The right used to mock identity politics: now it’s all it has

Splitting people along lines of identity is every bit as enticing for the right as it has ever been for the left

If there’s one thing right-wing politicians love, it’s to opine on the culture wars. It is as if conservatives all have little “break glass in case of emergency” topics to wheel out when reality gets a bit too close to home.

Housing crisis? Yes, but the trans issue! Energy shortages? Yes, but woke students. Drought? Won’t somebody think of the statues?!

For years, the right strove to “own the libs” when it came to culture war issues. “Debate me” was the battle cry – confident of being able to win using conservative arguments. But as time went on, that bravado slipped slowly away, as the approach failed to win converts.

Instead, it has been replaced by something the right of yesteryear would never have dreamt of embracing: talking up just how progressive, diverse, and tolerant their own side is, and how the left are hypocrites for not accepting minority conservative voices as purveyors of some divine truth.

You see it time and again: “I’m a conservative, but the left hates me because I’m black/gay/a woman/working class.” The people who espouse the lines are elevated by their own side not for what they say, but because they are a signal of their collective virtue – the same virtue signalling that was so recently a cue for round mockery in those same circles. That in itself is a sign that conservatives know they are losing cultural arguments, and can no longer fight them on their turf.

All the while, those who parrot the lines are oblivious to the truth: the left opposes anyone who is not on the left, regardless of colour or creed.

Take the example of the outrage sparked among British conservatives when a non-white Tory is criticised. Priti Patel, the home secretary, has been a regular victim of left-wing vitriol. When it happens, conservatives jump in and accuse them of hypocrisy, claiming they are “intimidated by strong, right-wing women of colour,” claiming that they should in some way be happy, grateful even, that such a woman is succeeding at all.

Not only is it patronising, it misses the point: they do hate Patel, but not for the colour of her skin or her gender; while her gender and skin equally does not exonerate her for her views. It is the left that does not give in to identity politics in their most base form.

What is common, though, is conservatives using identity in an effort to bait their opponents.

We see it in the recent Tory leadership election, with the boasts that the hate aimed at Tory candidates is based on their diversity not matching leftist ideals of women and minorities, indulging the identity politics they claim to hate. “The left can’t handle such a diverse roundup of candidates,” they say. “Where is Labour’s female leader?” they taunt.

If the right and its figureheads despised identity politics as much as they claim to, they would disregard these attacks. But the truth is, they love them, because splitting along lines of identity is every bit as enticing for the right as it has ever been for the left. The difference is, the left prioritises discrimination by ideas; the right use the whole thing as a PR exercise: “we are the virtuous, they are the hypocrites.”

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The identity politics war in general is a distraction that only appeals to politicos – for most people it pales in comparison to inflation, surging bills, housing, energy, crime, healthcare, and the many other things the Tories have ostensibly had control over this past decade, and failed to address.

If the right wants to fix this country, they should be the ones to shelve the identity politics debate. But politics is a game to them, and it’s all about winning.

They couldn’t “own the libs” by debating them, so now they try to do it by aping them. All the while, the country cries out for a political movement that keeps the lights on and the water flowing; identity politics doesn’t matter when basic services break down for everyone.