Hypermasculinity, Revolving Doors and Consumer Debt (Hillbilly Book Club 4, with Viewers' Comments)

[@zukov85]

Laurie, thanks for being that one special teacher to me and I am sure many others! I have been through academia and found it rotten all the way through. Practical and social skills are the way to go I think. Welding, baking, farming, plumbing - trades that all communities need and skills that cant be taken away. Nothing wrong with the gym either, society is dangerously undermuscled actually and rigorous daily physical training is a perfect compliment for intellectual persuits. As far as I know PLATO was actually a champion wrestler. We are all as strong as our weakest link.

[@ljpolitical-philosophy]

You are welcome--thanks for listening and taking the time to comment! I agree about fitness--if it's put in perspective it helps you think rather than becoming the single-minded focus, absolutely.

[@numbersix8919]

My dearest cousin, a rock-ribbed liberal and petite-bourgeois, after his business failed, worked as a unionized supermarket employee. How he hated to see people on food stamps buying lobster! How he agonized over it! Bless his memory, the poor man.

[@Barklord]

@numbersix8919 That anecdote rings true for many people I know as well. Many people in the petite bourgeoisie are unaware of the degree to which government (society) works on their behalf while firmly believing in their own economic individualism. It's interesting to note that while Kamala Harris is being labelled a "Kammunist," she is also promising money for future small business owners. This shifts the incentives of voters more toward maintaining capitalist interests (instead of working class politics) while also signaling help for the wage-workers by aligning with Tim Walz. There's an unacknowledged contradiction in American political economy in the modern Democratic party, which they can't hide anymore. The Republicans seem like their entire project is to create unintelligible discourse around every subject so as to prevent solidarity.

[@numbersix8919]

@Barklord MLK's Letter from a Birmingham Jail opened my eyes to the reality of so-called liberals.

[@Barklord]

​@@numbersix8919 Yep. I've actually been reading James Baldwin's collected essays lately. Amazing stuff!

[@ljpolitical-philosophy]

It is interesting how openly Democrats now proudly communicate to the public like regular Republicans from about 30 years ago, when Republicans said they cared about small and medium businesses. If that's communism, we're through the looking glass (and we are). The truth is the rightward pull of the Republican Party and their popularity of late has consistently pulled Democrats to the right, but since no one seems to know what "communism" even means, they can still be labeled as such because they support, at least superficially, issues such as LGBTQ rights.

[@Barklord]

Interesting topics. I haven't read Hillbilly Elegy. The growing number of BS bureaucratic jobs probably contributes to status-quo inertia because more people become aligned with corporate interests and then vote accordingly. Layers of bureaucracy help insulate the power structure from reforms.

[@ljpolitical-philosophy]

Absolutely agree--that's exactly how it functions, which isn't to say someone consciously set it up that way, but it's certainly one of the reasons it continually grows even though it actually gets in the way of the purported mission of the organization, whatever it is.

[@emilianosintarias7337]

It's interesting how the learning to fight, stoicism, and weightlifting aren't considered unpaid labor or a double shift by feminists. The truth nobody wants to say is that most men aren't trying to be tough to impress their dear old track coach or make dad proud - it's for women judgement on one hand, and to get ready for a life with much less protection from the tiny minority of truly violent men (and even women in the case of SA), and from the state, than women enjoy. Men are far more likely to try to aid or save others, even dying doing so. They work an unpaid security detail for life around women and children. Men are far and away the majority of violence victims, despite far less than a tenth of 1 percent of them being violent themselves. 3/4 of men in prison, wouldn't be there if their cases were identical, except they were women. Nothing will change until we grasp that both sexes face serious pressures, unfreedoms, and dangers.

[@numbersix8919]

Good point Dr Laurie, about that possible lasting harm that JD may have suffered. Makes me sort of re-think Clinton (with his sexual acting-out) and maybe even a superstar like Condoleezza.

[@ljpolitical-philosophy]

Yes, when you think about it, how unbalanced do you have to be to think it's a good idea to have your affair with the intern while you're president of the United States, and in the Oval Office?