(WEEKLY) Leftist Infighting vs. The Real World
**Reminder: This post is from the Community [Actual Discussion](/c/[email protected]). We try to use voting for elevating constructive, or lowering unproductive, posts and comments here. When disagreeing, replies detailing your views are highly encouraged as no-discussion downvotes don't help anyone learn anything valuable. For other rules, please see [this pinned thread](https://lemmy.ca/post/15242874). Thanks!**
I've seen the phrase "leftist infighting" mentioned here and there around Lemmy, but prior to joining it wasn't something I'd ever seen brought up. After it was mentioned, however, I saw it absolutely everywhere leftists are.
The belief system of the infighters seems to be the same even if the details aren't:
"There can be no leftist victory without (veganism / giving perceived oppressed group rights that others don't have / complete overhaul and policing of language / rewriting power dynamics to match the stack I have in my head / complete governmental overthrow / anarchy)."
It's one of the reasons my activity on Lemmy has dipped severely. The platform is rife with well-meaning, but overly-aggressive people who are more interested in their particular sliver of political ideology instead of coming together to solve issues. They can't explain *why* they're right, but they'll sure be angry if challenged even slightly and yell at you before blocking you, sometimes reporting you, maybe PMing you vitriol, and definitely using the word "nazi" in there somewhere (because there's nothing a politically-motivated person likes better than exaggerating and using the worst word they can think of to describe someone they don't like).
Recently (since I'm in Canada), I watched the NDP Convention and it was... well, [you can watch for yourself](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a58yET05bas). To call it "inept" would be polite. I can't blame you if you don't want to watch. It's long, it's pretty boring, and everyone has their own pet issues that they feel are more important than running things correctly. There's little to no structure, and everyone is tripping over themselves to not step on toes (even saying that would be a verbal slight against people without legs and now you have people booing you, you ablest jerk) in invented and arbitrary power dynamics.
I described it as "watching a philosophy teacher attempt to teach calculus to cats." Nobody knows how to run it, it wouldn't work if you tried, and the cats all fucking hate each other because they're *different cats*.
In response to this criticism, you often get people who tell you that people can focus on more than thing at once, which is objectively true... as individuals. But as a group, you wind up with a hot mess and run a show where you prove you can't govern a single room of diverse people and views, let alone a whole country full of them. Even members of *just that room* can't cohesively come together, how are they going to convince normal voters?
Am I overreacting? Am I overlooking something? Should we be rejecting solutions that do 90% of the population some good and can actually be implemented over letting 1% of leftists angrily dictate a different issue be addressed first? Are you also leftist and angry and now want to block me because I'm not *your* brand of leftist?
I vote for this group. I want them to win. So how can a leftist group solve this and actually come into power without infighting when we can't even work together between servers on Lemmy?
I've seen the phrase "leftist infighting" mentioned here and there around Lemmy, but prior to joining it wasn't something I'd ever seen brought up. After it was mentioned, however, I saw it absolutely everywhere leftists are.
The belief system of the infighters seems to be the same even if the details aren't:
"There can be no leftist victory without (veganism / giving perceived oppressed group rights that others don't have / complete overhaul and policing of language / rewriting power dynamics to match the stack I have in my head / complete governmental overthrow / anarchy)."
It's one of the reasons my activity on Lemmy has dipped severely. The platform is rife with well-meaning, but overly-aggressive people who are more interested in their particular sliver of political ideology instead of coming together to solve issues. They can't explain *why* they're right, but they'll sure be angry if challenged even slightly and yell at you before blocking you, sometimes reporting you, maybe PMing you vitriol, and definitely using the word "nazi" in there somewhere (because there's nothing a politically-motivated person likes better than exaggerating and using the worst word they can think of to describe someone they don't like).
Recently (since I'm in Canada), I watched the NDP Convention and it was... well, [you can watch for yourself](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a58yET05bas). To call it "inept" would be polite. I can't blame you if you don't want to watch. It's long, it's pretty boring, and everyone has their own pet issues that they feel are more important than running things correctly. There's little to no structure, and everyone is tripping over themselves to not step on toes (even saying that would be a verbal slight against people without legs and now you have people booing you, you ablest jerk) in invented and arbitrary power dynamics.
I described it as "watching a philosophy teacher attempt to teach calculus to cats." Nobody knows how to run it, it wouldn't work if you tried, and the cats all fucking hate each other because they're *different cats*.
In response to this criticism, you often get people who tell you that people can focus on more than thing at once, which is objectively true... as individuals. But as a group, you wind up with a hot mess and run a show where you prove you can't govern a single room of diverse people and views, let alone a whole country full of them. Even members of *just that room* can't cohesively come together, how are they going to convince normal voters?
Am I overreacting? Am I overlooking something? Should we be rejecting solutions that do 90% of the population some good and can actually be implemented over letting 1% of leftists angrily dictate a different issue be addressed first? Are you also leftist and angry and now want to block me because I'm not *your* brand of leftist?
I vote for this group. I want them to win. So how can a leftist group solve this and actually come into power without infighting when we can't even work together between servers on Lemmy?