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The Politics of Resentment

For discussions of events and conditions not necessarily related to Peak Oil.

The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Loki » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 01:15:27

I'm starting this thread in response to Ibon's posts on white working class support for Trump.

Ibon wrote:I think it would also be interesting to start a separate thread about privilege and the elite liberal rhetoric and how this angers uneducated white americans and how this fuels Trump's popularity. That is worth exploring as a separate topic and the part of me that would fit this description isn't so attached to this that I can't stand outside and objectively enter into dialogue concerning this. I guess because i do hold the opposite position as well. I also experience the disdain and anger toward hite liberal elitist positions. Probably why I sometimes confuse people.


Much has been written about working class support for Trump, most of it sneeringly dismissive. Ignorant, racist, uneducated, etc. are the adjectives usually used. Ibon suggested they (we) are just upset because of a loss of an alleged "white privilege."

I see the question pretty much in line with John Greer, who wrote an excellent essay called Donald Trump and the Politics of Resentment. The phenomenon he describes is not limited to the US. We saw the exact same dynamics in the UK recently in the wake of the Brexit vote.

Of all the predictions I made for the new year in my post two weeks ago, the one that seems to have stirred up the most distress and derision is my suggestion that the most likely person to be standing up there with his hand on a Bible next January, taking the oath of office as the next president of the United States, is Donald Trump. That prediction wasn’t made to annoy people, entertaining as that can be from time to time; nor is it merely a reaction to Trump’s meteoric rise in the polls and the abject failure of any of his forgettable Republican rivals even to slow him down.

The rise of Donald Trump, rather, marks the arrival of a turning point....

To understand what follows, it’s going to be necessary to ask my readers—especially, though not only, those who consider themselves liberals, or see themselves inhabiting some other position left of center in the convoluted landscape of today’s American politics—to set aside two common habits. The first is the reflexive resort to sneering mockery that so often makes up for the absence of meaningful political thought in the US—again, especially but by no means only on the left....

The second is going to be rather more challenging for many of my readers: the notion that the only divisions in American society that matter are those that have some basis in biology. Skin color, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability—these are the lines of division in society that Americans like to talk about, whatever their attitudes to the people who fall on one side or another of those lines....

Here’s a relevant example. It so happens that you can determine a huge amount about the economic and social prospects of people in America today by asking one remarkably simple question: how do they get most of their income? Broadly speaking—there are exceptions, which I’ll get to in a moment—it’s from one of four sources: returns on investment, a monthly salary, an hourly wage, or a government welfare check. People who get most of their income from one of those four things have a great many interests in common, so much so that it’s meaningful to speak of the American people as divided into an investment class, a salary class, a wage class, and a welfare class....

Just as the four classes can be identified by way of a very simple question, the political dynamite that’s driving the blowback mentioned earlier can be seen by way of another simple question: over the last half century or so, how have the four classes fared?

The answer, of course, is that three of the four have remained roughly where they were. The investment class has actually had a bit of a rough time, as many of the investment vehicles that used to provide it with stable incomes—certificates of deposit, government bonds, and so on—have seen interest rates drop through the floor. Still, alternative investments and frantic government manipulations of stock market prices have allowed most people in the investment class to keep up their accustomed lifestyles.

The salary class, similarly, has maintained its familiar privileges and perks through a half century of convulsive change....On the other end of the spectrum, the welfare class has continued to scrape by pretty much as before, dealing with the same bleak realities of grinding poverty, intrusive government bureacracy, and a galaxy of direct and indirect barriers to full participation in the national life, as their equivalents did back in 1966.

And the wage class? Over the last half century, the wage class has been destroyed....

The catastrophic impoverishment and immiseration of the American wage class is one of the most massive political facts of our time—and it’s also one of the most unmentionable. Next to nobody is willing to talk about it, or even admit that it happened.

The destruction of the wage class was largely accomplished by way of two major shifts in American economic life. The first was the dismantling of the American industrial economy and its replacement by Third World sweatshops; the second was mass immigration from Third World countries. Both of these measures are ways of driving down wages—not, please note, salaries, returns on investment, or welfare payments—by slashing the number of wage-paying jobs, on the one hand, while boosting the number of people competing for them on the other. Both, in turn, were actively encouraged by government policies and, despite plenty of empty rhetoric on one or the other side of the Congressional aisle, both of them had, for all practical purposes, bipartisan support from the political establishment.

The next point that needs to be discussed here—and it’s the one at which a very large number of my readers are going to balk—is who benefited from the destruction of the American wage class. It’s long been fashionable in what passes for American conservatism to insist that everyone benefits from the changes just outlined, or to claim that if anybody doesn’t, it’s their own fault. It’s been equally popular in what passes for American liberalism to insist that the only people who benefit from those changes are the villainous uber-capitalists who belong to the 1%. Both these are evasions, because the destruction of the wage class has disproportionately benefited one of the four classes I sketched out above: the salary class.


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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby onlooker » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 02:40:11

I do not necessarily see a parallel between what is happening in South America and specifically Venezuela to the social/political situation in the US. First, wealth is more diffused here and also the level of poverty is not as bad in most cases. What I do see is the tedious dumb downed debating between Conservatives and Liberals and I agree it is nauseating at this point. I believe the fault lines in this matter lie in the economic sphere. Trump has tapped into it. We are also in the US aware of the continued fracturing in relations between whites and non whites. So, the elite wealthy are not so conspicuous here because of our widespread dissemination of opportunities to work and earn a decent living. However, this is changing and economic matters are becoming more and more of a source of friction between groups. Having said that our social order is still way above that of most South American countries. I traveled to Colombia my country of birth in my teens and early 20's and I say first hand the beggars in the street many of them children. What we also have is a serious Drug Crime problem now. I think Trump as is usual with Republicans will emphasize the Law and Order strength of a Republican President. Yet this War on Drugs continues without any effective remediation of the underlying causes regardless of what party takes power. So the real resentment should be against both Republicans and Democrats for not fixing this situation or the Immigrant situation or the Infrastructure situation of this country. Yet TV and the mainstream just wish to frame it as a battle between Conservatives and Liberals. Even as real problems transcend this false dichotomy.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Cid_Yama » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 07:42:50

That article is disingenuous. It is the investors that benefits from cheap labor. White collar workers have little control over wages paid. CFOs control budgets, Management does what it can with what they are allotted and are usually squeezed between inadequate budgets and labor realities.

Regardless of how the media echo chamber shapes opinions, those opinions have little weight in actual reality.

It is top down and has always been top down.

Blaming the poor no longer works so they are trying a new tactic of blaming middle management.

There is no such thing as a middle class. It has always been those that own and those that labor. Don't listen to the obfuscation. There is little difference between the whip slave and the slave.

It is those that harvest the wealth of the nation, that is the determining factor in how much is left for everyone else.

Let me give you a perspective you have not heard. Everyone wants their children to live in the manner in which they themselves have lived. With each generation there are that many more that have to be provided for. That means those at the bottom of the heap have to be squeezed that much more to provide for the succeeding generations at the top.

That's the reality. It is becoming top heavy, and eventually will topple.

This thread should be titled, 'The redirection of resentment'.
Last edited by Cid_Yama on Mon 01 Aug 2016, 08:07:07, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby SeaGypsy » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 08:00:25

A massive swathe of the salaried classes were disenfranchised of their expected shift to investor status though the wealth destruction which occured over the GFC, a personal financial disaster for many millions of baby boomers, trapping many into working years longer than they thought they would as a matter of need. At the same time swathes of the gen x/y workforce has been totally casualised. Often we hear about salaried positions involving tens of hours a week of unpaid work being par for the course as unions vanish from corporate workplaces & membership dries up or is bought off.

There are still windows of opportunity for the brave, fortuitous, the hard working smart gambler, but the pool is full of sharks.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Newfie » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 08:08:23

Investment
Wage
Salary
Handout

I guess I have fit all 4 at one time or another.

I grew up doing piece work, then earned a wage.

I went into the USCG and earned a salary, then into the public sector, and then the private sector where I earned salary also.

I saved money, bought a small apartment building/house so that the rent and 401k make me an investor.

Now I get SS and Medicare, so I'm on the dole.

At my heart, I identify most with the wage earner, my roots are in piece work. You get paid for what you do.

I am resentful but not in a traditional way as typically identified. I kind of just hate everybody, all classes, equally. For me, I don't see it tied to one of the 4 classes as identified above. But typically I'm not typical.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby AgentR11 » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 09:47:12

SeaGypsy wrote:Often we hear about salaried positions involving tens of hours a week of unpaid work being par for the course as unions vanish from corporate workplaces & membership dries up or is bought off.


I largely agree with the OP article; I kinda sit at the rim between the salary & investment class, and so I think I can see the world from each viewpoint. Part of what makes the salary side so comfortable, is $5 tshirts and $2 for a 5lb bag of flour, fruit from across the world at a buck or two a pound, tools that cost next to nothing compared to what they are worth; electronics of all sorts that are also priced very, very low. Those are direct, immediate benefits, that are available in small measure to all; but which provides a massive, luxurious, if not nobly trendy, boost to the value of that 100k salary.

The investor class though? Sure, they'll buy their laundry basket at target or walmart like anyone else, but the benefit acquired by doing so becomes a tiny, nearly insignificant savings simply by matter of scale; while on the income side, it doesn't REALLY matter if the widget is made for 1 and sold for 2; or whether its made for 3 and sold for 6. What matters is that the productive economy and the finance economy keep racing along, keeping the velocity high, and the transaction count high.

There's also the 20%/1%/0.001% thing I post about from time to time. The upper 20%, mostly salaried, has not only done well numerically, but also benefited greatly from wage suppression at the same time, so available income has risen, but cost of any given capability has been either stable or falling. They acquire an immense benefit as the gap continues to widen.

but the pool is full of sharks.


Only sharks and piranha belong in that pool. They will not make you hop in, but make the jump, and you best be firing on all cylinders looking for the kill from the get go. There is no room in the pool for compassion.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby efarmer » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 10:40:36

One of the trends I have seen over the last 30 years is that of the hourly wage earner becoming part of the investor class via their 401K and similar plans. I have had many conversations during that period with others and several times have had it explained that the retirement investment was hedging the fact that wages were stagnant and health care costs skyrocketing by plugging them into the globalization profits. It was often stated that "this will work for me, but not for my kids".
This is the point in the political cycle where we are referred to as citizens by the political forces that really think of us as consumers and have managed us that way for 40 years.
I resent being a dumb consumer who has been fleeced so often and in so many ways by the people who are now counting on me to play the resentful citizen to get them into power.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Tanada » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 12:06:11

While in general I agree with Greer on this topic I think that a good swath of the 'salary class' were forcibly redistributed to other categories when the mass downsizing and elimination of middle management waves swept through the entire USA economy over the last 20 years.

Having said that those who are still in the salary class tend to be holders of high level University degrees who feel themselves superior to labor/hourly workers who did not go through the system to become part of the Salary class. This shows in their statements about people who have gotten were they are in life without a "higher" education even when those people are high wage earners. This sneering attitude towards people who do not agree with their political or social positions comes through in everything they say (or post). They are not alone in having a sneering attitude, but there are very few in the salary class/intelligentsia who do not express such an attitude.

It certainly does not help their cause when they sneeringly say if you could not afford higher education or were not willing (or able) to put in the mental effort to parrot back whatever the professors said that you are a racist sexist misogynistic homophobic Islamophobic dullard who just doesn't understand the enlightened world view they think they are representing. They completely ignore the fact that to function a culture is like a bee colony, there have to be a lot more worker bees than queens or the whole thing falls apart. In a natural culture/hive the highly paid classes are recognized as being important automatically, they don't have to constantly proclaim their superiority over the masses. For example a Doctor preforms a service far beyond what the average person can do and they are automatically garnered respect and admiration, sometimes tinged with a bit of jealousy. A college professor teaching esoteric economic theory that does nothing useful for the common person? Not so much admiration or respect in that case. In fact if you think about it a good portion of the highly paid salary class fall into that same category, they are convinced that they are special people by dint of their education status. They work in very specialized fields where the value of what they do can be very hotly debated. They sneeringly look down on people who are not in their self selected social category. And most of all they consider their status and decision making sacrosanct so when the common folks question their decisions "for the good of all" they sneer harder and tell people they are racist sexist misogynistic homophobic Islamophobic dullard's who need to sit down, shut up and do as they are told.

Strangely enough this causes resentment in the common folk who make up quite a large portion of the over all population.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby eugene » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 13:45:58

The author's classifying my Social Security as "a welfare check" certainly triggered a bit of resentment in me. What an asshole.

As far as jobs shipped overseas: In the mid 1990s I read some economists who pointed out the American worker was way over paid in a global economy meaning in order to compete a decline in the standard of living or a massive increase in productivity was required. Well we didn't see a massive increase in productivity standard of living had to fall which didn't happen as Americans chose to take on massive amounts of debt. Want to drive a huge gas guzzler, own an expensive boat, a huge house (950 square feet in 1950, 2300 today), have to rent as storage unit to store the shit you have no need for, etc, etc. Plus we have the most expensive, worst health care system in the industrialized world and refuse all efforts to change it. Educational system is an utter disaster. Change it? No way.

And those god awful immigrants who are destroying our utopia. No mention that those immigrants are running from countries that were destroyed by America. Must be a graduate of the "wonderful, world class educational system" as the ignorance is to blatant to even argue with. Gotta have that world class military you know.

I won't go on as way too much to say. So I'll just stick with much of what is happening is our own fault. And Trump? I saw from the beginning he was trying to ride to power on the backs of the pissed off. He gives a shit less for the average man other than as someone to manipulate. In fact, politicians simply ride to power ranting what we want to hear. Now, like spoiled children, we're pitching a fit as the candy has stopped. Legions of tyrants have ridden this trail in the past.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Cid_Yama » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 23:05:41

This could be and enjoyable exercise. (Let me try to work up a good sneer.)

If you're a Republican and not a member of the Leisure class or at the very least Executive corporate, you're on the wrong deck sonny, and need to get back down to Steerage where you belong.

And since it takes, at the very least, a four year degree at a University that has a general distribution requirement, to even start to have a clue, you are just excess population, using up resources better reserved for your betters.

Unfortunately, even the most virulent pandemic, or 24/7 crematorias are unable to sufficiently cull your numbers to make a difference. Let's hope climate change can accomplish this much needed task.

How was that? Feeling sufficient hatred and resentment yet? :lol:

And Yes, I'm mocking you and your petty little emotions, that you somehow feel matter to anyone. Get off my planet.
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The level of injustice and wrong you endure is directly determined by how much you quietly submit to. Even to the point of extinction.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby SeaGypsy » Mon 01 Aug 2016, 23:46:22

You are losing it Cid, if you had an doubt. What kind of pussy issues fighting words to a whole class of people whilst hiding behind an anonymous login? Pretty pathetic don't you think?
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Loki » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 00:23:23

AgentR11 wrote:There's also the 20%/1%/0.001% thing I post about from time to time. The upper 20%, mostly salaried, has not only done well numerically, but also benefited greatly from wage suppression at the same time, so available income has risen, but cost of any given capability has been either stable or falling. They acquire an immense benefit as the gap continues to widen.

I used to think your 20% figure was too high, 5% made more sense to me. But I've come to think you're probably about right. The precise figure isn't important, of course, but it's useful to understand who benefits the most from globalization, which includes both free trade and mass immigration (outsourcing and insourcing). It isn't just the 1%, or even just the 5%, the benefits are clearly enjoyed at a broader level. You've helped me see that.

The Brexit vote really brought this to the fore, with a fairly numerous contingent of Remainers vociferously proclaiming the benefits of cosmopolitanism and associated erasure of a British identity, mass immigration, and corporate free trade, and how those ignorant, racist Leave voters made it slightly more inconvenient for well-off Remainers to jet off to Spain for the weekend or to send their princess to study in Munich for a year.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Simon_R » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 07:54:04

Interestingly, one of the main feature of the Brexit vote was the 'we dont need experts' dialogue from the Brexiters ....

Scarily, there is evidence that the human race will bifurcate in the next 10,000 years or so, as the 'educated' tend to breed within their own class.

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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Cid_Yama » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 11:23:07

Totally missed the point I was making. Taking it to the extreme.

The fundamental pillars that divide us. Inclusiveness vs exclusiveness.

Exclusiveness is the root of all evil. It is the sin from which all other sins derive.

Each and every individual is a person. Each is entitled to equal consideration, to be treated as one would wish themselves to be treated. No one is above another, more deserving than another, better than another. These are all means of exclusion. No one's hair, skin color, religion, geographical location, politics, education, or economic status, makes them of lesser value, each is a human being. Just like YOU. Equal.

We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.

The second you exclude ANYONE, you deny these words.

Inclusiveness is the Gospel of Christ, and the root of social justice.

The celebration of the fact we are each hand-crafted works from divine fingertips, regardless of our religion (or lack thereof), ethnicity, citizenship, gender, race, sexuality, socio-economic status, or any other variety in which our humanity is celebrated and expressed is woven throughout the story of scripture. This radical inclusion is best seen in the person of Jesus...


http://www.redletterchristians.org/reve ... the-other/
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby KaiserJeep » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 13:37:11

Last year I ended a 37 year career as a salaried Electrical Engineer. Prior to that I spent 5 years getting an engineering undergraduate degree and if any of you believe that EE is something that one can coast through without trying, you couldn't be more wrong. If you don't believe me, dip into calculus/differential equations, Boolean Algebra, multidimensional matrices, quantum physics, and the esoteric chemistries of monolithic silicon crystals at 1420 degrees Centigrade.

My work history before that included hourly wages in High School and (sorry Newfie) a 4-year stint as an Electronics Technician in the USCG - and all enlisted positions are effectively blue collar, only the officers (aka orificers) are actually salaried.

But for 37 years I labored at a small startup tech firm (employee #237) that saturated a particular targeted market segment (fault tolerant online transaction processing) and grew from $27,000,000 revenues the first year into an $80,000,000,000 per year annual worldwide business. That 37 years included many 80+ hour weeks. Meanwhile I spent my salary and sold most of the stock options on houses, cars, and college degrees for the wife and daughter. The wife is a CPA/Business Tax analyst and the daughter isn't really using her degree in Biology as she works in the Healthcare insurance racket, while raising my twin grandkids. She is a star wherever she works, as she was raised in Silicon Valley and works very hard. Meanwhile my "startup" Tandem Computers Inc. went from the 3000th computer company to one of the 3 largest tech firms, a part of HP Enterprise Computing. In order to remain employed, I had to dip into management, even though I really only wanted to design new products.

I don't doubt that there are places and job choices (especially when protected by a union) where one can coast and not try very hard and still get paid. But here in Silicon Valley it is dog-eat-dog, very competitive, and if you have more ambition than me (I really only wanted to build new computers) then you could become a tech millionaire (there are a few from my residential block) or even a billionaire like Gates or Jobs or Musk. Note also that Silicon Valley is over-the-top when it comes to being equal opportunity, as an adult white male I was in the only totally unprotected group.

I was one of only a few thousand engineers who labored mightily to advance the state of the art from giant (but feeble by modern standards) non-networked IBM type mainframes with magnetic drums and ferrite core memories to mobile smart phones and tablets and even Dick Tracy style BlueTooth smart watches, all in a worldwide network. You simply have NO IDEA how long or how hard we labored here in the Valley. My own work products actually run the entire world - but are an invisible part of the infrastructure that most people will never hear about or see. But anywhere that electronic bits are being flipped in the name of commerce there is a NonStop computer sitting in a chilled room, counting the money that makes the whole network possible.

This sort of environment is extremely productive - and Silicon Valley is one of the places with the highest earnings per employee in the entire world, not just the USA. China and Korea and Russia are busily stealing tech advances from here on a continuous basis, for anybody who cares to look. We don't care particularly, because any tech available to be stolen is at least one generation older than state-of-the-art, and such a level of innovation will not be found in China, Japan, India, Russia, etc. Tech innovation requires higher education, hard competitive business, and Laissez-faire Capitalism, meaning a freedom from anything except the thinnest veneer of government interference.

Feel free to resent me - but I busted my butt for 5 years of school and 37 years on the job, after 4 years in the military. I was raised by two parents whose families suffered greatly during the Great Depression, and both of whom earned their way out of abject poverty to Middle Class status in the greatest country the world has ever seen. I have no patience for fools, for lazy bums who don't work, for people that don't even understand what a privilege it is to be a US citizen in the Golden Age we are living in. But I feel the most contempt for those who want to take the things from me that I have worked hard for and give this to lazy welfare recipients.

In fact if POTUS Donald Trump wants to give out hunting licenses and game tags for Democrats, members of the Teacher's Union, criminal illegal immigrants, and like undesirables, I'll queue up to be one of the first in line.

Now you understand Real Resentment. It has nothing whatsoever to do with White Supremacy, or being a racist, or being uneducated, or being ignorant.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Newfie » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 13:56:56

The problem is we are both inclusive and exclusive by nature. Inclusive of our family, tribe, race. Exclusive along the same lines. I think that as the noose tightens we will see more of Balkanization. And it will likely be necessary to be part of a dominant tribe to survive.

Not taking sides, just observing.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby SeaGypsy » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 16:46:18

Cid, how can you post on the sacredness of the individual & call me a hater for hating on Duterte, who advocates the 10 to 20 murders a day done to people who are simply accused of using a common street drug, or being deemed a drug lord for peddling some bags? Incongruous positions.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Ibon » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 18:29:55

Cid_Yama wrote:Each and every individual is a person. Each is entitled to equal consideration, to be treated as one would wish themselves to be treated. No one is above another, more deserving than another, better than another. These are all means of exclusion. No one's hair, skin color, religion, geographical location, politics, education, or economic status, makes them of lesser value, each is a human being. Just like YOU. Equal.

We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.

The second you exclude ANYONE, you deny these words.

Inclusiveness is the Gospel of Christ, and the root of social justice.


Hmmm. These human morals of inclusiveness are in direct contradiction with biological natural selection where each individual is not created equal and each individual is not deserving of equal treatment.

I mention this only in one reference. The moral idea of equal justice requires that there is enough abundance of basic resources to provide for all. It is from there that we can then apply fairness. Which today is valid, tomorrow maybe not. The minute the resource base dips below carrying capacity another set of rules apply.

This has nothing to do with this thread which I hope to get around to commenting on. I just felt like interjecting this reminder from an ecological perspective.
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby Ibon » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 18:59:49

I think resentment has less to do with the actual socio economic status one finds oneself and more to do if you are on the ascendancy or decline. This is important in America right now. I mentioned I was recently in Medellin Colombia, a city of 4 million people. Onlooker mentioned that comparisons between Latin America and the US are not valid because there is a lot more poverty in Latin America.

Raw statistics are misleading in terms of resentment or wellbeing.

Colombia suffered decades of violence, for the past two decades the country is experiencing a reduction of violence and more steady and positive economic growth. Medellin has a new metro and interlinked cable cars, they close major avenues on the weekend and the population hits the street jogging. The vibe was positive and folks seemed happy. They are much poorer than your average US citizen but their economic situation and political stability has both improved so folks perspective are more positive.

In the US we have a far higher standard of living but for many they see this declining. This creates a funk in the collective. This spreads across a whole suite of the public population . It touches different racial groups.

Politics are exploiting this resentment, this general Funk in the collective because the trend is downward regardless if most Americans still do enjoy a higher standard of living than most of the planets population.

A big part of resentment is happening when folks refuse to re calibrate to a lower standard of living .They try to keep houses cars and vacations and lifestyles they can no longer afford and then become imprisoned in debt hanging on to trappings of status that only weigh them down.

Many Americans are socialized with a lot of individual freedoms... Get a smaller house and share a room with a family member? no way. Downsize your car? no way. Take public transportation ? no way.

These are things folks do regularly in Latin America....happily without resentment.

Funny example.... all throughout Latin America you can find these Love Motels. These short term rooms you rent by the hour where couples can have private sex. There are neon cupids at night advertising these places. Most Americans or Europeans think these places are sleezy establishments where bosses take their secretaries for affairs or places where Johns take prostitutes. But do you know who uses these love motels the most? Young couples, engaged couples. married couples still living with their parents and extended families where everyone shares a room. How can you have loud uninhibited sex when your grandma is behind that curtain in the next room? The only place for these folks to go and have private sex are these love motels.

This is just a funny example in how a society becomes socialized around solving problems of limited resources, in this case limited space in family households and the need for a place to be intimate.

Americans used to being privileged and losing some privileges is the source of a lot of resentment that politics is exploiting.

How do you re calibrate to a lower set of expectations and maintain well being without getting resentful?

That is a challenge for many folks. A populist like Donald Trump survives and gains popularity not be preaching re calibration but by stoking the resentment.

This is primitive

Clinton does something almost equally egregious...making false promises that wont ever be met.

A politician that would preach re calibration would be like Carter back in the 70's preaching turning down your thermostat and wearing sweaters. And that would be the wisest message today for most Americans. But no politician preaching such a message could ever get elected!

I personally think most Americans are horribly spoiled about a set of expectations they feel they deserve. Too much expectation, entitlement, resentments and sense of deserving.

Not enough hard work and humble expectations. Most Americans have become whiners. Most Americans are not following the quiet hard working work ethic of their fore fathers.

Of course many are victims of racism, many are victims of the rich elite, many are victims of bad corporations, many are victims of exaggerated political correctness, many are victims of police violence. The list goes on and on. Folks on the political right and left feeling increasingly resentful.

The path way falling down and re calibrating to a more humble lifestyle is never easy for a society accustomed to privilege.


Good Luck America! I hope Donald Trump helps you with your resentment problem! Ha ha ha ha ha

I am a US citizen as well of course. I am being somewhat flippant with this post and am setting a bit of a tone here to help folks see how much of this resentment is petty whining by an over spoiled society.

Or ?
Patiently awaiting the pathogens. Our resiliency resembles an invasive weed. We are the Kudzu Ape
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Re: The Politics of Resentment

Unread postby efarmer » Tue 02 Aug 2016, 21:56:10

America is a great experiment based at the founding on abundant natural resources and especially able to thrive and innovate on the exponential increase in fossil fuels and the corresponing explosion in human population, technical innovation, and creature comfort available in the nation based on exponential growth allowing individual hard work and personal choice to create a higher expectation in the pursuit of happiness to manifest and that has become a treasured attribute and a base ingredient in our national and personal strategies. None of this reconciles with any notion of exponential growth being finite, and seeing signs of such finiteness prompts the natural political response of promising a return to an era when we still saw such growth as infinite with regard to our national and personal time horizons needs. You want the 1950's or the 1990's? Care to blame the immigrants since the feel good era of your choice as the killers of exponential growth bliss? Our politics has always stumbled and stalled, but as long as it didn't do too much damage, the overall system fixed almost everything via exponential growth. We wish to flourish and thrive, but are proven to boom and bust, and we just hate that notion. Any story of who did this to us, or about a great time machine that goes back to a sweet spot on the exponential up slope is probably going to be a big seller this year. I predict such diversional stories will enjoy exponential growth.
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