Ayyy, no problem. I do think that there have been certain interesting things that have come from it, but they're all to do with the reaction. Obviously one is the degree to which it's exposed the level of deeply held reactionary views among people who are in the process of forming a degree of class consciousness, but are arriving at it purely through their relationship to the economy and have no political education. This clearly leaves them open to co-option, not just by liberals but also by fascists.
Honestly, there's a kind of prophesy failed feeling to the meltdown, as well as obvious aspects of poorly disguised self-hatred that I think relate to people's lack of class consciousness. So many of the attacks against the mod in the reddit threads are basically, 'she (more likely misgendered as 'he') looks too much like a redditor/looks too schluby', and basically just echo all the stuff that conservatives and liberals always throw at anyone remotely progressive who doesn't look like a media ghoul because they ended up in the spotlight basically by chance. These are real brainworms that people have deeply internalised as a result of being forced to live in the culture that the ruling class has created and they have a real impact. They are the basis of the 'looks presidential/prime ministerial' rating that is constantly used to beat down any left-wing politician and make scions and aristos seem like the natural leaders of the country. I'm not saying that the interview was good, but people's reaction to it is totally ridiculous at this point. It's a really sad kind of response that when someone comes on TV and performs like a normal person who doesn't have media training, and, even worse, reinforces stereotypes that our political enemies have about us, so many of us completely lose our shit and just revert to the conditioned responses. So we get a bunch of threads filled with people gatekeeping working class identity in the kinds of regressive ways that we constantly see conservatives deploying.
I also think that part of the issue is that people are really desperate for someone/something to come along and save them, and so completely lose it when the vehicle is shown to be flawed/it doesn't work out. The sooner we realise that no one is going to do that the better. The form of most social media encourages this passivity tbh. It encourages people to see voting on posts and having an opinion as akin to activism and gets them into the mindset (whether they admit it or not), where they imagine that if something gets enough votes then the admin of real life will have to take action. We're all Karens now! Social media has become the tragic spectre of an actual radical democratisation of everyday life. Instead of actual agency, 'you'll vote on everything and it will change nothing'.
Ayyy, no problem. I do think that there have been certain interesting things that have come from it, but they're all to do with the reaction. Obviously one is the degree to which it's exposed the level of deeply held reactionary views among people who are in the process of forming a degree of class consciousness, but are arriving at it purely through their relationship to the economy and have no political education. This clearly leaves them open to co-option, not just by liberals but also by fascists.
Honestly, there's a kind of prophesy failed feeling to the meltdown, as well as obvious aspects of poorly disguised self-hatred that I think relate to people's lack of class consciousness. So many of the attacks against the mod in the reddit threads are basically, 'she (more likely misgendered as 'he') looks too much like a redditor/looks too schluby', and basically just echo all the stuff that conservatives and liberals always throw at anyone remotely progressive who doesn't look like a media ghoul because they ended up in the spotlight basically by chance. These are real brainworms that people have deeply internalised as a result of being forced to live in the culture that the ruling class has created and they have a real impact. They are the basis of the 'looks presidential/prime ministerial' rating that is constantly used to beat down any left-wing politician and make scions and aristos seem like the natural leaders of the country. I'm not saying that the interview was good, but people's reaction to it is totally ridiculous at this point. It's a really sad kind of response that when someone comes on TV and performs like a normal person who doesn't have media training, and, even worse, reinforces stereotypes that our political enemies have about us, so many of us completely lose our shit and just revert to the conditioned responses. So we get a bunch of threads filled with people gatekeeping working class identity in the kinds of regressive ways that we constantly see conservatives deploying.
I also think that part of the issue is that people are really desperate for someone/something to come along and save them, and so completely lose it when the vehicle is shown to be flawed/it doesn't work out. The sooner we realise that no one is going to do that the better. The form of most social media encourages this passivity tbh. It encourages people to see voting on posts and having an opinion as akin to activism and gets them into the mindset (whether they admit it or not), where they imagine that if something gets enough votes then the admin of real life will have to take action. We're all Karens now! Social media has become the tragic spectre of an actual radical democratisation of everyday life. Instead of actual agency, 'you'll vote on everything and it will change nothing'.