Arrogance Redux

While I disagree somewhat with Karen's charge of discombobulation, I wanted to make my argument more clear:

A) Many on the "Left" are just as guilty of arrogant, out-of-touch, self-righteousness as many the "Right".
They have plans and grandiose visions of a better world, surely, just like the neo-Cons and the Christian Fundamentalists. But are any one of these visions truly practical? The Fundamentalists want to establish an Atwood-esque Theocracy akin to Taliban-era Afghanistan, while people on the Left have equally lofty goals of environmental sustainability which seem to have no reasonable basis in reality; The Nature Conservancy's stance of "OMG we have to kick out all of the native people off their land so we can save it!" and the Canadian Green Party's seemingly one-track focus are good examples of this. Yes, your goals are truly admirable. But how do you plan on actually acting on these goals?

B) The amount of appreciation, level of integration with, or even respect for moderates and/or religious liberals is dismally minimal.
This is where my own personal experience comes into play: people I've met who use their position as being on the Left to justify their bigoted, irrational and prejudiced hatred of religious traditions. I'm sorry to say this, but not even some professors and grad students I know here are wholly above such emotions. Granted, I understand why they and Renee feel the way they do given their life experiences, but it's indicative of the fact that people on the left are more than willing to divorce themselves from a potentially significant source of support through their apparent universal disdain for the value and role of religion. I think that a whole lot more could be done if more people on the left were more willing to talk to and include religious liberals. Sadly, it seems that they view us as nothing more than a peripheral footnote in their collective history.

And here's really what I wanted to say, in so many words:
C) Because of A and B, many initiatives carried out by the left will suffer greatly and may even fail.
As an aside, I think that the number of religious liberals out there is greater than many people think. For example, I think that the number of Christians who support gay marriage is more than the conservative Christians would lead you to believe. I think that the images of religious liberals as the minority is because a lot of people of faith do have a vague sense of liberal (or at the very least, non-Conservative) beliefs -- social justice, economic equality, LGTBQ/Women's rights, etc. -- but they just haven't really closely identified with them. Because of this, there is no apparently strong and cohesive identity for liberal Muslims or liberal Christians the way there is for the conservatives, and as result, it's clear that the "Christian Left" or the "Muslim Left" is itself very weak as a social movement.

Now, what does this have to do with points A and B? By being more vocal and more organized, we can go a long way towards solving both those problems. Without the support of religious liberals, in the general public eye liberals will be more and more marginalized and with them, much of their message. Additionally, it will give more and more "mainstream" people of faith a more visible and viable alternative to the arguably insidious movements carried out by religious conservatives. And finally, it will help to convince more and more "common folk" that being a liberal is more than just being a tree-hugger or some radical protester; that it's a legitimate and respectable way of approach social and political issues.

Without this support, the amount of people who stand to be convinced of the virtues of these movements (for environmental conservation or social/economic/political justice) would, I argue, be considerably less than it could be. That means a weaker, and more marginalized left with less support among people who are of more "mainstream" socio-political ideals. Which means that there are less voices being heard than there could be, supporting things like conservation and human rights.

In short, everyone wins. Everyone has something to gain from a tighter integration of liberal religious faith groups with the main body of the "Left". The only thing left standing in the way of a more stronger, united Left are egos and self-righteous arrogance, really.

I'm not suggesting that this is a panacea that will drive the Republicans or the Conservatives into oblivion, but it'll at least make alternatives to them more practial, stronger, and more accessible to The Rest Of Us.