MZT says that first we must analyze the primary contradiction in a society, from which all other contradictions build from.
My thought is that American working class do not revolt because our lifestyle is subsidized by the global poor. Of course there are impoverished workers (and lumpen) within America, but they are dissuaded by revolutionary organization because of this neocolonial dependence.
And I don't just mean "treats" although that's a big part of it. Many basic essentials are produced through the global supply chain and most people rely on income from companies who plunder the global south.
The financialization and deindustrialization of the American economy from neoliberal politics is the culmination of this. Why when workers made gains against industrial capitalists, production was moved to the global south.
I'm sure this has been discussed before by proper scholars, but I'd love to hear your thoughts. I'm just reading through On Contradiction now.
I'm not really sure I understand you. Imperialism sucks and is evil, but isn't really contradictory as many workers in the imperial core, maybe even most, benefit from imperialism more than they suffer.
I also really don't understand where you're coming from suggesting I'm arguing to fight for climate without class consciousness - in fact quite the opposite I'm not sure where in my comment I suggested otherwise. I'm saying the blatant contradiction that letting the rich do what they want is something that destroys the Earth, which is something that affects all workers. This is an animating, radicalizing contradiction that can be leveraged to push for an overthrow of the ownership class primarily because liberal reformism cannot solve it.
I think the problem is it does not affect all workers evenly. We are already seeing the impacts of climate change outside the imperial core, Syria, Pakistan, any island nation, etc. But the US especially will be insulated from the worst impacts of climate change due to it's geography as well as people having the wealth to mitigate it. Essentially I'm worried that most Americans will ignore climate change until it's too late.
Of course resource extraction is inherently linked to imperialism, but I wonder if it's one of the contradictions that arises from the larger contradiction of capitalist imperialism.