Talk:Far-left politics

United States section

This is regarding this edit

@Lukacris: Hello. Content on Wikipedia must be directly supported by sources, not indirectly according to an editor's research of those sources. Nowhere does this source from the British Green Party say anything about being far-left, nor does it confer that status to the United States Green Party. Using this source to imply this is original research. Likewise, this source from NPR does not say that Antifa is "violent anarchists", nor does it actually say they are part of the far-left. These might seem reasonable interpretations to some, but this isn't what the source is supporting, so this cannot be used for this claim. Likewise, this source from Foreign Policy says nothing directly about the far-left, nor Marxism. None of these changes were acceptable for these reasons. Please discuss your concerns here instead of restoring this content again. Thank you. Grayfell (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

@Grayfell: I take your criticism of the version I offered. Going forward, this section needs to be rewritten or removed altogether. First, the current text does not describe what the far-left in the U.S. is; it only describes the far-left from the perspective of an adherent (not to say such a perspective is not useful in proper context). The article capo defines far-left as being left of the political mainstream. This section should then describe the ideologies, movements, and organizations in the U.S. that are left of mainstream.

For instance, overt communism and neo-marxism are left of the political mainstream. Radical feminism (distinct from Marxist Feminism) is also left of mainstream. Radical environmentalism also exists left of mainstream politics-- whether the American Green Party is fairly labeled far-left is a good question that should hinge on whether they are not mainstream and, if not, whether they run left or right (with this rubric, the far-left label is probably apt). With respect to Antifa and the NPR article, I disagree with you because the article does support the fact that Antifa uses violence and that the movement is left of the political mainstream (I can see why the "anarchist" label is not supported though). For example, the article reads: "Antifa rarely talk to reporters and rarely give their names, at least not while wearing masks. But in online discussions they say the far-right activists are being disingenuous." This directly supports Antifa being far-left. The article also gives direct accounts of violent tactics used by the group. So that article gives ample support for the conclusion that Antifa is far-left and is violent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lukacris (talk • contribs) 18:42, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

This is all WP:OR, as I said. If sources do not say a group is far-left, Wikipedia should not include this. Believing that the far-right is disingenuous does not "directly" support that a group or movement is far-left. It is not up to you to decide where the mainstream lies, or what is left of it, right of it, above it, or below it. This spectrum is, by design, a simplification, and its an oversimplification, at that. Even with sources, this needs to be handled carefully, and not every passing mention in a Googled news article will be sufficient for broad claims about the entirety of the far-left. Grayfell (talk) 20:54, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Then remove it. The problem with this article is that there is no clear definition of far left and the article conflates a lot of unrelated groups. TFD (talk) 22:40, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

As an alternative to outright deletion, this could work as a starting-point:

• Since World War II, certain far-left groups have fallen under the ideological umbrella of anti-facism (usually shortened to “Antifa”). In the 1980s and 90s, these groups operated as clandestine watchdogs of emerging neo-Nazis. “Since the 1990s, many antifa activists have combined antifascism and general anti-racism/anti-prejudice sentiments.” . The New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness described Antifa as “a subset of the anarchist movement [who] focus on issues involving racism, sexism, and anti-Semitism, as well as other perceived injustices.”

Again, it's not clear to me that this page should even exist.(talk) 22:58, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Certain far-left groups have fallen under the ideological umbrella of anti-facism (usually shortened to “Antifa"). Where is the source? Certain groups are usually shortened? What does this even mean?

In the 1980s and 90s, these groups operated as clandestine watchdogs of emerging neo-Nazis inside the United States. Where is the source? This is pretty much the definition of WP:SYNTH and a clumsy shoehorn of the "antifa" buzzword. Blackguard 21:22, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

I agree that it's a mess, but these additions have some serious problems that need to be resolved for this to be a positive change.

Nowhere does the NJ homeland security post state that antifa is "far-left", making this yet more WP:SYNTH. We have an article on Antifa, where this source has already been discussed in some length.

The Wired article does not say they were clandestine, and only says that it "often leans way left" and "many" are anarchists. Yes, they may be far-left, but you still need to find a source which specifically spells this out instead of trying to find a source which supports a preconceived narrative. This Wired source is a intentionally simplified overview from a pop-culture focused outlet, and as I said above, these kinds of things need to be weighed cautiously before being used to insert contentious sweeping claims about the latest hot-topic in an article about something with decades of history.

Instead of finding sources that align with a conclusion, find sources that actually directly state the conclusion. Find a reliable source which says "antifa is a recent example of a far-right political movement in the United States" or similar. This is the simplest way to avoid OR and editorializing. Grayfell (talk) 00:10, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

References

Wikipedia is far left. Rational (conservative voices) are not welcome. 47.137.185.148 (talk) 14:48, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Re-visiting the Unites States

What we have for the USA now is a section called Criticism of the Far-left in the United States. It seems to me that to have such a section and not define what the "far-left" in American is about is silly. That is, to criticize something without saying what it is. So I am inclined to move that section to here (the Talk Page) pending some sort of referenced clarification. That is, after I hear your thoughts, of course. Carptrash (talk) 17:25, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

I've taken it out for now. I don't think a criticism section is the right way to approach it, and the one cite was to something that was just mentioned in passing in a larger paper that wasn't about the US. Possibly it could be included in a larger section (or in a section that compares the far left to the far right, which is what the paper is about in a larger sense), but I think a US section would probably lead with discussion of why the far left never took serious root in the US the way it did in Europe, which seems to be what most academic sources talk about. --Aquillion (talk) 05:27, 28 May 2018 (UTC)

Possible sources for expansion

This article is a mess; I think most people agree with that much. There's four issue templates on it, all of which still apply, and almost every discussion we've had acknowledges the problems. But it's a tricky subject to summarize, so I thought I'd do a quick search and throw together some possible sources for expansion. Note that I haven't read these in-depth, so I can't attest to their accuracy, neutrality, or even that they necessarily pass WP:RS, but they all looked usable at a glance. Note that several of these are by the same author (Luke March). Also, it seems like most of the academic attention on them is in Europe (where they have seen at least some political success), rather than in America. Finally, the term "radical left" seems to be used far more frequently than "far left". Also, there's a lot about South America, so we should probably have a section for that in the article. To the extent that these sources talk about the US at all, they generally focus on why the United States has no meaningful far-left to speak of. Anyway, cites:

References