Andrew Yang and the Death of Dogma
I am a good eco-socialist, and yet, I am often tickled by Andrew Yang’s techno-optimistic-capitalism. Would I ever vote for him?
Like all great pieces, this one began with a drafted tweet:
“Ik this is bad for the take-industrial-complex but I actually understand why ppl would see a smiling tech bro daddy hopping around a fluorescent bodega and want to vote for him based on vibes alone”
Partial translation for the non-extremely-online: Andrew Yang, the former presidential candidate who helped to popularize the idea of Universal Basic Income in the US, is now running to be the mayor of New York City and one of his many gaffes was calling a brightly lit, clearly whole-foods aligned supermarket, a New York Bodega. My “take,” which surely would have banished me to bad-socialist twitter hell, could be translated as this: people want optimism after a shitty year and decade and they are willing to forgo complete policy agreement and certain gaffes for an ethos that comforts them. Not revolutionary, but a bit pedestrian for my circles.
You see, I am supposed to HATE Andrew Yang. He is, after all, a capitalist whose pitch is a “new” form of capitalism. For example, his 2020 campaign website says the following:
We need to make the markets serve us rather than the other way around. Profit-seeking companies are organized to maximize their bottom line at every turn which will naturally lead to extreme policies and outcomes. We need government leaders who are truly laser-focused on the public interest above all else and will lead companies to act accordingly.
To 2020 presidential candidate Yang that looked like “1,000 bucks a month” for every American, from the houseless to the ultra-rich. And while I am aligned with movements that advocate for more sophisticated policy prescriptions, the “1,000 bucks a month” idea did speak to a few of my core political principles. It was politically simple and could thus galvanize a wide coalition; its universal nature (meaning all citizens are entitled to it) aligned well with other universal programs I have advocated for such as Medicare for All; and in 2021, after a year of stimulus checks and expanded unemployment benefits, it’s hard to deny the impact that government cash relief has in improving people’s lives.
Unfortunately, the progressive intelligentsia I am aligned with hates Yang and his pie-in-the-sky UBI ideas. They also hate him as a person. To them, he’s a tech bro, a craven capitalist, and his gleeful attitude is only a cover for his nefarious neoliberalism. But if I’m being totally honest, most of those critiques feel more rooted in a narrow dogmatism than reality. Take this tweeted video for example:
The video displays a somber Yang explaining to real-life asshole, Jimmy Dore, why raising the minimum wage would, in the short term, possibly hurt some small businesses and force them to cut shifts. He states that instead of raising the minimum wage, he would prefer to give everyone cash as a way of circumventing employers and giving direct financial power to workers. These workers could then utilize their newfound financial stability to leave their low wage job or take bigger risks by withholding labor to negotiate higher wages. I think Yang is creating a false dichotomy; we can have both higher wages and UBI. But Yang’s take on this is not insane nor stupid. And frankly, I’m tired of painting people with different but cogent ideas as shills, puppets and evildoers.
Look, even though Yang does not check many of my policy priorities, I appreciate his optimism, his affinity for deeming entrenched problems as solvable, and his openness to new ideas. Ever since I saw his first Breakfast Club interview, and throughout his tenure as a podcaster ( seriously, who doesn’t have a podcast now?), I have consistently seen him grapple with complexity and disagreement in numerous, long form settings. And I really appreciate that. Thankfully I do not have to look in the mirror and make the fateful decision to vote for Yang, but the possibility that I would signals a newfound openness within myself.
Friends, I am having a moment. Oh god, am I becoming moderate? No, I am simply laying down the mantle of dogma, of strict ideological group consensus, and allowing myself to consider that past “enemies” may have certain ideas and attributes that I find compelling and that I can identify with. Would I vote for Yang? I mean certain policy ideas he favors such as turning Governor’s Island into a casino, seem not only bizarre when other ideas for the island include renewable energy projects and homeless shelters, but also impractical. And there are definitely more progressive options in the New York City mayoral race such as Scott Stringer and Dianne Morales who I’d probably vote for in the end. But if Joseph R. Biden, the politician who arguably did the most to maintain a cruel austerity politics in the US over the past few decades, can be the president who gets certain big progressive priorities done (and I’m not giving a pass on the entire administration), then I think it’s time to admit that certain ideological labels such as progressive, moderate, centrist and leftist are less useful than many of us once assumed. And it may be time to take stated rhetoric as just one factor in considering what political actors we support, in addition to a real observation of how they interact with constituencies and lead their actual lives. And when I do this for Yang, I personally find that the caricature of him presented on twitter is patently unmoored.
Doing mental gymnastics to rationalize one’s narrow dogmatism tires you out, and I’m ready to be a bit more even-handed in my analysis; to recognize where disagreement is existential and where it is merely a difference of opinion; to be as committed to persuasion as I am to preaching. Not all who disagree with DSA on certain points of policy are neoliberal shills, and I’m ready to lower the temperature a bit. I am not talking about lowering the temperature because of some centrist fetish for civility, I am talking about lowering the proposed stakes of some political debate so we are better able to diagnose reality. I am tired of looking at the real world and distorting it through my warped lens, grafting binaries onto gradients and getting that rush of dopamine from my momentary sense of moral certitude. The world is not filled with good and bad people, progressives and their adversaries, but complex actors working within complex systems. I feel ready to let go a sense of ethical assuredness, and allow myself to be occasionally tickled by a glib tech-bro with a helpful, if not ideal, policy prescription.
“I am tired of looking at the real world and distorting it through my warped lens, grafting binaries onto gradients and getting that rush of dopamine from my momentary sense of moral certitude..” this part resonated w me so much!!!