I am on the precipice of one and don't want that to turn me into a disengaged normies, lib, or chud. I know that a local DSA chapter was financially backed by a person of incredible means, so I wonder what keeps such people left wing or at least SocDem.
Your personal conditions won't affect the superstructure of capitalism. Once you break free of the propaganda machine and see the demon for what it is, there's no going back.
I don't think that's true, unfortunately. A lot of people will acknowledge all sorts of injustices, but then they get to this choice:
- Try to do something about it, despite no clear path, a ton of failed attempts before you, and the knowledge that any serious effort will require sacrificing time and money, or maybe even more. Or,
- Fire up that grill, baby, and try to enjoy what you can in life.
And choose Option 2.
yeah like how many people striked during 68 and became yuppies just a few years later. fighting the good fight doesn't mean sacrificing just "time and money" it means sacrificing everything the middle-class bourgeois life might offer you instead
Sure but unless you're a soulless freak like buttigieg you still see it, and when people fight against it, you provide support or at the very least shut up and get out of the way. You're not gonna be out there voting for Biden or whatever.
Also you can provide material support to folks which imo is one of the best forms of praxis there is.
Yeah, it's good to highlight ways people can help (or at least get out of the way) that don't require as much of a commitment. Because not everyone is fully committed, at least not at first, and doing a little can lead to doing more.
I wish, but look at all the 'back to normal' "leftists" out there.
I've only become more left as my salary increased
This and seeing exactly how much my company makes compared to how much they pay us.
I've said this before, my family is basically the Park family from Parasite
It's a big picture thing for me. Capitalism "benefits" me individually in that it enables my family to live in decadence right now, but it's not sustainable. The world is burning up and while it won't affect me initially, it inevitably will. The immense alienation and loneliness is also a direct consequence of individualist ideology.
My family is upper class, but not billionaires. We will be on the chopping block later than most, but we will end up there eventually. Capitalism, like fascism, has no end goal. While it might temporarily benefit me to close my eyes and pretend like neoliberalism is epic, I can't ignore how fucked we are if nothing changes.
I make more money than ever and it hasn't stopped my leftist ideals. If anything, it's only emboldened my resolve.
But here's the straight dope: I live a very isolated life. My friends lower on the economic totempole see me differently. Not necessarily negatively, but I noticed as I "made it" that relations started to change. I've had a buddy of mine confide in me that he feels embarrassed to hang out because he's been so unsuccessful. I suspect my other working-class friends feel similarly.
And because I can't relate to the Libshits around me at work and in the burbs, I have like maybe 2 friends I can sort of hang with and even then, their bad takes on the world are incredible. Meanwhile I'm constantly minding my "financial freedom" in paying bills, saving for college, figuring out taxes, figuring out insurance... which is fucking exhausting. Tangent: I'd rather have money than not have money in this hellscape (who wouldn't) but minding your shit after a certain level of income is basically another fucking job.
So yeah. Wife and I made it (whatver bullshit that means) and I might as well go live on an island. Which only proves to me how atomized we really are. If I had no money I'd strive for financial stability and have that consume my thoughts and motivations. Now I have money and the parts of life that matter most (friendship, piece of mind, personal fulfillment, etc) are unobtainable.
Which only makes me more of a Leftist.
so fun how class mobility rips apart the social network you used to have while at the same time putting you around people you don't want to spend time with
The reason a dude like engles can be as rich as he was while being committed to communism, is because he was intelletually curious and committed to the truth, he wasnt satisfied with taking the easy way and coasting, you have to demand of yourself to never get intellectually lazy, and demand yourself that you keep studying, so set study goals and timetables and stick to them, form a reading group to keep each other on track and to advance your understanding and dont stop, when you get lazy youre cooked.
I was in tech for two years recently. It gave me enough money to purchase a vehicle to live in and to coast for the next little bit, but among the many reasons I quit (it was bad for my brain, it took up way too much of my time) was feeling the distinction in class interests. The biggest expression of this was that my coworkers had such bubbled views of social relations and had strange expectations of what the world owes them simply on account of how much money they have.
I think if you're committed to your principles you'll be fine. I just found I didn't like being around people of that class for such extended periods of time.
my coworkers had such bubbled views of social relations and had strange expectations of what the world owes them
Can you elaborate on this?
I found very few of them had any close contact with "outsider" groups - the big two that come to mind are queer people and neurodivergent people (at least those who would have trouble masking all day so as to conform to the culture, dress, etc.) Some of them were certainly a bit socially isolated, but they could count on being able to pay for not just basic needs but treats, comforts, and brand identity markers to paper over that. With an above-median personal income, the main next steps are to secure house ownership and then start a family, which can serve as your main purpose in life and also your main social unit that isn't governed by economic transactions. I found very little interest in community building or intersectional solidarity.
When you're on that level there's no reason to question eating out or ordering food several times a week, flying across the world and staying in hotels several times a year, or ridesharing into work every day. There's no need to think about the massive amounts of service labour that go into making those comforts accessible at the push of a button, nor anything that would lead them to realize that very few of those labourers can afford any of that themselves. For them, service labour is something you do in high school for some extra spending cash and a way to teach diligence to the youth.
FWIW even a high-paying job still means you're part of the working class, not the ownership class.
I'm curious to know what someone who doesn't need a real job, like a landlord, thinks.
Becoming a lawyer is part of what radicalised me tbh. Being in the system lets you hate it with the contempt born of familiarity
IANAL, but my family lives comfortably on our income. I've had the opportunity to peek behind the curtain and get to know (professionally) people with seven figure incomes and eight figure net worths. The "contempt born of familiarity" resonates for me, intimately.
What surprised me and continues to haunt me is how trapped they are in the same system as the rest of us. They were keenly aware that not "playing the game" for even a moment would mean they're out of it. No single millionaire can change anything much more than you or I. The system would destroy them for trying. Even if an entire company of top executives were to collectively band together and try to make change the market would dissolve their wealth in a heartbeat.
And that is what keeps me up at night... there are no heroes, no saints, no saviors. Just a system put in place generations ago that is going to have to implode under its own weight, likely violently and at great human cost, for anything to get better.
Hearing from some of my other high paid coworkers talk about social issues reminds me that I'm nothing like them. I think for me, I just happen to have a high paying job and the pursuit of infinite wealth does not interest me. I'd only want more funds to fund mutual aid and things that grow communism.
I wonder what keeps such people left wing
Um... having fucking principles? Like... I don't know, recognizing that communism is necessary for the continuation of humanity rather than barbarism and climate apocalypse?
I don't mean to be flippant, but I guess I do. If you know about the shit that we as leftists know about, you have learned about exploitation and class dynamics. With full awareness of these things, then if you're dipping out toward the right, you know what the fuck you're doing, you're a traitor. And knowing that, and still drifting off on greedy ass winds in a rightward direction because of your material interests... then fuck you, you were never a leftist. You may still sell your labor maybe you even make a killing with it as an aristocrat. But aristocracy in capitalism is being a class traitor. They are among the ghouls that those of us who are committed to human liberation speak of when we talk about having a place on a wall or in a pit.
Yes, I know. I'm just being idealist. Everything comes down to only class interest, and we are all of us victims of material circumstance. No, that's vulgar. If you were ever on the left because you had a human heart, you can't ever turn right and without knowing your position is: "screw y'all, I'm going for MINE."
Take the job. Get as much as you can. But whatever excess you have, and you'll know what is excess if you're honest with yourself, then don't waste it on personal enrichment. "Invest" it in revolutionary potential, organizations, direct aid, whatever. Enjoy your life, but know that if you have any power to effect change with or through your wealth, if you consider yourself leftist, if you consider yourself human you take the opportunity to help others.
Don't worry, you'll still have shitty management and alienated labor, it'll just be harder to explain exactly what shitty things the management is doing, and the numbers will be bigger.
by how much i fucking hated the job (other than the pay), to the point that i quit bc the depression and desire to self harm it tried and succeded to induce wasn't worth the money
Death to America
and also just a general conviction that everyone should be able to be materially comfortable without such grave spiritual sacrifices, or vice versa
Death to America
For real. My whole job is bullshit and shouldn't exist but I'd be broke if I didn't do it. Can't wait to save up enough so I can finally quit.
Being closer to money has helped me see how fucked up the bean counters really are. Thankfully, I'm lucky to be in a position where a lot of my day to day work is being actively adversarial to environmental degradation caused by capitalism.
Are you out there trying to make more money just so that you can make more money? Then your leftyness was just opportunism. When you're poor you'll be more anti-capitalist/pro communist and for the moments in your life that you're not poor you'll be pro-capitalist/anti-communist.
Communism isn't a poverty cult.
I'm not particularly highly paid compared to most people i work with, but it seems like a simple way to not have your convictions eroded is to begin thinking about issues in a more structural way, rather than just the immediate.
So sure, the driving contradiction in my life is the fact that my rent and car-payments and childcare expenses are taking up a solid 105% of my post-tax pay, but I'm also capable of looking outside and seeing the fact that a 1000 people just fucking died of heatstroke during the Hajj, because temperatures in Saudi Arabia crested 50 degrees celsius. If you are actually interested in socialism, you'd probably pretty easily be able to connect the lack of income growth compared to inflation and climate change, as both issues have the same fundamental cause.
