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This is quite likely a personality preference on my part. Very INTP -- do all your actual thinking in your head, anything you actually say, regardless of context, is something of a performance (what we Myers-Briggs nerds call the Ti-Ne mode).
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ie I might have a very different take if I had a different personality, of the sort that thinks best out loud, and in some cases out loud and in conflict mode (ESFJs?). In a way, being sanguine about this shit is a "free strategic option" for me. It costs me nothing to be immune.
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Good question. I think the issue being contested is that the group privileged in public spaces has changed. Now the public is *most* accessible to those to whom it was *least* accessible in the past. The access hierarchy isn't gone. It's flipped polarity.
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Replying to @vgr
really interesting thread, thank you. im a bit dumb -- so bringing back public spaces would be futile or unlikely b/c they would be based on "know your place?" and who in anglo society is driving the elimination of such spaces?
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ie, to use the cartoon example, we are heading towards the point where a black lesbian can basically say anything in public, and a cis-white-male can only speak if spoken to. We are VERY far from that actual condition, but obv. the directional trend upsets those currently on top
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This may be another reason I'm personally unable to develop strong feelings about the shift... "brown male" is sort of somewhere in the illegible middle of the totem pole whatever happens. The middle is actually the best place... no fighting needed to tread water there
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A common objection I get when I offer this kind of class-based analysis is that all this is really elite-on-elite conflict (right now, for eg. rich liberal arts educated kids without jobs who got radicalized and grifterized by the GFC and neethood). This is not that important.
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This goes back to at least Pareto's circulation of elites theory (lion elites vs. fox elites) who in turn drew from Machiavelli. The fact that currently-out-of-power elites are an intermediary in the elites-vs-masses conflict doesn't change the fact that it IS elites vs. masses.
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Eg: Trump is obviously lion elite -- born to wealth, strongman ethos. He became the voice of one kind of non-elite. The NYT is fox elites... often rich trustie kids... who speak for another kind of non-elite. This is just plumbing you can nerd-out over, but rarely important.
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So long as circulation of elites creates liquidity in the market for actual class warfare, the class warfare aspect is by far more important. Neither Trumpism, nor BLM, both of which try to place/ tone police each other's elites, is a pure elite-vs-elite conflict. Masses matter.
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Replying to
This war is asymmetrical. Trumpians/righties don't control any cultural levers (media/academia/tech/corporate). So their tools are primitive-rallies, guns, sometimes literally torches. The neoliberal order used BLM & the masses to recapture that last rightful! lever of Presidency
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This is a standard whine that I just don’t buy. Fox News, an entire alt-right media space, half the business leadership, radio networks. And 4 years in political power, 2 years complete power. And massively stacked courts.
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That depends on whether you judge by the balance sheet or cash flows. I'm a cash flow guy. The public-facing cultural trajectory is rocketing away from right wing positions, exacerbated by Trump. Especially in large cities that set the cultural pace. Taken one at a time...
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