Democrats Don't Know How to Talk About Class Oppression
Democrats have forgotten how to talk about class oppression, and they have paid a steep price for their forgetfulness. In an earlier post on this blog, I talked about how the Democrats came to forget what had been the core of leftist politics in the early decades of the twentieth century. The anti-communist fervor of the time made it politically difficult to talk about class oppression without being accused of being a communist, and then, the Civil Rights Movement and the Women’s Movement gave American leftists a way of talking about oppression without mentioning class.
The Limits of Talk About Race and Gender
In this way of talking, the oppressed are said to be women and people of color, and the oppressors are said to be white men. There is some truth in this, but it hides the fact that while our country is indeed run by a small group composed mostly of white men, the majority of white men do not belong to that small group. Most white men are also among the oppressed. They may be less oppressed than working-class women or people of color, but focusing exclusively on that difference only serves the interest of the real oppressors.
The Democrats' inability to see class oppression even extends to working-class women. They are among the most oppressed people in our society but neither the Democratic Party nor the women's movement - which is mainly a movement of business and professional women - has really addressed their concerns.
On the wall of the office of the Democratic Party in the county where I live, there is a mural that exemplifies the way that Democrats have come to think. The mural consists of portraits of famous figures in the struggles for racial and gender equality. It shows people like Cesar Chavez, Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It celebrates their struggles, their achievements and their suffering.
However, the heroes of earlier class struggles are not included. The long list of white men who have struggled, suffered and sometimes died in the fight for social justice in our country is not represented. As a result, the mural conveys the message - probably unintended - that the Democratic Party is not interested in the suffering of working-class white people or in their contributions to the struggle for justice.
The Price That the Party Has Paid
By focusing on race and gender to the exclusion of class, Democrats have thus come to appear to be indifferent to the oppression of white,
working-class people, and they have paid a heavy political price for their apparent
indifference. White working-class people in large numbers have given up hope in
the Democratic Party and have joined the Republican Party. Some of this change
was triggered by the Democrats’ support for the Civil Rights Movement and for
the Voting Rights Act of 1965, but that is not the whole story. It explains why
the southern states shifted to the Republican Party in the late twentieth
century, but it does not explain the success of the MAGA movement, which did not exist until
after 2010.
Donald Trump the leader of the MAGA movement offered the white working class an explanation for its oppression. He told people that they were oppressed because of DEI and because of immigration. This explanation was false, but it was persuasive, and millions of people believed him. He has also come up with a few policies that appear to favor working-class people. Eliminating the income tax on tips is such a policy.
Now, we
are seeing the results. Trump has control of all three branches of government, and he is pressing universities and other institutions to
abandon DEI; he is arresting and deporting tens of thousands of immigrants; he is close to eliminating the independence of the Federal Reserve; and
he is pressing museums and national parks to downplay any references to
racial oppression. None of this will really help the working class
because the source of its suffering lies elsewhere, but in the meantime our
democracy may be destroyed.
The Way Forward
If Democrats wish to counteract the MAGA movement effectively, they are going to have to rediscover the
vocabulary of class oppression, and they are going to have to speak for all of
our oppressed people including the white working class. The Democrats are going to have to find a way to talk about working class solidarity across the lines of race and gender if there is to be any hope for democracy in our country.