First of all, terms like “left” and “right” & “liberal” and “conservative” — and the varied permutations of these that have cropped up — can be useful, but often are misleading and tend to reinforce historically illiterate fashions. They also tend to over-simplify complex sociopolitical phenomena.
That said, the reader will notice I myself am trafficking in such terminology in my title. It would be nice if some other, more scientific (in the Voegelinian sense) term could be found for the phenomenon we call “Leftism”. I just don’t know — yet — what that is. Speaking of Eric Voegelin (1901-1985), he at times would denote it as “modern Gnosticism” which isn’t a bad alternative, except that it usually requires a few hours and dozens of pages to contextualize & explain.
At any rate, for now, we shall continue to plow the waves ahead using the well-worn language of Left and Right, though the reader will readily see I prefer to use the term “anti-Leftist” rather than “right winger” or “conservative”. (Humanist also is an excellent option, but that too requires some unpacking before the discussion can be understood.)
The second term of my title is “the Mainstream” — a deceptively simple concept. Part of its deceptiveness lies in its quality of being the “forest” largely ignored while various “trees” are focused on. Or when not entirely ignored or taken for granted, it is tacitly assumed to be some kind of neutral shell or context or framework or warehouse, in which the various phenomena of focus are analyzed — if not ignoring this framework out of hand, certainly assuming it transcends partisanship and thus has no pertinent relation or role to those phenomena.
I’ve noticed that various analysts out there whom we may situate more or less within the “anti-Leftist” ambit (even though they themselves seem to self-identify more or less as Leftist) — Jordan Peterson, Tim Poole, Paul Joseph Watson, Dave Rubin, Benjamin Boyce, Peter Boghossian, Bret Weinstein, Jenny Holland, Celia Farber, James Lindsay, Jodi Shaw, and many more — talk about this general issue in a way that seems oblivious to the problem of the “forest for the trees”. They rarely if ever even mention the Mainstream (or any symbolic equivalent). One reasonably concludes they take it for granted, and unthinkingly grant it a neutral status. Thus, one teases out what seems implicit in their various views: that, namely, Leftist and “Conservative” actors debate and fight within a neutral framework — the Mainstream — which remains above, around, and outside the fray. This perspective I think is seriously flawed and leads to various problems, including excessive pessismism or its mirror image, excessive optimism; as well as related problems radiating out from various misperceptions of the nature of our opponents in the ongoing war of ideas.
What I maintain is that we now find ourselves in a sociopolitical situation where we are not really battling our Leftist opponents within an arena, on a more or less neutral, level playing field; but one where our Leftist opponents dominate this arena, they control the playing field; they own the building (while we just rent space within it). This domination/control/ownership is not meant to be taken literally; it’s a metaphor for some amorphous kind of cultural hegemony yet to be fully palpated & clarified. One thing is for sure, however: It changes the nature of the game radically. At the same time, we don’t want to exaggerate their cultural power to the point of imputing omnipotence—which, at any rate, seems an unlikely problem, given that the vast majority of anti-Leftist pundits out there seem oblivious to this forest for the trees.
I draw to a close an essay already running too long, just to say I find it dismaying to be listening to, or reading, analysts who are obviously thoughtful and intelligent, such as Benjamin Boyce and James Lindsay, expatiate on this general problem yet seemingly oblivious to the forest for the trees, effectively taking the Mainstream for granted as a neutral space, rather than a context itself crackling with the electricity of Leftist influence.
What then, is this “Mainstream” of which I have been speaking….? More about that in my second part to come.
Looking forward to the next essay.