It's a useless way to frame the issue. Environmentalism is an easy sell. It's much easier to get people to agree with socialism if you use climate change as part of your argument. But framing climate change as "first world vs third world" is just about the dumbest thing you can do because it puts everyone in the first world on the side of the corporations who are actively trying to downplay and obscure climate change.

If you make an actual, internationalist appeal for fighting climate change then you will have no problem getting people on your side. But framing the issue as "this one group of people is hogging all the resources and we need to stop them" will inevitably play into the hands of ecofascist rhetoric that views humanity as a virus on the earth.

Sorry for venting. Feel free to dunk on me in the comments

  • CyborgMarx [any, any]
    ·
    4 years ago

    I have already analyzed the dynamic and concluded the top 20% of first worlders ARE irredeemable and unchangeable, and that they have to be politically, socially, and materially disenfranchised for there to be any chance to salvage this mess

    because the contradictions between those two groups are not necessarily antagonistic.

    Doubt. The contradictions are inherently antagonistic, that's why they're called contradictions, first world labor is not competitive with third world labor, that is a fundamental antagonism that can't be squared with simple internationalist rhetoric

    • AccordionTomato [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      To paraphrase Mao, not all contradictions are inherently antagonistic. The go-to example Mao uses is the contradiction between the rural peasantry and the urban proletariat. A contradiction becomes antagonistic when it in and of itself causes an external conflict. By that token, the contradiction between first world workers and third-world workers isn't necessarily antagonistic.

      • CyborgMarx [any, any]
        1·
        4 years ago

        Mao was sometimes known for his occasional bouts of incorrigible idealism

        • AccordionTomato [he/him]
          ·
          4 years ago

          :mao-aggro-shining: For the sake of having/defending a revolution, Mao's position on contradiction is absolutely correct. It preserves the heart of diamat, while ensuring that it can't be weaponized against itself.

          • CyborgMarx [any, any]
            ·
            4 years ago

            If you pretend contradictions aren't a problem, they will eventually bloom into antagonisms when the first external shocks rock the system you created, the contradictions must be SYNTHESIZED and SQUARED

            Otherwise, you'll bring about the very weaponization you seek to avoid, and looking at China in the last forty years oh boy is there a lot of synthesizing needed

            • AccordionTomato [he/him]
              ·
              4 years ago

              I'm not saying that the contradiction between first world and third world workers should be ignored. I'm saying that the contradiction can and should be resolved without the destruction/negation of one of those groups. That's what I mean when I say the contradiction isn't antagonistic the same way as the contradiction between labor and capital or between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie.

              • CyborgMarx [any, any]
                ·
                4 years ago

                I would generally agree with that, with some caveats, at last synthesis has been achieved