The current controversy/discussion over the term “alt-left” has really made me think. As has been pointed out quite well, the term “alt-left” is terrible because it makes an implicit comparison to the “alt-right”, which is a euphemism for “neo-Nazis”. Yet this didn’t seem obvious to many until this weekend. (Personally, I found it cutesy and pat but hadn’t thought through the full implications.)
Although I don’t think it’s remotely productive to have a group shaming session, it’s worth asking why this term caught on with liberals at all, to see if there are deeper lessons there. To do that, we have to understand what it meant to the liberals who used it. The meaning varied from person to person, but the most common usage to me seems to have been the one adopted by Markos Moulitsas:
The hardcore Bernie Sanders dead-enders—the ones who insist on waging jihad against the party and its mainstream liberal adherents—are undying in their belief that income equality can solve all ills. Dubbed “alt-left” on Twitter (quickly replacing “Bernie Bro” as the preferred moniker), this crowd has […..]
The usage seems to be as a rough synonym for “Bernie Bro” or “Bernie Sanders dead-ender”. Those, especially the latter, are (poor) euphemisms for a group of liberals/leftists who withheld their support from Hillary Clinton last fall. Anecdotally, as far as I can tell, this seems to be the median use: as a catch-all term for those on the left who stayed home last fall.
And now we come to the point. For the liberals/centrist liberals who used the term, “alt-left” was, at the core, a way of classifying the people they considered responsible for the 2016 election. It was part of the blame game for 2016.
This game is toxic no matter at which group it’s directed. Every single one of us, regardless of 2016 primary allegiance, is traumatized by what happened, and there is literally nothing more infuriating than being singled out for responsibility. I personally voted for Clinton in the primary, and I have to fight off intense anger every time I see someone single her supporters out for blame. I have no doubt that Sanders supporters feel the same way. I understand why being described as “alt-left” would make people angry even if it weren’t an implicit Nazi comparison.
So how do we fix this?
From all camps, I’ve seen variants of “well, [my opponents] should accept their blame and then fall in line behind [my group] to lead us forward.” Though it seems to arise frequently, it should be obvious that this is a terrible response — even if true, that argument will inflame rather than convince.
But it’s not even true, no matter who’s saying it. There’s plenty of blame to go around. Clinton supporters like me have to recognize that we backed a poor candidate. Sanders supporters should recognize that some criticisms of Clinton during the primary were unnecessary and caused lasting damage to her in the general election. We can debate the proper apportionment of blame forever (and sadly, probably will), and I don’t know if there’s a right answer there. But it seems obvious to me that all of us share at least some responsibility. The intra-party dynamic in 2016 was destructive, and we built it together. And now we need to find a way to end it together.
As trite as it is, the key is acceptance — namely accepting our own individual roles in what happened rather than trying frantically to assign the blame to others. This means approaching discussions of 2016 with humility rather than defensiveness, and it means abandoning slurs like “alt-left”.
None of us have to give up our preferred positions on policy and/or politics to do this; we can and should continue having intra-party debates (which I’m sure we will). But the blame portion needs to stop. We’ve got work to do to stop Trump and his fellow neo-Nazi sympathizers, and we can’t afford to keep throwing emotional hand grenades at each other. The only way out is to forgive each other, forgive ourselves, and move forward.