"the baron is playing chess; he must be a lazy, shiftless bum"
Most things are intelligible to most people, given the time and effort. Even notoriously brainy subjects like physics or math.
The range of intelligence among humans is not as large as those in power would like you to believe, because just like the chess community, it helps the ruling class legitimize a hierarchy.
Capitalist division of labor increases the intensity of this phenomenon. Specialization of labor increases with technological advance. The more specialized the laborer, the more dependent they become on a web of other specialists, and dependent more broadly on a particular technique of production.
Yet, as technology advances, lines of work “become antiquated before they can ossify.”[1] The means of subsistence for the worker, ie their special expertise and education, is constantly being undermined by the incessant advancement of technology as capitalists chase after additional profits (relative surplus value).
On the one hand, specialization requires significant investment on the part of the worker; they identify with it as an essential aspect of their self. On the other hand, specialization becomes synonymous with precarity: the more specialized one’s expertise, the less easily it can be adapted to new techniques of production.
The result is that workers strongly identify with their skill sets, and find it in their interest to make their expertise as scarce and inaccessible as possible, or at least perceived as such.
The same thing happened with the guild system during feudal times, with the rise of the bourgeoisie which led to reactions by the guilds to artificially restrict knowledge of their trades (consequently restricting production of trade goods) except through official mentorship programs. Modern universities have their origin in the guild system. “Scholastic” guilds worked to advance knowledge as such, analogously to the trade guilds which refined knowledge of their respective trades.
For myself, I’ve been happier to drop this desire to identify with a hobby or career. I’m just a person who has certain skill sets like anyone else. I’m more in touch with my humanity now than I was when I was in school desperately trying to earn the respect to be called a [area of study]ist.
Yeah Mr. Engels that's all well and good, but have you considered neurodivergent people's special interests?
TBH, I think identifying as what I do is kinda healthier than what nationality I am or what religion I am or other similar things.
For myself, I’ve been happier to drop this desire to identify with a hobby or career.
Speak for yourself, I'm a cocaine leftist. my hobby of being a cocaine addict is core to my identity.
to be fair, is anyone who has enough skills in something to be called an [insert respected term]ist getting there without cocaine?
They targeted gamers.Gamers.
We're a group of people who will sit for hours, days, even weeks on end performing some of the hardest, most mentally demanding tasks.
Heh, kid, you take bathroom breaks? It's far more efficient to wear a diaper and sit on one of those puppy pee pads. I basically only have to change myself if i take a boom boom.
Two weird things people assume about me often enough that it's worth mentioning, that is good at chess, cause I'm smart and that I'm Jewish which I think is cause I'm funny and do bring a sort of Larry David vibe to the table. I don't even know how to play chess, I don't know what all the pieces do. And my family are Anglican loyalists who moved to Canada and German Midwesterners who went to Canada instead of the midwest.
However me and another guy at work have started a bit where we call random chess moves to each other at work and occasionally say things like 'ahh! The morrocan gambit, how clever!' to give customers the impression that we're super geniuses
"We need a kid's spaghetti, a mushroom Alfredo, 1 dine in arancini and some sprouts! Rook 2 to pawn 6!"
"Just swapped the oil so the aranchini is gonna take longer than normal! Knight to bishop 1, checkmate!"
"Just crank the fryer for a bit and it'll go faster, just remember to turn it down after, and are you sure about that checkmate?"
"Sorry, check"
"That's fine, it's a busy night. Speaking of busy knight mine takes your rook!"
We spend like 30 hours a week together and have for 3 years now, we are really good at improv with each other by now
I play chess (badly) and this is hilarious.
Now I want to imagine what the Moroccan gambit would be like
Bongcloud
Frenchman's Cumsock
Monkey Bum
Only one of these is made up and the other two are the names of openings used by grandmasters in FIDE sanctioned events.
I think we'll keep going with things that sound like what a 1780s aristocrat might say, anyone who knows chess will catch on to the bit when they notice.were just naming chess pieces and letters and numbers at random. Here's some others we've made up:
The Brussels Wager
The Haliburton Exit (mine, I thought it was clever)
The Barcelona Maneuver
The Antwerp Flank
The Dreaded Parallel Strategem of the Swiss
The Buckaneer Open
The Proto Indo European Midgame Meta
But no seriously two of those are real with wiki pages and everything lol
Lol yeah I believe you, I knew one of them, and I figured the other out. I just didn't want to give the game away
Then he said "more mechanics = more smart" I'm sure there are 6 years olds who can understand why this is false
Go is infinitely more interesting strategically and much more difficult than chess, yet it's simple af.
Child brain, I tell you.
