Lilla traces the origins of identity politics to a slogan of the feminist movement during the 1960s: the personal is the political.
"Originally," Lilla observes, "It was interpreted to mean that everything that seems strictly private - sexuality, the family, the workplace - is in fact political and that there are no spheres of life exempt from the struggle for power But the phrase could also be taken in a more romantic sense: that what we think of as political action is in fact nothing but personal activity, an expression of me and how I define myself. As we would put it today, my political life is a reflection of my identity."
Focusing attention on the members of his own profession, Lilla argues that "The big story is not that leftist professors successfully turn millions of young people into dangerous political radicals every year. It is that they have gotten students so obsessed with their personal identities that, by the time they graduate, they have much less interest in, and even less engagement with, the wider political world outside their heads."
This is what Lilla apparently considers a primary cause of "The Liberal Crackup." As he concludes in his final paragraph: "The politics of identity has done nothing but strengthen the grip of the American right on our institutions. It is the gift that keeps on taking. Now is the time for liberals to do an immediate about-face and return to articulating their core principles of solidarity and equal protection for all. Never has the country needed it more."
In her January 12, 2018 Wall Street Journal article on when parents should give children smartphones, Betsy Morris stresses that the goal of Facebook and Google "Is to create or host captivating experiences that keep users glued to their screens, whether for Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat or Facebook. A child" she adds, "Can understand the business model: The more screen time, the more revenue."
"In the meantime, the college professoriate continues to make students"obsessed with their personal identities" that civil discourse no long has meaning.
More likely, this war is really about identity politics and what Columbia University Professor Mark Lilla has called "The Liberal Crackup."
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/02/identity_politics_and_the_end_of_meaning.html
"Originally," Lilla observes, "It was interpreted to mean that everything that seems strictly private - sexuality, the family, the workplace - is in fact political and that there are no spheres of life exempt from the struggle for power But the phrase could also be taken in a more romantic sense: that what we think of as political action is in fact nothing but personal activity, an expression of me and how I define myself. As we would put it today, my political life is a reflection of my identity."
Focusing attention on the members of his own profession, Lilla argues that "The big story is not that leftist professors successfully turn millions of young people into dangerous political radicals every year. It is that they have gotten students so obsessed with their personal identities that, by the time they graduate, they have much less interest in, and even less engagement with, the wider political world outside their heads."
This is what Lilla apparently considers a primary cause of "The Liberal Crackup." As he concludes in his final paragraph: "The politics of identity has done nothing but strengthen the grip of the American right on our institutions. It is the gift that keeps on taking. Now is the time for liberals to do an immediate about-face and return to articulating their core principles of solidarity and equal protection for all. Never has the country needed it more."
In her January 12, 2018 Wall Street Journal article on when parents should give children smartphones, Betsy Morris stresses that the goal of Facebook and Google "Is to create or host captivating experiences that keep users glued to their screens, whether for Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat or Facebook. A child" she adds, "Can understand the business model: The more screen time, the more revenue."
"In the meantime, the college professoriate continues to make students"obsessed with their personal identities" that civil discourse no long has meaning.
More likely, this war is really about identity politics and what Columbia University Professor Mark Lilla has called "The Liberal Crackup."
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/02/identity_politics_and_the_end_of_meaning.html
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