Americans don't understand class. American socialists especially
Every week i hear: "How can Trump be considered anti-elite? He's a billionaire!?"
This fundamentally misunderstands class. its not how much you have, its how you make it.
And Trump definitely ain't elite
2/
Classic Marxist economics divides class via the individual's means of securing resources.
The proletariat trade their labour to employers for wages.
The bourgeoise use their ownership of the means of production to extract surplus value from the proletarian laborer
etc.
3/
Sure this usually resulted in the bourgeoise being wealthier than the proles.. but not always. Some decayed bourgeoise barely made more than proles, while many successful skilled proles earned as much as lower tier bourgeoise.
These were dubbed the labour aristocracy
4/ there was an intensive debate amongst socialists in Russia as to freed serfs, many of whom owned their own land (and owed a mortgage to their former masters), and whether or not these former serfs should be considered Proles or Bourgeoise.
Thus the peasant/kulak distinction.
5/
The important thing to understand about the American Class system and the rise of "The Elite" as opposed to "the Bourgeoise" or "the Aristocracy"
Is the rise of prestige generating institutions and their integration with governments.
6/
Universities, thinktanks, government departments, prestige media, NGOs, and non-revenue generating segments of fortune 500s have exploded in the past 50 years
All targeted at controlling political and regulatory outcomes via manipulation of institutional and social prestige
7/
A typical career for the modern elite is to do a masters or PhD at an elite university, a post doc or internship at a thinktank, a few years at a media firm, get hired at a government department.
then bounce back and forth between government and the companies they regulate
8/
At every stage in their career their wealth is generated either by their attachment to institutions the government funds, or by their perceived ability to manipulate regulatory outcomes...
Trump by contrast is a classic American huckster who attracts hostile regulators
9/
Trump's career could not be more different than the modern American elite.
He generates his wealth through a blend of family business ties, real "free" market activity, and his extreme bravado infused brand.
He's a man who sells board games of himself
10/
His entire brand is a crass rejection of the prestige elite. every effort they've put into seeming thoughtful, measured, or respectable he rejects
Trump is the Grifter's grifter... the Petite bourgeoise's ideals made flesh.
There's a reason rappers reference him so often
11/
Even his book "Art of the Deal" is infused with an ethos of getting away with something, of going into a negotiation and winning.
Any of these "thoughtful" "measured" "girl-bosses" would have written "The Dream of Compromise"
12/
But the economics of class are the real division.
The American elite almost never ventures outside of government funded institutions except to collect tribute from the corporations they regulate.
13/
Trump by contrast is an old-school capitalist.
Sure a capitalist in the corrupt field of New York real estate... but a more or less productive person who had to make bribes to government officials... not a leech who sat back a collected bribes
14/
notably Trump is the only presidents in the past 40 years who will not be offered a teaching position at a university, nor be invited to the board of think tanks or fortune 500s.
Unlike Obama he will not receive Wall Street speaking fees into the hundreds of thousands
15/
Trump is a man with more negative prestige than almost anyone else in US history. his currency amongst the governing elite approaches negative infinity.. yet he is one of the most potent political forces in America today.
This is not just a culture war, it is a class war.
READ MY BLOG! DO IT!
Go to my profile, click the link, and read my piece on Motorcycles and the future of warfare.
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🧵Fedposting is your Civic Duty🧵
(Not legal advise) 1/
Probably no secret police force in world history has achieved a greater psychological victory than the US letter Agencies in the 21st century.
The tabooing of "FedPosting" is now almost total on the internet.
2/ On dissident forums across the web no sooner has someone advocated revolution or invoked the image of a guillotine before the accusation of "Fed" starts flying
Statements are said to "Glow" and participants called "Glowies" if they advocate anything but ineffective activism
3/
In this the letter agencies and particularly the FBI have achieved a psychological victory over dissenters to the regime greater than almost any security force in the history of the modern world...
And they have won this without any legal grounding whatsoever.
Few understand how much warfare has changed in 70 years.
Sure most look at the Afghan defeats of the Soviets then the US and conclude insurgencies matter, but Afghanistan is a place these empires should have won!
the guerillas lacked their ultimate weapon:
Mega-cities
2/
Cities have always challenged armies.
Troy held 10 years, Athens held off the Spartans 30 years, hell Constantinople maintained its shrinking empire/kingdom/city-state 1000 years after Rome fell.
3/
the European theatre of WW2 was defined by 2 massive urban battles.
First Stalingrad broke the Wehrmacht's forward momentum and ended German dreams of Russian conquest
2 million people died in that city
.
It was only 3km deep from the surrounding fields to the Volga river
Few understand how much warfare has changed in 70 years.
Sure most look at the Afghan defeats of the Soviets then the US and conclude insurgencies matter, but Afghanistan is a place these empires should have won!
the guerillas lacked their ultimate weapon:
Mega-cities
2/
Cities have always challenged armies.
Troy held 10 years, Athens held off the Spartans 30 years, hell Constantinople maintained its shrinking empire/kingdom/city-state 1000 years after Rome fell.
3/
the European theatre of WW2 was defined by 2 massive urban battles.
First Stalingrad broke the Wehrmacht's forward momentum and ended German dreams of Russian conquest
2 million people died in that city
.
It was only 3km deep from the surrounding fields to the Volga river
Setting aside the twist everyone already knows, this might be one of the best and most interesting dystopias ever created
Lets take a look back at the dark days of 2022... and see why the world still needs Soylent Green
2/
Soylent Green might have some of the best world building I've ever seen
Every time Detective Thorn leaves his tiny apartment he has to hop/crawl over 30 people who pay/are subsidized to sleep in the hallway and stairwells instead of freezing or getting murdered on the street
3/
Likewise even the poorest building has permanent armed security lest it get destroyed and looted by the homeless masses outside.
A man's time and life goes cheep in an overpopulated New York with 20 mil unemployed. but even the most rundown building is precious.
The phenomenon has never been confirmed, in fact many studies have disproved it.
Women just lie due to lemming behaviour
2/
What happens is one girl, the alpha, starts complaining about her period loudly and powerfully (being the alpha) and then the most awkward one won't know what to say and will say "uhh...Ugh... me too"
3/
then the next weakest willed will cave to peer pressure, and at that point none of the rest of the group can resist the need to fit in... so they'll all lie as well
🧵 The Sopranos and Therapy 1/ The Sopranos is one of the thematically richest texts of the late American empire. "Tony I" would make a great Shakespeare play (but that's a different thread)
And one of its best themes is its merciless critique of Late American Therapy Culture
2/
The Sopranos has an amazing concept.
A Mob Boss, someone who's actions and motives are kept secret from even his wife and friends, goes to a therapist, who's job is to interrogate motives.
This is basically the Shakespearean monologue updated for TV.
3/
Except there are two Characters in this "monologue"...
Two people whose actions and motives need to be dissected... and Dr. Melfi certainly doesn't escape innocent and unscathed.