Cancel Culture IS NOT a Republican Myth! | TaraElla Report S8

Today, I want to talk about a disturbing development I am seeing recently: an attempt to paint the cancel culture problem as a Republican talking point, something Republicans and conservatives use to wedge Democrats on. I've seen this particular idea being promoted in way too many articles just in the past few weeks. Couple this with a recent poll finding that Democrats placed much less importance on the issue of cancel culture than Republicans, there is a real worry that the progressive half of the population in America, and likely in other Western countries too, are tuning out of the cancel culture debate completely.

Q: But isn't cancel culture a favorite conservative talking point, especially in recent years?

A: It is very clear that cancel culture is not a conservative myth. Indeed, many of the people who have been canceled in the past few years, probably a majority of them, are not conservatives or Republicans. Part of the reason is, given that conservatives and progressives often occupy different spheres of life, the far left wouldn't be able to cancel conservatives even if they wanted to. Therefore, most cancellations I have seen are of liberal or progressive people who refuse to agree with the activist establishment on one or two issues. This means that, in practice, cancel culture is most often used by activists to enforce ideological conformity among progressive ranks. Meanwhile, given the silence towards this issue within progressive media, progressives who have not been personally affected generally don't care much.

Q: So why are you so worried that progressives aren't paying attention to cancel culture?

A: The danger of half of the population not taking cancel culture seriously, is that cancel culture will win. There is no way we can defeat cancel culture without broad support and commitment from across the political spectrum.

Q: So how can we get progressives to start caring about cancel culture?

A: I guess two things need to happen. Firstly, we need to show how free speech and free debate are required to achieve true justice. Real justice can only be achieved if we understand the truth, and all sides of it. If you silence some inconvenient viewpoints, you are potentially throwing away important parts of the puzzle. This is especially true since most targets of cancel culture aren't openly racist or hateful people, but actually well meaning people with different ideas.

Secondly, we need to attack the root ideologies that fuel cancel culture, things like postmodernism and Marcusean critical theory, or criticalism for short. We need to show how these ideologies are, in many ways, the opposite of the liberal ideals that have been responsible for everything from the civil rights movement to marriage equality. For example, whereas liberalism is focused on objective truths, cirticalist theories deny its importance. Many great liberal thinkers were dedicated empiricists who derived their ideas from observation and the scientific method, while criticalism is anti-empiricist and possibly anti-science.

Q: But some people may say, what you call criticalism helps us tackle discrimination and oppression better, so it's useful. Some may even say that liberalism has never lived up to its promises anyway.

A: The important point is, while nations that profess liberal ideals, like America and Britain, have not always lived up to what they profess, it is the continual application of these values that has made things better as time goes on. On the other hand, criticalism, has an inherent anti-liberal orientation. Criticalism uses these historical flaws as justification for throwing the whole liberal project out, which will mean canceling all future liberal reforms still to come. Criticalism is essentially trading away prospects for much needed reform, for holding onto a utopian ideal of humanity that will never come true. Indeed, I believe that the rise of criticalism came close to derailing gay marriage in Australia, and has actually turned the clock back on LGBT rights in the UK. These developments should deeply concern any progressive.

Elites With An Agenda Smear Andrew Yang Again! | TaraElla Report S8

Today, I want to talk about the reaction around a recent Politico article, that described in detail Andrew Yang's appearances on right-leaning podcasts and shows like The Rubin Report and The Ben Shapiro Show back in 2019, during his run for the Presidential primary, as well as some of his supposedly controversial comments. Now, some people on the pro-establishment parts of the so-called Left are using that as evidence that Yang is somehow 'not progressive', by which they probably mean 'right wing'. As many of you would know, I followed Yang's campaign closely, and my view is that that characterization is totally unfair.

In reality, Yang did nothing controversial at all. His comments against identity politics, for example, were generally well received. They were certainly not a racist dogwhistle or anything like that. His outreach to people across the political spectrum was considered one of his greatest assets. Furthermore, Yang was, and still is, one of the most popular rising stars among people on the Left. He is considered one of the best choices for 2024 among people who identify as progressive. And they still choose him, knowing all of the facts presented in the article.

What I'm worried about is that the pro-woke crowd is now out to smear anyone who does not entirely subscribe to woke culture and its demands as 'not progressive' at the very least, or even outrightly 'right wing'. In other words, the woke will set the terms for qualifying as 'progressive' going forward, and those who don't obey will be banished. We saw the beginnings of that last year, during the drama surrounding the Harper's free speech letter, where the woke openly doubted the progressive credentials of even figures like Noam Chomsky, for simply supporting free speech and opposing cancel culture. Meanwhile, woke leaders were all out to discredit any concerns about cancel culture and the erosion of free speech, even from well meaning people who otherwise supported racial justice. Make no mistake, this is not about social justice, it's a clear neo-Gramscian 'war of position' move. The smearing of Yang is clearly a continuation of that work.

I've said in the past, and I will say it again now, that I believe being skeptical of wokeism is actually being the real woke, because wokeism is pushed by elite establishments. Wokeism is divisive and unconstructive, and would certainly not lead us towards ending racism, sexism, homophobia or bigotry any time soon. It's not that I'm not concerned about actually racist people hiding behind anti-woke. I am certainly very concerned about that, and I have repeatedly spoken out on that. I think we should all combat that kind of deception. But the reason why I'm anti-woke is because I'm anti-racist, I want to end bigotry, I want a world of equal opportunity, and the worldview, methods and real world results of wokeism is leading us away from that. Identity politics has had the effect of increasing rather than decreasing racism. I seriously worry that it could even undo many years of progress if it is allowed to continue down its current path. That's why I cannot support any of it in good conscience. And there's nothing 'right wing' about this position at all.

Honestly, sometimes I feel like we're living in a movie, where the world is on the verge of a major crisis, but the problematic guys have the biggest megaphone, and they have somehow convinced many people that they are the good guys. They have turned a large chunk of the population against the real good guys too. Somehow, the good guys have to fight back and save the world. The only question is, how.

I Hope Jordan Peterson Fans can Appreciate his New Political Message | TaraElla Report S8

Jordan Peterson is back, and he is busy promoting his new book Beyond Order. The book contains 12 more rules for life, and literally complements the previous book, with its cover being black, as opposed to the white cover of the original 12 Rules For Life. Now, Peterson has always been a controversial figure. Among the people I know, some absolutely love him, and some have a much less charitable view of him. Over the years I have had both agreements and disagreements with him, but what I like about him is that he speaks his mind, and he is also rather more complex than the party-line talking heads you see everywhere.

When Peterson first became a global phenomenon a few years ago, many people understood his position as one of defending order against chaos. Some described his worldview as being in favor of an 'ordered liberty'. This time, he is adding some important nuance to his views on order. Basically, as I understand from his recent comments, he sees order as both protective but also capable of turning oppressive. Order becomes oppressive when it degenerates, when it is based on power and not competence. While an order based on competence would enjoy wide support, an order based on power would have to resort to force to get people to obey it, and hence such a degenerated order would be oppressive.

Since order can degenerate into oppression, then, the antidote to chaos cannot just be order. Rather, it must be truth. Specifically, Peterson advocates for a truth based on love, a desire for all things to flourish. I think this is a very interesting point. Lately, I have been doing a series called The Liberal Project, in which we examine the beliefs and values of great liberal thinkers. And what strikes me is that, the great classical liberal thinkers, Locke, Mill, and so on, don't necessarily share the same worldview all the time, but they are united by their dedication to the objective truth, and their liberal values is a consequence of this commitment to the truth.

Indeed, one may have different reasons for a commitment to truth and objectivity, but the ultimate consequential values are going to be very similar. For example, my own position as a Moral Libertarian is that there is one objective truth, and hence one objective right and wrong morally, but that no human being is infallible in decerning the right from the wrong. This is why there must be a dedication to finding the objective truth, and this would necessitate free speech, rational debate, freedom of conscience and so on. Mill's position differs from my position in that his commitment to truth is based on utilitarianism, but the consequences, a commitment to free speech and so on, is the same. A study of the history of liberalism would show that commitment to the truth, and an order or morality that is based on the objective truth, is inherent to liberal philosophy. Conversely, any ideology or philosophy that is not committed to the truth would be, by definition, incompatible with liberal democracy's spirit. Hence, if we are committed to the continuation of liberal democracy, we must call out all such ideologies.

Now, let's return to Peterson. In Chapter 6 of his new book, he advises readers to abandon ideology and think complexly. Discussing this on the Rubin Report, he said that ideologies often try to explain everything by just one thing, like the way Marx focused on economics, Freud focused on sex, and the current New Left on power. However, in real life, most things are explained by the result of a combination of factors, or 'multivariate' in the language of quantitative researchers. Indeed, I think it is regrettable that this point isn't a much bigger part of our school education. I personally think that high schools should teach some basic quantitative research methods, so that every adult would have a fundamental understanding of this. The take home message is basically that, if you are committed to the truth, if you really want to understand the truth behind things, then you cannot just focus on certain ideas or explanations and be satisfied with that. Rather, you should be more open-minded in terms of the possibilities. I guess independent thinking, breaking free of echo chambers that reinforce the same talking points every time, would be important here too. This would equally apply to the Left and the Right alike.

This is also a message I hope Peterson fans would take time to absorb. Due to his position against political correctness and his association with the IDW, Peterson has come to be seen as an anti-woke figure, and a large part of his fanbase have strong anti-woke views. As you may know, the anti-woke world is experiencing a kind of schism at the moment, with some people placing the need to defeat 'woke' ideas like critical race theory at the center of their politics, while others take a more moderate approach, looking at the whole picture for the whole truth about things, critiquing ideological wokeness as part of their overall critique on insufficient objectivity. I'm obviously more sympathetic to the second group. Indeed, I am worried that parts of the anti-woke movement are now trying to explain everything using their anti-woke lens. They are essentially becoming the mirror image of the woke. Like every other one-factor ideological approach, this would oversimplify and distort reality, and is no good in terms of understanding the truth. Postmodernism should be seen as inherently incompatible with the principles of liberal democracy, because of its lack of commitment to the truth. But any other ideology that is more committed to its a-priori biases than the objective truth would be just as bad, and this includes anti-woke fundamentalism.

Sensible Liberal Reforms Can Defeat Identity Socialism | TaraElla Report S8

Today, I want to talk about the controversial author and filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza, who has published a book about what he calls 'identity socialism', and has been going to media outlets like Prager U to promote his views on this matter.

People who have read my book The Moral Libertarian Horizon Volume 1, or alternatively my early Moral Libertarian articles from around March 2018, may have come across me describing something called 'identity socialism'. At that time, I believed I was coining a new term, even though I'm not sure if it was already used by other people before. Anyway, the important thing is that I first used the term in early 2018, before the publication of D'Souza's book in 2020. I feel that I need to clarify this, so at least people won't mistakenly think that my use of the term 'identity socialism' is in any way inspired by D'Souza, given my many disagreements with him.

D'Souza's concept of 'identity socialism' does have some overlap with the way I used it, in that it is used to describe a form of pseudo-Marxist identity politics that treats identity groups like Marxism treats economic class. Back in early 2018, I thought that 'identity socialism' was a more neutral and less ideological term to describe the phenomenon. But soon after, there was a sudden buzz around Jordan Peterson's term 'postmodern neo-Marxism', which changed the whole discussion, and which meant I didn't use the term much. Nowadays, I think most people just call it 'postmodern critical theory', or directly describe variants of it like 'critical race theory'. I have also used other terms like 'criticalism' or 'the Marcusean Left'. For me, all the aforementioned terms just about describe the same things.

Where D'Souza's concept of 'identity socialism' differ from mine is that he sees it as a marriage of economic socialism and identity politics. I reject this because it is overly broad and generalizing, which means it essentially creates a strawman of much of the Left. Now, this is not about whether the Left or the Right is wrong, or which part of the Left is better, or so on. This is purely an exercise in understanding reality without further value judgements. We need to get the facts correct first, because if we don't, then the whole debate becomes meaningless.

Let's start with this: while there are indeed people who practice both 'identity socialism' and traditional economic socialism together, there are also many people on the Left who practice one without another. The idea that Bernie Sanders should be lumped together with people who support identity politics or critical race theory just because he supports socialized medicine is groundless. Indeed, as I covered last year, many economics first Bernie supporters were dismayed that culturally radical elements might have contributed to Bernie's loss. On the other hand, it was also hypothesized that many rural working class voters supported Bernie in 2016 because he was the more culturally moderate candidate compared to Hillary, but in 2020 they jumped ship to Biden because now Biden was seen as the more culturally moderate among the two. D'Souza's theory doesn't even acknowledge the existence of this complexity within the so-called Left. While D'Souza's theory has been well received by some on the Right, it wouldn't even stand up to basic scrutiny among people who actually have a reasonable understanding of the Left and its many divisions.

Another thing I disagree with D'Souza is his idea that 'identity socialism' is a way to build that 51% support needed to usher in economic socialism in a democratic system. This 'plan' is certainly in the minds of some people, but I don't think it's the motivation for most of those who practice 'identity socialism'. Rather, I think most 'identity socialists' primarily want radical cultural change, while they also believe they need to usher in economic socialism to allow that to happen, because of their belief in critical theory, which holds that capitalism is inherently tied to 'oppressive' social constructs and institutions. Hence, even their support for economic socialism is secondary to their desire for radical cultural change. Now, this stands in strong contrast to those parts of the Left which see improving the lives of working people through programs like Medicare For All, free college, a $15 minimum wage and a UBI as the end in and of itself. As previously discussed, these economic socialists are actually usually skeptical of the 'identity socialists', because they think identity politics and criticalist ideology would alienate an otherwise receptive working class from their policies.

Understanding all this is important because it tells us that 'identity socialism' is primarily a cultural movement, not an economic movement. After all, this makes sense because, if one packaged more acceptable and less acceptable items together, it is logical to guess that one primarily wants the less acceptable items to get done. In other words, if what you wanted was Medicare For All, you would champion for that directly like Bernie, rather than going in a round-about way via much less popular ideas like critical race theory or social constructionism.

I think correctly understanding the motivation of criticalists, i.e. 'identity socialists', is very important, because then we can offer either an alternative or a rebuke, depending on how reasonable the underlying wish is. In some cases, criticalists are just impatient about some much needed reform, in areas like racial equality or equal opportunity for minority groups. In those cases, a truly ambitious yet liberal program could attract people away from criticalism. Remember, what people want is equality of opportunity in practice, not just theoretical equality that doesn't happen in practice. If we can suggest liberal reforms that can convincingly make society truly equal for everyone regardless of race, gender, sexuality and so on, I think that would attract many people away from criticalism. On the other hand, some committed criticalists want nothing less than the dismantling of core values like free speech and core social institutions like marriage and family, in a misguided belief that this would lead to some kind of 'liberation'. These demands certainly cannot be entertained by society, so a reasoned yet forceful rebuke to this kind of so-called 'liberation' is needed instead.