It's not "cool" to be a progressive, leftist or a democrat anymore. What happened?

     In any country, there is almost always a group of political parties, groups and organizations which stand for the "politics of the default" and another one which stand for the "politics of the exception". These two groups roughly correspond to what we often call "conservatism" and "progressivism", respectively, and it's without a surprise that older people tend to support the politics of the default more than the politics of the exception and vice-versa for young people.

    Without going into too much detail about how each manifest, as I've already done this in a previous article, these two positions could be summarized as follows:

    The politics of the default include: status-quo protection, conservatism, masculinity, majority groups (“straight white male”), capitalism, unity/cohesion and inclusion of others/constant recruiting in your platform.

    The politics of the exception include: change, progressivism, femininity, minority groups (“black trans woman”), socialism, division/infighting and exclusion of others from your platform/”purity testing”.

    It should be especially insisted that these two political "positionings" (the default vs. the exception) are not a way to split political groups and ideologies based on the actual policies they want to implement (like other "classic" axes like economic 'left' interventionism vs. economic 'right' laissez-faire, or the authoritarian-libertarian axis) but a way to split them based on the discourse they implement. It is a way to divide up the "vibe", "aesthetic" and "culture" around political organizations and ideologies, along with the "archetypal voter" and "archetypal politician" of each party, and their respective personalities and public personas. Thus, "the default" and "the exception" represent less what someone says and more how they say it.

    In the USA, the "default-exception axis" is strongly and positively correlated with the economic left-right axis, but it should be noted that this is not a rule in the rest of the world. The default party in the USA is the Republican party and the exception party is the Democratic party. The Democratic party, and leftism in general in America, not only formally but also informally in terms of its culture and its typical voters, employ division and infighting, change and a breaking free from what they call the status-quo. The Republican party, and conservatism in general in America, not only formally but also informally in terms of its culture and its typical voters, support unity, cohesion and tradition.

    There is, however, another second way in which we can split the discourse of politics: the parent-child axis. You could alternatively also call this the authority-rebel axis.

    The political discourse of the parent/authority include: (often hypocritical) moralizing, shaming, restrictions on freedom of speech regarding what is "offensive" or "blasphemous" and state regulations of everyday personal interactions. 

    The political discourse of the child/rebel include: rebelliousness, individualism, support of freedom of speech and being provocative and offensive.

    Therefore, just like we have 2 or 3 dimensional "political compasses" based on the actual policies that certain political groups may implement (ex: socially authoritarian with left economics, socially authoritarian with right economics, socially libertarian with left economics, socially libertarian with right economics), we could also imagine a political compass of discourse: on one axis, you put the default-exception spectrum. On the perpendicular axis, you put the parent-child axis. Now you get four quadrants: parent default, parent exception, child default, child exception.

    What are the correlations between those two axis in the US and more generally, worldwide? Well, until 10-15 years ago, in "Western society" (North America, Europe), the parent discourse was strongly correlated with the default discourse and the child discourse was strongly correlated with the exception discourse. Then something happened, I don't know what, that almost suddenly reversed this correlation, and nowadays we have a strong and positive correlation between default and child discourses and between exception and parent discourses. What happened? I can't pinpoint this to any specific political or historic event in the USA or outside. It happened way later than the fall of the Berlin wall, so it's not that. I don't know what it is.

    The USA is the prime example of this. 10-15 years ago, and before, the democratic party was the rebellious, childish party, and the republican party was the "mature" righteous authority that had to keep the democrats "in check" so they don't do something stupid. Again, I am referring less to actual politicians and policies and more the culture that revolved around the supporters of each of these parties. 

    The conservatives were doing cancel culture and political correctness at the time way before it was considered cool, and they weren't very fond of freedom of speech. Anything that challenged their religious, Christian agenda had to be censored because it was "blasphemous" and "indecent". Young artists like Marilyn Manson and Eminem were called to be censored by conservatives because they were a "bad influence" on children. Video games were called to be removed off shelves because they were thought to cause violence. Drugs and homosexuality were heavily shunned by society and conservatives were attempting to restrict those freedoms. Basically, all the leftists/democrats wanted to do was engage in "fun" stuff, and the conservatives were trying to ruin everything that was fun. The leftist-conservative interaction back in those days could be summed up as follows: leftists were like an rebellious child that screamed "Leave me alone!" from the rebellious conservative 'authority' that they were provoking, which replied with "NO! You're not allowed.".

    All of this has changed. Now it's the exact opposite. Conservative culture has become more tolerant of homosexuality and recreational drugs. It is not as obsessed with Christianity anymore, and when it is, it places less restrictions on individual freedoms or on freedom of speech. Instead, it is the democrats which have taken the place of the righteous authoritarian parent and the republicans which have taken the place of the rebellious child. Now the conservatives are screaming "Leave me alone!" and the leftists are screaming "NO! You're not allowed to do that.". Conservatives are refusing to wear a mask, to get vaccinated, to respect social distancing. They are refusing to be "politically correct", constantly misgendering trans people and saying "offensive" things to provoke people. And the leftists now tell them that what the rebellious child is saying is not "blasphemous" but "offensive", seeking strict restrictions on freedom of speech and the press.

    And the parent archetype often implies hypocritical virtue-signaling too. Before, this was the hypocrite fundamentalist Christian, virtue-signaling to God about how "moral" they are compared to these "degenerates", while secretly doing the same things they criticize. Now? Now that archetype is not relevant anymore, now you have the leftist social justice warrior virtue-signaling to minorities while doing nothing to actually help them and employing the bigotry of low expectations.

    And throughout the times, the archetype of the drug-using conspiracy theorist, with conspiracies against "the system" and "the government" remained associated with the child/rebel discourse. Only that before, he was a leftist hippie, and now he's a conservative or libertarian at most.

    In other words, it is not "cool" to be a democrat anymore. 10-20 years ago, you could be a leftist and really feel like you were a rebel against 'the system' and 'the establishment', who's trying to stop you from smoking weed, having homosexual sex, playing video games and listening to Eminem and you were a "cool" kid. And the conservative parents were struggling to keep you "in check". Now if you're a leftist, you became the very thing you swore to destroy: the moral authority policing other people's "offensive" speech and acts, "cancelling" everything that you don't agree with. We have gotten to a point where it is "cooler" to be a conservative, if your only goal in politics is to feel like you are a rebel against crushing authority: the system and the establishment is forcing you to wear a mask, to get vaccinated, to say this and that word, otherwise you get cancelled. And what is especially weird, is that this implies that younger people are more and more likely to employ the "moral and disciplined parent" discourse while older people are more and more likely to employ the "rebellious child" discourse.

    Or like the infamous repeated Youtube comments keep saying: Rage Against The Machine is not really "against the machine" anymore.