I think we underestimate the role of religion in some people voting to have the leopards eat their faces. There are plenty people from identities targeted by the far right who support them because they have been brought up to reject or convinced to attack certain other groups, rights and values which the far right also target.
@Gramps49, Zohran Mamdani may be a populist but he is decidedly not from the proletariat. His father, Mahmood Mamdani, is an academic who has an endowed chair at Columbia University, and his mother, Mira Nair, is a filmmaker who has won numerous prestigious international awards for her films.
Look at his early career, friend. He worked in Queens assisting low‑income and immigrant homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure. This experience is widely cited as shaping his political focus on housing justice and affordability. Regardless of his parents' background, he came out of the proletariat.
For that matter, if you look at Karl Marx and Vladamir Lenin's background, you will also find they came from upper middle class families.
@Gramps49, Zohran Mamdani may be a populist but he is decidedly not from the proletariat. His father, Mahmood Mamdani, is an academic who has an endowed chair at Columbia University, and his mother, Mira Nair, is a filmmaker who has won numerous prestigious international awards for her films.
Look at his early career, friend. He worked in Queens assisting low‑income and immigrant homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure. This experience is widely cited as shaping his political focus on housing justice and affordability. Regardless of his parents' background, he came out of the proletariat.
For that matter, if you look at Karl Marx and Vladamir Lenin's background, you will also find they came from upper middle class families.
That's not what coming out of the proletariat means. That's more like going into the proletariat.
Look at his early career, friend. He worked in Queens assisting low‑income and immigrant homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure. This experience is widely cited as shaping his political focus on housing justice and affordability. Regardless of his parents' background, he came out of the proletariat.
For that matter, if you look at Karl Marx and Vladamir Lenin's background, you will also find they came from upper middle class families.
That's not what coming out of the proletariat means. That's more like going into the proletariat.
@Gramps49, I live in NY State, but not in NYC; my city is heavily working class, in fact. I’ve followed Mamdani’s career trajectory. The issues that working class/working poor people face are important to him and he wants to improve their lives. That speaks very well of him. But I stand by my statement—Mamdani is not “from the proletariat.” He grew up in a rarified academic and cultural environment, and it isn’t an insult to him to state that fact.
I’m on the left and I hold it as absolutely true that excessive wealth and a society that permits, promotes and encourages avarice is inherently evil. Moreover, that is exactly what we have in UK and (it appears) the USA too. Not sure about other places: Russia, some of the Baltic states (ex-USSR).
Does that make me a populist? Or a straight down the line socialist?
I’m tempted to say that it makes you in line with traditional Christian thought, very tightly against “the world” (as in “the world, the flesh and the devil”). But while I think we should try to make laws as good as we realistically can, I don’t think that we can legislate that out of existence—whenever people try, people find a way of using the new system to benefit themselves and use others. The Soviet Union, etc. That doesn’t mean we don’t do the best we can, though.
Yes, I agree, @sionisais. This question occurred as I was writing. This all depends on what "populist" means: it would be possible to argue that all true left-wing politics is/are populist, in that the interests of the mass of the people, rather than an elite or other identified particular group, are the focus of effort.
But then I think the question of what constitutes “true” left-wing politics comes into play, with the danger of the “true Scotsman” thing.
I’m on the left and I hold it as absolutely true that excessive wealth and a society that permits, promotes and encourages avarice is inherently evil. Moreover, that is exactly what we have in UK and (it appears) the USA too. Not sure about other places: Russia, some of the Baltic states (ex-USSR).
Does that make me a populist? Or a straight down the line socialist?
I’m tempted to say that it makes you in line with traditional Christian thought, very tightly against “the world” (as in “the world, the flesh and the devil”). But while I think we should try to make laws as good as we realistically can, I don’t think that we can legislate that out of existence—whenever people try, people find a way of using the new system to benefit themselves and use others. The Soviet Union, etc. That doesn’t mean we don’t do the best we can, though.
Thanks, I think we have a consensus that there are some common business practices that are immoral. Whether they should be outlawed is another question, as it will be difficult to frame suitable legislation. My preference would be for people to identify, organise and boycott these offending entities.
Thanks, I think we have a consensus that there are some common business practices that are immoral. Whether they should be outlawed is another question, as it will be difficult to frame suitable legislation. My preference would be for people to identify, organise and boycott these offending entities.
At the moment, I’m not officially boycotting anything, though I generally don’t find myself inclined to go to certain places because of their practices. One of the things that is frustrating is that it seems like if you dig just a little bit in any big business or company, or maybe even the small ones, you will find something awful.
Thanks, I think we have a consensus that there are some common business practices that are immoral. Whether they should be outlawed is another question, as it will be difficult to frame suitable legislation. My preference would be for people to identify, organise and boycott these offending entities.
At the moment, I’m not officially boycotting anything, though I generally don’t find myself inclined to go to certain places because of their practices. One of the things that is frustrating is that it seems like if you dig just a little bit in any big business or company, or maybe even the small ones, you will find something awful.
At one point I was boycotting Dixie paper products because they were owned by a company owned by the Koch brothers, etc., for example.
Thanks, I think we have a consensus that there are some common business practices that are immoral. Whether they should be outlawed is another question, as it will be difficult to frame suitable legislation. My preference would be for people to identify, organise and boycott these offending entities.
Boycotts need to be fairly narrow and targeted to get good take up and succeed in their aims, or build on existing social networks in a relatively small community. Trying to force Nestlé to stop being shitty has largely failed over the decades because their fingers are in too many pies. Similarly it's very hard to boycott sweatshop-made clothing because of tangled and opaque supply chains. Regulation is the only option for actually addressing the issues.
Thanks, I think we have a consensus that there are some common business practices that are immoral. Whether they should be outlawed is another question, as it will be difficult to frame suitable legislation. My preference would be for people to identify, organise and boycott these offending entities.
Boycotts need to be fairly narrow and targeted to get good take up and succeed in their aims, or build on existing social networks in a relatively small community. Trying to force Nestlé to stop being shitty has largely failed over the decades because their fingers are in too many pies. Similarly it's very hard to boycott sweatshop-made clothing because of tangled and opaque supply chains. Regulation is the only option for actually addressing the issues.
I still try my hardest not to buy Nestle though. It is difficult as as pointed out they own parts of many businesses.
I think I read that Koch Bros in the USA are hard to avoid because a lot of what they're invested in is stuff like toilet paper. It's really hard to avoid basic necessities, and it's hard to persuade people to pay markups on boring crap like that.
Comments
Seconded. I grew up around this cult[ure.]
Look at his early career, friend. He worked in Queens assisting low‑income and immigrant homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure. This experience is widely cited as shaping his political focus on housing justice and affordability. Regardless of his parents' background, he came out of the proletariat.
For that matter, if you look at Karl Marx and Vladamir Lenin's background, you will also find they came from upper middle class families.
That's not what coming out of the proletariat means. That's more like going into the proletariat.
Thanks, @KarlLB. That’s precisely what I meant.
@Gramps49, I live in NY State, but not in NYC; my city is heavily working class, in fact. I’ve followed Mamdani’s career trajectory. The issues that working class/working poor people face are important to him and he wants to improve their lives. That speaks very well of him. But I stand by my statement—Mamdani is not “from the proletariat.” He grew up in a rarified academic and cultural environment, and it isn’t an insult to him to state that fact.
I’m tempted to say that it makes you in line with traditional Christian thought, very tightly against “the world” (as in “the world, the flesh and the devil”). But while I think we should try to make laws as good as we realistically can, I don’t think that we can legislate that out of existence—whenever people try, people find a way of using the new system to benefit themselves and use others. The Soviet Union, etc. That doesn’t mean we don’t do the best we can, though.
But then I think the question of what constitutes “true” left-wing politics comes into play, with the danger of the “true Scotsman” thing.
Rightly, not tightly.
At the moment, I’m not officially boycotting anything, though I generally don’t find myself inclined to go to certain places because of their practices. One of the things that is frustrating is that it seems like if you dig just a little bit in any big business or company, or maybe even the small ones, you will find something awful.
At one point I was boycotting Dixie paper products because they were owned by a company owned by the Koch brothers, etc., for example.
Boycotts need to be fairly narrow and targeted to get good take up and succeed in their aims, or build on existing social networks in a relatively small community. Trying to force Nestlé to stop being shitty has largely failed over the decades because their fingers are in too many pies. Similarly it's very hard to boycott sweatshop-made clothing because of tangled and opaque supply chains. Regulation is the only option for actually addressing the issues.