For most of my life, I’ve been a radical pacifist. I believed that violence was literally the very last of last resorts… that violence should only ever be committed by you if, and only if, you are directly being attacked and are directly fighting for your life… and even then, you should commit the barest minimum amount of violence possible, working only to save yourself rather than hurt them.
But then we reached 2012, and Trayvon Martin was murdered by a man who was all but given a ticker tape parade for it, and was acquitted in 2013, sparking #BlackLivesMatter.
And then 2014 rolled around, and Michael Brown and Eric Garner were murdered by the police and there were no consequences.
And then there was 2015, and Baltimore, and I wrote the post White Supremacy and Violence (that’s the original link, not the most recent one with edits, which you can find here). That really should have been my first clue that my pacifism was being challenged, but it wasn’t.
The challenge wouldn’t play out publicly, or even consciously, until much more recently. No, not Richard Spencer getting punched in the face. It was when a preacher got wacked upside the head with an aluminum baseball bat. I found it impossible to feel bad for said preacher, and even wrote it about here on this blog. The reality is that I felt some level of schadenfreude for it, and didn’t, and still don’t, feel bad for that. I could only laugh at the preacher, having felt, and actually still feel, that, while he may not necessarily have deserved an aluminum bat to the head, he absolutely deserved something more than a tongue-lashing.
I went back to being quiet about it, not really thinking about the fact that, after that post, I couldn’t really justify calling myself a pacifist.
And then something I genuinely didn’t want to believe could happen actually happened. After two years of frankly annoying campaigning, Republican lies, Russian hacks exposing a red herring in the form of useless, bullshit emails, an old white man who riled up White Progressives because not even liberals could stomach the idea of a woman as president, and an outdated Electoral College system, Hillary Clinton, who really should be our president right now, lost to an orange fascist who very likely has ties to Russia and Vladimir Putin…
(I’m just going to say this here: I don’t fucking care how corrupt Hillary Clinton is. I just fucking don’t.
EVERY FUCKING POLITICIAN IS FUCKING CORRUPT! THAT’S THE BAREST FUCKING MINIMUM REQUIREMENT TO BE A FUCKING POLITICIAN WORLD FUCKING WIDE! IT IS FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE TO BE A FUCKING POLITICIAN WHO ISN’T FUCKING CORRUPT!
If anyone else had been Clinton’s opponent in the election, then I’d care about those fucking emails and how corrupt she is. But her opponent was fucking Cheeto Fascist. And some fucking assholes were so goddamned pressed about some pathetic fucking emails that they preferred fucking Dorito Leader over someone who, at the very fucking least, would not be trying to become a fucking dictator.
Hillary Clinton would be a better president than Agent Orange.
Period.
End of fucking subject.)
And I was pissed. Like… violently livid.
And I still am. (I mean… obviously… look at that rant above…)
And then… then Richard Spencer got punched in the face. This is when, I think, I realized that I’m no longer a pacifist… that I no longer abhor violence.
It crystallized for me in an email conversation I was a part of, where I said this:
I think I’m so used to being a dedicated pacifist that realizing that I’m turning my back on that scares me. To be fair, I’ve been turning my back on that for a while, now. I think my first sign was when I wrote that post “White Supremacy and Violence” back during the Baltimore protests. It was the first time I ever wrote something that defended rioting and property damage, and the first time I ever thought about the fact that property damage and violence are two different things. I also started noticing that my favorite podcasts (Radio Dispatch, TWiBPrime, TBGWT, The Read, Citizen Radio, etc) were more and more defending the same things.
Now…
Now I honestly don’t see what else is left. Pacifism really does seem to have failed… miserably.
Because it’s so easy to ignore…
And then, a few days ago, I read the news that a Grand Wizard of the KKK was found dead in Missouri. I listened to The Black Guy Who Tips, where Rod read the headline and then played “Celebration” while Karen laughed. I listened to Citizen Radio, where Allison and Jamie made an entire hilarious bit out of it. I find myself hoping that Crissle and Kid Fury of The Read will have some hilariousness to say about it.
And then I read who the suspects were, and the only thought I had… indeed, the only thought I can have… is “well… heroes often come from unexpected places”.
And… like… I should feel bad about this! I should be chastising myself for even daring to think this!
A human life was taken! This man was murdered! Sure, he was an evil leader of an evil organization that has a history of murder and terrorism… but when they go low, aren’t we supposed to go high? And besides… I’m against the Death Penalty! It’s wrong, and we as a country shouldn’t be practicing it! Revenge isn’t justice!
But that’s just it…
What justice?
See… the problem I’m having is that… well… to me, peace has utterly and completely failed. While we’ve been “going high”, fascists have been slowly turning the United States into a right-wing Christo-fascist state. While we’ve been “going high”, the KKK and neo-Nazis have been enjoying a popular resurgence. While we’ve been “going high”, people of color have been murdered by the state, and there’ve been essentially zero consequences.
What has peace ever gotten us but more White Supremacy, more Patriarchy, more pain, more death, more suffering…? What has it ever won?
People will, rightly, point out Martin Luther King, Jr and what he won with Civil Rights.
But he didn’t win it.
First, any of the successes garnered by the Civil Rights movement can at least be equally credited to Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, and many other more violent movements working alongside King and his radical pacifism.
Second, if King was alive today, he’d see quite clearly that not only have we not fulfilled his dream, we’ve actively shat on it and then forgotten about it. His dream has become nothing more than a meaningless platitude, parroted by white people who want to feel good about believing something good while literally doing nothing but maintaining a status quo that’s been in place since the US’s founding.
So… really… King didn’t win much at all.
To be honest, this does scare me. I don’t want to lose my devotion to pacifism. I don’t want to be violent. I don’t want any of this.
But I’m genuinely lost as to what else is left. A large part of me is actually afraid that the Electoral College just handed us the last president the United States will ever have.
Because peace is so easy to ignore. People take peace for granted. We can ignore peaceful protests. We can pretend they aren’t happening. When everything is peaceful, us privileged people are comfortable. We don’t have to worry about literally anything other than our own personal problems. We don’t have to worry about the state of our world. We can sit here, living our lives, ignorant of the shit happening around us.
But then pharmacies burn down. Coffee shops get their windows smashed. Cop cars go up in flames. Misogynistic preachers get whacked over the head with aluminum baseball bats. Nazis get punched in the face. Grand wizards of the KKK turn up dead.
And we are FORCED to pay attention.
It’s funny, isn’t it? Peace can be taken for granted. Violence, however, demands attention.
Maybe that’s why violence works where peace fails?
What has peace done for us but get Agent Orange elected to the White House? What has peace done for us but embolden racists, misogynists, anti-Jewish bigots, transphobes, homophobes, Islamophobes, classists, and ableists? What has peace done for us but embolden fascists?
What has peace done for us but maintain the status quo?
Is peace even possible at this point?
I’d like to hope so, but I’m feeling less and less hopeful every day… and Antifa is looking more and more appealing, too…
You know, there is one thing… one hope… one ray of light… that could turn me around:
In 2018, we’ll hold the midterm elections. And I’d like to believe that so many people are appalled at current events that we’ll elect a Congress more progressive than any ever seen in the United States.
But then I remember that the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act. I remember that Republicans are working damn hard to ensure that only conservative white people are able to vote. I remember that while Agent Orange lost the popular vote, he still got a holy hell of a lot of votes. I remember that, really, the United States is conservative.
And that ray of light looks more and more like a lying little mirage… a tease, but not a reality…
This is my uncomfortable confession. These are the thoughts I’m having now. And I know, objectively, that I’m wrong. That there has to be a path that can be taken peacefully. That pacifism is still the way.
But I can’t feel that. I can’t believe that. I’ve lost all hope in pacifism. I’ve lost all hope in peace. I genuinely can’t see what good peace has brought us. Hopefully, as the days move on, I’ll leave this space I’m in now, look back on this post, and be embarrassed. I can’t express in words how badly I want to proven wrong. I can’t express in words how badly I want to be a pacifist.
But, at least right now, I…
I just can’t…
I think there are shades of pacifism.
Violent aggression is wrong.
Violent defense… against what? Against just dickish behavior would be wrong. Against offenses where you could trust the justice system to do what it says on the tin is probably wrong.
But where we are now… defending against someone else’s violent aggression, often ORGANIZED violent aggression, when the police and the courts are not merely unlikely to do justice but very well might side with the aggressors, or BE the aggressors? What choice is there?
I think the framing is wrong. In this situation, pacifism is already gone. The choice is not violence or peace, it’s violence or *surrender*. I’m no more a fan of this than you, but sometimes… sometimes we have to make sacrifices for the greater good… sometimes that sacrifice is becoming a lesser person by the lights of our moral ideals, in order to make the world safer for others. It is a dirty sacrifice, but still noble.
Should read “not even liberals could stomach the idea of that woman as president”. Against anyone else, would Clinton have won? Probably. But against anyone else, Trump would have lost.
Did I dream that bit about a black President?
Your anger is understandable. I can’t offer many ideas, as I’m privileged not to be living in the US. Progress is slow and stuttering and takes the occasional backward step. The UK took one last year, and that emboldened our homegrown racists as well. And we don’t have any mid-term ray of light to look forward to on that one. Here, as there, the opposition to what we call the Right is a “left” that is in disarray, apparently more concerned with arguing among themselves than organising and regaining power and representing the people whose betrayal and feeling of powerlessness and abandonment led to the rise of the current regimes as they sought some way, any way, to give the Establishment a bloody nose. Both lefts seem to prefer scolding those who didn’t vote for them rather than trying to persuade them.
But ultimately, pragmatically… pacifism simply can’t work if you stick to it dogmatically. You have to make exceptions. Where you draw those lines defines your character, but if you draw the line at any violence at all, you’re just a victim. Don’t beat yourself up. You don’t deserve it.
sonofrojblake, #2
No, shit for brains.
The people who voted for Trump, the people who voted independent, and the people who chose not to vote are not non-sentient, blameless forces of nature like tornadoes. They are to blame for Trump winning. They made a decision. And the decision they made was either “Trump is better than Clinton” or “Trump couldn’t be any worse than Clinton”, both of which are wrong. They are responsible for getting such an easy question so horribly wrong. You and a handful of other ignorant fucking dumbasses on FtB are still at this point acting like there would be little to no difference between the two candidates. Trump won because too many American voters love white supremacy and hated having a Kenyan Muslim president. Clinton or Trump for POTUS is a very, very easy choice. You acting like it isn’t shows you to be completely ignorant or delusional.
I’m not sure that we should be framing this as “peaceful means have failed, therefore violent ones are the solution”. Violent means may well have failed far harder in the same situation, and there are many more kinds of peaceable approaches to take than what has already been tried.
I’m wondering just what achievements and successes violent opposition is supposed to secure in the US at the moment? Would gathering into mobs and beating up Trump supporters intimidate them into not attacking minorities? Or would it just make them bitter and vengeful and more likely to commit acts of violence? Would fighting back against the militarised police forces convince them that they need a radical re-think of their policing strategies? Or would it entrench the problem further? Would gangs of vigilante leftists do anything to persuade the people who voted for Trump that his bluster is nonsense and his regime is malignant? I don’t think so.
In fact, looking back on historical examples, the escalation of political violence on both sides of a conflict tends to end very badly for many years. Once the senatorial traditionalists in Rome started getting Tribunes of the Plebs like the Gracchi beaten to death by mobs, the stage was set for a decline into decades of bitter civil wars. The escalation of vendetta and political murder in Renaissance Florence made the Medici into tyrants and caused no end of instability and death. The French Revolution gave Paris decades of mob violence in addition to the executions of the Terror.
There is no reason to think that violent protest is likely to do anything here other than make the tensions worse. Sure, it will get people’s attention, but it won’t convince them to accept the messages it highlights. People don’t come round to other people’s way of thinking just because those other people are willing to do acts of violence to promote their beliefs. When people are threatened they tend to double down and protect what they already have.
So what will work? Ah, now that’s the question. It is entirely possible that nothing will work -- that this is just how circumstance has arranged the situation. It is entirely possible that the American electorate is too complacent in its acceptance of Trumpism, can’t be dislodged from that apathy, only made more ossified in it, and we’ll have to wait until their standard of living gets much worse before people finally change their minds. I don’t think that’s true, but it’s just as likely to be true as a situation where political violence is going to help any.
abbeycadabra @ #1:
I can agree with all that, I think. But where would the preacher, Richard Spencer, and the KKK grand wizard fall into that? Or would they?
You’re right. Your framing is better, and much clearer.
sonofrojblake @ #2:
Before I respond to you, I want say this:
I am not belittling or dismissing the experiences you’re having across the Atlantic. Shit is utterly fucked up all across the world. This rise in fascism is not just happening in the US, but literally everywhere. Nowhere is safe.
However… I can’t help but feel that you really don’t have an understanding of just how it’s manifesting in the United States, because you continue to suggest that Trump and Clinton are just two sides of the same coin, when that not only is not the case, it’s a patently absurd framing…
This is 100% wrong, not least because Agent Orange did lose. He lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million votes. It’s not the first time the electoral college has elected a president who lost the popular vote, but it is the first time an electoral college pick has lost the popular vote by such a wide margin. Clinton was the clear winner.
This is probably going to come across snarkily, but I genuinely don’t mean to be…
I really think you should read up on the electoral college in the United States, and then specifically read it’s role in the 2016 election, and why many people (myself included) think it needs to go.
No, you didn’t. But you seem to have missed the increase in racism in the States during his presidency, the racism he and his family faced (including from our congress), the fact that straight white people here largely didn’t vote for him (he literally won both elections on the strength of minorities), and the fact that, since he was president, our Supreme Court gutted the voting rights act and Republicans are doing everything they can to make it impossible for the people who voted for President Obama to ever vote again.
President Obama, sadly, was a fluke. A wonderful fluke, but a fluke nonetheless.
True, but you have to understand the nature of the problem with the left…
Look at Bill Maher, for example. I’m sorry, but Bill Maher is a misogynistic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, Islamophobic asshole who is lauded purely because he’s a “liberal” with a platform. The Bill Maher part of the left believes that intersectionality is a “pointless, unimportant” issue. He thinks misgendering isn’t that big of a deal. He thinks the pay gap and even abortion just aren’t that important. He, and liberals like him, have utterly dismissed Black Lives Matter, again calling the issue of black people being murdered in the streets a “distraction”. In short, he, and liberals like him (and there are a holy hell of a lot of them) think there’s only one issue: class. Everything else is a “distraction”… (wait… except for issues affecting atheists… those are important, as well; but that’s it…)
On the other hand is those of us who think the left is an utter failure if it is not intersectional. We believe the left cannot ever succeed if we don’t address the issues faced by women, people of color, the LGBTQ communities, minority religions (including Islam and Judaism in the US), and so on.
Perhaps there are those who think we can put aside our differences for “the greater good”, but the fact of the matter is that if “the greater good” is not intersectional, than it’s bullshit. And as long as lefties like Bill Maher exist, there will never be a coherent left. Maybe I sound like a fanatic saying this, but…
My liberalism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit. We are an utter failure if we are not intersectional.
I agree with you here. And thanks.
Saad @ #3:
Don’t forget the electoral college. Trump did lose the popular vote. So, arguably, the electoral college holds a lot of blame, as well. Though I don’t disagree with you otherwise at all…
Exactly. I remember seeing so-called “progressives” saying that, if Sanders *spit* didn’t win, they would actually vote for Trump. I genuinely don’t understand how or why so-called “progressives” could ever think that. You’re not progressive if you voted for Trump… you’re a right-wing fascist.
cartomancer @ #4:
I would love to know what, because I’m genuinely not seeing it…
For me, it’s not about that. For me, at this point, it’s self-defense. The only result would be self-defense. I don’t actually expect violence to have a positive outcome.
I genuinely don’t expect a positive outcome at all, no matter what happens. When I said I’ve lost hope, I meant it.
Very true. You are right about that. And that is why I don’t feel good about this. That is why it’s such a dark place to be mentally.
The problem is that tensions are bad enough that there is no getting better… there’s only breaking. I’m afraid of that, yes, but I also fully expect it and already know which side I’m on if (or, really, when) it happens.
I do think that’s true. That is, sadly, exactly what I think.
Sure… I could very well just be in too dark of a place right now to see the reality, but just look at what I’ve been highlighting on this blog since Trump’s election (much of which have had no comments, and I’m honestly not even sure are being read). Is it any wonder that so many, myself included, are in such a place?
@Saad, 3:
Neither are the candidates or the parties who nominated them. The US public was presented with a choice between the worst, most unpopular candidate of all time, and the second worst, most unpopular candidate of all time. You can’t blame the mass of the electorate for that.
False. Sorry, “alternative fact”.
Clinton or Trump for POTUS is a very, very easy choice for you. You acting like it is identically simple for every single other voter in the US shows you to be completely ignorant or delusional. FIFY.
@Nathan: I honestly don’t see where either you or Saad are getting the idea I consider Clinton and Trump in any way comparable. Pretty much their only point of commonality that I can see is how viscerally they are both hated by really a LOT of people… but obviously for different reasons.
But please: can we draw a line under the bleating about the electoral college? You sound like you just played a football game where you had possession of the ball for 85 of the 90 minutes, and are bleating that you lost because in the five minutes the opposition had the ball they scored five goals, while you passed the ball back and forth between your defence for 85 minutes and never got into the opposing half. Trump WON. Clinton LOST. They both entered the race knowing the rules. Worse, Clinton had previously been in a position to CHANGE those rules… and didn’t. She obviously felt they suited her. They operated their campaigns accordingly. If you think they’d have campaigned in exactly the same way if the result had hinged on the popular vote, then you’re just kidding yourself. Everyone knew the rules, and Trump was the clear winner. This is one thing you really do need to just get over. And you didn’t sound snarky, just a little patronising, and I don’t need to read up on the electoral college, thanks. I did that 16 years ago. I probably know more about it than 90% of Americans, for all the good it does me (or them).
That’s a nice, pacifistic sentiment. Here’s my take on it:
My liberalism will be in power or it will be bullshit. We are an utter failure if we are not in power.
The first responsibility of any progressive politician is get elected. Fuck principles, fuck intersectionality, fuck snowflakes and PC and SJW and all of that -- first, get into power, otherwise you might just as well be writing snarky comments on a blog or moaning to your hipster friend over some hummus at your local vegan restaurant. All of that good stuff comes later, after you get into office.
Tony Blair understood this. It’s unfortunate that his footnote in history will be “Iraq War”, because he rescued the left in the UK from two decades of moribund irrelevance and made them electable, and once there delivered peace in Northern Ireland, the minimum wage, devolution, the repeal of Clause 28, civil partnerships for gay couples, and a host of other stuff. He couldn’t have done any of that stuff if he’d followed the model Corbyn is currently, bafflingly doing.
And there’s your problem. Nobody ever changed their mind because they were shouted at and insulted until they realised how wrong they were. A minority voted for Trump. Not all of them are right-wing fascists. Sure, some are, and you’re wasting your time trying to reach those people. But enough people who aren’t voted for him too, and shouting at them isn’t going to get them on your side. Offering them the Establishment candidate because it’s her turn obviously isn’t either. And despite being called “shit for brains” (stay classy, Saad), I stick by my contention that if the Dems had picked Sanders, he’d be President right now.
I do understand enough about the US to get that changing the minds of even one Trump voter might be beyond the capabilities of the so-called left, and that their only hope for winning is to mobilise more of the people who are of the left but didn’t bother to vote (perhaps because the year and a half of constant ridicule they heaped on Trump convinced their more apathetic voters that the dolt had no chance of winning so they didn’t need to bother -- well done, ridiculers). But here’s what I don’t know: what is the so-called left in the US actually doing, right now? Where is the next Sanders? Trump has already started saving for his 2020 campaign -- who have the Dems got lined up? The time for action is now, and “action” does NOT mean “walking down the street with a banner with a witty riposte on it”.
Seriously -- what are the left doing now? It’s hard to tell if they’re doing anything, what with the news cycle being intentionally dominated by the word “chaos”.
I wouldn’t call myself hopeless but I do see your point and agree with it despite not really having much use for the Democrats and in many ways seeing them and their associates as enforcers for the views that you’re now somewhat rejecting.
Congratulations, you’re a Republican. Think like this, and once you’re in power that is all you will care about. You will gerrymander, you will take bribes, you will suppress voters, because nothing else matters than being in power.
You would be a living demonstration of the phrase “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
Your liberalism will be principled, or it will be… is… bullshit.
I didn’t address that because it’s so sticky, and what I believe in this case I think is right, but I can’t easily back it up with solid data.
To me, these men all were participating in acts of violence. Suborning genocide is not dickish behavior, it’s the thin edge of a wedge of death, and they deserved what they got as acts of defense.
@abbeycadabra, 8: You are being wilfully ignorant. I gave you a relevant, recent, Western democracy example, and you either didn’t understand it, or deliberately chose to ignore it because it doesn’t fit your narrative. Which is it?
There’s a third possibility -- that the Labour government elected in the UK by a landslide in 1997 won the next two general elections in 2001 and 2005 because they took the opportunity to “gerrymander, […] take bribes, [and] suppress voters”. It’s odd that nobody in the UK noticed any of that, at the time or since. To us ignorant peasants, it seemed that the Labour government was mainly in the business of doing good things (some of which I listed in post 6), but were brought down by:
-- the disastrous foreign policy of the dimwit US President which our PM unwisely followed along with
-- the disastrous financial policies of the dimwit US President which crashed the global economy for which our dullard electorate blamed our Chancellor of the Exchequer
-- the overweening ambition of said Chancellor when he became PM and wouldn’t acknowledge his own personal unpopularity and step aside for a more popular candidate who could have formed a coalition in 2010.
They prioritised the acquisition of power in 1995, and it worked. And this country became a much better place to live as a result.
But please, tell me more about how their power corrupted them and Britain in 2010 was so much worse than Britain in 1997.
10:
1) You’re being a dick. This is nothing new, and nothing unexpected.
2) You’re describing the party that, at the moment, has 100% thrown their lot in with UKIP and the Tories on every racist and Brexit (but I repeat myself) issue. They are currently working to keep their power, by going along with fearmongering and hatred and, frankly, being a shining example of why I’m right.
1. I’m being a dick? Leaving aside gendered insults, let’s move on to point 2.
2. My point, clearly stated, twice, was about the Labour Party in power in the UK between 1997 and 2010, an example which clearly contradicts your contention.
Your response is to bring up the Labour party in opposition right now. You say “They are currently working to keep their power”, wilfully ignoring the fact that they have no power, which is the entire point. They’re the opposition, and they’re going to stay there because with the current dolt in charge they’re unelectable.
The Labour Party in 1997 was a well-oiled vote-winning machine at the head of which was a popular man who understood the importance of unity and leadership. He had many faults, but he can be credited with getting a progressive party into power and keeping it there for a decade in which he was able to enact a slew of progressive policies (and follow the US into an illegal war, but hey, nobody’s perfect). It’s really hard to convey how euphoric the atmosphere was in the summer of 1997, when in the words of the song it really did feel like things could only get better after 18 long years of Tory government.
The Labour Party in 2017 is a shambles. They’re “led” by a pro-Brexit extremist who was, in the leadership contest of 2015, basically a joke candidate. He compromised his principles by following official Labour policy and backing Remain, but did so in such a weak manner it was obvious he was lying. The majority of his own MPs have zero confidence in him and the electorate at large clearly agree. The Tories are ecstatic that he’s still leader because they know with him in charge they basically have no opposition. In the vote on Article 50 he called a three line whip in favour, and several of his own whips voted against. Any person in his position with an ounce of honour or self-awareness would resign in shame if that happened, but he’s living the same delusion of competence as Trump, only without the chance of similar electoral success.
If you would like to engage my point, which -- for the third time now -- was about the Labour Party under Blair and Brown, 1997-2001, and how they did none of what you say they’d do, then let’s hear it.
Actually, on reflection, it’s worse than that. Your contention, summed up in your own words, was that corruption is inevitable because once you’re in power…:
And yet, among the first things the Labour government did on gaining power in 1997 were:
-- give the Bank of England monetary policy committee the power to set interest rates, independent of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, removing elected politicians from the process
-- devolve power to elected parliaments in Scotland, Wales and, later, Northern Ireland
Both of these things were massive handovers of power AWAY from the Labour government, and both were really positive good ideas.
Then, at the opposite end of their administration, when Gordon Brown led the party to a hung parliament in 2010, the Lib Dems offered coalition power-sharing to Labour first, on the sole condition that the massively unpopular Brown stepped down and there be another Labour leader instead. Brown refused, the Lib Dems went to talk to the Tories instead, and the rest is history. Labour gave power away, again, when it was right there in their grasp. Brown didn’t refuse to step down because he was corrupt and he didn’t fail to win the election outright because of voter suppression. He wasn’t the media darling Blair had been, and with his “bigoted woman” comment demonstrated that he hadn’t learned the lessons of the BNP’s success and was massively out of touch with the electorate’s legitimate concerns on immigration. His refusal to fall on his sword at that point led us to five years of coalition, a Tory majority, the rise of UKIP, Brexit, and the condemning of the left in this country to irrelevance for a generation. If I sound angry, I am, and it’s not with you.