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ZorbaTHut  2yr ago (text post)   35554 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 19, 2022

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I am personally undecided what balance of EU-beuracratic following of American progressivism is an artifact of American cultural influence versus federalist designs. Eurocrats absolutely have their own sort of internal messaging programs and strategies to try and build public support, but while one part of that is pro-Europe, another is the teardown of prior loyalties, especially nationalist inclinations. Identity-politics as framed by the US- white versus black- is a meaningful alternative framing to European 'identities,' as it homogenizes European diversity into a collective that the EU can claim to represent as Europeans, as opposed to national identities that object to EU-centralization on national grounds.

For the lack of / failure to create a European nationalism despite significant effort, diluting the rest works almost as well.

I don't think it's very useful to look at EU messaging and such through the lens of how well it fits American progressivism. If you look at, for example, the Twitter accounts of European Commission and European Parliament, it is generally vaguely progressive/technocratic, but the common themes include:

  • EU as a climate leader (absolutely more central here than climate/environmental issues are in US Dem messaging, for instance; even Biden's major climate act had to be called Inflation Reduction Act, lol)

  • EU as a global actor, currently particularly in the sense of EU supporting Ukraine (Europeans have never exactly needed American progressives to tell them to fear Russia and oppose Russian expansion)

  • EU as an innovation leader (businesslike technocratic appeal of the EU)

  • European unity (connected to the above, at the moment)

These are all quite similar to the main arguments of local Europhiles, and they're fairly consistent with messaging the EU has pushed out for a long time. Race/gender/sexuality messaging is not nearly as prominent, apart from some appeals to "women's achievements" style basic feminism.

Race/gender/sexuality messaging is not nearly as prominent

It's becoming more and more prominent such as the European Commission's Anti-Racism Action Plan 2020-2025. Feminism/"gender equality" has always been a core component of EU social messaging.

It is partially an importation of American progressivism, albeit adapted to local conditions.

Again, I'm not arguing that there isn't a progressive element to EU messaging - rather that the EU messaging is quite different from current American progressive messaging, where race/sexuality/gender messaging often seems to be front and center, not something that usually takes a back seat compared to the issues I mentioned.

Yes, and I'm saying it is becoming more and more prominent and is on track to becoming front and centre.

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