Comment by shazbotter
2 days ago
I'm about as far left as you can be, as a syndicalist anarchist, and I definitely perceived a bit of what you described. But I'm not super worried about it because he didn't say "the left", but rather a specific lefty position.
But also, the left isn't uniform on housing policy. Some folks want anti trust and limited capital ownership. Some folks want to de commodify housing. Some folks want all housing to be government built and owned. The left is a very diverse place (and the joke is no one hates leftists more than other leftists).
The people the article quoted as "left" like Stoller are really not left, and the whole anti-left felt more like a unnecessary strawman label and definite turn off for me reading it. I would characterize Stoller as an independent anti-monopolist - not really on the right or left spectrum at all politically. Unless the right is now pro-monopoly.
He’s specifically talking about Zephyr Teachout. Her work is specifically in anti-monopoly stuff.
I'm confused, that name does not seem to occur in the article. Are you talking about some other context
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Then why even bother calling it "left" at this point? Just say they're anti-monopoly. Is there really nobody on the right who are also anti-monopoly?
Presumably because anti monopoly right is much less common? Or because the anti monopoly right is concerned with different aspects of monopoly?
If someone said they were anti monopoly, that the government should do something to prevent businesses from operating like that, I'd never expect them to be from the right to be honest.
> If someone said they were anti monopoly, that the government should do something to prevent businesses from operating like that, I'd never expect them to be from the right to be honest.
So consider several perspectives:
a. The government should be in charge of, or at least heavily involved in, planning and organizing most resources in a country.
b. The market is a good way of solving most problems, and it works best if you just leave it alone, enforcing only very minimal rules (like property ownership, contracts, and such).
c. The market can be a good way of solving many problems, if it's regulated so that it has the properties you want.
Now consider other questions: Should abortion or pornography be legal / easily available? Should we invest in a large military? Should the government actively support "diversity" programs? Should gay marriage be allowed? How should the government relate to transgender people?
There are LOTS of people who believe in c as a principle, but have very non-"lefty" opinions on the other questions. Loads of people who consider themselves "on the right" think that everyone "on the left" actually believes a, not c; and loads of people who consider themselves "on the left" think that everyone "on the right" actually believes b, not c.
My sense is actually that the reason he talks that way is to make sure that people who consider themselves "on the left" don't mistake him for being someone "on the right" (and therefore in camp b), and immediately dismiss his claims.
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Tbh classification that makes most sense is wealth level.
Ultra rich and very rich and rich and upper middle class and ..
Because the underlying beliefs of a 'left' anti-monopolist and a 'right' anti-monopolist are likely very different, and similarly their proposed solutions and view of an ideal society will also diverge significantly?
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Also, it should be noted that we lack sufficiently concise but specific terms to use instead, and because alternative terms that are used are relative, and open to interpretation.
e.g.:
Many political commentators currently use the term "populist" to describe someone who's somewhat divergent from the capitalist political mainstream (and in US terms, I'd include the current Democrat establishment and traditional non-MAGA Republicans in this group). But when the term is applied to people as diverse as Corbyn, Sanders, and AOC on the one side, and Orban, Farage, and Trump on the other, it's nonsensical without much more explanation.
> Because the underlying beliefs of a 'left' anti-monopolist and a 'right' anti-monopolist are likely very different, and similarly their proposed solutions...?
Just curious, how "left" and "right" anti-monopolist solutions might be different? I mean, naturally some "left anti-monopolist" people might be in favor of governments taking over industries, but presumably that's not what most of the people in question are advocating at the moment.
> But when the term [populist] is applied to people as diverse as Corbyn, Sanders, and AOC on the one side, and Orban, Farage, and Trump on the other, it's nonsensical without much more explanation.
I don't think so. It's essentially an accusation that they haven't thought through the hard issues: they're saying "We're going to achieve X", when in fact X is simply not possible given the current state of play (or perhaps, not possible without significant negative consequences, like erosion of human rights or setting up an economic or ecological disaster further down the road).
Boris Johnson's promise to conservatives that they'd be able to "make a deal" which allowed them to trade freely with Europe while not accepting immigrants from Europe was just a fantasy. A lot of populist "progressive" politicians make similar kinds of promises.
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