Yes, and...
“If it is a sudden change in status to a once dominant group that drives
electorates to the far right, as political scientist Roger Petersen has
argued – then we have to start with the biggest change in status of all
time. That is the reproductive shock that began 50 years ago, with the
pill, which has put women into boardrooms, frontline combat roles and,
more relevantly, control over who they have sex with, and when, and
how.” https://gu.com/p/5b5ee/sbl
from Paul Mason Guardian today
On 11/10/2016 8:18 AM, Michel Bauwens wrote:
I strongly agree with Michael Lerner's approach here:
"http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/cp/opinion/election-night-2016/stop-shaming-trump-supporters
"The right has been very successful at persuading working people that
they are vulnerable not because they themselves have failed, but
because of the selfishness of some other villain (African-Americans,
feminists, immigrants, Muslims, Jews, liberals, progressives; the list
keeps growing).
Instead of challenging this ideology of shame, the left has buttressed
it by blaming white people as a whole for slavery, genocide of the
Native Americans and a host of other sins, as though whiteness itself
was something about which people ought to be ashamed. The rage many
white working-class people feel in response is rooted in the sense
that once again, as has happened to them throughout their lives, they
are being misunderstood.
So please understand what is happening here. Many Trump supporters
very legitimately feel that it is they who have been facing an unfair
reality. The upper 20 percent of income earners, many of them quite
liberal and rightly committed to the defense of minorities and
immigrants, also believe in the economic meritocracy and their own
right to have so much more than those who are less fortunate. So while
they may be progressive on issues of discrimination against the
obvious victims of racism and sexism, they are blind to their own
class privilege and to the hidden injuries of class that are
internalized by much of the country as self-blame.
The right’s ability to portray liberals as elitists is further
strengthened by the phobia toward religion that prevails in the left.
Many religious people are drawn by the teachings of their tradition to
humane values and caring about the oppressed. Yet they often find that
liberal culture is hostile to religion of any sort, believing it is
irrational and filled with hate. People on the left rarely open
themselves to the possibility that there could be a spiritual crisis
in society that plays a role in the lives of many who feel
misunderstood and denigrated by the fancy intellectuals and radical
activists.
The left needs to stop ignoring people’s inner pain and fear. The
racism, sexism and xenophobia used by Mr. Trump to advance his
candidacy does not reveal an inherent malice in the majority of
Americans. If the left could abandon all this shaming, it could
rebuild its political base by helping Americans see that much of
people’s suffering is rooted in the hidden injuries of class and in
the spiritual crisis that the global competitive marketplace generates.
Democrats need to become as conscious and articulate about the
suffering caused by classism as we are about other forms of suffering.
We need to reach out to Trump voters in a spirit of empathy and
contrition,"
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: *Rabbi Michael Lerner and Peter Gabel at Tikkun magazine and the
Network of Spiritual Progressives* <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
Date: Thu, Nov 10, 2016 at 7:07 AM
Subject: Trump's Victory - Mourning and Analysis
To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
Tikkun
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=%2BJB%2BqqE3DzpAid0bqs2EtI0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
SUPPORT TIKKUN
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=YBvcbvZ3GnSFo89CpWs5rY0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
GET THE MAGAZINE
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=4HRxj4rQES8KhB8TBdJT840bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
ADVERTISE
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=s9BWxLrG%2FiTbQ0pJT1sxz40bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
JOIN THE MOVEMENT
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=sI04gxh%2FC5MitWAOAla%2Fjo0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
I too am mourning and grieving the election results. This is a sad and
scary time for our country. Like many of you, I am stunned at the
results. We need to take time to grieve and mourn, to express our
shock and even our rage in community where we are held.
And we need to mobilize now more than ever. If ever there was a time
when Tikkun's voice is needed, now is that time. Please read the
analyses below by Rabbi Lerner and Peter Gabel to hear a perspective
not available elsewhere. We need your support, please make a super
generous tax-deductible donation at www.tikkun.org/donate
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=%2F3xThjHgex%2BnmBORQywVD40bZ2Z1n%2Bij>.
We are also holding a conference this weekend to explore - What's Next
- please consider joining us. To register go to:
www.tikkun.org/30thcelebration
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=M0%2FH5zIqKsHIlcRTzcOjyI0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>.
~ Cat Zavis
Click here to share this on Twitter
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=BarlpsSO6HUMDFyhVg08AI0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
Click here to share this on Facebook
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=iQ%2BtdHMNQ%2FXIvdOSLQFx6Y0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
---
*Stop Shaming Trump Supporters*
By Rabbi Michael Lerner
[/This article originally appeared in The New York Times. You can read
it online //here/
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=VoYZD9t540fVX7rvXlzkHo0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>/.
Below the article, Rabbi Lerner adds some of the ideas that the N.Y.
Times took out in order to make it fit for their blog space./]
It turns out that shaming the supporters of Donald J. Trump is not a
good political strategy.
Though job loss and economic stagnation played a role in his victory,
so did shame. As the principal investigator on a study of the middle
class for the National Institute of Mental Health, I found that
working people’s stress is often intensified by shame at their failure
to “make it” in what they are taught is a meritocratic American economy.
The right has been very successful at persuading working people that
they are vulnerable not because they themselves have failed, but
because of the selfishness of some other villain (African-Americans,
feminists, immigrants, Muslims, Jews, liberals, progressives; the list
keeps growing).
Instead of challenging this ideology of shame, the left has buttressed
it by blaming white people as a whole for slavery, genocide of the
Native Americans and a host of other sins, as though whiteness itself
was something about which people ought to be ashamed. The rage many
white working-class people feel in response is rooted in the sense
that once again, as has happened to them throughout their lives, they
are being misunderstood.
So please understand what is happening here. Many Trump supporters
very legitimately feel that it is they who have been facing an unfair
reality. The upper 20 percent of income earners, many of them quite
liberal and rightly committed to the defense of minorities and
immigrants, also believe in the economic meritocracy and their own
right to have so much more than those who are less fortunate. So while
they may be progressive on issues of discrimination against the
obvious victims of racism and sexism, they are blind to their own
class privilege and to the hidden injuries of class that are
internalized by much of the country as self-blame.
The right’s ability to portray liberals as elitists is further
strengthened by the phobia toward religion that prevails in the left.
Many religious people are drawn by the teachings of their tradition to
humane values and caring about the oppressed. Yet they often find that
liberal culture is hostile to religion of any sort, believing it is
irrational and filled with hate. People on the left rarely open
themselves to the possibility that there could be a spiritual crisis
in society that plays a role in the lives of many who feel
misunderstood and denigrated by the fancy intellectuals and radical
activists.
The left needs to stop ignoring people’s inner pain and fear. The
racism, sexism and xenophobia used by Mr. Trump to advance his
candidacy does not reveal an inherent malice in the majority of
Americans. If the left could abandon all this shaming, it could
rebuild its political base by helping Americans see that much of
people’s suffering is rooted in the hidden injuries of class and in
the spiritual crisis that the global competitive marketplace generates.
Democrats need to become as conscious and articulate about the
suffering caused by classism as we are about other forms of suffering.
We need to reach out to Trump voters in a spirit of empathy and
contrition. Only then can we help working people understand that they
do not live in a meritocracy, that their intuition that the system is
rigged is correct (but it is not by those whom they had been taught to
blame) and that their pain and rage is legitimate.
Michael Lerner, the rabbi of Beyt Tikkun Synagogue in Berkeley,
Calif., is the editor of Tikkun magazine and chairman of the Network
of Spiritual Progressives.
[/Up to here is what the NY Times printed in their blog. Lerner adds a
bit more below, so as to deepen one's understanding./]
We need to retool the discourse on the Left and train hundreds of
thousands of people to become part of an "Empathy Tribe" that can
reach out to Trump supporters to apologize to them for the ways
they've felt "dissed" by the liberal and progressive world and to help
people understand that what the actual causes of their suffering are
the perverse spiritual distortions and twisted psychodynamics of a
global competitive marketplace. We can and must help people understand
that the inequalities in this society are not a function of who is or
is not talented, smart, or works hard, but instead are a function of
the class structure which will only allocate economic security and
jobs that feel fulfilling to a small percentage of the population
while the rest of the population is scrappling for the leftovers.
What we do not want to do is deny or lessen the importance of the
struggles against racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia,
anti-Semitism, and xenophobia. Rather, what we want to do is insist
that those struggles must be carried out in ways that do not negate
but rather affirm the pain and suffering caused by classism and the
internalization of the materialism, selfishness and "looking out for
number one" consciousness of our society. We want to avoid the kind of
discourse that we so often hear in liberal and progressive societies
in which one identity politics group fights with another over who is
most oppressed while simultaneously demanding that others defer to
their will on question a, b, or c. Please read Peter Gabel's piece
below to get a fuller sense of what we are talking about here.
In fact, if we could learn to listen to the life experiences and work
experiences of middle income working people and the working and
unemployed poor, empathically validate their experiences, and really
hear their grievances, we would be in a much better inner place to
build a transformative movement that included people who yesterday
voted for Trump. In part, this means compassionately challenging those
in the liberal and progressive world who are now talking as though
everyone who voted for Trump is racist, sexist, homophobic, stupid
and/or evil. Some fit into that description but many do not, and when
they hear themselves described by liberals or progressives reacting to
the 2016 election by demeaning or shaming everyone who voted for
Trump, they become even more attached to the Right, and even more
outraged at what they perceive to be the arrogance and elitism of the
Left.
What I'm describing here is a massive project, but one which is
absolutely necessary if the movements for environmental sustainability
and a slowing of global climate change, human rights, anti-racism,
peace and nonviolence are to have any chance of achieving the
political power they need to actually change our society. And the
first step is one that YOU can be personally involved in by
circulating this analysis and Peter Gabel's analysis, bringing your
friends together to talk about it, and then becoming an activist with
us in Tikkun's interfaith and secular-humanist-and-atheist-welcoming
NSP-- Network of Spiritual Progressives. So if you are not able to
come to our conference this weekend, at least join the NSP
www.spiritualprogressives.org/join
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=RTR%2FLuBVi94TkNodlu8IhY0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>,
and help us create a group in your local area to help promote this
consciousness!
Rabbi Michael Lerner [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
*****
*Coercive Deference and Double Bind Politics on the Left *
by *Peter Gabel*
Many white working -class communities feel robbed of much of their
sense of worth and recognition by the impact of the global economy on
the conditions of their life and on their culture. They see
elites...millionaires, billionaires, tech wizards, bi-coastal cultural
sophistocates...benefiting from an economy that their prior economic
communities have been eviscerated by (in the rust-belt states of
Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, for example, all of whom
voted in large numbers for Trump). And they feel this marginalization
and cast-asideness not just because of its material or economic
aspect, but also and in some ways more importantly because of its
denigration of their own sense of worthiness, recognition, and sense
of communal belonging and value. In this latter sense, they feel
spiritual suffering and the loss of human solidarity and love.
..
Instead of responding to this with compassion and concern, the liberal
world has communicated to this community that the world is or would be
fine if these whites had exercised their "equality of opportunity" to
pursue their god-given right to fulfill their dreams through
successfully competing in the marketplace... except for minorities,
women, the LGBT community, disabled people, and other designated
groups who must be given "special benefits" due to past discrimination
so that they can gain the same "equality of opportunity" that the
so-called "white" community already has. This liberal attitude
reflected in the mainstream of the Democratic Party not only denies
the spiritual pain of the white working class...it also blames the
white working-class for failing to succeed themselves and for somehow
contributing to the oppression of African-Americans, women, and all
the other groups whom the liberal world (correctly) wants to extend
more rights to and more benefits to.
Thus the liberal world in effect flaunts their own success as elites,
blames the working class for their own failures, and then holds them
responsible as "whites" for the oppression of other oppressed groups,
requiring them to deny their own sense of marginalization and
spiritual pain, their own invisibility, and to defer to the orthodoxy
that it is the other oppressed groups who are deserving of concern and
recognition. And even more, the white working-class communities are
not allowed to comment upon this whole process because that would be
racist, or sexist, or otherwise not politically correct for them to
do. Understandably this makes these white working class communities
feel they are simultaneously in pain and silenced from commenting on
their pain, an untenable and explosive hurt that Donald Trump
perfectly spoke to in his campaign.
What we saw in the election results, furthermore, was that this
dynamic was not limited to to the white working-class, but also to
white college-educated men/ and women /who voted for Trump in large
numbers, in spite of his derogatory comments about women. While these
"whites" don't face the identical socio-economic conditions of the
white working-class, they also suffer the spiritual pain of not being
affirmed in a loving and valuing way within our alienated culture, and
they also are expected to direct all their concern to designated
oppressed others and deny the pain of their own spiritual isolation.
And they too are not allowed to comment upon this because they are
supposed to be guilty about the pain of others rather than crying out
themselves.
This is the coercive deference, the double-bind, that has undermined
the Left's appeal for the last forty or so years since the Left
abandoned a universalist view of human liberation in favor of an
exclusive focus on the extension of liberal rights to previously
discriminated-against groups, and on identity politics based on the
past and continuing injuries to each victimized identity group for
which a designated oppressor group ("whites") are responsible.
.
The solution to this is a new spiritual politics that sees all of us
as suffering from a capitalist social world that fails to affirm all
of us as worthy of love, respect, and recognition, and seeks to build
an economy and a culture that carries forward that loving affirmation
to all human beings. Of course this must include compassion for the
historical and continuing particular suffering inflicted on
African-Americans, women, the LGBT community and others who have been
harmed, demeaned, and unrecognized, but it must also extend a loving
solidarity to the "whites"--that is to /all of us/ as universal beings
with particular histories and circumstances who long for a world based
on love, care and the embrace of truly being supported and valued.
.
Bernie Sanders did a great job of showing such a politics is possible
right now, even though he focused only on economic issues as carriers
of spiritual care and concern rather than on a fuller truly
spiritual-progressive program that would have addressed a broader
array of spiritual and communal needs. Until we move our politics in
this universalist healing direction, others like Donald Trump will
continue to succeed with messages that speak to "white" people's pain
in distorted ways with likely harmful consequences.
.
Peter Gabel is Editor-at-Large of Tikkun magazine, co-founder of the
Project for Integrating Spirituality, Law, and Politics, and the
author most recently of_ Another Way of Seeing: Essays on Transforming
Law, Politics, and Culture._
MAGAZINE
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=pvOILEspKir7JgS8F9LEdo0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>ADVERTISE
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=PTr%2FJMMJy3vr%2BM0zUHiuho0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>JOIN
THE MOVEMENT
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=al54APlux0bZHlYa7wt6uY0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
2342 Shattuck Avenue, Suite 1200 <tel:1200>, Berkeley, CA 94704
Phone: 510-644-1200 | Fax: 510-644-1255 | www.tikkun.org
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=WliVQZoapVWZHb1YZXAkQo0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
Unsubscribe
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=Tg7kS5Kx40XPA2TCY660440bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
| Contact Us
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=ZIM%2Bep6RU3VNwblFgir%2B0o0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
| Intern or Volunteer
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=xYzQ0%2FtHBFtk%2F47PjOB5oY0bZ2Z1n%2Bij>
empowered by Salsa <http://www.salsalabs.com/?email>
--
P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation
Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
_______________________________________________
P2P Foundation - Mailing list
Blog - http://www.blog.p2pfoundation.net
Wiki - http://www.p2pfoundation.net
Show some love and help us maintain and update our knowledge commons by making
a donation. Thank you for your support.
https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/donation
https://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation
--
new site text
I have a new web-site: denis.postle.net <http://denis.postle.net> -
street poetry, free ebooks, writing, photos, videos, music and therapy
all in one place.
_______________________________________________
P2P Foundation - Mailing list
Blog - http://www.blog.p2pfoundation.net
Wiki - http://www.p2pfoundation.net
Show some love and help us maintain and update our knowledge commons by making
a donation. Thank you for your support.
https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/donation
https://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation
