention they deserve. If we do not reinforce both of the fronts that the GOP will use to attack us, both civil rights and economic rights, all the do is bide their time and figure out where they need to attack us on one side or the other. People need both of these, we need to stop arguing whether or not the working class needs freedom from prosecution or freedom from want, because they need and deserve both. But A lack of either makes it easier for the GOP to take both.
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