Progressives and 'woke politics' are the reason the US let its infrastructure crumble? I don't follow your logic. You are saying progressive weakness is the reason America has let its infrastructure crumble, and why America doesn't have universal healthcare, why its education system isn't as good as it should be? That sounds wrong.

I see a lot of claims lately that 'woke politics' are the reason the US has let itself crumble and underperform for decades (relative to its potential), but 'woke politics' is a fairly new thing, and progressives generally aren't against infrastructure spending or universal healthcare or investing in education/science/tech, so I don't see the connection. The 'woke'/progressive politicians actually tend to favor this type of major investment/public spending more than the right does.

The adoption of critical theory as a base for policy directions ("woke politics") is not what caused infrastructure to crumble. Infrastructure crumbles because it costs money to maintain while it does not return profit in the short term when maintained. In the long run crumbling infrastructure leads to a loss of profit or opportunities for such but by then those who decided not to invest in maintenance are long gone from their positions.

However, the adoption of critical theory does play a significant role in bringing about the decline of western society since it leads only to deconstruction of existing structures without providing functional alternatives.

This thread is predictable degenerating into "Whatever my pet peeve is, is going to be the fall of western civilization"

Yet the education & healthcare system are funded more now than ever. It seems like throwing money at the problem does not make the problem go away; throwing money at the problem may make it worse. More expensive government has opportunity costs & enables the state to have more totalitarian control. How & why did education & healthcare get bloated?

This is overly simplistic. The west is in decline for tons of reasons in concert, not any one feel good reason. Identity politics/wokeism is just a symptom of a system already in decline, not the cause of it.

You could just as easily say that the internet is the reason the west is in decline because it allows loud minorities, corporations, and bad actors to amplify their voices and promote their agendas, sow division and discord, spread misinformation, and more. Which is also overly simplistic and not the sole reason for decline.

> because progressive values don't promote strength.

Venice in the 1400s,

London in the 1685-1700

Paris 1875-1914

vienna 1890-1914

London in the 1960s

All of these cities flourished because they were progressive.

Counter point: Islamic empires until the Ottoman empire collapse post WWI. They flourished, yet were not "progressive" in the modern Western sense of the word.

That's not a counter-point. It only points out that there is more than 1 way to promote strength. (Or that progressiveness has nothing to do with the strength at all).

I don't think thats a counter point! Depending on which time frame you are talking about, the ottoman empire was a cosmopolitan fairly free empire. There was freedom of religion (of sorts, there was a tithe.) and a civil law system that appeared to have some semblance of working for the lay man.

If you compare the treatment of jews in venice, parts of the ottoman empire were a haven. Spain's loss was the ottoman's gain.

That's why I said they were not "progressive" in the modern Western sense. Islam is able to perfectly accommodate different cultures, and lead the host society to prosperity.

but they were progressive, comparative to the western world at the time. Hence why they were a mecca (excuse the pun) for creative and scientific types.

I agree. Though these are examples of progressive 'class politics'. That doesn't exist in the west like it once did. Thanks to neoliberalism and its promotion of individualism, progressives now focus on identity. Worthy yes, but an ineffective replacement in terms of promoting unity amongst those with legitimate grievances.

The problem here is the definition of the term "progressive". If you take it to mean "forward-looking" then yes, being progressive is a sure strategy for success in the long run, even if such success may come at a price in the short term. This, however, is not what most current "progressive" ideologies do, instead of looking forward they often look backward in time in search for grievances in need of redress. This, in combination with the rise of identity politics which drives people apart into groups vying for current or historical claims of being oppressed does the opposite of the original progressivism. This modern interpretation of progressivism - adherents of which are often called "regressive left" - does not lead to flourishing societies, the opposite is true.

Identify politics has been on the rise for a long time. The right heavily contribute to identity politics. See: openly racist GQP leaders, transgender bathroom ban, mexican "caravans" conveniently appearing in the news around election time, satanic panic, homophobia, muslim ban, "Kung flu".

In no way can you place the blame for the rise of identity politics squarely on progressives. I get the feeling that most people opposed to a more fair and equitable society are the ones currently benefitting the most from inequity.

Please don't use HN for political or ideological battle. It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for, so we ban accounts that do it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Understood. I will refrain. Is there something about my comment that's more political than the ones above it? Like I guess I used a lot of buzzwords instead of vague political terms.

I don't know—we can't come close to seeing all the comments. If there are specific posts that you think should have been moderated, you can always let us know. But when a post hasn't been moderated, it doesn't follow that we must somehow approve of it—that's a big non sequitur!

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...

it doesn't even matter. this whole discussion is people blaming the material decline of the west on their cultural hobby horse. basically, things you don't like on twitter is the cause, according to the comments here. i think we're totally blinkard by culture.

I do not "blame" the rise of identity politics on anyone, I merely point out that it has been taken up by many people who consider themselves to be "progressive" and that it, in combination with the adoption of critical theory - specifically the practice of "deconstruction" - leads to a witches brew of regressive and destructive ideologies.

It looks like you've created a new account to do ideological battle on HN. That's not what this site is for, so I've banned it. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email [email protected] and give us reason to believe that you want to use HN as intended and will follow the rules in the future. They're here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

yeah, but do material realities factor in at all, or do empires rise on fall on attitude alone?

That is a good question to which I do not have a sensible answer other than a vague "both, probably". I suspect empires follow more or less the same trajectory as many family fortunes do: the founders build a base upon which subsequent enterprising generations build an empire. Once the empire has been established and more and more generations grow up with the certainty of it being there decay sets in. Eventually the empire either falls prey to its neighbours, decays without outside intervention or enters a steady state. The steady state makes it vulnerable to new ideas which might not necessarily be better than current ones but at least they are new or progressive.

Seriously? "Mexican Caravans"? 18,000 UNACCOMPANIED CHILDREN were "dumped" across the US-Mexico border in MARCH of 2021. And the current administration refuses to admit the "may" be a problem. Your selective ignorance is astounding.

Please don't use HN for political or ideological battle. It's not what this site is for, and it destroys what it is for, so we ban accounts that do it.

Crossing into personal attack and name-calling is particularly not cool. No more of that, please.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

> The west is in decline because progressive values don't promote strength.

Big reach. I think it's much less controversial to say it's in decline because of mindless consumerism, declining education budgets and corporate takeover of governance, which are hardly progressive.

I need to learn how to pronounce "baizuo", it's a great word.

Wait. You mean the progressive 'knowledge worker', 'green energy', and 'service economy' focus that left millions under & unemployed wasn't a winning strategy?

I hate to break it to you, but progressive values aren't why the dictators of the world walked all over the US for the past 4 years.

Oh, like when Russia invaded Crimea?

That's ridiculous. No dictator has walked all over the US in the last 4 years or ever. Anytime we failed diplomatically it occurred with the knowledge that our military dominance was insurmountable and complete, but that it's use indiscriminately would not serve our overall diplomatic strategic policy of caring about human rights, and self-imposed limits on how we use our military. Any of our failures in war against dictators etc directly stems from self-imposed limits on how we use our military power. We could literally glass them but we don't. Thank goodness.

Military dominance is only insurmountable and complete when it's a credible threat, and ours hasn't actually won a war of note in over half a century. The best we've ever done in that timeframe has been to supplement military leadership that was already in place, and we've failed to even accomplish that half the time.

The US military is a money pit.

Our military is absolutely a credible threat. We did not win those wars because we restrained ourselves. Iraq could have easily been turned into a wasteland of death and destruction, for example. We could have done like the Romans, implemented complete tyranny, and lined their streets with staked bodies as a reminder to not rebel. Harbor terrorists among civilians? Leveling the whole city would send a message that harboring our enemies is a death wish.

But we are not willing to conduct such indiscriminate brutality. We tried to fight ethical anti-insurgent wars with our hands tied behind our back in order to preserve life and cling to our values. But pushed too far, that restraint could drop. So it IS a credible threat.

That's all really cute but it doesn't address the issue.

People who are living in their homelands are more willing to fight and more entrenched than foreign invaders, especially when they've been at war long enough that you can't simply target a couple of places to bring them to their knees. The US military is not a credible threat. They're simply another invader who will get tired of the conflict and go away.

We're not going to war with Russia or China. We didn't do it when Russia annexed Crimea, or when they targeted US troops in Syria, and we aren't going to do it when China puts its boot on the neck of Taiwan. It's a stupid political game to pretend otherwise.

Like I said, the military is a money pit.

> The US military is a money pit.

Yes, but it's a very visible money pit. Its purpose is to discourage any other country from throwing their own money into a similar pit by competing.

I agree.

Christ on toast! Is "baizuo" becoming the "SJW" for the 20's now? Ugh.

Progressive values focus on class? If only. Neoliberalism has successfully neutered the left by promoting individualism at the expense of collectivism. Progressive values now focus on identity.

This is a trope that is rather popular on the internet, but is not at all accurate at either describing or predicting history.

It's in many ways even less useful than Historical Marxism. (Which is a damn low bar to fail to clear.)

spot on. CCP cultivates it.

also, your account is screwed. These are not the sort of opinions one's allowed to have connected to their real name

It is the most excruciating thing, to watch your nation self-immolate in a blaze of self-righteous naivete and stupidity. Maybe when we are old we will be able to say "I told you so." So at least there's that.

Though the silver lining for America as an economic power is that, at least for now, identity wokeism seems to have displaced socialism as the main outlet for progressive energy. So we might actually avoid economic decline as long as big businesses virtue signal enough about supporting sex changes for children. That future sucks too, but at least we might not be poor.

So you consider China (which is winning) a society with a more conservative philosophy? I didn't realize China is a small-government free market place...

I wonder if hawkish foreign policy along with an Imperialist mindset, is a crutch leading to the degeneration of domestic society.

Logic being: having & maintaining the dollar as a reserve currency created a context where it becomes more economically efficient to offshore labor & production, causing broken domestic feedback loops.

History demonstrates that Empires do not last forever. The contexts that lead to the rise of the host nation/entity taking on the mantle of Empire and the host nation/entity of the Empire change.