Leo, do you think that Democrats should support right-wing economic policies?

[Joshe]

All culture war stuff must be quietly abandoned. Not saying toss those values out, just don’t advertise and never crusade on them. The Dems screw themselves when they decorate the White House lawn with rainbow flags. Any advantage it gains is offset 100 or 1000 times over in the other direction.

This was clearly a mistake. Kamala might have won without the trans smears. The majority chose a coup-attempt convicted felon over a they/them candidate. Doesn’t matter if she ran on it or not because the opposition successfully made it the main point. 

[Emerald]

1 minute ago, Joshe said:

All culture war stuff must be quietly abandoned. Not saying toss those values out, just don’t advertise and never crusade on them. The Dems screw themselves when they decorate the White House lawn with rainbow flags. Any advantage it gains is offset 100 or 1000 times over in the other direction.

This was clearly a mistake. Kamala might have won without the trans smears. The majority chose a coup-attempt convicted felon over a they/them candidate. Doesn’t matter if she ran on it or not because the opposition successfully made it the main point. 

Kamala did abandon all identity politics. She was VERY careful to avoid it. And she lost.

So, we already know that that's a losing strategy.

The reason why Trump is getting people over to his side is because he is demonstrating certainty... and influencing people into his way of thinking and he isn't giving concessions to anyone.

Stop conceding to the right wing on these things and stand firm with conviction.

It just adds more fuel to their fire when you're acting responsively to whichever way the wind is blowing... as opposed to imposing your own vision.

And we don't need to create a lukewarm vision where we concede to the right wing framing on social issues. 

[Leo Gura]

28 minutes ago, Emerald said:

and assert that that paradigmatic frame is just normal and that disagreeing with that frame is fringe and wacky.

You are not gonna overcome the gravitational pull of xenophobia and allergy to wokeness so easily.

Lefties need to read the room.

Stuff like DEI, trans sports, weird gender issues, and open border is killing leftist chances of winning.

The reason the right can get away with being shamelessly themselves is because they are skiing down hill. Progressives are skiing up hill.

Edited May 7 by Leo Gura

[Joshe]

26 minutes ago, Emerald said:

Kamala did abandon all identity politics. She was VERY careful to avoid it. And she lost.

So, we already know that that's a losing strategy.

The reason why Trump is getting people over to his side is because he is demonstrating certainty... and influencing people into his way of thinking and he isn't giving concessions to anyone.

Stop conceding to the right wing on these things and stand firm with conviction.

It just adds more fuel to their fire when you're acting responsively to whichever way the wind is blowing... as opposed to imposing your own vision.

And we don't need to create a lukewarm vision where we concede to the right wing framing on social issues. 

I understand the idea, and it sounds good, I just don’t think it’s gonna work. The way I see your strategy playing out is just amping up the culture war. You can’t simply dominate the frame with “yeah, we’re all about that Woke, and you’re wacky and weird for making it a big deal”. That’s never gonna work because the majority would disagree in body, mind, and spirit, so a dominant frame will not get you there with the current citizenry. I’m sure it could be effective to a degree, but not effective enough. Besides, it takes extraordinary character to dominate frame like that, so is it really feasible to train the Dems on that? I doubt it. Plus, no single politician or even group of politicians can sway the cultural frame on their own. They’d need constant, concerted effort across media and influencers, and I see no path for that. 

Also, Kamala did not abandon anything. She tried to avoid it but her history spoke for her, which was capitalized on with the they/them ad. 

Edited May 7 by Joshe

[Emerald]

37 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

You are not gonna overcome the gravitational pull of xenophobia and allergy to wokeness so easily.

Lefties need to read the room.

Stuff like DEI, trans sports, weird gender issues, and open border is killing leftist chances of winning.

The reason the right can get away with being shamelessly themselves is because they are skiing down hill. Progressives are skiing up hill.

People are actually quite malleable and easy to influence, if you know how to wield power and you give them repeatable narratives that normalize a certain point of view and de-normalize and stigmatize its opposite.

All you have to do is convince people that anti-wokeness is abnormal and associated with strange socially maladapted people... and people will run from it at 1000 miles per hour.

And luckily, anti-wokeness is associated with many socially maladapted people, so it isn't that difficult to find examples.

And the entire reason why wokeness has the stigma that it does... is because the right wing understand power and has brand-jammed basic concepts like "accept people who are different from you" and made that which used to be a mainstream reasonable viewpoint seem unreasonable by associating it with ugly blue-haired freaks who shout at the top of their lungs.

Also, politicians on the left are almost never focusing on these identity politics issues... and they still get tarred and feathered with it because the right wing has imposed its frame so thoroughly and imposed their power onto society so well.

And now, even a Joe Biden gets viewed as an extension of weirdos with blue hair shouting at the top of their lungs.

That's what power is... you get to set the tone for what's normal.

And all this "the left need to distance themselves from wokeness" talk is just more right wing normalization... and just adds more and more power to those narratives.

People on the left need to stop playing defense and trying to fit into people's current paradigms (which have been both subtle and overtly influenced by the well-oiled right-wing propaganda machine)... and start recognizing that we have the same power to influence people's paradigms.

We just refuse to wield that kind of power... and instead feel like we need to work around and work with the right wing propaganda.

But we don't have to do that. We can actually wield power and impose our frame on reality instead of conceding on everything all the time like little philosophical cucks.

 

Edited May 7 by Emerald

[Emerald]

34 minutes ago, Joshe said:

I understand the idea, and it sounds good, I just don’t think it’s gonna work. The way I see your strategy playing out is just amping up the culture war. You can’t simply dominate the frame with “yeah, we’re all about that Woke, and you’re wacky and weird for making it a big deal”. That’s never gonna work because the majority would disagree in body, mind, and spirit, so a dominant frame will not get you there with the current citizenry. I’m sure it could be effective to a degree, but not effective enough. Besides, it takes extraordinary character to dominate frame like that, so is it really feasible to train the Dems on that? I doubt it. 

Also, Kamala did not abandon anything. She tried to avoid it but her history spoke for her, which was capitalized on with the they/them ad. 

I'm not saying to frame it as the "culture war"... because that too is right wing framing that we've conceded on for far too long.

It isn't a culture war at all! It's normal people who want to live their lives in peace... while others are neurotic and controlling about it and want to be busy-bodies and stop them from living their lives in peace.

And frame it as the Golden Rule... and minding your own business... and not being a neurotic weirdo asshole who obsesses about what's in people's pants or what goes on in people's bedrooms.

And frame it as a pro-freedom stance... while demonstrating how anti-freedom the opposition is who tries to control the lives of strangers.

It's honestly not that difficult to frame these dynamics in a normal light... because normal people tend not to obsess about gay and trans people. And normal people tend to be unphased by these types of differences and have a live and let live attitude.

Then, frame the majority of your message around working together towards an economic populist vision without letting petty neurotic hatreds divide us and get in the way of our common cause to fight against the corruptions of the powers that be.

Edited May 7 by Emerald

[Apparition of Jack]

Why do Democrats not simply go on the attack? Spam scary images of Trump with his terrible policies plastered in big red letters everywhere. Literally just remind people time and time again how evil he is.

Conservatives always do this shit because it works, why are progressives / liberals so adverse to this?  

[Joshe]

28 minutes ago, Emerald said:

I'm not saying to frame it as the "culture war"... because that too is right wing framing that we've conceded on for far too long.

It isn't a culture war at all! It's normal people who want to live their lives in peace... while others are neurotic and controlling about it and want to be busy-bodies and stop them from living their lives in peace.

And frame it as the Golden Rule... and minding your own business... and not being a neurotic weirdo asshole who obsesses about what's in people's pants or what goes on in people's bedrooms.

And frame it as a pro-freedom stance... while demonstrating how anti-freedom the opposition is who tries to control the lives of strangers.

It's honestly not that difficult to frame these dynamics in a normal light... because normal people tend not to obsess about gay and trans people. And normal people tend to be unphased by these types of differences and have a live and let live attitude.

Then, frame the majority of your message around working together towards an economic populist vision without letting petty neurotic hatreds divide us and get in the way of our common cause to fight against the corruptions of the powers that be.

I get it, but I think that would just amp up the culture war because it’s still saying “yeah, we’re for this, and you’re not, and you’re weird and overly obsessed with this stuff”.

I see it boiling down to the same ideological disagreements because the right would relentlessly press for the left to state their positions and sooner or later, Dem politicians would be at podiums saying “ yes, I think trans is ok”. Lol.

I do think your proposed framing is much more solid than anything we’ve seen, and definitely the way to go if this stance was adopted, but sooner or later it would distill down to the same culture war disagreements, and would very likely lose. Maybe not as badly, but lose nonetheless.

If the Dems decide to keep this rhetoric, then I agree with you, they should adopt your stance. It could pay off in the long term, if they managed it right, but probably not by next election. Woke has too much baggage for now, no matter how you frame it, and the Dems don’t have nearly enough influence to offload that baggage.

I suppose it could work if you get lucky with transmission. 

Edited May 7 by Joshe

[Emerald]

17 minutes ago, Apparition of Jack said:

Why do Democrats not simply go on the attack? Spam scary images of Trump with his terrible policies plastered in big red letters everywhere. Literally just remind people time and time again how evil he is.

Conservatives always do this shit because it works, why are progressives / liberals so adverse to this?  

100%

People on the Left forget that we have that power too... and they act like everyone's mindset is already set in stone.

But people are so malleable and prone of the forces of normalization regardless of where it's coming from or what their starting point is.

And Right wingers are the only ones actually molding the clay... while Left wingers are like 'the clay is set in stone' and we have to work around it and avoid imposing our will at all costs.

[Emerald]

13 minutes ago, Joshe said:

I get it, but I think that would just amp up the culture war because it’s still saying “yeah, we’re for this, and you’re not, and you’re weird and overly obsessed with this stuff”.

I see it boiling down to the same ideological disagreements because the right would relentlessly press for the left to state their positions and sooner or later, Dem politicians would be at podiums saying “ yes, I think trans is ok”. Lol.

I do think your proposed framing is much more solid than anything we’ve seen, and definitely the way to go if this stance was adopted, but sooner or later it would distill down to the same culture war disagreements, and would very likely lose. Maybe not as badly, but lose nonetheless.

If the Dems decide to keep this rhetoric, then I agree with you, they should adopt your stance. It could pay off in the long term, if they managed it right, but probably not by next election. Woke has too much baggage for now, no matter how you frame it, and the Dems don’t have nearly enough influence to offload that baggage.

I suppose it could work if you get lucky with transmission. 

The bold above is exactly where you assert your position and the normalcy of your position. And then, you put your opponent on defense and having to defend their own neuroticism.

The whole game is to put the opposite side on defense.... and you do this by going on offense and press people about "Why are you so obsessed with trans people?".

NEVER play defense. It's a losing strategy.

 

[Hardkill]

22 minutes ago, Emerald said:

The bold above is exactly where you assert your position and the normalcy of your position. And then, you put your opponent on defense and having to defend their own neuroticism.

The whole game is to put the opposite side on defense.... and you do this by going on offense and press people about "Why are you so obsessed with trans people?".

NEVER play defense. It's a losing strategy.

 

What you’re suggesting is not how TR and FDR successfully built their winning party coalitions that would last for decades and not how they successfully shifted the Overton window to the left. They too had to pick their battles by focusing primarily on economist populism to the hilt while putting on a believable performance that they stand for all traditional American values including Judeo-Christianity, abiding by what the Bible said, patriotism, the dominance of masculinity, women serving their men and raising their children at home, men being men, women being women marriage between a man and a woman, law and order, being tough on crime, being very pro military while also being strong diplomats, keeping America pure, prioritizing the well being of white people, etc.

Edited May 7 by Hardkill

[Emerald]

16 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

What you’re suggesting is not how TR and FDR successfully built their winning party coalitions that would last for decades and not how they successfully shifted the Overton window to the left. They too had to pick their battles by focusing primarily on economist populism to the hilt while putting on a believable performance that they stand for all traditional American values including Judeo-Christianity, abiding by what the Bible said, patriotism, the dominance of masculinity, women serving their men and raising their children at home, men being men, women being women marriage between a man and a woman, law and order, being tough on crime, being very pro military while also being strong diplomats, keeping America pure, prioritizing the well being of white people, etc.

Again... you're focusing on conforming to old-school values from the 40s as opposed to influencing others with your own values.

And it's a show in unsavvy weakness and submissiveness to the conservative paradigm.

That's the difference between someone who asserts their power and wins... and those who conforms to the other side's framing and reasserts the normalcy of the other side, even as the other side is certifiably cuckoo crazy.

[Hardkill]

22 minutes ago, Emerald said:

Again... you're focusing on conforming to old-school values from the 40s as opposed to influencing others with your own values.

And it's a show in unsavvy weakness and submissiveness to the conservative paradigm.

That's the difference between someone who asserts their power and wins... and those who conforms to the other side's framing and reasserts the normalcy of the other side, even as the other side is certifiably cuckoo crazy.

So, what if we are conforming to old-school values from the 1940s?

Most Americans are either conservative or moderate. How can you realistically expect to convince the majority of Americans to accept DEI, transgender rights, and other left-leaning social issues when many are undereducated and barely making ends meet?

Let the right-wing and the Republican Party think they’re winning by siding with them on almost all social values—except on abortion and climate change—and then completely shock them when they realize they're losing the fight on economics through a revival of New Deal or Square Deal-style policies.

That doesn’t mean Democrats have to sound insulting toward foreigners, racial minorities, women, or the LGBTQ community like Trump often does. And it doesn’t mean they shouldn’t call out serious, unconstitutional actions committed by Trump and the GOP—especially when those actions have gravely harmed individuals like Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Democrats just need to sound more like Reagan Republicans on cultural issues—minus the rhetoric on “welfare queens,” anti-abortion stances, and climate denial—while forcefully opposing far-right extreme freaks like Alex Jones and Steve Bannon. On economic issues, they should sound like New Deal Democrats.

Edited May 7 by Hardkill

[Emerald]

21 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

So, what if we are conforming to old school values from the 40s?

Most Americans are either conservative or moderate. 
 

Let the right-wing and Republican Party thinking they are winning by siding with them on almost all social values, except on abortion and climate change, but then get completely shocked when they realize that they are losing the battle on economics with New Deal or Square Deal type of economics.

The concept of moderate and normal are very malleable for people and highly contingent upon the narratives that are mimetically imposed and framed as normal and moderate.

If the prevailing narrative is that it's normal to hate trans people and be Nazis... people will hate trans people and be Nazis. And you can notice how so much extreme outlandish stuff has been normalized just because the right keeps insisting all the extreme outlandish stuff is normal. 

But if the prevailing narrative is that it's normal to live and let live and mind your own business... and that only weird people are hung up on what's in other people's pants... then people will avoid getting caught up in these neurotic anti-trans panic movements.

[Hardkill]

25 minutes ago, Emerald said:

The concept of moderate and normal are very malleable for people and highly contingent upon the narratives that are mimetically imposed and framed as normal and moderate.

If the prevailing narrative is that it's normal to hate trans people and be Nazis... people will hate trans people and be Nazis. And you can notice how so much extreme outlandish stuff has been normalized just because the right keeps insisting all the extreme outlandish stuff is normal. 

But if the prevailing narrative is that it's normal to live and let live and mind your own business... and that only weird people are hung up on what's in other people's pants... then people will avoid getting caught up in these neurotic anti-trans panic movements.

If people are so malleable, then why did it take a bloody Civil War to free African Americans from slavery? Why did it require one of the largest and most effective civil rights movements in U.S. history just to secure women the right to vote? Why did it take yet another herculean effort—along with the traumatic loss of many innocent lives—to finally end Jim Crow laws through the civil rights movement of the mid-20th century?

And why did so many gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer people suffer, face violence, die by suicide, or endure unnecessary death and suffering from AIDS during the decades-long fight for LGBTQ+ rights—before mainstream acceptance and the eventual legalization of gay marriage in the mid-2010s?

Democrats obviously shouldn't normalize Nazism or Trump-like rhetoric. Hell, even most Republicans don't normalize Nazism.

Edited May 7 by Hardkill

[Emerald]

25 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

If people are so malleable, then why did it take a bloody Civil War to free African Americans from slavery? Why did it require one of the largest and most effective civil rights movements in U.S. history just to win women the right to vote? And why did it take yet another herculean effort—along with the traumatic loss of many innocent lives—to finally end Jim Crow laws through the civil rights movement of the mid-20th century?

Because slavery had to do with the economic interests of the rich and powerful... and the rich and powerful were using their power to impose their own "narratives of normal" onto society.

And they had created many narratives for why slavery was normal, right, good, and justified that the populace bought into despite very few white people having enough money to have slaves.

To appeal to liberal types of the time, they basically said that black people couldn't govern themselves properly because they were inferior and uncivilized and needed their white masters to take care of them.

To appeal to traditional conservative types, they needed to emphasize the superiority of their culture and people over the enslaved people's culture and people.

And they could always appeal to poor white people who wanted to feel like they weren't on the very bottom of the social hierarchy... who could imagine that the power of the white ruling elite would rub off onto them.

And I'm sure that abolitionists were framed as a bunch of screeching abnormal Quaker SJWs whose anti-slavery views were so extreme that it would be political suicide for any serious politician at the time.

But you don't make any changes like this by conceding to the framing of slave owners and normalizing these viewpoints.

You remain steadfast until the only acceptable and serious position in society is that "Slavery is bad" and that anyone who doesn't agree is a crazy stupid racist weirdo who's probably just bitter because they smell bad and women are creeped out by them.

That's how you wield power. You don't play defense... and you don't meet weirdos and crazies in the middle.

Instead, you give them a disgusted look like you're smelling something bad and say, "You don't ACTUALLY think that way. Do you?"

And if they say yes, you laugh at them like you're suprised and you believe they're joking and like they can't possibly be serious.

Then, when they say they're serious, you press them... and you make them have to defend the indefensible. You make them play defense and you pose your point of view as the "duh" position.

Edited May 7 by Emerald

[Leo Gura]

@Emerald You can't bluster nor bull your way through lack of human development.

This isn't merely a PR or leadership problem. This is fundamentally a problem of lack of education, intelligence, and development. And that will not be fixed with any kind of clever political manuvering.

Humans severely lack intelligence and development. Which is why leftists will continue to lose and conservatives continue to win.

[Emerald]

39 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@Emerald You can't bluster nor bull your way through lack of human development.

This isn't merely a PR or leadership problem. This is fundamentally a problem of lack of education, intelligence, and development. And that will not be fixed with any kind of clever political manuvering.

Humans severely lack intelligence and development. Which is why leftists will continue to lose and conservatives continue to win.

That's an incorrect assumption. And it's a total misunderstanding of how power and influence works.

You can always shape and form people's viewpoints regardless of where they are Spiral Dynamics-wise. People don't need to be on the same level of development as a political movement to get on board with a political movement.

You just need to frame things in a way that normies will respond to and inch them closer to your position over time.

It's just like how the far right has gotten a lot of Stage Green hippie folks to go Fascist by posing the right wing as the rebellious contrarian anti-establishment position and the left wing as the establishment position. 

Of course Fascists aren't Stage Green. But the creators of the propaganda machine that's tasked with normalizing Fascism understands Stage Green enough to know how to rope them into their movement.

So, you just have to use language that fits within the prevailing paradigm of society and that will resonate with most normies (which is mostly Orange with a bit of Blue)... and you can get people on board with just about anything. 

And this should be obvious at this point... given all the outlandish extreme stuff that's been normalized over the past decade.

Now, most people won't resonate with a deeper Green message about where trans identities come from and bla bla bla. But that wasn't going to carry any rhetorical weight anyway, as it's too complex.

The narratives and slogans themselves have to avoid being too complex, ideological, or wonky. 

Instead, you have to appeal to the value of freedom... and to the idea of minding your own business... which are already normalized in society and are situated smack in the middle of the Overton Window.

And you have to frame people who get hung up about trans people as weird and neurotic and anti-freedom... because they genuinely are weird and neurotic and anti-freedom.

You have to make it a taboo where people will try to avoid having that social stench on them because it's associated with creepy guys who never bathe or go outside and who post on 4-chan everyday.

And you do it just the same way as the right wing did with blue-haired SJWs back in 2015-2016.

They took a mainstream viewpoint of "accept people's differences"... and they found a group of screeching weirdos that held that viewpoint. 

And they used these same images of screeching weirdos to stigmatize the idea "accept people's differences" to the point where some would want to run away from association with that value because they didn't want to be seen as belonging to the group of screeching weirdos.

The left needs to learn to do our own version of that to re-normalize the "accept people's difference" viewpoint after 10 years of heavy right wing propagandizing and re-affirm it as the norm.

We on the left may be developed enough to understand Green values. But we need to be smart enough to figure out how to wield power well enough to re-normalize this value through the current societal lens.

And you need to show crazy creepy weirdos obsessing about trans people and transvestigating everyone in the same light as those blue-haired SJWs... and put it out there as a popular meme.

Then, have the progressive politicians be like "Duh. In our party we're pro-freedom and we mind our own business... and we focus on the real issues (insert economic populist vision here) instead of getting hung up on neurotically fearing people like the other side does."

 

Edited May 7 by Emerald

[Hardkill]

33 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@Emerald You can't bluster nor bull your way through lack of human development.

This isn't merely a PR or leadership problem. This is fundamentally a problem of lack of education, intelligence, and development. And that will not be fixed with any kind of clever political manuvering.

Humans severely lack intelligence and development. Which is why leftists will continue to lose and conservatives continue to win.

So, then why don't run on socially moderate to conservative stances while running on economic populism from now on?

 

 

[Leo Gura]

7 minutes ago, Emerald said:

You can always shape and form people's viewpoints regardless of where they are Spiral Dynamics-wise. People don't need to be on the same level of development as a political movement to get on board with a political movement.

You just need to frame things in a way that normies will respond to and inch them closer to your position over time.

It's just like how the far right has gotten a lot of Stage Green hippie folks to go Fascist by posing the right wing as the rebellious contrarian anti-establishment position and the left wing as the establishment position. 

You can do some of that. But you cannot talk a man out of his level of development.

It is much either to talk someone down into low development than up into high development. The devil whispering in your ear has more force than the angel. Because his words tickle the devil within.

Edited May 7 by Leo Gura