Great piece once again Scarlet! This one speaks directly to something I've been thinking about a lot more in recent memory: mindset and priorities within the context of a capitalist system. I knew I had to reference this quote from you when I read it in your piece, because it describes this so perfectly:
"Instead of making sure wealth is distributed fairly, and that government provides a social safety net that gives some semblance of stability to workers, society can tolerate wealth disparity so long as these divine benefactors contribute some share of their largesse to the plights created by their existence."
If the existence of billionaires was truly a "net-positive for society", then why are we seeing disparities between the wealthy and workers perpetually increase? Why aren't they devoting themselves to truly transforming the world in positive ways with their immense capital, power, and influence? I think when we start to ask these kinds of questions, we start to understand where the priorities of billionaires truly lie, and the mindsets they wield in order to maintain them. Your point about the Trump administration ripping the mask off is a good one to make as well. Ideally, the more people are able to see what has been lying beneath the floorboards for quite some time now, the more we can provide space for that consciousness to organically grow and cultivate. I also really liked this point as well:
"While not all billionaires envision technofuturist torture devices for the bulk of humanity, every single one of them exists at the expense of the rest of us. Literally. Every single one is not just a policy failure but a consequence of the system itself."
I can often become too comfortable with my billionaire governor of Illinois, JB Pritzker. I appreciate that he's not as openly rabid as the likes of Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, but as you articulated really well, they "exist at the expense of the rest of us." You don't make billions by pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and I believe that as we continue on into the Trump administration, that'll become clear for a larger group of people. It won't be easy and the "bro-ligarch" angle from Democrats will certainly take root and hinder that effort, but as you said to perfectly tie this piece together in the end, "It is our duty as workers, as humans, to throw off our shackles reclaim this world from the parasites who would tear it asunder."
I've written similarly themed pieces like The Obama Era is Over where I make the case that Obama ran on radical progressiveism then once in office moved to the center and aligned with the donor class selling out his progressive voters.
Then in my post The Death of the Democratic Party I talk about how Bernie Sanders ran on the same radical progressiveism Obama first won on then abandoned, but there was an oligarch- backed Never-Bernie movement among Democratic Party elites where they pushed a culture war To replace economic reform as the focus of the Democratic Party while engaging in anti-democratic tactics to prevent Bernie from winning the nomination.
Then lastly in my post The Progressive Party of America I wrote that the progressive wing of the Democratic Party aligned with Bernie Sanders economic ideology need to take over the democrats to start a genuine left-wing economic populist party. The progressive need to issue an ultimatum: it's either us or the billionaires and corporate lobbyists, not both.
“Motivated by profit, self-serving by nature, billionaires should be nowhere near societal governance or world-impacting decision making. In times of crisis, especially when human welfare or human lives may be in the balance, billionaires should not even be allowed in the room.” —The Billionaire Condemnation Society
Great piece once again Scarlet! This one speaks directly to something I've been thinking about a lot more in recent memory: mindset and priorities within the context of a capitalist system. I knew I had to reference this quote from you when I read it in your piece, because it describes this so perfectly:
"Instead of making sure wealth is distributed fairly, and that government provides a social safety net that gives some semblance of stability to workers, society can tolerate wealth disparity so long as these divine benefactors contribute some share of their largesse to the plights created by their existence."
If the existence of billionaires was truly a "net-positive for society", then why are we seeing disparities between the wealthy and workers perpetually increase? Why aren't they devoting themselves to truly transforming the world in positive ways with their immense capital, power, and influence? I think when we start to ask these kinds of questions, we start to understand where the priorities of billionaires truly lie, and the mindsets they wield in order to maintain them. Your point about the Trump administration ripping the mask off is a good one to make as well. Ideally, the more people are able to see what has been lying beneath the floorboards for quite some time now, the more we can provide space for that consciousness to organically grow and cultivate. I also really liked this point as well:
"While not all billionaires envision technofuturist torture devices for the bulk of humanity, every single one of them exists at the expense of the rest of us. Literally. Every single one is not just a policy failure but a consequence of the system itself."
I can often become too comfortable with my billionaire governor of Illinois, JB Pritzker. I appreciate that he's not as openly rabid as the likes of Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, but as you articulated really well, they "exist at the expense of the rest of us." You don't make billions by pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and I believe that as we continue on into the Trump administration, that'll become clear for a larger group of people. It won't be easy and the "bro-ligarch" angle from Democrats will certainly take root and hinder that effort, but as you said to perfectly tie this piece together in the end, "It is our duty as workers, as humans, to throw off our shackles reclaim this world from the parasites who would tear it asunder."
Thanks for another fantastic read Scarlet!
Really great article!
I've written similarly themed pieces like The Obama Era is Over where I make the case that Obama ran on radical progressiveism then once in office moved to the center and aligned with the donor class selling out his progressive voters.
Then in my post The Death of the Democratic Party I talk about how Bernie Sanders ran on the same radical progressiveism Obama first won on then abandoned, but there was an oligarch- backed Never-Bernie movement among Democratic Party elites where they pushed a culture war To replace economic reform as the focus of the Democratic Party while engaging in anti-democratic tactics to prevent Bernie from winning the nomination.
Then lastly in my post The Progressive Party of America I wrote that the progressive wing of the Democratic Party aligned with Bernie Sanders economic ideology need to take over the democrats to start a genuine left-wing economic populist party. The progressive need to issue an ultimatum: it's either us or the billionaires and corporate lobbyists, not both.
“Motivated by profit, self-serving by nature, billionaires should be nowhere near societal governance or world-impacting decision making. In times of crisis, especially when human welfare or human lives may be in the balance, billionaires should not even be allowed in the room.” —The Billionaire Condemnation Society