It certainly belongs among the most popular concepts of contemporary political theory class dealignment which seeks to capture the trend of class abandonment of traditional political preferences, which is noticeable to everyone. Although it is class fluid, the concept is mainly reserved for the working class and its electoral separation from the left and social democratic parties. The concept, therefore, conceptualizes the trend, but does not itself offer its explanation. Several "narratives" are competing for the fulfillment of that task, which are not mutually exclusive: from the collapse of the so-called of real socialisms that took with them the persuasiveness of political alternatives as such through the transformations of contemporary capitalism that made the workers' resistance significantly more demanding to changes in the class composition of the left. In the wake of that last item, in this contribution we will deal with the prevailing sensibility on the (Western) left which translates these changes into its own virtues. And that sensibility is primarily anti-social. This does not mean that others do not exist on the contemporary left, nor that this one is not realized in different ways, but that it is predominant.
When analyzing this sensibility, a song by Duško Trifunović, which gained wider popularity with a vocal arrangement by Željko Joksimović, will help us as an incidental illustration. Its title is "There's something in that you don't want me" and it's often treated as a kind of anthem of unrealized love. However, we are somewhat less inclined to the universalist interpretation, and in it we primarily see the usual subvariant of the lyrical of mansplaining: a woman's rejection is not a decision as such, but a somewhat malicious interpretation bait, a new stage in the narrative of seduction in which rejection is not an epilogue but only a twist. The last verse, which says that the lyrical subject does not actually want her, is not there for the sake of balance, but for imagined "revenge". But this, fortunately or unfortunately, is not a self-help portal but a political one, so after this legitimizing interpretation of the poem, we turn to it as a handy tool for illuminating the relationship of the contemporary left towards the working class.
The first two verses of the song "There's something in that you don't want me / you leave me time for others" quite precisely describe the departure of the contemporary left from class issues and seeking refuge in all possible discriminatory practices. The following lines of the first stanza "I see how you move cheerfully / like a butterfly around my sadness" introduce a dose of pathology and accuse the working class of a kind of betrayal: although I am your natural partner, you laugh at my weakness and are joyful despite voting for the "unnatural" political options and you live your life normally outside the "default" historical role. The first two lines of the second stanza introduce the inevitable pose of the contemporary left when it comes to the working class, and it's about patronization: "There's something in the fact that you don't want me / what you don't know the name of". Your new political position is full of oscillations and contradictions, you don't even know who you are or what you are. And the next two verses are there to make the left die and know that the working class has not forgotten it and that it still has the legitimacy to speak on its behalf: "There is something in the fact that you don't want me / and it all means don't forget me". But, in the end, the third and last stanza leads to frustration and a vengeful epilogue: first, the working class is accused of lying and betrayed through the verse "I will surely die of that lie" to end with the last two verses dealignment cemented: "there is something in the fact that you don't want me / and in the fact that I don't want you". Or to quote Žižek's famous variant of the classic interrupt line: "It's not you, it's me, but nevertheless it's you."
Therefore, it is an unhealthy political culture on the left - which of course varies from group to group and milieu to milieu - in which political positions and "lines" are not built collectively through listening to the needs of those who are supposedly represented already at a social distance. This social distance implies that attitudes are more susceptible to the communication logic of social networks than to the dynamics of social coalitions. From that vortex arises the need for more radical attitudes, such as, for example, "Let's abolish the family!". This attitude examines the radicalism of everyone involved and assesses how far they are willing to go to prove their correctness and loyalty, while the role of the family in the lower classes, which functions as a form of social support in the absence of public support, is largely ignored. There is no doubt that leaving public functions to families represents a regression and that families deserve a strong integration redefinition considering all the troubles within the four walls they produce, but when the family remains the only social and financial refuge, demanding its destruction can only be a political game show. Radical demands must represent a political solution to the problems of the majority, not identification markers for the recognition of the minority.
The left often, in the absence of class rootedness that characterizes the entire political life in the West in recent decades, indulges in moralistic liberalism which, as pointed out recently by Wolfgang Streeck, leads to Manichaeism that divides the world into two camps: the good and the bad. A moral compass is necessary in politics, but if we do not deal with the social and material conditions behind various moral decisions, then that compass not only has nothing to do with the left anymore, but also represents a luxury. The left must insist on rigorous positions and not squint compromisely at the endangerment of the rights of various minorities, but it must not turn into a lifestyle group that continuously assesses the moral correctness of all involved and make sure you choose the currently most endangered group for your engagement on social networks. It is not an easy task at all and it will stumble a thousand times, but there is hardly a second chance if the left wants to be relevant again. There's nothing wrong with not wanting us.
Bonus video:
