That's not what I'm saying and you know it. I know firsthand that Marxist ideas are so powerful precisely because they appeal to the lived experience of working people.
I'm saying that for the vast majority of American working people, defeatism and/or apathy are the order of the day when it comes to politics. They see no material gains for themselves by participating in bourgeois politics, and as a result retreat into pop cultural consumption and social media like opiates.
American economic and social infrastructure has been deliberately constructed to destroy the ability for workers to organize and achieve class-consciousness. It is a very deliberate fomentation of reactionary political impulses. This is essentially what Matt's thesis is. Because all "legitimate" American politics have retreated entirely from the economic into the realm of the purely cultural, the reactionary brand of the Republicans has more appeal to the non-college-educated. And in my experience that's correct - the biggest obstacle to the Republicans becoming a legitimate working-class party is their all-but-explicit white supremacy.
I think it is probably bad to broad strokes the "working class" based on education level.
I was responding to this bit you dropped:
Pretty much every working-class person I know is consumed either by conspiratorial thinking/religious mysticism, knee-jerk hostility to government (due to their interactions with government being solely negative), or both.
Which comes across as pretty out of touch and unhelpful.
Otherwise, both democrats and republicans are incredibly reactionary. I'm not sure I see the point here.
I definitely don't think democrats are even kind of aware of their white privilege outside of knowing what the terminology is. They just elected Joe Biden for Christ's sake lol
Is there a benefit to creating another dividing line between college educated and non when talking leftist politics?
Yeah all us people that didn't get no book learning in college actually love to taste the boot-heel of capitalism.
Fuck off. This is classism and you should feel bad for agreeing with it
That's not what I'm saying and you know it. I know firsthand that Marxist ideas are so powerful precisely because they appeal to the lived experience of working people.
I'm saying that for the vast majority of American working people, defeatism and/or apathy are the order of the day when it comes to politics. They see no material gains for themselves by participating in bourgeois politics, and as a result retreat into pop cultural consumption and social media like opiates.
American economic and social infrastructure has been deliberately constructed to destroy the ability for workers to organize and achieve class-consciousness. It is a very deliberate fomentation of reactionary political impulses. This is essentially what Matt's thesis is. Because all "legitimate" American politics have retreated entirely from the economic into the realm of the purely cultural, the reactionary brand of the Republicans has more appeal to the non-college-educated. And in my experience that's correct - the biggest obstacle to the Republicans becoming a legitimate working-class party is their all-but-explicit white supremacy.
I think it is probably bad to broad strokes the "working class" based on education level.
I was responding to this bit you dropped:
Which comes across as pretty out of touch and unhelpful.
Otherwise, both democrats and republicans are incredibly reactionary. I'm not sure I see the point here.
I definitely don't think democrats are even kind of aware of their white privilege outside of knowing what the terminology is. They just elected Joe Biden for Christ's sake lol
Is there a benefit to creating another dividing line between college educated and non when talking leftist politics?
This is where you're missing the point. This isn't discussing "leftist politics" it's discussing American politics, as it actually exists.
Fair enough then. American politics are definitely classist.
Still we shouldn't be looking at this under the idea that all non-college educated working class are stuck in backwards ideas.
Like I don't see the benefit of even platforming that kind of assumption.