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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024

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"White dudes for Harris" is a decline in both premises you mention, though:

It is appealing to the white identity of white men rather than just demanding pure intersectionality, in a way that does go beyond simply ranking white men as the worst in the progressive stack:

“Throughout American history, when white men organized, it was often with pointy hats on,” said Rocketto before he added how proud he was of this group of white men, who he said are too rarely heard from.

Actor Jeff Bridges, who played “The Dude” in the cult classic “The Big Lebowski,” was excited when he heard about the gathering of his fellow white dudes.

“I qualify, man! I’m white, I’m a dude, and I’m for Harris,” Bridges said. “A woman president, man, how exciting!”

So we've gone from "white men cannot organize, to identify as a white man is either silly or vehemently immoral" to The Dude and other celebrities saying "I'm white, cool I can participate in this event for white men!" Now it's a political reality acknowledged by the Harris campaign- and not by the Trump campaign or Republican party, I might add.

True, the actual content and movement is not pro-white, but it's an introduction of White Identity politics to polite society and that's a significant change which will most likely continue as white people become "just another" demographic in our democracy. This George Floyd "white people are evil" peak-wokeness is not going to be permanent.

It's another example of "The Liberals" leading the Conservatives by the nose. The Liberals dragged the Conservative movement towards no acknowledgement for the actual interests of White people, and now that Liberals are acknowledging white people we may see the Republican party do the same. In all the Conservative thrashing over Wokeness they never did the actual transgressive thing, which would have been to directly appeal to white people like Harris is doing now. They fundamentally respect that boundary and will respect the new boundaries put in place by "The Liberals."

Identity politics typically don't involve the group actively advocating against their own group's interests.

There have been plenty of anti-White struggle session groups, maybe this is the most prominent but I don't think it's anything totally new.

This George Floyd "white people are evil" peak-wokeness is not going to be permanent.

He literally can’t make his pitch for this group without reminding us how evil white dudes are by saying

”Throughout American history, when white men organized, it was often with pointy hats on," said Rocketto

This is the usual “We’re so sorry” organizing of whites

It is appealing to the white identity of white men rather than just demanding pure intersectionality, in a way that does go beyond simply ranking white men as the worst in the progressive stack:

“Throughout American history, when white men organized, it was often with pointy hats on,” said Rocketto before he added how proud he was of this group of white men, who he said are too rarely heard from.

That's not going beyond the progressive stack, that's temporarily rearranging the order. It's the whole beauty of it, you can promote / demote client groups depending on what's necessary in the moment. In this case it's made pretty clear this particular group isn't even being given any amount of respect, they're just loosening the leash a little - they're explicitly warning you that if you even think of getting too uppity, you'll be thrown in the "pointy hats" bag.

they're explicitly warning you that if you even think of getting too uppity, you'll be thrown in the "pointy hats" bag.

Yes, this is what they are doing. With Peak Woke they oscillated between "White identity is the most evil thing in the world" and "there's no such thing as White people". Now they are "ok you can identify as white in a positive regard as long as it is to support our campaign, otherwise you are the KKK." But there's an important difference between those two positions, with the latter position being much weaker than the former position, and more indicative of a future White Identity Politics.

With Peak Woke they oscillated between "White identity is the most evil thing in the world" and "there's no such thing as White people". Now they are "ok you can identify as white in a positive regard as long as it is to support our campaign, otherwise you are the KKK." But there's an important difference between those two positions, with the latter position being much weaker than the former position, and more indicative of a future White Identity Politics.

No, it's really not, and it requires to thinks so requires a singular obsession with white identity. They do this stuff all the time, they used to tell women that they're on top of the world, until Women+ came along. The thing is you're not even being offered anything all that hot. They're not telling you you're going to be on top of the stack - you're still at the bottom, but maybe the boot won't press so hard, if you behave.