In progressive politics, it’s impossible to remain
consistently optimistic. The always-unpopular cause of social justice is
invariably belittled, isolated and vilified by the corporate-sponsored mainstream,
a force that weighs heavy on the popular consciousness. Values like freedom,
equity and democracy can occasionally push the mainstream leftward, but with
power so concentrated, they can always be pushed back.

Humanity is a tough cause.

The unfortunate paradox of the radical sensibility is in the
righteousness of its struggle: Its efforts toward the creation of a better
world — based on the altruistic and empathetic impulse innate in human beings
— garner hostility more often than solidarity, and consequently, failure more
often than success. Much to its detriment, power is powerful.

Leftism is an ideology of opposition. Its ultimate value —
human welfare — doesn’t elicit a lot of honest concern from the ruling
ideology (the mainstream), so it can only find its niche in a difficult exile
from acceptable thought. It is always criticizing the unacceptable status quo,
which in turn unfairly brands it as an ideology of negativity and misguided
anger. In truth, it is expressing righteous contempt for unnecessary misery.

It is some consolation to know dissident movements are never
popular in their own time, and that past causes and figures of the left have
been redeemed by history. Martin Luther King Jr. was probably the most despised
man of his day, but at least part of his cause eventually achieved success and
acceptance from the majority population. Time can be a friend of progress —
but not always.

The ideological apparatus of the elite is perhaps its most
powerful weapon. For anyone who cares to take a careful look, progressive
causes are glaringly obvious, humanitarian and conservative (in the
nonpolitical sense). The right to material comfort and security and a private
sphere of freedom are only extreme or unseemly when distorted by the political establishment,
the media and other corporate surrogates.

Undocumented immigrants are among the most suffering members
of our society, and yet most Americans support frighteningly xenophobic
initiatives, including the revocation of driver’s licenses for noncitizens and
a militarization of the Mexican border. It would be easy (not to mention
depressing) to conclude that most people have an inherently malevolent fear and
dislike of the “other” if not for the fact that undocumented workers
are consistently scapegoated as criminals and economic liabilities by the
elite, thereby manufacturing the widespread hatred.

Similarly, most Americans did not support the invasion of
Iraq because they wanted to see a bloody war for oil profit, but because they
were lied to about the real reasons for the policy. Indeed, once Saddam’s
weapons of mass destruction were exposed as nothing more than an illusion
created by neoconservative magicians, Americans turned against the war.
Concomitantly, President Bush’s approval rating is now among the lowest in
American history.

Therein lies the reason for hope, even in the most
disagreeable of eras. Beneath the stupid prejudices and anxieties, beneath the
coarsening effects of competition and scarcity, humans are limitless in their
desire to see something better for not only themselves, but fellow members of
their species. Progressives are continually hammering away at the artificial
walls that separate the powerless majority, a task aided by the mystical
magnets that pull people together: human solidarity.

As long as injustice exists, as long as the existing system
stifles creative development and stunts the potential for cultural refinement,
progressivism will not only remain relevant; it will have the potential to
usher people into truly democratic action and create social change.

Nonetheless, the task is always difficult. In a celebrated
collection of essays, Ralph Ellison, reflecting on the long, terrible centuries
of black oppression, sees the music of the blues as perhaps the most poignant
expression of resistance. He writes, “The blues is an impulse to keep the
painful details and episodes of a brutal experience alive in one’s aching
consciousness, to finger its jagged grain, and to transcend it, not by the
consolation of philosophy but by squeezing from it a near-tragic, near-comic
lyricism.”

As Mr. Ellison contends, reflection on the oppressed
condition requires a tragicomic outlook, one that allows for both tears and
laughter, both of which are necessary for the nonrobotic activist. But beyond
that, there is always resistance. It can take diverse forms — from Mr.
Ellison’s writing to the single mother’s 10-hour workday to the tactics of
freedom fighters branded as terrorists — all of which share a heroic, if
wavering, effort to improve the standard of living within a system that has the
means to do so.

Obviously enough, hope is necessary. If progress is to stand
a chance, its proponents must remain energized and optimistic. Even in times
like our own, I think we have good reason to be.

Kyle Szarzynski ([email protected]) is
a junior majoring in history and Spanish.