Cultural Marxism: The Right Painting Themselves as Victims

[pErvinalia]

On Saturday, the Australian published a column by the ABC’s political editor, Chris Uhlmann. In it, Uhlmann repeated a disturbing theory about the origins of 20th century social change. It’s one that appears to have firmly lodged itself in the minds of many conservative Australian journalists.

It begins in its familiar way with the Italian Marxist, Antonio Gramsci, who, after realising that open calls to revolution were falling on deaf ears in the west, argued that Marxists, in Uhlmann’s words, should seek the “commanding heights of the bureaucracy, universities and the media”, and “scrub the landscape clean of Western values”.

Then, we are told, “neo-Marxists … built critical theory as a vehicle for change and began the deconstruction of the West.”

At this point, Uhlmann’s retelling of the tale embraces darker, more vivid and disturbing imagery:

Frankfurt School academics fleeing Adolf Hitler’s Germany transmitted the intellectual virus to the US and set about systematically destroying the culture of the society that gave them sanctuary.

Not just a vector of intellectual infection, and not just ungrateful parasites who sought to destroy their hosts, these academics were, on this account, determined to use the freedoms America afforded them in order to destroy it.

America’s freedom of speech was its achilles heel. Critical theorists were given university pulpits and a constitutionally ordained right to preach, grinding its foundation stones to dust. Since 1933 they have been hellbent on destroying the village to save it.

In the work of a late Frankfurt School theorist, Herbert Marcuse, “developed a plan for reversing the polarity of freedom”. In Uhlmann’s view, Marcuse singlehandedly redefined the nature of tolerance in a way that advantages the left.

“It is now considered tolerant to demand silence from nonconformists,” Uhlmann wrote.

This tale of decades of Marxist subversion was rolled out by Uhlmann to explain why some people had taken issue with him on Twitter.

He attracted criticism because he stuck up for Tony Abbott’s decision to address the Christian far-right group, the Alliance Defending Freedom. He claims that some unnamed Twitter users – including journalists – disagreed with this, and claimed that Abbott had no right to speak to a reactionary group. Had he named anyone, the truth of his assertions could be checked.

Personally, I only saw people – including me – arguing that while Abbott has the right to speak to whomever he chooses, he should expect his engagements to attract scrutiny.

A little criticism and disagreement – the only thing that Uhlmann has really had to endure – was all it took for him to reach for the theory of “cultural Marxism”, whose details he repeats without giving it its title.

As the US hate-watch group, the Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC) puts it, this “theory posits that a tiny group of Jewish philosophers who fled Germany in the 1930s and set up shop at Columbia University in New York City devised an unorthodox form of ‘Marxism’ that took aim at American society’s culture, rather than its economic system”.

The “cultural Marxism” theory was developed towards the end of the cold war to open up a new front against the left: the culture war against a supposed “political correctness”.

The SPLC describes the theory as “bizarre”, because it is. The Frankfurt School once in the US were primarily focused on the origins of far right authoritarianism, not the subversion of the US.

Any critique of American values they made – for example in the work of Theodore Adorno – was on the basis of a lament for the decline of traditional European high culture in the face of post-war commercial culture. Anyone who thinks otherwise has likely not read their work.

And anyone who looks at the global contemporary capitalist order would find it hard to believe that we are living under a Marxist hegemony.

The decline of traditional values is a result of the relentlessly transformative nature of capitalism itself, not the work of a small group of emigre Marxists who are little read now even among academics.

In 2002, when they first reported on it, the SPLC called it “the newest intellectual bugaboo on the radical right”, but worried about “signs that this bizarre theory is catching on in the mainstream”.

It’s still popular on the far right – increasingly so. Everyone from white nationalists to militant antifeminists on “the redpill right” still relies on it as an explanatory theory of history. The notion was central to the thought of Anders Breivik, who massacred young social democrats in Norway.

But the SPLC were right to predict its penetration of mainstream conservatism. The sclerotic inhabitants of the Australian’s op-ed page appear to have a particular affinity with this line of thought.

Before Uhlmann, Kevin Donnelly and Nick Cater also gave potted versions of the story. (I noted the latter instance in an earlier column.)

The SPLC worried about this happening, because it may lend respectability to a narrative that “in its most virulent form, (it is) an antisemitic theory that identifies Jews in general and several Jewish intellectuals in particular as nefarious, communistic destroyers.”

The far right thinkers who popularised the story of cultural Marxism from the late 1980s were not above peddling it to political antisemites. Paul Weyrich who, along with William S Lind, promoted this theory at the Free Congress Foundation from the late 1980s onward, was known to propound in speeches to Holocaust-deniers.

Not everyone who critiques cultural Marxism is an antisemite and there’s no suggestion being made here that Uhlmann himself is antisemitic. But in the context of this history, his metaphors of infection and internal subversion are exceptionally poorly chosen. He should have been more careful with his metaphors and should have not got himself entangled in a theory that the right – mainstream and extreme – are increasingly happy to use to paint themselves as history’s victims.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... MP=soc_567

[Forty Two]

On Saturday, the Australian published a column by the ABC’s political editor, Chris Uhlmann. In it, Uhlmann repeated a disturbing theory about the origins of 20th century social change. It’s one that appears to have firmly lodged itself in the minds of many conservative Australian journalists.

It begins in its familiar way with the Italian Marxist, Antonio Gramsci, who, after realising that open calls to revolution were falling on deaf ears in the west, argued that Marxists, in Uhlmann’s words, should seek the “commanding heights of the bureaucracy, universities and the media”, and “scrub the landscape clean of Western values”.

This is accurate, actually. If you look at some of the writings of various Communist and Marxist groups, they refer to "incrementalism" as a guiding principle. The whole notion of a radical revolution in the west went by the wayside, because, well, the reason it worked in Russia was that the bulk of the populace were so poor as to be in servitude -- serfdom. They could barely eat, and often could not. They owned nothing. They had nothing. So, Marxist socialism promised them a bump up. In Europe, Oz and the US, Marxist socialism can only be a bump down for such a large number of people that you can't get them to overthrow the system.

So, instead, if you want to effect change in the way they ultimately desire, they have to do it gradually, and partly from within. It's not a conspiracy theory, and it's not even controversial. It's not some nefarious behind-the-scenes power, etc. It's existing groups on the radical left having goals and moving toward them.

It's Fabian Socialism.

“It is now considered tolerant to demand silence from nonconformists,” Uhlmann wrote.

We see this a lot in the Progressive Left.

This tale of decades of Marxist subversion was rolled out by Uhlmann to explain why some people had taken issue with him on Twitter.

He attracted criticism because he stuck up for Tony Abbott’s decision to address the Christian far-right group, the Alliance Defending Freedom. He claims that some unnamed Twitter users – including journalists – disagreed with this, and claimed that Abbott had no right to speak to a reactionary group. Had he named anyone, the truth of his assertions could be checked.

Personally, I only saw people – including me – arguing that while Abbott has the right to speak to whomever he chooses, he should expect his engagements to attract scrutiny.

A little criticism and disagreement – the only thing that Uhlmann has really had to endure – was all it took for him to reach for the theory of “cultural Marxism”, whose details he repeats without giving it its title.

This reference to a "little criticism and disagreement" belies the pattern in the Progressive left of, say, Professor Melissa Click and her "Who wants to help me get this reporter out of here!? I need some muscle over here!" And, the endless examples of no-platforming, and attempts to ban speakers, etc. Leftist groups shutting down peaceful meetings by pulling fire alarms. Leftists who engage in the very conduct they say they deplore - harassment and violent threats -- when someone "breaks ranks" (a la Joss Whedon).

It's not just "a little criticism." We find examples where feminists think it's right to get people fired, or try to, because they publish anti-feminist youtube videos (e.g. Thunderf00t).

They go to the UN and call for the UN to push for requirements that there be "systemic changes" to limit what people can and can't say on Twitter, like, posting videos critical of feminists like Anita Sarkeesian, and calling her a liar or telling her she sucks in comment sections.

As the US hate-watch group, the Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC) puts it, this “theory posits that a tiny group of Jewish philosophers who fled Germany in the 1930s and set up shop at Columbia University in New York City devised an unorthodox form of ‘Marxism’ that took aim at American society’s culture, rather than its economic system”.

The “cultural Marxism” theory was developed towards the end of the cold war to open up a new front against the left: the culture war against a supposed “political correctness”.

There is a movement within intersectional feminism that espouses cultural Marxism. You'll see these activists openly suggest that they would persecute bourgeousie reactionaries, and even suggest that executions of dissidents are in order. Obviously, this doesn't represent the average person on the street who is not an activist, but there are plenty of activists who think Marxism is the nice, Progressive way to go, and that those who would oppose that way to go are hateful, reactionaries who need to, as Melissa Click said "need to get out."

Not everyone who critiques cultural Marxism is an antisemite and there’s no suggestion being made here that Uhlmann himself is antisemitic. But in the context of this history, his metaphors of infection and internal subversion are exceptionally poorly chosen. He should have been more careful with his metaphors and should have not got himself entangled in a theory that the right – mainstream and extreme – are increasingly happy to use to paint themselves as history’s victims.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... MP=soc_567[/quote][/quote]

If anything, it's cultural Marxists who are antisemitic these days. Jews are an oppressor group nowadays. They are higher up the Progressive Stack. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_stack

[Forty Two]

Oh, and it's not just "the right" that opposes cultural marxism and the politics of the "Progressive Left." Liberals do, too. Often folks confuse Progressive Left with Liberal, which are not the same thing at all. People confuse them because of the perception that the are both after helping people and opposing racism, as well as being anti-religion and such. But, the Progressive Left and Liberalism are diametrically opposed in many ways, and if one is truly Progressive Left, one is far more illiberal than liberal.

[pErvinalia]

Liberals are ultimately largely conservative as that's where their policies naturally lead. And I've explained this before in other threads in response to posts of yours, so no, I'm not going to explain it again.

So basically your rebuttal to this piece is the usual hyperbole you and Dave Dodo peddle. Teh radical feminists are out to shut us all down. No one disagrees that radical feminists are nuttier than a fruitcake. It's the relative influence of them that is the point. That is, they are an exceedingly tiny minority outlier. It's like being scared that Muslims are going to take over the west.

As the article pointed out, these alleged "cultural Marxists" are doing a totally fucked job of hijacking society. Neoliberalism has ruled supreme for nearly 40 yrs now. Get a fucking grip you lot.

[JimC]

If the intent was to destroy capitalism, then it's been a big fucking failure. No more real communist states, and the world economy is massively dominated by free enterprise based corporations...

And I always thought that cultural marxism involved discussing Das Capital while wearing pearls and a twinset, and drinking dry sherry...

[pErvinalia]

It's basically just the conservative right whinging that power in society has the potential to move away from them. They are so used to being in charge that their born to rule sensibilities can't take it.

The ironic thing about all this is that neoliberalism is the biggest authoritarian threat to individuals, and that's exactly what we've seen over the last 35yrs as political power has significantly shifted from the people to corporations and a small percentage of oligarchs.

[JimC]

I think the whinging from conservatives about the creeping marxist danger is pretty absurd. However, at the same time, the rigid leftist ideology that dominates some parts of academia is also fairly removed from reality, and deserves a robust critique. It has become the new academic orthodoxy in many sociology and humanities departments, and can be very illiberal, in the true sense of the word; it is what drives the most humourless versions of PC culture...

But a cunning plot to do away with capitalism it is not...

[pErvinalia]

It is illiberal in many respects. But the alternative, the neoliberal status quo, is just as illiberal. The liberals whinging about PCism and feminism etc seem to miss the forest for the trees.

[Forty Two]

Liberals are ultimately largely conservative as that's where their policies naturally lead. And I've explained this before in other threads in response to posts of yours, so no, I'm not going to explain it again.

Well, liberals aren't conservative, as a conservative is not generally in favor of the liberal ideas that liberals hold. Like, rights to privacy, and limitations on government power, etc., free speech and freedom of the press, and the like -- conservatives typically are against the right to privacy (opposing rights to contraception, sexual privacy and abortion, etc) and they are more likely to support the police and law enforcement and to oppose technicalities like Miranda rights, search and seizure requirements, warrant requirements, etc.

So basically your rebuttal to this piece is the usual hyperbole you and Dave Dodo peddle. Teh radical feminists are out to shut us all down.

To some degree, yes. I mean, did you see what they did when Milo Yiannopolis was invited to speak at Rutgers University last week? They tried to shut him down.

Did you see what they did at the University of Missouri, trying to use "muscle" to physically remove members of the press from covering a protest in a public square?

Have you seen the videos of radical feminists shutting down conferences by hitting fire alarms and such?

the list is extensive....

No one disagrees that radical feminists are nuttier than a fruitcake. It's the relative influence of them that is the point.

Their influence is rather extensive, as they are achieving results. Their influence in colleges, for example, is so extensive that they are succeeding in removing due process protections against accused persons. They are succeeding in denying accused sexual assault or harassment perpetrators from being represented by an attorney, having a hearing at which an attorney is present, being specifically apprised of the charges and the evidence against them, and being able to confront witnesses or test the evidence. They are succeeding in having free speech silenced by having contradiction or opposition labeled "hate."

That is, they are an exceedingly tiny minority outlier. It's like being scared that Muslims are going to take over the west.

It's not about being afraid of them. It's about opposing their pernicious ideology.

As the article pointed out, these alleged "cultural Marxists" are doing a totally fucked job of hijacking society. Neoliberalism has ruled supreme for nearly 40 yrs now. Get a fucking grip you lot.

That's your position, but it is not born out by the facts, as I noted by citing the college campuses as an example. Further, their propaganda is making it into the mainstream, like when they pretend that women are paid 77 cents on the dollar for the same job as a man and other notions. They are making significant headway in having their mythologies accepted as true, like when they claim that women are an oppressed class in the US. It's almost an article of faith, and is making it mainstream -- in the US it is, anyway.

[Forty Two]

It's basically just the conservative right whinging that power in society has the potential to move away from them. They are so used to being in charge that their born to rule sensibilities can't take it.

For me, it's about being liberal and wishing to live in a liberal society. It's about opposing folks who want to control the language, and silence dissent and opposition. It's about affronts to reason and logic and skepticism.

The ironic thing about all this is that neoliberalism is the biggest authoritarian threat to individuals, and that's exactly what we've seen over the last 35yrs as political power has significantly shifted from the people to corporations and a small percentage of oligarchs.

Liberal ideas are the answer. The philosophy of the enlightenment, the age of reason, and a focus on the rights of man are the answer. Cultural Marxism where races or genders are considered oppressed groups and juxtaposed against the white males (who are the aristocrats and the bourgeousie) is not only nonsense, but also illiberal. It breeds ideas like "women can't be sexist" and "minorities can't be racist". And, it breeds ideas that favor discrimination based on sex and race, like where racial groups demand segregated public spaces (now called safe spaces) and the right to exclude others from those otherwise public spaces. It breeds the issues of microaggressions and prosecution of opinions as hate speech.

[laklak]

I think we should all be free to smoke as much dope as we want, fuck each other in any ways we deem interesting, and not pay any taxes. At all.

Does that make me a Libservatarian? I'm so confused.

[pErvinalia]

So basically your rebuttal to this piece is the usual hyperbole you and Dave Dodo peddle. Teh radical feminists are out to shut us all down.

To some degree, yes. I mean, did you see what they did when Milo Yiannopolis was invited to speak at Rutgers University last week? They tried to shut him down.

Did you see what they did at the University of Missouri, trying to use "muscle" to physically remove members of the press from covering a protest in a public square?

Have you seen the videos of radical feminists shutting down conferences by hitting fire alarms and such?

the list is extensive....

It may or may not be extensive, but as a regular(ish) person in society with big opinions and no fear of stating them, I've never run across any of this nonsense. I've had one facebook friend who is a tumblresque SJW/oppression-olympics activist who banned me from his page for some of this stuff, but that's literally it. And that, of course had zero effect in my ability to get about in society from day to day. And I'd expect it's the exact same in the US. Are your day to day activities under threat from these people? How many times a day do you need to hold back for fear of offending some radical feminist or SJWer?

No one disagrees that radical feminists are nuttier than a fruitcake. It's the relative influence of them that is the point.

Their influence is rather extensive, as they are achieving results. Their influence in colleges, for example, is so extensive that they are succeeding in removing due process protections against accused persons. They are succeeding in denying accused sexual assault or harassment perpetrators from being represented by an attorney, having a hearing at which an attorney is present, being specifically apprised of the charges and the evidence against them, and being able to confront witnesses or test the evidence. They are succeeding in having free speech silenced by having contradiction or opposition labeled "hate."

In College. Not in society. And Mercan college at that. Having studied and worked at a major university for 20 years, I saw literally zero cases of this at my university.

As the article pointed out, these alleged "cultural Marxists" are doing a totally fucked job of hijacking society. Neoliberalism has ruled supreme for nearly 40 yrs now. Get a fucking grip you lot.

That's your position, but it is not born out by the facts, as I noted by citing the college campuses as an example.

That's colleges. Neoliberalism rules supreme over our societies and political systems. Neoliberalism is a greater threat to freedom than a tiny minority of fringe theorists in a tiny segment of society.

Further, their propaganda is making it into the mainstream, like when they pretend that women are paid 77 cents on the dollar for the same job as a man and other notions.

that's not propaganda, it's true. It's what analysis you do with that fact that is important. And like all socio-political analysis, it's not easy to get at an objective answer. Both sides of the argument have truths to it. To claim that it's all one sided is ridiculous, as many threads here with many pieces of data and analysis have show

They are making significant headway in having their mythologies accepted as true, like when they claim that women are an oppressed class in the US. It's almost an article of faith, and is making it mainstream -- in the US it is, anyway.

In a country where abortion is still not universally legal, and public breastfeeding is at best shunned upon in many states, they do have a point. Research showing that women applying for the same theoretical job as a man will both be disadvantaged in getting the job in the first place and also get paid less salary, then they have a point. Your personal view to the opposite, or your incredulity to these facts, isn't a repudiation of the concept.

[pErvinalia]

It's basically just the conservative right whinging that power in society has the potential to move away from them. They are so used to being in charge that their born to rule sensibilities can't take it.

For me, it's about being liberal and wishing to live in a liberal society. It's about opposing folks who want to control the language, and silence dissent and opposition. It's about affronts to reason and logic and skepticism.

I don't know what it's like in the US, but liberals here are famous for saying "everyone has the right to be a bigot", but get furious when they themselves are attacked, and aren't afraid at all to launch silly legal actions to stop people criticising them. Ultimately liberals are conservatives. They are only liberal about ideas that they themselves hold.

The ironic thing about all this is that neoliberalism is the biggest authoritarian threat to individuals, and that's exactly what we've seen over the last 35yrs as political power has significantly shifted from the people to corporations and a small percentage of oligarchs.

Liberal ideas are the answer. The philosophy of the enlightenment, the age of reason, and a focus on the rights of man are the answer. Cultural Marxism where races or genders are considered oppressed groups and juxtaposed against the white males (who are the aristocrats and the bourgeousie) is not only nonsense, but also illiberal. It breeds ideas like "women can't be sexist" and "minorities can't be racist". And, it breeds ideas that favor discrimination based on sex and race, like where racial groups demand segregated public spaces (now called safe spaces) and the right to exclude others from those otherwise public spaces. It breeds the issues of microaggressions and prosecution of opinions as hate speech.

The problem is, "cultural marxism" is a made up conspiracy theory.

As mentioned, if you liberals actually cared about freedom you wouldn't be largely voting for neoliberal governments like the Tories, Dems and Republicans, and Labor and Liberals* here in Australia (*The Australian Liberal Party is allegedly a "broadchurch" of liberals and conservatives. It's nothing of the sort. The Tories reign supreme in the party).

[Forty Two]

It's basically just the conservative right whinging that power in society has the potential to move away from them. They are so used to being in charge that their born to rule sensibilities can't take it.

For me, it's about being liberal and wishing to live in a liberal society. It's about opposing folks who want to control the language, and silence dissent and opposition. It's about affronts to reason and logic and skepticism.

I don't know what it's like in the US, but liberals here are famous for saying "everyone has the right to be a bigot", but get furious when they themselves are attacked, and aren't afraid at all to launch silly legal actions to stop people criticising them. Ultimately liberals are conservatives. They are only liberal about ideas that they themselves hold.

That's the regressive Left you're referring to. An example of what you're referring to would be the "liberal" folks who shut down conferences by pulling fire alarms, or throw paint around while screaming and yelling in order to disrupt a speech by Milo Yiannopoulis.

Everyone does have a right to be a bigot, and a hypocrite too. But, there is a difference between criticizing, counterarguing, counterprotesting, on the one hand -- and shutting down or silencing or disrupting on the other. I think feminists, even the most radical of them, have every right to say whatever they want -- but, what makes me point to them as examples of illiberal intolerance is when they claim to be liberal but call for "muscle" to get rid of a reporter (from a public place).

The ironic thing about all this is that neoliberalism is the biggest authoritarian threat to individuals, and that's exactly what we've seen over the last 35yrs as political power has significantly shifted from the people to corporations and a small percentage of oligarchs.

Liberal ideas are the answer. The philosophy of the enlightenment, the age of reason, and a focus on the rights of man are the answer. Cultural Marxism where races or genders are considered oppressed groups and juxtaposed against the white males (who are the aristocrats and the bourgeousie) is not only nonsense, but also illiberal. It breeds ideas like "women can't be sexist" and "minorities can't be racist". And, it breeds ideas that favor discrimination based on sex and race, like where racial groups demand segregated public spaces (now called safe spaces) and the right to exclude others from those otherwise public spaces. It breeds the issues of microaggressions and prosecution of opinions as hate speech.

The problem is, "cultural marxism" is a made up conspiracy theory.

Well, it isn't. There is a cultural marxist conspiracy theory regarding the Frankfurt School, but that is not to say that the concept of cultural Marxism is entirely a conspiracy theory.

As mentioned, if you liberals actually cared about freedom you wouldn't be largely voting for neoliberal governments like the Tories, Dems and Republicans, and Labor and Liberals* here in Australia (*The Australian Liberal Party is allegedly a "broadchurch" of liberals and conservatives. It's nothing of the sort. The Tories reign supreme in the party).

Well, I don't disagree, which is why I have no candidates here to support, and most liberals don't. Certainly, the Republicans have nobody that is really liberal in the offing. Of the GOP candidates, Trump is more liberal than Cruz or Rubio, but Trump is not a liberal in general, he's just not as overtly conservative as Cruz and Rubio, which isn't saying much. Rand Paul was more liberal than Trump, but Paul is not a serious contender.

Among the Democrats, neither candidate is liberal. Hillary is a conservative Democrat, and Bernie is a Progressive Leftist. Both are authoritarian, and neither really gives a shit about liberal principles.

If I limited my voting this year to liberal candidates, I would have nobody to vote for.

[laklak]

Hardly one of them worth driving to the polls for. This will definitely be a case of holding one's nose and voting against someone or another. I just can't decide which is worse.