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Ah Bernie, what could have been...
(lemmy.ml)
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this post was submitted on 22 Jun 2024
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He also put Japanese Americans into internment camps, his New Deal policy led to institutional racism (red lining), and he ordered the FBI & IRS to investigate someone further left than him because he was worried they posed a political threat.
(Source on that last one: https://www.history.com/topics/crime/huey-long )
His left wing credentials are a bit lacking.
You're correct, but also missing the point. He implemented economic policies that were further left than any other US president.
Absolutely. I just don't think we should use him as a symbol of social democracy, because we can do much better. We need better than FDR, not just for leftwing politics, but leftwing social issues.
What I like about this conversation is the parallels to today.
Edit: To be clear, I mean FDR did some bad things, just like Biden. But we still remember all the good that came from him, of which there was arguably more.
That comes from an incredible point of privilege.
If you were one of the people who were thrown in an internment camp, you probably wouldn’t remember all the good. You would only remember years of your life, wasted, having been thrown in prison camps due to the circumstances of your birth. Fuck, if you were the child or grandchild of a survivor of it, you would remember the stories of your grandparents thrown in a camp, discarded from society by a xenophobic government who clearly sees them as a second class citizen. You might remember hearing about them selling their homes for a fraction of their worth in order to get anything from them at all. When they were finally free, they were homeless too.
If you were a Palestinian American, you probably are stressed out of your mind, waiting on the uncommon phone call from your family, hoping for a confirmation that they are alive, and hoping you don’t hear that your cousin was gunned down by a gun drone when looking for food, or your aunts, uncles, and their children were blown up at a refugee camp, or executed in a hospital.
You might not have heard anything for six months, and you feel like absolute shit, having gone to protests, and even direct actions to try and put a stop to it only to be ignored, called antisemites, or otherwise degraded by a government and press lying through their teeth to justify a “war” wholeheartedly supported by the president. You might be looking at your paystub, seeing almost a hundred bucks, maybe more, being taken by the government to fund the extermination of your family.
To say “FDR did some bad things, just like Biden. But we still remember all the good that came from him, of which there was arguably more” is not a pragmatic calculation. It is valuing the good done to you, as a person who wasn’t systemically attacked by the government during that time, over the suffering of a marginalized group who felt the force of a white supremacist government coming down on them. Being a social democrat doesn’t excuse anything bad FDR did, and it certainly doesn’t make up for any of the bad things either.
(moved to correct comment)
Hi, Palestinian American here, I think securing Gaza's natural resource rights and being the point of negotiation that secured a bunch of people getting to see their families again is good actually.
I also see all the white kids raising stink about my people's struggle and feel fetishized and used by people who couldn't even begin to understand what my people's struggle is like and who need to BTFO using it as their excuse to be petulant little twits about doing the bare minimum duty to defend their democracy from the guy who'll make our struggle exponentially worse.
Not sure what you were going for, but you proved my point given the image is circulating.
I thought about it and realized that you missed the point of what I’m saying.
I’m arguing that the only way you can view them (both biden and FDR) as someone who did more good than harm is if you abstract the harms and goods from the perspective of someone who is not being harmed while being a person who is benefited.
FDR sentenced a single ethnicity to prison for the crime of being japanese. This destroyed generational wealth, and ruined the upward mobility of a generation. It’s easier to say “he did more good than harm” if you are both the one being harmed.
Biden is not just allowing genocide, but funding it, and attacking those who prevent it from continuing. If you are isolated from the suffering he is causing, it’s super easy to say he is doing more good than harm.
Sure, there are parallels that can be drawn, but that’s not what I’m arguing against. To say I’m proving this point would be true, but completely dishonest since it blatantly ignores the argument I made against that point you madr in the edit.
Yup, understood and agree with all that the first time.
But since the "royal we" spread these memes like wildfire, then "we still remember all the good that came from him, of which there was arguably (to all the people you describe) more."
I have no idea what you mean by that
I am pretty sure racism was institutionalized prior to New Deal....
Red Lining itself was definitely established well before the New Deal, and the practice had spread across the US by the end of the 1920s
People don't remember how awful Wilson was
It would've been more accurate for me to say that it continued institutional racism, and denied black people from benefiting equally from the New Deal. It led to further economic disparities, and Democrats overall should've used the opportunity to chip away at institutional racism.
There isn't a single leader in history who would pass your smell test. The reality is every human is complex and no one is all good or all bad. Except Andrew Jackson. Fuck that guy
But really, take a look, for example, at Lyndon Johnson. He was a renowned racist who ushered through the Civil Rights Act among many other progressive policies. He also escalated the Vietnam War. Dude did a lot of great things and a lot of bad things, and there's no single policy or act in his life that defines the entirety of his administration.
Actually just to wrench your caveat, Andrew Jackson was a major figure in the voting rights battle of the day, the right of non property owners to vote.
If it weren't for the Jackson admin, we wouldn't have the language we used to expand voting rights even further when those fights came to their crescendoes, and this country would still be entirely governed as a landowner oligarchy instead of just significantly like it is now.
That sounds sarcastic and cynical but there is a big difference.
I appreciate the info. You're totally right, and this further proves my point. People deride "the founding fathers" for the racist, capitalist state they created, but the reality is that what they created was absolutely radical for their time. The idea that white people of common birth could have power was incredibly radical in the late 18th century.
Since the US was founded, it's been a steady march to increase rights, first to white landowning men, then to poor white mean, then to white women, and then to black, brown, and indigenous people. Many will say "well we haven't gone far enough," and that's true, but that doesn't discount the progress that's been made since we were literally beholden to the whims of a king
Yeah, we can absolutely recognize that the FFs were quite radical for their day. I don't question their merits as their day's progressive wing, my beef with their document is in how poorly it's aged with the nation, to the point that serious overhaul if not a complete rewrite is needed to address the problems we face today because of problems in the document.
Oh I'm not denying that at all. I'm just saying that FDR is a flawed human and we shouldn't lionize him as a symbol of social Democrats.
He is a symbol of social Democrats, though, but he's also a realistic product of his time. I heard an interview with a historian awhile back I wish I could find again. They basically described how if you try to judge a historical figure through today's moral lens, you'll always be disappointed, because history is rife with racism, dehumanization, slavery, and genocide. The most ardent leftists will point to the handful of white people who were actively fighting racism in the 1930s and say "See? Roosevelt didn't have to implement racist policies!!" But the reality is that the majority culture was racist. The concept of not being racist just didn't exist to 95%+ of white people at the time. Abraham Lincoln didn't believe in racial equality, but I don't use that to discount his positive contributions
Yeah it's difficult to judge. Don't Ask Don't Tell for gay rights was once considered leftwing politics for instance. I guess it is unfair to blame FDR though. He was no worse than most of the American left at his time. I still think we can aspire to much better though.
We can absolutely aspire to be better than we were in the past
And annoyingly he is (along with the other Roosevelt) still among our best presidents in history. We really shoupd demand more from our representatives.
We get what we deserve unfortunately. If we had 100% turnout and more of us considered running for office ourselves, we would see huge improvements.
I've thought about doing local politics in retirement, and maybe see where it goes. I don't think it's my primary calling -- but then again, perhaps that's the exact issue I'm pointing out.
Most of the country didn't even have voting rights when FDR was elected.
And today we still see tons of voter suppression as well as outright cheating from the right and dismissal of the will of the people, by institutions like the DNC.
Nobody said economic leftists can't be racist.
Did somebody say George Wallace?
Fair points! But Bernie's are not... (Unfortunately I think he's legit too old now anyway, and I would bet he would agree.) Not saying I wouldn't vote for him, but I think age alone would stop many. (insert Biden/Trump swipe here)
Yeah unironically Bernie is further left than FDR when you look at it holistically. FDR may have been further left economically (which he also had to be pushed on a bit), but Bernie is left all around.
I think at this point in his career, the Senate is probably best for him. We need powerful progressive senators to pass progressive legislation. The Inflation Reduction Act could only go as far as it did because of Bernie's influence and cooperation with Biden.
Which is something important I want to highlight -- Clinton scorned Bernie, while Biden welcomed him. Biden was friendly to him in the Senate, and that set them up for a successful cooperative future. Lemmy could learn a lot from that. We're stronger when we ally together.
I've seen this sentiment expressed before and I agree, it's a reasonable view. I'd still enthusiastically vote for him tomorrow if he could be on the ballot instead of Biden. I am not a strident hater of Biden, but I agree with most of the (non-maga) criticisms against him to one degree or another. No doubt I'm picking him over Trump, but I wish we had better choices.
Yep, I don't keep a spreadsheet of these sorts of things or anything, but I remember claims during the 2020 runup that he would at least take advice from progressives under advisement, and I get the feeling that he's lived up to that much, at least.
No one in the US political establishment has any "left wing credentials" or ever has. FDR (and every other so-called "social democrat" then and now) are merely advocating for measures to make the status quo more stable and resilient - not for dismantling it (which is what an actual leftist wants).
Making people happier is bad, actually!
/s
FTFY - note I also removed your /s, as this is your actual belief.
I do actually agree with this, but this is not what it seemed like you were implying. How would making the few happier at the expense of the majority be increasing stability and reinforcing the status quo?
Very simple... it's literally recent history. FDR's New Deal (for instance) enriched the white working class and thereby separating it from the non-white working class, making any kind of class consciousness in the US very unlikely and preventing a repeat of the labor movements that rocked the imperialist nations in the aftermath of WW1 and the subsequent Influenza pandemic. The Apartheid-regime in South Africa essentially did the same thing without bothering with all the liberal propaganda.
It worked. In both states, it created a white "middle class" that was loyal to the status quo - you can witness that loyalty in it's full glory right here on lemmy.world. Neoliberals (as personified by Reagan and Thatcher) easily manipulated this loyalty to usher in the dismantling of New Deal-style Keynesian economics, leading to the deprivations you see in the US right now.
You're right. Whenever somebody makes a post like op I can just smell the authoritarian bs leaking from hexbear and lemmygrad.
Nah this isn't authoritarian or Tankie at all. It is a valid point that economically left-wing policy was very successful in the past (and it's just a meme anyway, it's tongue in cheek).
Now there's a lot of discussion we can have about why left-wing economics aren't as popular among Americans anymore -- I don't think FDR's policies could win an election today necessarily. But I think they can in the future. Reagan made us a deeply conservative nation and we're only just coming out of that now.
You're right, we should abolish term limits to make a forever leader whose opposition gets disappeared, and we should start apprehending and sentencing to death any wealthy who disagree with that leader. Trump seems to claim he's the opponent of corruption and big money, right? He can be our leftwing supreme leader. /sarcasm
Can you point to where anyone said we should "abolish term limits to make a forever leader whose opposition is disappeared?" If you can't, this is what's called a straw man argument.
The meme states that they "had to enact term limits" to stop leftists. The leftist in question had the FBI and IRS investigate his opponents.
So you can't point to where anyone said we should "abolish term limits to make a forever leader whose opposition is disappeared." This is what's called a straw man argument. You're arguing against a straw man.