A great read, thank you. In the same way I am also looking for some political identity to belong to but, despite my best efforts, I don't feel very inspired by anything on offer. I've voted Green and voted Labour and even done some leafleting, but am yet to get behind a vision, and on reading this I realise that you've nailed it - the vision that I imagined would speak to me sounds so totally cliche and all talk and no trouser - it is completely detached from any recognisable, reachable reality and I have heard it all before, a hundred times, without seeing any real movement towards it.
I wonder sometimes about how my identity shapes this response. As a white, middle class, educated, liberal woman I steer clear of the Right, but I wonder if the Tories suddenly came up with an amazing set of policies that genuinely seemed like they might address inequity in the UK (ha ha!), if I could bring myself to vote for them. Probably not. But at the same time, I can't help but be impressed by their capacity to appeal to people and connect with individual's and leverage parts of people's identities that the Left just can't seem to engage. Maybe one of the issues with the left is that it is necessarily universalist in its approach - it rejects individualism in favour of community but, in the West particularly, we are socialised by this neoliberal capitalist system to see ourselves and to operate primarily as individuals. Perhaps its hard for the left to mobilise people's lefty vision at a manageable, individual level, so we get stuck with these huge, sweeping, unattainable ideas?
I also envy the Conservative capacity to leverage nationalistic sentiment. Obviously, nationalism is not comfortably compatible with an anti-imperialist option but I think we might need an alternative national narrative for the left to have a chance to connect with a wider audience. I saw you speak at the Empowering Employment seminar yesterday (really interesting but, just as you said, I don't really think more advice and more mentoring is really going to blow it out of the water) and I wondered if we could really do with a national conversation about what it means to be British/English. The British identity is still awkwardly tied to our horrific imperial past and despite a brief flirtation with Cool Britannia (sad times) we've never successfully reinvented ourselves - not that we should sweep our past under the carpet, but it might help us to navigate away from this misplaced nostalgia for the 'Good Old Days' and this seemingly unstoppable drive into an insular, bigoted Right wing return to the past. We've gone and Brexited now and I think we need to build a vision of a future Britain that we can be proud of, to help us to steer away from the right because without a solid Plan B we've got nothing to aim for. How can we build a workable challenge to the outdated British identity? One that includes Muslim women at the top as standard, one that welcomes the gift of diversity, thrives on openness and still manages to tickle the tastebuds of the dyed in the wool nationalists? Could we make a lefty vision more tailored to our identity, if we could find some elements of Britishness that weren't too archaic and awful? Or is that just a stupid idea?
The procrastination of acting on your moral conscience due corruption of the political machine. I'm sure some philosopher has written volumes on this. I like your views but you are far to directional to be apart of any major political party. You would need to run as an independent but that requires a platform and the support of those that are like minded and a desire to be heard but most of all, critiqued, ridiculed and taken out of context. Putting you head up takes an understanding that it will constantly be whacked (metaphorically speaking) and having the will to keep it up. Not for all as much as we would like to be heard.
The areas of inclusion within our society as a whole that I would like to see are never going to come to fruition in my life time due to exactly what you site in your writing. To many in Government that are governing for the system as it is and the system isn't completely broken but it is far from perfect. Not much of a writer so please excuse grammar etc. Look forward to week 3
What a great read, thank you. I also find myself in the position of finding it difficult to align myself with any particular ideologies or movements, there always seems to be something that doesn't feel quite right. I also don't want to be just an anti-imperialist, there's definitely more to the both of us than that.
Since you're watching some French series on Netflix, I would recommend watching 'Le Bazar de la Charité'. We have just started watching it in our film club. A few of us aren't usually ones for period dramas, but (from watching the first two episodes) this is a great series that I think you would enjoy. I look forward to hearing from you next week!
Thank you Kaeshelle for a really thoughtful comment. I will definitely check out Le Bazar, just saw the trailer and it looks fab! Thanks for the recommendation!
A great read, thank you. In the same way I am also looking for some political identity to belong to but, despite my best efforts, I don't feel very inspired by anything on offer. I've voted Green and voted Labour and even done some leafleting, but am yet to get behind a vision, and on reading this I realise that you've nailed it - the vision that I imagined would speak to me sounds so totally cliche and all talk and no trouser - it is completely detached from any recognisable, reachable reality and I have heard it all before, a hundred times, without seeing any real movement towards it.
I wonder sometimes about how my identity shapes this response. As a white, middle class, educated, liberal woman I steer clear of the Right, but I wonder if the Tories suddenly came up with an amazing set of policies that genuinely seemed like they might address inequity in the UK (ha ha!), if I could bring myself to vote for them. Probably not. But at the same time, I can't help but be impressed by their capacity to appeal to people and connect with individual's and leverage parts of people's identities that the Left just can't seem to engage. Maybe one of the issues with the left is that it is necessarily universalist in its approach - it rejects individualism in favour of community but, in the West particularly, we are socialised by this neoliberal capitalist system to see ourselves and to operate primarily as individuals. Perhaps its hard for the left to mobilise people's lefty vision at a manageable, individual level, so we get stuck with these huge, sweeping, unattainable ideas?
I also envy the Conservative capacity to leverage nationalistic sentiment. Obviously, nationalism is not comfortably compatible with an anti-imperialist option but I think we might need an alternative national narrative for the left to have a chance to connect with a wider audience. I saw you speak at the Empowering Employment seminar yesterday (really interesting but, just as you said, I don't really think more advice and more mentoring is really going to blow it out of the water) and I wondered if we could really do with a national conversation about what it means to be British/English. The British identity is still awkwardly tied to our horrific imperial past and despite a brief flirtation with Cool Britannia (sad times) we've never successfully reinvented ourselves - not that we should sweep our past under the carpet, but it might help us to navigate away from this misplaced nostalgia for the 'Good Old Days' and this seemingly unstoppable drive into an insular, bigoted Right wing return to the past. We've gone and Brexited now and I think we need to build a vision of a future Britain that we can be proud of, to help us to steer away from the right because without a solid Plan B we've got nothing to aim for. How can we build a workable challenge to the outdated British identity? One that includes Muslim women at the top as standard, one that welcomes the gift of diversity, thrives on openness and still manages to tickle the tastebuds of the dyed in the wool nationalists? Could we make a lefty vision more tailored to our identity, if we could find some elements of Britishness that weren't too archaic and awful? Or is that just a stupid idea?
The procrastination of acting on your moral conscience due corruption of the political machine. I'm sure some philosopher has written volumes on this. I like your views but you are far to directional to be apart of any major political party. You would need to run as an independent but that requires a platform and the support of those that are like minded and a desire to be heard but most of all, critiqued, ridiculed and taken out of context. Putting you head up takes an understanding that it will constantly be whacked (metaphorically speaking) and having the will to keep it up. Not for all as much as we would like to be heard.
The areas of inclusion within our society as a whole that I would like to see are never going to come to fruition in my life time due to exactly what you site in your writing. To many in Government that are governing for the system as it is and the system isn't completely broken but it is far from perfect. Not much of a writer so please excuse grammar etc. Look forward to week 3
What a great read, thank you. I also find myself in the position of finding it difficult to align myself with any particular ideologies or movements, there always seems to be something that doesn't feel quite right. I also don't want to be just an anti-imperialist, there's definitely more to the both of us than that.
Since you're watching some French series on Netflix, I would recommend watching 'Le Bazar de la Charité'. We have just started watching it in our film club. A few of us aren't usually ones for period dramas, but (from watching the first two episodes) this is a great series that I think you would enjoy. I look forward to hearing from you next week!
Thank you Kaeshelle for a really thoughtful comment. I will definitely check out Le Bazar, just saw the trailer and it looks fab! Thanks for the recommendation!