Tag: The Both

In her new book, Political Tribes: Group Instinct and the Fate of Nations, Chua argues that identity politics and tribalism, and the way they feed off one another, are weakening America. The reason there’s so much turmoil right now is because there’s always been all of these group identities and tribalism underneath, but we never heard about them because for almost 200 years the country was dominated economically, politically, and culturally by a white majority. A study shows that two-thirds of working class [white] Americans feel that whites are more discriminated against than minorities. Ironically—talk about tribalism—it’s the progressives, it’s the liberals, it’s all my students, it’s me, it’s the people you and I probably know who are criticizing capitalism, who support Bernie, who say, “We need to fight inequality.” A lot of poorer Americans of all races love the American dream. And in your book the way you phrase that is, “It may seem absurd to some.” And then you go on to say that a lot of whites feel that way. Because I feel like one of the things that you’re doing when you talk about this is you’re being—I don’t want to say being politically correct—but you’re tiptoeing around this group instead of saying things that they don’t want to hear. At the same time, we have to tiptoe around the way we talk about average Americans and white Americans who voted for Trump. But your analysis of why Trump has support and why people look up to him the way they don’t other rich people: I don’t entirely disagree objectively, but my attitude is principally not, “Well, the left needs to be better about identity politics,” but rather that we should criticize the people and institutions, like Fox News, exploiting identity politics to get people to vote for racists. I looked up Black Lives Matter, which you point out in the book that you think sometimes doesn’t speak for all people the way Martin Luther King did, capturing their ideals. It’s not as important a thing, but all my life, I’ve felt like, “Why are these people, these liberals, white people, talking like they’re helping me?” I don’t want their help.