As I've pointed out many times before, the whole politics of the 21st century Western far-left is rooted in two branches of philosophy: postmodernism and critical theory. Therefore, the key to winning the argument against the far-left is to intellectually win the argument against these two worldviews. The way we can approach this is two-fold: firstly, by demonstrating the intellectual unsoundness of these worldviews, and secondly, by demonstrating the real world harms of activism and political action rooted in these worldviews.
Postmodernism rejects the pursuit of objective truth, and sees speech and discourse primarily as exercises of power. Identity-based critical theories, often drawing on postmodernism, imagine society as being made up of interlocking 'systems of oppression', where people are defined as oppressors or the oppressed based on their immutable characteristics. Together, these two overarching philosophical views lead to seeing culture as constructed to oppress the marginalized rather than organically evolved to serve the needs of the people, seeing society as a sphere of powerplay rather than a marketplace of ideas where the objective truth can be pursued, and seeing people as inherently divided into oppressor vs. oppressed groups rather than individuals with their own needs, desires and agency.
Unsurprisingly, a politics rooted in this outlook is often hostile to free speech, and is generally counterproductive in terms of resolving society's most sensitive conflicts. One needs to look no further than 2010s wokeness, its harmful impacts on free speech, and the backlash it ultimately brought, to prove this point. Other previous instances of the far-left causing similarly deleterious effects include the 1960s-70s New Left (which led to the backlash of the 1980s), the 1930s left in Europe (which led to the rise of fascism and World War II), and the actions of the Jacobins during the French Revolution (which led to Napoleon and the restoration of the monarchy). The far-left's formula has produced the same result again and again, and I think it would be irresponsible to allow them to experiment with society one more time.
