Who Benefits From America’s Political Bundles?

Identity politics blunts people’s ability to think independently about the myriad issues facing them, leading to contradictory and self-harming viewpoints.

Tsahi Shemesh | August 24, 2026

I teach self-defense, so I spend a lot of time watching how confusion affects people. If you misread the situation, every decision that follows gets worse.

America has the same problem.

Gender, sexuality, race, economics, climate, policing, colonialism, immigration, and Israel now get bundled into the same political package. People are told which opinions belong together, then judged by whether they accept the package.

I don’t care how another adult chooses to live. Gay and transgender people deserve the same rights and safety as everyone else. Being gay describes sexual orientation. Being transgender concerns gender identity. Those are different things.

A gay man doesn’t automatically have a position on medical treatment for minors, women’s sports, pronouns, or school curriculum. Parents have every right to object when schools present contested beliefs about sex and gender to children as settled truth.

Economics has become equally confused. Capitalism now means greed to some people. Socialism means compassion. Those are slogans.

Israel offers a useful reality check. The kibbutz had nearly ideal conditions for communal economics: small communities, voluntary participation, strong social bonds, and shared purpose. Even there, most kibbutzim eventually introduced private income, different salaries, outside employment, and market........

© American Thinker