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.