Post Azijn82I27oSwK4BGK by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) More posts by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) Post #AziMm1DzZeJOa02elE by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-29T22:03:20Z
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"It's so refreshing to be able to talk honestly about these things now that everybody [here has] left politics ..."#RoryStewart, 2025https://alastaircampbell.org/2025/08/150-nicola-sturgeon-what-really-happened-in-the-scottish-referendum-part-2/Well, isn't that a revealing statement?Yes, I did unsub from The Rest is Politics in protests at their shameless shilling for HP. But I stumbled on this 2-part interview with former SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, which intrigues my Scottish diaspora roots, and it's well worth a listen.#podcasts #GoalHanger #TheRestIsPolitics #Leading
(DIR) Post #AziQIyJLj9cmxhx7IG by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-29T22:42:54Z
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Hey fellow political nerds in the UK, do you think the Greens could steal a march on Reform by announcing a policy that would allow national Parliaments in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales to run independence referenda without needing permission from Westminster?This would be totally in keeping with core Greens principles of participatory democracy and appropriate-level decision-making. It would boost their support among independence supporters, without needing to declare for or against.
(DIR) Post #Azijn82I27oSwK4BGK by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:20:02Z
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"You'll get even friends of Alistair on the left saying, the [US] Democratic Party could have won if it hadn't leaned so hard into [identity] issues. And actually what they need to do is move away from those issues, become more relevant to everyday voters ..."#RoryStewart, 2025https://alastaircampbell.org/2025/08/150-nicola-sturgeon-what-really-happened-in-the-scottish-referendum-part-2/If there really are people on the left saying that, I'd love examples. Because to me that sounds more a never-Trump centre-right critique. (1/?)
(DIR) Post #AzijnP7sUbNrwZoNpg by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:21:19Z
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"You'll get even friends of Alistair on the left saying, the [US] Democratic Party could have won if it hadn't leaned so hard into [identity] issues. And actually what they need to do is move away from those issues, become more relevant to everyday voters ..."#RoryStewart, 2025https://alastaircampbell.org/2025/08/150-nicola-sturgeon-what-really-happened-in-the-scottish-referendum-part-2/If there really are people on the left saying this - that specific angle -,I'd love examples. Because to me that sounds more a never-Trump centre-right critique of the progressive left.(1/?)
(DIR) Post #Azik7a61PqDnl5Z47c by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:24:57Z
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What I hear people on the left saying - because I'm one of them - is that we need to move from the moralistic, pseudo-conservative, scorched earth approach to progressive issues. Because it demonstrably alienates large chunks of the very populations it purports to champion. See the huge rise in votes for Orange Stalin among black and latino communities, for example.(2/?)
(DIR) Post #Aziku5Yhk2s7Ep6vo0 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:33:43Z
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We do need to keep talking about how human rights includes women, indigenous people, immigrants, people of colour, homosexuals, gender noncomformists, kinksters, etc, and we *certainly* need to keep talking about climate change. But what need to do differently is talk about these issues in ways that keep connecting them back to the everyday struggle for survival that unites the 99%.(3/?)
(DIR) Post #AzilKzjLWGTqyquyy8 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:38:35Z
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Quite frankly, I don't give a single, solitary gob of shite about the struggles of women corporate executives to break the glass ceiling. What I do care about is;* mothers carrying the stress of whether they can afford the rising costs of keeping their kids properly fed and getting them health care before conditions become chronic* indigenous women dying younger on average than their settler counterparts , mostly from preventable diseases, many of those borne of poverty and overwork(4/?)
(DIR) Post #AzimOmjjs5StnHTOO8 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:50:28Z
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Similarly, I don't give a shit about the struggles of middle class cyano-tories who now have to pay the full costs of buying a new EV. Cry me a fucking river. What I do care about is;* the impact of rising public transport prices on the disabled, the elderly, and parents who can't afford to ferry their kids around in an Epsom shopping cart. People whose only option in many cases is public transport* people who can't afford a new car, and struggle to afford fuel to get to work(5/?)
(DIR) Post #Azin7Ffpe5V8HXqhZA by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T02:58:31Z
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I don't give a shit about multimillionaire trans celebrities either. Nor what decisions professional sports bodies make about who qualifies for men's and women's competitions. That's for them to sort out.What I do care about is;* whether my trans friends who can't afford health insurance can access gender-affirming healthcare, in a timely fashion* whether they need backup against gangs of crypto-fascist thugs who claim to be "defending women" while menacing them in public toilets(6/?)
(DIR) Post #AzinlS2L6ECwCzXrcm by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T03:05:46Z
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See the pattern here? It's not about abandoning progressive politics for the white bread, workerist, blue-collar-bloke politics of the Old Left. It's about getting rid of the ideological boundary walls that neoliberals erected between the 2, and that neo-fascist nostalgia is busy plastering the cracks in. Turtles and Teamsters, pulling together.It's about focusing on how these angles of oppression affect the genuinely marginalised, not the economically and socially privileged.(7/7)
(DIR) Post #AzinxIScWrMNz3UDUe by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T03:07:55Z
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@violetmadder > I think that whole narrative is a vile lieThe narrative Stewart is spinning there?
(DIR) Post #AzioDbJMD7fX55vauu by sy@mastodon.nz
2025-10-30T03:10:48Z
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@strypey Is it a reference to this stuff? https://www.newstatesman.com/comment/2024/11/kamala-harris-perils-of-identity-politics
(DIR) Post #Aziwh21glNDdy3CyhM by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T04:45:48Z
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@sy> Is it a reference to this stuff?Maybe. But that article was written by a former Tory MP who served in Theresa May's Cabinet. Exactly what I meant by;> a never-Trump centre-right critique of the progressive leftHe does reference a left perspective;"... the Bernie Sanders critique of the Democrats’ campaign. Abandon the woke obsessions of the liberal intelligentsia and focus on delivering a left-wing economic agenda for the working classes ..."But this is a slanted summary at best.
(DIR) Post #Azj1SltsQDttfcZeCG by sy@mastodon.nz
2025-10-30T05:39:14Z
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@strypey Maybe not a great example (although New Statesman is generally considered a left liberal publication), but Sanders criticism of Harris and the Democrats for abandoning the working class was pretty widely reported... And has seemingly gained a lot of traction since then with Mamdami etc. adopting a very different stance.
(DIR) Post #Azj5fwbgKHwYSPbGUK by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T06:26:29Z
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@sy> Sanders criticism of Harris and the Democrats for abandoning the working class was pretty widely reportedThe conservative centre-right and the left pretty much share a critique of the Dems tone deaf, elite-centric politics. But that's where the agreement begins and ends. They are we have opposite ideas about how Dem politics breaks with their utterly failed neoliberal dogma and comes back to the centre-left.See the rest of the thread following on from the post you replied to.
(DIR) Post #AzjKPjoLdCU7S2FrPs by wxhbxh@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T09:11:34Z
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@strypey I generally feel similarly, though I think we should also be careful to acknowledge that the sports thing is not and has never been about sports. It's a wedge issue to drive far-right radicalisation, and a low-stakes way of broaching the subject of the removal of trans people from public life that acclimatises the public to having those discussions.
(DIR) Post #AzkCoduc5ywPv7VgJc by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T19:21:10Z
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@wxhbxh I broadly agree with this, but it's a matter of where you focus people's attention, to what effect.So much of the Culture War consists of symbolic equivalents of a weak front strategy. Where the right waves what looks an easy target in front of us, and when we rush in and take the bait, they flank us on both sides with pre-pepared attack lines that play to undecideds.It doesn't matter if we're in the right, if we lose the debate with everyone who doesn't already agree with us.(1/2)
(DIR) Post #AzkDLV7To4aCCuCDg0 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T19:27:07Z
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(2/2)So we need to learn from the last decade and stop taking the bait. Refuse to fight the issue on the ground chosen by our opponents. Keep bringing the focus back to how the issue affects ordinary, working people. Not elite athletes, celebrities, and others who struggling undecideds struggle to identify with.It's like the glass ceiling thing. I'm not against the equal opportunities part of equal opportunities exploitation. It's just not a debate that will move women's rights forward.
(DIR) Post #AzkLfzPlgC7jaf1ywy by wxhbxh@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T20:59:59Z
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@strypey I think we're on the same page here, it's just a matter of finding ways to shut down the recruitment/radicalisation aspect and their ability to use these niche issues to shift the Overton window, while *also* not giving them undue weight.I think the strategy of pointing out how weird it is to obsess over such stuff is useful here."How does this policy help everyday New Zealanders, Mr Seymour?"Put the onus on them to explain why we should care.
(DIR) Post #AzkR7glf6L2HdZIbMO by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-10-30T22:01:30Z
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@wxhbxh> I think the strategy of pointing out how weird it is to obsess over such stuff is useful here100%. That's why I advocate refusing to take a hard position on edge cases, eg deferring the professional sport to players, coaches and administrators. Refocusing onto working class trans people struggling to access healthcare or housing.