April 28, 2005

Why the Left Really Hates (Some) Labels

This is a lengthy post...please bear with my long-windedness today!

Most leftists like certain kinds of labels: African American, Native American, Asian American, Arab American, Latin American and...white. It gives (almost) everyone a sense of specialness, a "I'm just as good as you are" kind of feeling.

Of course, if we all concentrated more on who the person is on the inside, we wouldn't need to make all of these distinctions. We could all be Americans without fear or guilt. References to skin color would only be important in describing a missing person or a fleeing criminal suspect (or the hottie you met at the club last night). But then, the left wouldn't be able to divide and conquer the different groups it constantly panders to by giving special preferences. In other words, saying certain groups of people need more "help" than others, implying they can't compete on their own merits. (For more on this with regard to politics, read this article by Larry Elder.) Note: I realize that there will always be someone in the crowd who makes distinctions (good or bad) based solely on skin color, ethnicity, physical impairment or whatever. Not everyone considers character first, unfortunately...

Why, though, do I bring up the question of labels? Well, it seems as though some on the left are upset that David Horowitz has begun a categorization of leftists on his Discover the Network website. An article by Lawrence Auster on Front Page Magazine today discusses this in length, for as regular visits to the site know, during forums on this topic many left guests have plenty to complain about.

Auster begins with the complaint:

In an exchange at FrontPage Magazine between David Horowitz and history professor Timothy Burke, the latter complains that Horowitz's Discover The Network data bank unfairly categorizes various people as leftists without sufficient definitions and evidence, ignoring the many differences among people whom the data bank places on the left. Horowitz retorts, first, that leftists don't hesitate to lump together all conservatives as right-wingers despite the many differences among conservatives; second, that it is perfectly reasonable to classify people politically according to their general associations and loyalties; and, third, that leftists simply can't stand being identified and exposed as what they are.

Auster continues by defining the very reason why he believes the left can't stand to be categorized (stay with me here):

If we belong to some naturally or socially defined category, as man or woman, or as Jew or Catholic, or as housewife or soldier, then, insofar as we belong to that category, our purpose, our telos, is to fulfill the potentiality and meaning of that category. While this limits our freedom, as already pointed out, it does something more. It creates a distance between ourselves as we are and ourselves as we ought to be. It establishes a standard, according to which we can be judged, and according to which we are not perfect. It even says that we are inherently imperfect and cannot be perfected, since our full nature, represented by the category or class to which we belong, represents an ideal, a set of potentialities, which as individuals we can never entirely realize but can only strive to approximate. To most normal people, this inherent human imperfection or inadequacy, this gap between the actual and the ideal, is simply a fact of life and does not represent any special problem. But to liberals and leftists it is deeply threatening, because they insist on human perfection (namely their own) and refuse to accept the idea that people are not readily perfectible. [emphasis added]

Auster really nails it here. By promoting a socialist or even Communist society, the left is saying that "we can all be equal, we can all be the same." But we can't all be equal or the same...not in the sense that the left would have us be. Every individual (hence the word individual) enters this world with different social backgrounds, different abilities, different personalities, different expectations. While it's one thing to expect equality in the sense that if you do the same work you should get the same pay, or that all citizens should be treated equally under the law, it's quite another to say "men and women are the same" because it simply isn't true. There are inherent biological and yes, social aspects to being a man or a woman, just as religion and upbringing come into play.

This isn't to say that if one is born into a family of blue-collar workers that one cannot aspire to become an executive, a scientist, or whatever. That's what America is all about. It does mean, however, that the utopia the left yearns for will never come to be. Human nature is too volatile, too unpredictable. We don't want to be worker drones...we want to do our own thing.

Auster goes on to point out that the left has no problem with labels when it comes to "collective guilt of white Americans," "Republicans are evil," or "American Indians or Arabs have some special mode of being and relationship that is closed to whites." This is how they are trying to rewrite the social fabric of our world with their standards, their ideals, their mores. Thousands of years of tradition and social conditioning have to be chucked into the garbage because the left deems it to be wrong.

The human race, especially Western culture, has made great strides since man first emerged from the cave. No one says it's perfect but as we continue to evolve, we can continue to perfect society to the best of our ability. There will always be kinks in the hose. However, the few trying to shove a fabricated structure on the whole won't fix things...it only creates more problems by dividing, rather than uniting, different groups.

When is the left going to get it?

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