Saying Americans are too comfortable is just reinforcing US propaganda that the USA is this free capitalist paradise where food and luxury rains from the sky. It ignores the psychological war constantly being waged against the working class in the heart of the empire. Yes they have food, but they're malnourished because it's made of cheap plastic slop. Yes they have circuses but even cavemen had entertainment, that's not a luxury. I can't believe I have to tell leftists that 'but you have iPhone' isn't a sign your life is easy. Especially because half of these 'luxuries' are just tools that:
- You can't take part in society without.
- Everyone fucking hates them but you're damned if you do, damned if you don't (good luck getting a job and feeding yourself without a phone, car and social capital of being a good consumer).
Ask the people working three jobs just to afford rent if they're comfortable.
Ask the people living in tent cities in they're comfortable.
Ask the young people grimly joking that they're going to die before they retire if they're comfortable.
Ask the people on the kill line who are one medical bill away from being on the street if they're comfortable.
Are there countries where life is harder? Yes, but playing the suffering Olympics ignores the real material conditions that the US (and it's vassals) face and we would be stupid to ignore it. Ignoring mental anguish and the exsaution of being human cattle just because they aren't being physically bombed is downplaying the severity of psychological violence. Telling the single mother burnt out working multiple dead end jobs worried if her kids are going to ever have a home or even a habitable planet that she's too comfortable is fucked and isn't going to create the vanguard.
Nearly every single person I talk to (excluding the owning class) is running on empty. Everyone is sick. Everyone is depressed. Everyone is hopeless. They have seen countless protests amount to nothing. They have seen our rulers commit every single unspeakable crime and go unpunished. They've watched the surveillance state grow and record their every move. They know, they fucking know. But their hope has died. The lack of riots over the Epstein files isn't the inaction of someone who has it too good to care, it's the inaction of a beaten spouse who knows their place.
They're doing nothing because their spirits are broken, not because they're too well fed. From their perspective they're too busy making sure they have the energy to put food on the table to start a revolution.
My point is that downplaying the struggles of the US working class is ignorant, reactionary, and ignores material conditions and therefore is unhelpful in mobilising anyone. I think this rhetoric needs to change if we are to be effective.
Agreed, and I think the major disagreement that i see in this discussion generally (and you and OP are good examples) is twofold.
Talking about labour aristocracy and the treats of empire does not mean that nobody has a hard life in the empire. It's an analysis that the benefits of imperialism will be lost if it's overthrown, and westerners are aware of this. And that's why they often choose fascism as the option to maintain at least that benefit to themselves. It's a real incentive structure which we need to account for in our analyses.
We have to be strategic and tactical, which means throwing this in the face of people occupying both the labor aristocracy class and the proletariat class is not the best idea. At least not in the unstrategic way that some do: "you're a treatlerite and that's why you don't love China." It's just not useful in that way. It must be a pillar of western theory, but with the goal of finding the positive message we can bring forth: "yes, it's a net positive to you in the short term if we let Libyans be enslaved for empire, but you get a much larger benefit of more free time, more meaningful work, and less poverty destroying your towns if we choose the other way". Many forget to say anything like the last part in any tangible, believable way.
yes I agree.
it seems that some people think having the type of analysis I said means you are not trying to organize at all or that you do but you walk up to a stranger and say "hey you fucking traitor to the workers of the world, if you don't join my book club now you'll just be forced to do it later in the reeducation camps."
the reason why having an accurate analysis of these conditions is important is because cadre need correct theory to plan strategy. not understanding this theory is why western leftists say shit like "we need to figure out how to organize rural white workers, they're workers too!" or "we need to elect more socialists and fight to push the democrats left!"
I would guess that a super majority of self identified leftists in the west are legitimately propping up capitalism more than opposing it because they have no real analysis of how to organize and often think that leftists that do are worse than reactionaries.
We agree entirely! I just think we don't really disagree with dirt owl either, or at least, we wouldn't if we all understood that these perspectives are complementary. In fact, I think dirt owl is making a useful point (don't just go around yelling that the US is labor aristocrats who have no revolutionary position). I just agree that this doesn't mean that the analysis of labor aristocracy is wrong, just the lazy application of it
are people really doing that though? people post that way online but I'm not sure if anyone who is actually motivated enough to try to organize people would speak to them like that.
Well I'm also of a pretty strong opinion that we can't just give ground to the enemy in the public square, which nowadays is located squarely in the online platforms. So people on Twitter getting attention for saying it has to be taken seruously, because we are judged by their faults anyways. So yeah, I've only seen people do it online, but that's just as important as the public squares were in Lenin's time. I say this all with a heavy heart because I wish it weren't so. Ive had people in real life act like all leftists thought that, so we have to treat it as a real movement to be struggled against
If the online narrative weren't important, the ruling class wouldn't be spending so much effort trying to control it.
It makes me cringe, but I think it might be true.
I am 100% sure it's true. It's very important to the ruling class, and we have to be better at it. Hexbear is not the example (it's hardly a public square and more an alley we use to talk about the public square). I've have said it before, but Roderic Day tried for years to treat Twitter like Lenin would've (in this analogy of public squares). It eventually failed (X turned shit, Roderic quit or something) but it was a serious attempt. Prole wiki tried to make an information source, and still could be more useful. I have no great ideas, personally, but know we need to do better
Got a bit off topic, but yeah, people saying the "you're a treatlerite" online are hurting us and should be either reformed or somehow separated and isolated