Identity Politics in the Modern World
Identity politics started out as large-scale political movements such as the second wave feminism, Black Civil Rights, and the American Indian movements which happened back in the second-half of the twentieth century movement. During that time, women were oppressed, specifically the group of Black Women who were told to keep quiet as they were treated as inferiors by white people. Also during the time, this had sparked people to speak up for themselves and start a political movement with like-minded people.
Identity politics is known as a political approach in which people of a different religion, race, social background, class and other factors which contribute to forming many political agendas in society. Usually, people form these political agendas as a sort of ‘defense mechanism’ in terms of fighting for their rights as a particular member of society. But as Jonathan Heidt had mentioned, how did it all go wrong? Well there are two sides of identity politics that are both opposite to each other, that is the good side of identity politics and the bad side.
The good side of identity politics stems from the concept of liberation especially to the social groups who are the most targeted. An example would be the topic of racism, as it it is a very controversial topic especially in the country of the United States. The role of identity politics in tackling this issue is that identity politics gives people a sense of protection as it gives people an ‘identity’ in society. People who share the same religion, race, social background, or class create political movements against discrimination and exclusivity against their rights as humans. That is also where most social movements come from such as the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movements that happen often in the United States. On an everyday basis, there will always be times where discrimination or oppression is happening against another person in the entire world. Identity politics hopes to give people political freedom especially to the marginalized groups in society.
The bad side of identity politics comes from the problem of elections where in candidates use this as sort of technique in luring people to vote for them. Now don’t get me wrong, it is good that they are advocating for equal rights and treatment, but if it is used to the point of being their main stand as a candidate, than that is wrong. Politics should not be just about identity politics but also personal politics. People should speak up about their own opinions and ideas and at the same time contribute in promoting social equality.
I think that identity politics is emerging in many countries around the world, as many people are now creating social groups from the different marginalized sectors in society and fight against the Government for their rights. Has it gone too far? I would say that identity politics is only still slowly evolving, since it is only apparent in the United States especially, but in other countries they are only starting to get bigger. This would only go too far if the Government of these countries would then dissect themselves from the society and become a dictatorship in whose authority force society to follow their command. That is the point when it would go too far and that is when society would end up in utter chaos.
References
Plato Stanford. (July 16, 2002). Identity Politics. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-politics/