Identity politics is the denial of the individual, his freedom and his value
The Superbowl that took place recently reminded me of a beautiful film set in the world of American football: “The taste of victory – United you win” . The protagonist is Herman Boone, played by Denzel Washington, an African-American coach who must earn the respect of his team, made up for the first time of blacks and whites, in 1960s America, where systemic racism was a thing. real and not a product of the fervent imagination of millennials .
Boone has a second manager who is the classic prototype of the liberal who pretends to be open-minded: white, he treats blacks in the team with compassion and a sense of pity. The revealing phrase is the one that Boone addresses to him, to challenge his habit of consoling black players (and only them) every time they receive a reprimand from Boone:
“I am equally bad to all the guys on the team. […]. She does not do him a favor with her condescension, she does the disabled with them ”.
It is safe to bet that this film has not been included in the list of those that some companies have begun to recommend to their employees.
But what does a private individual have to do with the cinematographic tastes of his employees?
It has something to do with it, especially if we are in February, the Black History Month . Born as a series of events to celebrate the pride of being African-American, the initiative has been embraced by large groups ( Nordstrom, for example, specializing in clothing) to marketing agencies, which invite staff to watch starring films or directed by people of African descent, listening to black music, reading black books, etc. There are even apps to find black-run shops.
They call it inclusiveness, to give themselves a patina of good intentions.
The reality is quite different: politically correct and identity politics , born on American campuses, after infecting the media are becoming more and more invasive.
In fact, it is not clear the connection between the fact that a shop is managed by a person belonging to a certain ethnicity and the value for money, courtesy, the competence of the shopkeeper, which should be the main criteria in choosing among many subjects. in competition.
It has nothing to do with the free market. Because it has nothing to do with the adjective free. The pink (or black, or any other color) quotas are in fact the negation of freedom.
The free and rational decision of the consumer in choosing a product or of the manager in choosing a collaborator is superimposed (indeed, almost imposed) on compliance with criteria whose violation leads to accusations of sexism, racism, and other assorted isms .
To date, these are only “spontaneous” initiatives of some companies. But tomorrow the matter could take a very dangerous turn, in case some legislator dreams of imposing them by law.
Already now, as noted by Jordan Peterson, in New York State companies can be fined for addressing a colleague using a personal pronoun that does not reflect their "gender identity".
Peterson, a famous Canadian psychologist, is not by chance a scholar of authoritarianism, especially of the left.
A left that finally shows its true face: contempt for the individual and the betrayal of the American Dream , that of the free man, a pioneer in uncharted territory, who manages to crown his dreams with hard work and commitment which highlights its merits.
Merit and meritocracy are in fact forbidden words in the neo-language that politically correct priests use in their cults.
All are labeled, based on gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, as if this were enough to define an individual and his aspirations. It is these memberships that decree respect and acceptance on the part of others, not the value in itself of what one says or does.
The consequences are sometimes unpredictable, especially where the categories overlap: the quarrels between some feminists and transgender groups are hilarious.
The left, however, does not seem to give weight to the contradictions that its thinking generates: with its (the) Orwellian logic, one can be obsessed with the color of the skin and ethnicity and at the same time fight against a racism that is believed to be infiltrated everywhere. , even in our retro-thoughts.
As far as I'm concerned, I will not follow any film recommendations other than those of a critic or someone who has already seen the film. I won't waste a minute of my time watching Black Lupine or Black Achilles (cinematic blackwashing deserves a separate article).
Instead, I will continue to watch films with Denzel Washington, not because he is black, but because he is one of the best actors around (and he would be even if he were transparent). Because like Herman Boone, I think that to discover the talents of blacks you don't need quotas, months dedicated to them or the pity of some parlor liberal .
Meritocracy and competition are enough to make them free and responsible people, whether they lead their team to victory or fail to score a goal, rather than handicapped people as the left would like with its claims of ethnic redemption.
The post Identity politics is a denial of the individual, his freedom and his value appeared first on Atlantico Quotidiano .
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/la-identity-politics-e-negazione-dellindividuo-della-sua-liberta-e-del-suo-valore/ on Thu, 11 Feb 2021 04:57:00 +0000.