The left is hemorrhaging a lot of people lately. It’s not just boring, white, middle-class people, either. It’s losing demographics the left has considered its own for decades but who are now seeing the light and moving on.
Consider the movement #WalkAway started by gay hair stylist Brandon Straka. In a powerful video that went viral, Straka states why he became a liberal – and why he walked away: “I staunchly reject racism of any kind. I reject the marginalization of any human being based off of their gender or sexual orientation. I reject tyrannical group think. I reject a system which allows an ambitious, misinformed and dogmatic mob to suppress free speech, create false narratives and apathetically steamroll over the truth. I reject the acceptance of junk science and superstition to advance ideological agendas. I reject hate. These are the reasons why I became a liberal … and these are the same reasons why I am now walking away.”
Straka continues: “For years now I’ve watched as the left devolved into intolerant, inflexible, illogical, hateful, misguided, ill-informed, un-American, hypocritical, menacing, callous, ignorant, narrow-minded – and at times, blatantly fascistic behavior and rhetoric. Liberalism has been co-opted and absorbed by the very characteristics it claims to fight against.”
Or consider the brave young African-American lady named Jay Stephens who wrote a scathing piece in Vice entitled “Four Years at a Liberal Arts College Turned Me into a Conservative.” Ms. Stephens attended college because she was “captivated by the idea of changing the world by immersing myself in a diverse pool of academic thought, theory, and action. Boy, was I wrong! After my four-year stint at university, I was transformed from a plucky, young, free-thinking free spirit into a cranky, old, get-off-my-lawn conservative. … I quickly learned that, at liberal arts school, the general aim of each class was to identify something problematic, discuss it and then refuse to do anything about it.”
A black man named Brandon Tatum notes how the Democratic Party hates black people. “For years and year and years,” he states, “people have told us that we should vote Democrat. That the Republicans are racist. That the Republicans don’t care about black people. That the Republicans are somehow anti-African-American agenda, African-American expansion, prosperity. It has all been a lie. It’s unfortunate because a lot of us believe it blindly.” He warns illegal immigrants: “They’re going to use you until you vote for them, then they’re going to throw you away.”
Tatum wrote on his YouTube caption, “It is time to walk away from the Democratic Party’s ideology. The democratic philosophy is filled with hate and fear mongering. They have no message. Actually, they never had a message. They only use the government to control people and to keep their people in power. All of the fake politicians use their position to make themselves rich and keep you weak and needing their philosophy. I tell you this, I will never accept their lies again. Period.”
Fellow WND columnist Brent Smith, at the Common Constitutionalist observes, “[A]s the left becomes more unhinged, some liberals are waking up to the lunacy. Some are reaching the Red Line of ‘you’ve gone too far,’ and refusing to cross.”
This includes gays. This includes blacks. This includes Hispanics. This includes women. This includes young voters. This includes, in short, everyone horrified by the violent, pugilistic, intolerant actions the left has promulgated in the last few years. As one commenter put it, “I can’t express a single different idea from my liberal friends. I will instantly become the enemy. I refuse that way of thinking, because it’s NOT thinking.”
A woman who grew up in Portland, Oregon, writes, “A few years ago I would [have] considered myself somewhere in between on the political spectrum. However after seeing the hatefulness the left has exhibited since Trump has been in office, I have been pushed further and further from being able to remotely relate to the left mentality. Conservatives have become increasingly tolerant, while the left has shown their true colors.”
A gay man notes, “[I]t was all the violence and hatred by the left during and after the presidential election that pushed me over the edge. I no longer wanted to be associated with this kind of behavior. … As a gay man we are told we must be Democrat and the same with black Americans and Hispanics. This is changing. Once you start to think for yourself it is easy to walk away. Admitting you are a Republican is the new ‘coming out!’ The reason Democrats are for open borders and illegal immigrants is because then those people feel obligated to vote for them. Hence it all boils down to political gain and greed.”
The left is trying desperately to pin every evil, every injustice, every phantom expression of racism and bigotry on Trump – and it’s backfiring in spades. The louder and more hysterical the left gets, the more people quietly take the blinders off their eyes, see the left for what it is, and leave.
Unable to accept the idea that people loath their hateful message, the left is denying anyone is leaving. FrontPage Magazine notes, “The paranoid leftists at hate site Salon.com claim #WalkAway is a Russian-operated misinformation campaign. Bob Cesca writes that #WalkAway ‘is a likely Kremlin operation’ that is fueled by ‘online trolls.’ It is a myth that ‘real-life Democrats [are] leaving the party in disgust[.]'” Huffington Post makes a similar claim. The Washington Post redefines the definition of “viral.”
Meanwhile, Brandon Straka is already experiencing a backlash for his views. All I can say is, watch your back, Mr. Straka.
So why does the message of Straka and other former-liberals resonate with me?
Because I used to be a liberal, too. Big time. I swallowed the Kool-Aid and believed everything they said. I was a dyed-in-the-wool feminist. I believed in abortion. I believed in social justice. I believed in male patriarchy and oppression. I was “intolerant of intolerance.” I walked away from those lies nearly 30 years ago and never looked back.
Good luck, Mr. Straka, and thank you for starting a movement. You may have started this walk alone, but I think your road will soon be crowded with fellow travelers.
