Post AtFfzcvUXcUjOLMLqq by rcz@101010.pl
(DIR) More posts by rcz@101010.pl
(DIR) Post #AtFfzaDScM5MzCk9wW by stfn@fosstodon.org
2025-04-19T05:58:13Z
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Sigh, why do I have to live in such a far-right prevailing, theocratic country? The soccer lining is that the two left-wing presidential candidates in the upcoming elections have together around 10% of the vote in the polls, which is impressively high in comparison to previous elections.
(DIR) Post #AtFfzbhH6zWpZxhU3M by rcz@101010.pl
2025-04-19T08:07:34Z
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@stfn 10% in total is only impressive against the backdrop of the Ogórek-Biedroń 2% fiasco. 10% is normally the baseline for left vote. That much people vote for the left unless they're actively alienated — as many people have been in the past years.Before that fiasco it was expected for a single left-wing candidate to get into double digits, and failing that was considered a failure of leadership — because going above 10% is actually when you're convincing anyone outside your hard base.There's not one person on the left who could dream of achieving that now.The left is still very, very toxic. And even inside that 10%, the left is in such self-inflicted internal disarray that it's not possible to appeal to parts of it without alienating other parts of it, hence the need of splitting it between multiple candidates.
(DIR) Post #AtFfzcvUXcUjOLMLqq by rcz@101010.pl
2025-04-19T08:22:56Z
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@stfn Also, the tendency to conceptualize politics in terms of purity is one of the most toxic aspects of the left, and the most alienating.Even the religious right learned better than to be this puritan. They learned it during their own disarray in the early 2000s, when they basically managed to marginalize their own puritans (both Catholic and free-market ones).
(DIR) Post #AtFfzdtkvYhUPFYTmi by stfn@fosstodon.org
2025-04-19T08:46:48Z
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@rcz ok, what do you mean by "the left is toxic"?
(DIR) Post #AtFfzevv501dcFZinQ by rcz@101010.pl
2025-04-19T14:39:23Z
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@stfn In general, the sense that people on the left are perceived as someone “you just can't talk to” and probably want to stay away from.More specifically: that they are unwilling to accept that someone can disagree with them in good faith, and to engage in good faith with views different than their own.That they are deeply ideological in their thinking, meaning a stubborn unwillingness to acknowledge any limitations to their ideological models (which any model has).That they often employ — a tactic borrowed from priests, another group “you just can't talk to” — performative offence-taking and exaggerated outrage in place of honest conversation. Also, from the same playbook — that they often pronounce in a pompous or sarcastic tone, with a pretentious sense of a moral high ground, even on things on which they're clearly uninformed, even when they're shown to be so. I vividly remember conversations with priests just like that.I see this toxicity from both ends.When I meet new people — as I now do more — the moment they sense left-wing ideas from me there's often a moment of tenseness and suspicion, when I need to reassure them that we can still talk and I'm still listening to them. That the conversation can continue normally and I'm not going to start acting like an offended priest all of the sudden, _even though_ I'm left-wing.And when I talk to my various left-wing friends, I can mostly still talk to them in very private circumstances, but if it's not very private, then I get all of the above treatment a lot. Like, really really a lot.It all seems to have happened some 5-10 years ago, I don't know why, but this is my perception. So then any ideas branded as ”left-wing” are also tainted with this toxicity. Such ideas are, consequently, assumed to be undercooked — that they were not subjected to any scrutiny, not allowed to be debated, not checked with reality, but rather backed by loud offence-taking and calling people who disagree with them ugly names.Who would want to be anywhere near that?
(DIR) Post #AtFfzfaKekLrdaTzmq by stfn@fosstodon.org
2025-04-19T05:59:31Z
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Still, 10% for three left, and the rest for various flavors of conservative, harmful right-wingers
(DIR) Post #AtFfzkkRSaPReOFdjs by stfn@fosstodon.org
2025-04-19T06:02:35Z
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Of course by conservative I mean a list of different -phobisms
(DIR) Post #AtFg2J4QoyHQg8oppg by rcz@101010.pl
2025-04-19T14:39:57Z
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@stfn In general, the sense that people on the left are perceived as someone “you just can't talk to” and probably want to stay away from.More specifically: that they are unwilling to accept that someone can disagree with them in good faith, and to engage in good faith with views different than their own.That they are deeply ideological in their thinking, meaning a stubborn unwillingness to acknowledge any limitations to their ideological models (which any model has).That they often employ — a tactic borrowed from priests, another group “you just can't talk to” — performative offence-taking and exaggerated outrage in place of honest conversation. Also, from the same playbook — that they often pronounce in a pompous or sarcastic tone, with a pretentious sense of a moral high ground, even on things on which they're clearly uninformed, even when they're shown to be so. I vividly remember conversations with priests just like that.I see this toxicity from both ends.When I meet new people — as I now do more — the moment they sense left-wing ideas from me there's often a moment of tenseness and suspicion, when I need to reassure them that we can still talk and I'm still listening to them. That the conversation can continue normally and I'm not going to start acting like an offended priest all of the sudden, _even though_ I'm left-wing.And when I talk to my various left-wing friends, I can mostly still talk to them in very private circumstances, but if it's not very private, then I get all of the above treatment a lot. Like, really really a lot.It all seems to have happened some 5-10 years ago, I don't know why, but this is my perception. So then any ideas branded as ”left-wing” are also tainted with this toxicity. Such ideas are, consequently, assumed to be undercooked — that they were not subjected to any scrutiny, not allowed to be debated, not checked with reality, but rather backed by loud offence-taking and calling people who disagree with them ugly names.Who would want to be anywhere near that?