My grandma always joked when I did something dumb that she could shine a light in one of my ears and see it out the other. Years ahead of the science, apparently.
I think belonging is one of the most important contributors to mental health, and anecdotally, fewer liberals and leftists "belong" to a group.
There are progressive churches out there, for example, but they see much smaller membership overall than other denominations. Evangelical conservative megachurches are designed to foster a sense of belonging and community for those who can believe their teachings. Progressive churches celebrate the questioning mind and search for meaning, which actively does not create a culture of conformity, and hence raises the barrier to allow people to feel like they belong.
We know that hazing rituals, shared uniforms and appearance, and groupthink create strong bonds, but also lead to little-t and capial-T traumas, especially for queer or neurodivergent folks who may never truly "fit in" without heavy masking or closeting. Leftists also have a problem with gatekeeping, contrast this with evangelicals who design easy paths in to their churches for folks who "haven't done the required reading"
Additionally, the active suppression of liberal/leftist and queer groups (e.g. McCarthyism), the AIDS crisis, leftist infighting, and leftist distrust of authority mean a lot of young progressives are starting from scratch or facing large headwinds in finding any sort of social group. The Internet is helping combat this, but the lack of elders, advisors, and established routes to leadership mean that there aren't many organizations to even join, and the ones that do exist are often run poorly.
Contrast this with conservative groups which have generations of experience, leadership routes, training, etc. Individual evangelical colleges matriculate thousands of students while progressive religious programs are lucky to number in the 30-50 range.
Source: anecdotes and personal experience, as someone with leadership experience in a progressive religion :)
> I think belonging is one of the most important contributors to mental health, and anecdotally, fewer liberals and leftists "belong" to a group.
> There are progressive churches out there, for example, but they see much smaller membership overall than other denominations.
You don't need a church to have something to belong to. I'm not going to believe in gods just so I can sing kumbaya with others. The whole point of belonging is that you can be yourself and be accepted as you are. That's key. If you're going to pretend you're just fooling yourself.
Also, churches tell you how to feel, what to do, what to think. Another thing that doesn't go down very well with most progressives. I don't think that this causes an extra barrier to belong though. The key part is finding a group that suits you.
Or do you mean these 'churches' are more like enlightenment classes of self discovery? In that case I wouldn't call it a church due to all the negative associations that brings.
> We know that hazing rituals, shared uniforms and appearance, and groupthink create strong bonds, but also lead to little-t and capial-T traumas, especially for queer or neurodivergent folks who may never truly "fit in" without heavy masking or closeting
As a neurodivergent kinda queer leftist, I absolutely hate hazing rituals and uniforms and authority. But it's not like I'm desperately trying to find a group to belong to. A group I belong to has to fit me, not the other way around. They're easier to find than you think. Just chat to someone wearing a rainbow band and they'll tell you what's good in the area. Or someone with blue hair or extravagant clothing. Our communities aren't strictly organised and regulated or formalized but that doesn't mean that they don't exist.
In fact that's something that conservatives tend to project on us. They think there's an LGBT or 'woke' 'agenda'. They project their own need for leadership and organisation on us. In reality this isn't the case at all. Everyone makes up their own goals. And that's great. Progressiveness is all about embracing different.
For me I have found such places such as makerspaces and more spicy places, all of which ended up being full of neurodivergents like me :) And definitely all progressive. But they share no elements of churches other than being a community.
I do think neurodivergents are often less happy because we have more difficulty in life where most others are neurotypical.
> there aren't many organizations to even join, and the ones that do exist are often run poorly.
Most makerspaces are really badly run :) But it doesn't matter. It's not about being successful. It's about making cool stuff with others.
I appreciate the response! I really enjoy talking about this stuff so please take my long response as just me thinking out loud.
I forgot to mention that I'm an atheist. I call myself "religious but not spiritual". I was super reluctant to go to anything called "church" until my partner dragged me along 10 or so years ago, and the religion I belong to now has no particular theological creed. Reclaiming religious language (like "church") and disassociating it from the baggage of conservative organized religion is something very interesting to me. It's like the word "god", which can mean a big white dude in the sky, or it can just mean the way the universe works. (Aka monotheism and panentheism).
> A group I belong to has to fit me, not the other way around
I think this is one of the major sticking points a lot of progressives have that lead to shallow relationships. Deep community often takes work, change, and sacrifice. I don't mean changing who you are - just how you interact with others, how you open up, and how/what you are willing to give.
Without buy-in (monetary, skills, helping others, etc.), it's not really a community. It's just a social interest group, and that's not going to provide the kind of psychological safety and deep connection that contributes to well being.
I'm not saying you have to go to church, or that a makerspace or spicy setting can't be a community. And I do think a lot of them can foster relationships that turn into real community. But in my (biased) experience, there are few multigenerational progressive spaces designed to encourage kids, elders, adults, etc. to connect meaningfully. Contributing further to the lack of structure, wisdom, and leadership that can allow an organization to do big work.
I too hate hazing rituals and uniforms and authority, although I'm starting to soften on that last one (authority), as I find progressive spaces that vet and hold accountable their leadership. Without a web of trust and accountability we are all just off on our own, pulling in many different directions at the same time, while conservatives have figured out how to get everyone working on the same few problems, regardless of minor differences.
I'm obviously exaggerating and using metaphor, but what else makes a good story :)
> I forgot to mention that I'm an atheist. I call myself "religious but not spiritual". I was super reluctant to go to anything called "church" until my partner dragged me along 10 or so years ago, and the religion I belong to now has no particular theological creed. Reclaiming religious language (like "church") and disassociating it from the baggage of conservative organized religion is something very interesting to me. It's like the word "god", which can mean a big white dude in the sky, or it can just mean the way the universe works. (Aka monotheism and panentheism).
Ah I see. I'm open to spiritualism. But calling something a church leads to an insta-pass from me. Which is a kinda personal hangup. But yes definining something yourself is a very typical progressive point. Try that in a conservative church, there you really have to stick with established dogma, colour within the lines. But anyway you said the same thing in different words I think.
> I think this is one of the major sticking points a lot of progressives have that lead to shallow relationships. Deep community often takes work, change, and sacrifice. I don't mean changing who you are - just how you interact with others, how you open up, and how/what you are willing to give.
> Without buy-in (monetary, skills, helping others, etc.), it's not really a community. It's just a social interest group, and that's not going to provide the kind of psychological safety and deep connection that contributes to well being.
Ok this is a point where we really differ in opinion :) I feel the complete opposite. A community where I have to change isn't really 'real' to me. Because it's not really me that is a member, it's a twisted role I'm playing. It just becomes a mindless ritual then, not something worth anything to me. I don't feel invested because I'm just playing some role.
I used to live in a pretty conservative place and it was hard to find a place to belong, but now I live in a big city and my life has become so much more full. My connection to friends is much deeper. We talk about deep personal problems and insecurities, about sex, about traumas. We really open up and show our real selves (and often bodies). I've never really had that before. Things are more fluid yes, sometimes I'm really close to one friend or group and sometimes to another, but it doesn't matter. We're all on our own journey but we travel together with the people that align with us at the time. I feel I'm really progressing in my life now and living it more fully. In the conservative place I couldn't do that because so many things were taboos or just frowned upon.
And yes we help each other too. If someone is moving house we all show up to help, if a friend has a computer problem they tend to come to me. And the others help me with things I can't do on my own. <3
Talking about some shared ideology that is set in stone (tablets :) ) or books would never bring that to me. Because I change over time too, even if I align at one point I will not later. And the world changes too.
> But in my (biased) experience, there are few multigenerational progressive spaces designed to encourage kids, elders, adults, etc. to connect meaningfully.
I have deep connections with people ranging from 18 to their 70s. Embrace different includes not allowing ageism.
> Contributing further to the lack of structure, wisdom, and leadership that can allow an organization to do big work.
See, this is the part that does not matter to us at all. Doing stuff some leader wants done is not something we care about at all. We don't have a shared agenda and we don't want one. Some organisations do, but they tend to be made up of different people over time, that align with the mission at that point in life. It's rare for them to stay in there for their whole life.
The shared goal thing is definitely a huge difference between conservative and progressive communities, as you mention. But my point is the lack of that doesn't matter. I do think it is one of the reasons that conservatism is so succesful in the world. Because they do have an agenda and the means (also financial) to push it through. Our communities are always struggling with money, but it's also because that's not a thing we find really important.
Running into this same issue. I tried to send you an email but it bounced. The error was "Your message couldn't be delivered ... because the remote server is misconfigured ... 554 5.7.1 : Relay access denied". Just FYI :)
There's a few people in here doing whataboutism like this. Where are you getting the idea that the "left" or whoever banned words in scientific articles?
I don't mean to refer to scientific articles specifically. Rather, it just seems to me that the left is usually the one coming up with lists of "bad words" (I believe it was Stanford? Some big university a few years back came up with a huge list of "potentially harmful" terms and alternatives you should say instead.) And the right usually gets mad about it, so I'm a little surprised to see them play the same game. It's not a good look (in my eyes).
Anyone is allowed to publish a list of "bad words". Did they force the CDC to retract 5 million perfectly good studies because they contained the words?
The one that says there are only two genders and disagrees with biological reality, confuses sex and gender, and is mostly about fear instead of education.
One of my radicalizing events was in 2016, when I was a delegate for Bernie at the Colorado caucus. (I can't recall exactly what level, but there were probably 200 people in the room.
The Hillary folks controlled the stage and completely ignored the Bernie crowd's calls of "point of order!", throwing out the rules to rush through their agenda despite the wishes of (more than?) half the crowd.
I know Bernie has a lot of detractors, and the calls of "socialist!" scare a lot of people off. But still, the process should have happened. I still think he had a real shot of winning 2016, because people were ready to overturn the system and the Dems establishment didn't see it. So instead many people who wanted that revolution turned to the other person who promised to burn it all down. Maybe I'm libbing out, but _I want to believe_.
I got incredibly ill for days after that experience, likely from the fact that there were a lot of folks yelling and sharing germs in a closed room, but also from the sheer stress of seeing the establishment flagrantly violate Robert's Rules when it served them, and state it as law when that served them instead.
I'm still mad. Thanks for sharing your experience.
Oh, the democrats saw this the whole time, but I think the establishment democrats would rather have an R in the white house over Bernie because when it comes to policy and maintaining existing power structures, they're closer to a Republican than they are to Bernie.
I think he would have won too, because he would have gotten the poor, working class vote that Hillary and Kamala failed to get. He would have faced a hell of a battle getting any of his policies implemented. But damn, I wish we lived in that timeline. He's the only "democrat" candidate that people have actually been excited about since 2008 Obama.
Someone remarked recently that the Democratic Party's fatal flaw is that it is not really a democratic organization, and this author's experience seems to support that idea.
Why shouldn’t establishment Democrats revile Bernie? He has been independent or third party his entire career, except during two brief stints where he joins the Democratic Party to use their national apparatus to run for president, much to the frustration of career Democrats.
Bernie, while being Vermont's Senator, has secured the democratic party primary every time he's run. He has pushed hard for policies that align with democratic voters and he's been extremely consistent. He's also fundraised for the DSCC and other democratic aligned organizations.
If you're familiar with his political stances it's bizarre to not classify him (in our two party system) as a democrat.
Oh, I agree! I was just frustrated that they were willing to break the rules to defeat Bernie (but then when they lose to the Republicans, it's just too bad and we must follow the rules).
I dunno. I'm not arguing that Dems should break rules/laws/whatever. I'm just venting about the hypocrisy that I think cost them the 2016 and 2024 elections.
When they lose to Republicans, the "rules" are not Robert's Rules of Order or the bylaws of the Democratic Party. Instead, the rules are the federal election laws. Not following the rules is a bit less of an option.
The irony is that Sanders has been super-loyal to the establishment Democrats. He endorsed and campaigned for Clinton. He endorsed and campaigned for Biden. He publicly defended Biden when people wanted to replace him on the ticket. And then when Biden was replaced, Sanders endorsed and campaigned for Harris. And he hasn't used to power as a Senator to block legislation, like Manchin and Sinema. He's been a reliable vote.
Despite all of the talk of a "political revolution", Sanders is anything but a revolutionary. He's practically an establishment Democrat himself.
The same goes for AOC, by the way. She never "brought the ruckus" against the Democrats. She's 100% establishment now.
Maybe because 45% of this country is independent voters. I'll continue writing in Bernie rather than voting for an establishment and nobody owns my vote. I'd rather see the country go to hell under R until blue votes for a progressive leader. If you can't bring true universal single payer healthcare, you're not someone I'll ever vote for. I want principles, not special interests.
Isn't Bernie overall quite good for the party? Isn't having a president of your party in office good for your party? Seems like cutting off their nose to spite their face for the Democratic Party to shun him.
What? From the very beginning he negotiated with the Democratic party to run under the D banner and support major platforms of the party - but he's not beholden to the Whip. His job was to represent the people who elected him, and he's very consistently done so, and probably worked 'across the aisle' to get things done moreso than anyone else in congress in decades.
> I still think he had a real shot of winning 2016, because people were ready to overturn the system and the Dems establishment didn't see it.
I wouldn't assume that it's that they didn't see it but that they're the system being overturned. The GOP did get turned over and it's unrecognizable compared to 2012, I can't even imagine being a long-time Republican senator trying to do right by people and suddenly have to gargle Trump's sweaty balls and betray a lot of what you believe in or be out of a job. I think it's a natural reaction to being cornered. Moderate Republicans are homeless right now boxed out of their own party and staring down their dwindling political and social capital. It's gotta hurt.
Don't get me wrong I would love to Feel the Bern, I don't agree with a whole lot of his pie-in-the-sky ideals but when he talks about actual concrete issues and policy changes to me it's clear he gets it.
Media, business and "power centers" of any kind align to wherever the power is, and take whatever form is necessary to tap into that power. The only ones actually wedded to ideology are the rubes who show up to the polls.
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