I bet it’s in response to people on the right identifying as “classical liberals” and such. The phenomenon I’m referring to started on the center and right about three or four years ago.
It’s more about disillusioned lefties who are done with identity politics and mainstream media than righties trying to rebrand as something less conservative.
A lot of those people that are “done” with identity politics are playing it just as much as the left does. I used to be one of those disillusioned lefties that didn’t see that hypocrisy. I used to be a guy that watched Dave Rubin and Steven Crowder and Ben Shapiro and Sargon and those other hacks. I know the crowd. They can’t go more than a couple sentences without mentioning identity. Jordan Peterson is obsessed with identity. He can’t stop talking about gender identity and how society disadvantages men and how people need Christian morals to be good and all that shit. He and his ilk play the identity politics game. The idea that these people are against identity politics is dishonest. They’re against the left’s identity politics, but that’s it.
Random political thought:
I’ve seen a lot of “leftists” vs. “liberals” stuff lately, and I wonder, since when did “liberals” become synonymous with specifically center-left democrats? I always thought “liberal” was just a general term that encompassed the entire left.
A lot of center-right and even straight-up rightwing people have been trying to make some distinction between “liberals” and people that are more socialistic as a way to co-opt the term liberal.
Just as the right has the alt-right, whose views are too extreme or racist for the typical conservative, the left has been overrun with wackos who have as much in common with their far-right “enemies” as they do with their own party (see: Horseshoe Theory).
I agree, but I’m going to need examples of how the left is “overrun” by these wackos. I’ve asked you many, many times for evidence of this and you’ve yet to give it to me so please do. I think it’s an important conversation.
Those who are left-leaning but have some views that are traditionally (or even more recently) seen as conservative often adopt the label of “classical liberal” to separate themselves from a left wing that is increasingly irrational and emotionally driven.
Classical liberalism is a laissez-faire, conservative ideology. That’s not a recent evaluation of it. The people using it as a way to separate themselves from the left are misusing it because if they’re actually classical liberals then were never on the left. I also agree that there is an irrational segment of the left, particularly the one that cares more about culture and language than policy and economics, but how is that any different than the right? How is the left more irrational and emotionally driven than Trump’s portion of the rightwing?