[skissane]

> They were full of liberals, but now they're full of leftists.

That’s not really true though. There’s a huge gap between old-school Marxism and contemporary progressivism. Classical Marxism foregrounds class; most of contemporary progressivism foregrounds race, gender and sexuality, and class issues are moved to the background.

African-American Marxist Adolph L. Reed Jr (professor emeritus of political science at UPenn), criticises “wokeness” as a capitalist scheme to distract and divide the working class-he’s definitely a “leftist”, but I don’t think he’d agree that many of the people you are complaining about really are “leftists” at all.

[Dalewyn]

>Classical Marxism foregrounds class; most of contemporary progressivism foregrounds race, gender and sexuality,

I don't see any difference of substance.

[skissane]

The point is if one person is a “Leftist” for whom class is most important and the other is a “Leftist” for whom it takes a back seat to race/gender/sexuality/etc - then the one word (“Leftist”) is being used to mean two different things.

What do queer theory, intersectional feminism and critical race theory have in common with Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao, etc? I don’t think they have much in common at all. Calling both the former and the latter “leftists” just makes the word meaningless

[Dalewyn]

Whether you're talking about how much money, or what genes, or what genitals someone has, or what genitals someone thinks they have, you're still overtly concerned with what someone is and how that can be used to discriminate.

So no, I don't see any difference of substance. The terminology changes, but the substance remains the same.

Not to mention, the left also still talks about class. Remember the "We are the 99%!" craze?

[skissane]

> you're still overtly concerned with what someone is and how that can be used to discriminate.

But aren’t many people on the Right “overtly concerned with what someone is” and even with “how that can be used to discriminate”?

I think your definition of “Left” is too broad, because it ends up encompassing much of the “Right” in its terms.

[Dalewyn]

Your response vindicates my position.

[skissane]

What does that mean?