Submitted by anon (not verified) on Mon, 10/04/2021 - 08:04
So is, as a different example, the idea of intersectionality.
It's a tool to help you understand a phenomenon. It is not isometric to such an understanding, obviously.
Anarchists frequently fit it into mainstream ideas of "extreme left" because we do the smashy-smash sometimes, but that's our behaviour. Our ideas (taken as a whole, as opposed to on any given issue) frequently don't allow us to be slotted easily into a left or right category very easily (although individualism, which is important for anarchists, will often get us pegged as right-wing by people who Marxists and Tiqqunists or whatever).
But let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. It's useful shorthand - for a lot of the polarized conflict that happens right now in the United States, for instance (there's a left side and a right side in a lot of these skirmishes), or for just talking about some boring thing like economic policy (in which case, it is pretty self-evident what "left" and "right" approaches indicate)
So is, as a different example, the idea of intersectionality.
It's a tool to help you understand a phenomenon. It is not isometric to such an understanding, obviously.
Anarchists frequently fit it into mainstream ideas of "extreme left" because we do the smashy-smash sometimes, but that's our behaviour. Our ideas (taken as a whole, as opposed to on any given issue) frequently don't allow us to be slotted easily into a left or right category very easily (although individualism, which is important for anarchists, will often get us pegged as right-wing by people who Marxists and Tiqqunists or whatever).
But let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. It's useful shorthand - for a lot of the polarized conflict that happens right now in the United States, for instance (there's a left side and a right side in a lot of these skirmishes), or for just talking about some boring thing like economic policy (in which case, it is pretty self-evident what "left" and "right" approaches indicate)