Race has always been used by the ruling classes to divide us

[InvisibleBallots]

It's a long standing tradition in the US, especially pronounced in the South. How can you maintain your position of privilege in society when you are a tiny minority? How can you prevent the majority of people from taking away your power?

Divide and conquer. Race worked well - you rile up the poor whites to hate the poor blacks. The tactic is to focus their attention on something else - anything else - but you and what you are doing with your power.

There's an even more effective tactic for today - religion. The vast majority of people in the US are religious to one degree or another, mostly Christian. So, what better way to divide the people than by religion?

The Christians have taken the bait and run with it. Instead of focusing on what the ruling class is doing to them - offshoring their jobs, stealing their retirement, privatizing Social Security - they have convinced many Christians that their real enemies are LGBTs, "liberals" and Democrats. How did they do this? By putting billions of dollars into a widespread propaganda campaign - on TV, in films, direct mail, magazines.

Thomas Frank in "What's the matter with Kansas" noted how many of these Christians feel they are fighting "the elite", but have been convinced the elite aren't the CEOs and the corporations, but urban liberals and middle class secular people.

How do Democrats and the left respond to this? By calling working class Whites stupid, ignorant, hicks, and mocking their culture and their religion. The result, obviously, is to strengthen their feelings of being attacked by "the elites". It seems many gladly take on their role as the "enemy elite" and get great pleasure in asserting their superiority over the working class Christians.

This may make us feel righteous. Does it help win elections? Does it unify the majority against the privileged? Does it in fact assist the propaganda campaign?

How can you expect to get the majority of people in this country to vote for you by insulting them? How can you win the support of the majority of Americans when you say things like "most Americans are stupid and ignorant?"

We can complain about the Republicans, how they lie, and how they cheat. In the end, what good does it do? They aren't going to change, and complaining about them won't win elections.

It's up to us. We can't make the Republicans change, we can only change ourselves - our strategies, our language, our marketing, our propaganda. Since Democrats are now a minority party - the Republicans run the White House, the Hosue of Representatives, the Senate, the Supreme Court, most Governors and most state Legislatures - obviously, our current tactics are not working. We can scream until we are blue in the face about how we are right, but it won't do us any good until we win elections again.

Personally, I don't think we can or should back off from our support for reproductive rights, our support for LGBT rights, nor our insistence on a separation of church and state. Maybe we don't need too - maybe we simply need to stop playing our part in the Culture War. It takes two to tango. What if they threw a Culture War and no one came?

[Viktor Runeberg]

1. Differ

Children understand that lying and cheating is wrong. That's why Kerry got 60% of the nationwide under-30 vote. All we have to do is keep doing what we're doing and we win big in the coming elections.

On the other hand if we back off from pointing out that the Republicans lie and cheat, and that the working class people who vote for them are traitors to themselves, their families, and their class, we'll lose the respect of the youth that we've currently gained. And it's a big gain - youth was pro-Reagan a couple decades back.

I'm writing this from a solidly working-class town in Vermont (yes, we have some here). It's also solidly Democratic. And fairly knowledgable about politics and economics. The working class isn't equally ignorant everywhere - just where it's kept so by 3rd-rate newspapers and media coupled with fundamentally-ignorant religious neo-fascism. The relative smallness of the fundamentalist-neo-fascist movement here in Vermont, coupled with merely 2nd-rate newspapers, accounts for the success of Democrats, Independents, and even our Socialist Congressman, as well as a moderate Republican governor.

[InvisibleBallots]

3. I agree of course

I didn't mean to imply we shouldn't point out that Republicans lie and cheat. It has limited effectiveness. "Attacking the enemy" only goes so far, we need to provide a positive, active alternative. We need to give people a reason to vote FOR Democrats, as opposed to just voting AGAINST Republicans.

Also, 60% of the nationwide under 30 vote when compared to the population as a whole, especially those under 30 who do not vote, is not necessarily going to win us anything. And some perspective - the entire population of Vermont is smaller than many cities.

How to save the white working class from "fundamentally-ignorant religious neo-fascism"? For some reason, I don't think calling them ignorant hicks and mocking Jesus is going to do the trick. At least, it sure didn't last time.

[Mike Niendorff]

2. spot-on.

race, gender, religion, urban/rural -- if it can be used to keep us fighting each other, rather than uniting against our common enemy, you can be your ass the RW will try to exploit it. The sooner we progressives wise up to this tactic and stop playing into it, the sooner the RW will find themselves running for the hills.


MDN

[Deja Q]

4. Money too. The more you have means the better a person you are.

Well, according to social stigmatic standards. With the Bible promoting peace and love and neighborly unselfish acts while saying "money is the root of all evil", you'd think more people would have figured it out by now.

And it's not race. It's ethnicity. We are all human, just variations of a theme. Black people are not aliens from another planet; or maybe I've never understood the term "race". :eyes:

[bryant69]

5. It's an interesting thing

Class warfare only applies if the poor criticize the rich, if the rich criticize the poor sometimes in the most vicious of terms, thats ok.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[InvisibleBallots]

8. it always seems to work that way doesn't it?

What are we going to do about it?

[Mike Niendorff]

7. yeah, I hate that word "race", too.

But whatever you want to call the concept, it's all a part of the standard bag of tricks by which the ruling class has kept the rest of us fighting each other for generation after generation after generation.


MDN

[madrchsod]

6. this is not new

or unique to the united states. race and culture has been used by people against others ever since man has organized into tribes.

[necso]

9. Nice post.

I won't quibble about the details, but I will point out that there are reasons why even the smallest "repackaging" will face great difficulties. These include, in small part:
1) There is a pronounced element of reaction in the positions of the left. Just as some atheists become opponents of all religious belief, (whether this belief works for better or worse), some leftists define their positions as the opposite of those taken by the "right". Personally, while I have little use for either Libertarians or Paleocons, I will work with just about anybody in the common interest... as long as I can keep my back covered... and my principles more or less intact.
2) The left has a bad case of political correctness. Question whether US Middle East policy is too influenced by far right Israeli politics, and you are called an anti-Semite. Question whether immigration (work visas, etc) needs to be restricted and you are called a "bigot". (etc, etc)
3) Many of the prominent figures on the left make their living (and their "reps") by taking offensive (to the many) positions, and they wish neither to endanger that living nor to deal with the attacks that will come their way if they do change.
4) Ego, along with the single-minded pursuit of self gratification that accompanies it, (together with self preservation), circumscribes most human behavior. People will have to "get over themselves" in order to "move on", and this is most unlikely.
5) The left has fallen so deep into the trap set for them by the neocons that it will be both difficult and humiliating to work their way out of it. -- And neither difficulty or humiliation are avidly sought by most people.
6) Any repackaging will take some changes in perspective and ways of thinking -- and few things, in my experience, are harder to bring about.
7) There is an old saying that rings true in our situation (with a little abstraction -- and only paraphrased here): Those who speak first and the loudest for violence are the narcs...

I also find it most peculiar that we, who are so sensitive to any categorizing of those groups that we claim to represent, are so quick to categorize other groups such as "rednecks" ("stupid white men" rings about the same), Xtians (itself seen as an insult), etc, etc.

While much of this behavior can be explained away by human weakness, our own forms of bigotry and ignorance, and a collective, colossal downfall into the neocon trap of debased, divisive political discourse, I suspect that simple treachery also has a large role.

Besides, many on our side will never, ever bring themselves to admit that they personally (as opposed to someone, anyone, else) have been wrong about anything that they hold important. The mere pain of doing so is great enough, but combine it with the public pillorying that they can expect, and the chances approach zero.

Such is human nature... And while the neocons have paid flunkies who are masters at manipulating it, sometimes we seem unable even to admit that we are subject to it.

Please note that these opinions are my own, and that these opinions should not be allowed to detract from the attempt (rare enough here) by the original poster to have a frank discussion about whether or not we should do something other than flogging that same old dead horse -- in that same old way -- a practise which has clearly served us so well.

And let me conclude by saying that I myself have erred on occasions too numerous to count -- and too numerous to list... And I will gladly follow the lead of anyone who has the vision to carry our great cause forward -- that great cause of democracy, freedom and the well being of our country, our people and the world at large, demands no less of me.

[onager]

10. Then there was the famous Southern Fundie-Communist conspiracy...

They use anything, not just race, though in the South that was always the default hatred. Here's a good example. BTW, many of my family members were "lintheads," and we never even got a trip to Moscow!

The "Southern Textile Bulletin," speaking for the mill owners observed: "It is doubtless the sons and daughters of the `Holy Roller' enthusiasts who followed the Communists into the strike" (at Gastonia, North Carolina, in 1929).

Hidden in this pejorative comment was the recognition that it was frequently the marginal churches of poor whites that supported the strikers. Pentecostal and holiness preachers, renegade Baptists, and others on the boundaries of the major denominations usually offered what little support the workers on strike or union organizers generally got.

Some Methodist and Baptist congregations were split by strikes and union activity. Generally, foremen defended the mill owners, while some workers were sympathetic with protest. The uptown churches made up of middle class whites, professional people, and the mill owners usually could be counted on to support law and order and to condemn violence. The established clergy of the leading churches in the urban areas were no threat to the economic interests of the industrialists.

Seldom did well-educated ministers with their scholarly sermons offend the sentiments of the mill management.

Liberation Motifs in White Working-Class Southerners

[InvisibleBallots]

11. awesome link, onager, thanks!

!

[necso]

12. "...use every weapon"... Indeed.

The patterns of manipulation used by the neocons are, in part, probably as old as that first day when some men set themselves above their fellows.

The neocons (through paid flunkies), however, have adapted and applied the techniques of modern marketing to this manipulation and, frankly, the results are impressive. (Particularly considering how in areas other than the political arena, the neocons tend to be bumbling, incompetent, ignorant, narrow minded, self-serving, amoral elitists.)

And the neocon elite are master (again largely though their henchmen) of the political process, which, sadly, is something that we have neglected.

When you consider the massive corporate backing (and that of other powerful interests) behind the neocons, their (joint) control of the main stream media, their near-total control of the government and all their other advantages, we would do well to consider carefully what our course forward must be -- and the extent to which we have in our efforts been falling into the path of human weakness, as opposed to the path of wisdom (which typically entails realism and practicality -- and no small amount of selflessness).

The interests of the American people have much in common. But to fulfill the core of those interests, we must take people largely as they are -- not as we demand them to be or become.

FDR was a great "liberal", who was responsible for much social progress, but he was also a great politician. He understood that you cannot always make the people go where it is best or right (or even necessary) for them to go. Sometimes you have to lead the people one small step at a time and rely in a big way on the natural course of events to make them take the final "plunge". -- And first and foremost, you have to put yourself in a position to lead them at all.

But such a practical understanding of politics seems to elude us... And FDR never had to face the formidable neocon "machine", although he did face its predecessor (with somewhat mixed success overall).

...

That is a nice link... and again, I won't quibble.

And while "linthead" (a picturesque "descriptor") may have special meaning to you, whenever I hear the word "redneck", I can't help feeling that someone is talking about me... at least in the sense of "the least of my brethren". For although I am an atheist, I can (on a good day anyway) appreciate the value of an ethical or wisdom teaching, no matter what the source.

I would also argue that the core Christian message is an important root of the liberal tradition... But I suppose that this is only an embarrassment to many now.

[InvisibleBallots]

15. the key to winning elections

"The interests of the American people have much in common. But to fulfill the core of those interests, we must take people largely as they are -- not as we demand them to be or become."

[InvisibleBallots]

14. good points, necso

"Those who speak first and the loudest for violence are the narcs."

Yep, I've been saying this. In fact, I wrote an article not too long ago about how to disrupt the Democratic party, which I am 50% sure got into the hands of some con somewhere. It was hardly a work of genius, evil or otherwise, but it's funny to see the exact same techniques being used here on DU.

[Mike Niendorff]

13. kick.

MDN