He considers it, or dominant tendencies within it, to have degenerated from soaring moral and intellectual heights with Rosa Luxemburg, W. The vacuousness of contemporary identity politics is best expos It's ironic that many self-styled anarchists advocate increasing the power of unaccountable bureaucrats to control what is said and what isn't. One problem with Kendi's and our culture's promiscuous, indiscriminate use of the label "racist" is that the concept becomes diluted: "to be a racist ceases to be what it ought to be: a scarlet badge of shame… [W]hat information is conveyed by a label that collapses the distinction between Frederick Douglass [whom Kendi considers a racist] and the Grand Wizard of the K. So, when someone says that they will “burn that bridge when [they] get to it”, they expect to deal with an upcoming difficulty badly which will result in permanently cutting ties or alienating other people involved.

Identity politics has distracted from and, when need be, outright sabotaged a class-based movement [viz.In the malaphor we have chosen this week, there are two conventional idioms at play- “to burn one’s bridges” and “I’ll/we’ll cross that bridge when I/we get to it”. It disturbs her that white feminists are presumptuous enough to speak for black women, but she "seems less concerned or, for that matter, even conscious that a high-achieving Black woman speaking for Black working-class women might also be problematic. S. were instances of cancel culture; so is the corporate media's treatment of virtually everyone on the left; so is the woke treatment of anyone who publicly strays from the party line.

Even if such victims of woke defamation campaigns usually find their footing again or don't always suffer career consequences in the first place, the mob's impulse to censor and silence remains operative and ever-vigilant. Unfortunately, there is no prospect of their ending as long as identity politics and woke culture remain dominant on the left and in the Democratic Party—as they surely do today, at the expense of a class politics.

Originating as a response to the 2020 publication of “A Letter on Justice and Open Debate” in Harper’s, Finkelstein’s new book I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get to It takes aim at both “cancel culture” and “identity politics”. Academia insists on politeness, decorum, "neutral" language, which often serves to enforce conventions, emasculate dissent, and uphold power structures; wokeness insists on ceaselessly monitoring your own and others' language, in fact making that a priority, allowing people to feel "radical" by doing nothing that remotely challenges real power structures. With I'll Burn That Bridge, he shows his willingness to burn bridges not only with the establishment but also with the "left" of today, for which he shows scarcely mitigated contempt. Or, more precisely, that isn't a difficult task—it's so easy that Finkelstein is able to devote huge chunks of these chapters to sheer mockery—but it does require patience and a willingness to wade through endless intellectual muck.

At best, it can occasionally be "interrupted"—through the "diversity training" at which DiAngelo excels and for which she charges a hefty fee. It should be clear from what has been said here that I'll Burn That Bridge When I Get to It is an unusual book.We hear, since emancipation, much said by our modern colored leaders in commendation of race pride, race love, race effort, race superiority, race men, and the like… [But] I recognize and adopt no narrow basis for my thoughts, feelings, or modes of action. By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. Heretical Thoughts on Identity Politics, Cancel Culture, and Academic Freedom, I thought early on of Obama's joke at the expense of Rahm Emanuel: "he's one of a kind, and thank god he's one of a kind. The vacuousness of contemporary identity politics is best exposed by considering its "great minds," the Crenshaws, Coateses, Kendis, and DiAngelos.