Why create a new progressive faction?

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Danton Sideways
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Why create a new progressive faction?

Post by Danton Sideways »

I would like to take a moment to explain some of the reasons that have motivated me try to create a new faction of politically progressive members of CDS.

Some of the more personal factors should be clear from a recent post on my blog, in which I tell about my experience of CDS politics over the past few months, and which can be found at this link: http://dantonsideways.blogspot.com/2008 ... -away.html

I would like to thank Desmond Shang for the thoughtful (as usual) comment he added to that post.

It seems to me that democracy leads inevitably to discussions of politics. In a conversation that I had with ThePrincess some while ago, I told her that I consider myself to be a leftist, and she asked what that could possibly mean in Second Life. Having thought about it, I now know what answer to give: I think that politics in Second Life means the same as it does in real life, which is debate about social issues.

That brings me to my principal motivation for wanting to create a new political party within CDS. I believe that the absence of political debate is itself a political stance. When I hear statements like "we are all here just to have fun," or long debates about when and how to build new sims or improve our commerce, with no reference whatsoever to real life politics, I have the impression that political debate is being stifled. The idea that we are all here only for own well-being is in fact a profoundly conservative point of view.

My esteemed fellow citizens in CSDF evidently have the same general political orientation that I have, but for a variety of reasons they prefer to focus, like the other parties, on debates about building new sims or improving commerce. These questions are obviously important for everyone, but I want to be able to discuss real life politics as well, and to make the inevitable connections between real life and our in-world debates. I get the impression that certain members of CSDF feel that to do so would be divisive and harmful to the over-riding goal of "building a community." But what is the good of a "community," and a democratically-run one at that, if we cannot freely discuss the issues that we feel to be the most important?

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Danton Sideways
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Re: Why create a new progressive faction?

Post by Danton Sideways »

Hi everybody. I've been absent from the forum for months. To keep up with events in CDS, I follow the RA meetings, either by attending when I can, or by reading the meeting transcripts. But keeping up with the forum seems to be beyond my day-to-day capabilities.

My project to create a new leftist faction in CDS has fizzled out. I wanted to create a radical left wing, that would leave CSDF in the position of moderate center-left party. My model was the French Greens Party, to which I belong in real life, and which is clearly to the left of the mainstream French Socialist Party. Since there is little existing far-left consituency in CDS, I planned to recruits newcomers from other progressive groups in Second Life, such as Commonwealth Island, Better World Island, Second Life Left Unity (SLLU), Leftist Beatnik Revolutionaries, Cafe Wellstone and so on. But I failed to recruit even one single new member, let alone the 8 or so that are now required for a party to present candidates in the elections. The full story is given here:

http://dantonsideways.blogspot.com/2008 ... pdate.html

So I''ve put aside the project of creating a new party, and have humbly gone back to being just another member of CSDF. And I'd like to encourage everybody, whatever party you belong to, to vote in the upcoming elections. Remember that the polls open on July 12th.

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