The Depoliticized Working class/ Money can't buy happiness (2 questions)

[smk]

Why is the working class of America so seemingly EDIT:accepting of their situation? They seem so depoliticized and unaffected to the real issues. As far as I can tell there is a general sentiment that the status quo is the only way and that there is nothing strange about working 80 hrs/week just to get by. have they just become so brainwashed with the capitalist rhetoric that they don't even wonder if there is something wrong with the way the world works? to me, this is a fundamental question that I need answered. I don't think class consciousness is the issue. It is that they seem to be okay with their understanding of their class.

In addition, It seems that material wealth has little to do with happiness (I know ive been told that since 1st grade, but I didnt believe it until I actually started looking at the world.) and if happiness, as I understand it, is really the end goal of every endeavor, what is the significance in. Trying to increase the working class's material wealth if it doesn't correlate well with happiness (http://www.cornelldailysun.com/section/opinion/content/2011/04/25/money-cant-buy-happiness)? This seems to fuck up my entire understanding of right and wrong

I don't mean to sound anti-socialist/pro-status-quo, because I'm really not. I'm just trying to find the best way to increase global happiness. Any help would be really appreciated. I'm just hopelessly confused at this point. Sorry for putting two questions in one thread.

(also please don't restrict me, mods!)

[Dunk]

As long as the majority of working Americans consider themselves "middle class", I think it's a sure bet they're not conscious of their class position. I also think the struggles against the anti-union/austerity onslaught is an example of working Americans who are not OK with the status quo.

Material wealth may not be the sole source of happiness, but in today's world, it sure as hell seems to strongly correlate with it.

[jake williams]

Why is the working class of America so seemingly content with their situation?
Who the fuck are you talking to who is content with their situation? I don't really know any working class people who are content with their situation. There are virtually unlimited public opinion polls in the US demonstrating that American workers are well aware that their class is losing what little political and economic power early 20th century victories were able to obtain.

That said, most people aren't centrally focused on politics most of the time. Most people - including, probably, most committed revolutionary leftists - are mostly concerned about getting by day-to-day, their friends and loved ones, hobbies, work, and trying to find joy, or at least comfort, in their lives, considerably more than they are about politics. That's just life.

Of course it doesn't help that the political and organizational strength of the US working class in particular has been falling for some time; that right wing, anti-political and anti-working class propaganda, both private and state, has only consolidated over the past century; that the left and the labour movement have fallen victim to reformism and revisionism; that fascist and religious fundamentalist movements have out-manoeuvered us; that public schools are deteriorating and the only "solutions" are coming from the ultra-right; the betrayal of right-wing unions; the international situation; the decline of good manufacturing jobs; and so on and so forth.

There are very good reasons that the average worker you meet on the street isn't going to be a revolutionary socialist, reasons that have nothing to do with the fact that it's not just in their abstract, long-term class interest but if done properly, in their immediate interests. We have a fuck of a lot of work to do. It's called "class struggle" for a reason.

[smk]

Who the fuck are you talking to who is content with their situation?

Thanks for the reply. I think content was the wrong word to use. I meant maybe "accepting of their situation"

[jake williams]

Thanks for the reply. I think content was the wrong word to use. I meant maybe "accepting of their situation"
Fair enough. I think in that case the short answer is because people haven't been given serious alternatives and they've given up hope.

[Hebrew Hammer]

Speaking for myself, I was and am not content with my situation which was my primary reason for looking into Socialism and Communism. I think people in America mainly think that Socialism/Communism would lead them into even more poverty, that it failed and would lead to an even worse situation than say, voting for the right President who will just cure this nation like some voodoo witchdoctor. I completely agree with whomever said most people are just concerned with getting through their day to day. Making it work on time, making sure you get enough food to were you don't feel like your starving but saving enough for tomorrow so you won't have to buy more and waste rent money, getting rent money, providing for their families or significant other and other such things. Politics usually comes second to this and due to American hegemony, reformism is usually seen as the answer. I mean all you're taught in school is that Socialism lead the working class into an even worse situation than before the revolution. Even though, even before I looked into Socialism, I had some vague ideas of a better system and a better way of life which were vaguely Socialist. The seeds of class consciousness are there.

Not to mention, all the while thinking possibly, maybe, somehow, they might achieve the American dream of becoming rich and famous. I'm still holding out that I might eventually win the lottery and all my worries will be solved, why I play it.

[Sixiang]

jammoe pretty much hit the nail on the head.

It doesn't help that the working class doesn't actually see itself as the proletariat and the capitalists as the bourgeoisie. They call each other rich, poor, lower, middle and upper class, and so forth. They measure their status by income, home ownership and size, and so other things.

The education system in America is entirely bourgeois influenced. Workers' movements in the past are either looked down upon or are regarded as "important for the time, but not relevant anymore." The impact of the "red scare" and propaganda to try to convince people that bourgeois values like individualism and nationalism are right have helped to weaken the revolutionary socialist movement as well.

Amid all of this, I still see hope, though. I see potential for unionization and spreading of discussion on international, revolutionary socialism in America.

But like jammoe said, people are spending so much time worrying about their jobs, family, friends, paying bills, and just living that there doesn't seem to be too much time to read Marx and company. I find it hard to spend what little free time I have on studying Marxism between work, school, and "living" these days.

[Old Mole]

Constant oppression has the consequence that the oppressed develops the belief that it is natural, unchangeable. But the bosses are always trying to think about new ways to fuck with the working class, this a necessity due to the laws of capitalism (the tendency of the rate of profit to fall for example). People have a tendency to question the legitimacy of their rulers when they rule to worsen the situation of said people. This means that every struggle, when carried with some success, means the opportunity for workers to realize the historical role of their class and transcend the boundaries of the laws of the present system. On the other hand capital has a large number of fairly advanced techniques to counter resistance, and they have all the power. If Marx's Capital has learnt us anything then it should be that the capitalists can control nearly everything in the production process with surgical precision, except for the element that is the workers, their struggle is built into the system because of the inherent contradictions in the sphere of production. You shouldnt ask yourself whether the workers fight or not, you should ask yourself how and were and why they arent winning. You dont need to have read Marx to shoplift, to sabotage production, to strike, to squat, to riot etc. This is not sufficient to make capitalism collapse of course. But I think that the starting point of creating strong working class organization is looking at the how we can develop the struggles the workers are presently engaged in. Not go around an whine about how they are brainwashed by the ideology of the bourgeoisie and hence dont act in the way some leftist deem correct. Because attacking ideology is often extremely inefficient, while attacking its material basis is often so more easy.

[Pioneers_Violin]

It's soapbox time...:D

Attention! Americans!
If you have to work for a living.....
You Are NOT "Middle Class", "Upper Middle Class" or "Lower Middle Class"!
You are "Working" Class. Proletariat. Be happy for it.

Your Employers, who live off of the efforts of your and your co-workers hard work are the "Middle Class" or perhaps the "Ruling Class", depending on who you work for. Let's just call them "Bourgeois"

Your Employer, Manager or otherwise "superior" is your ADVERSARY. He/she/they/it are not your friend(s).
Here is your Adversity:
You want: fair pay, hours and conditions,
They want: free, expendable slave labor.

Why doesn't anyone seem to understand this? :confused:
I've used the above paragraph a few times as I'm a part-time Union rabble-rouser.


Does anyone else know any really rich people? I know a few. One of their poor, wretched outcast children lived on my sofa for a while so I eventually got to meet the family and their rich friends. They're all completely crazy and miserable, exactly like old Soviet propaganda depicts them.
A lot of them accumulated money to find happiness and it just concentrates their unhappiness!

Money cannot buy happiness, but it's hard to do things that make us happy without some of it in todays modern America.

2¢

[blake 3:17]

Why is the working class of America so seemingly EDIT:accepting of their situation? They seem so depoliticized and unaffected to the real issues. As far as I can tell there is a general sentiment that the status quo is the only way and that there is nothing strange about working 80 hrs/week just to get by. have they just become so brainwashed with the capitalist rhetoric that they don't even wonder if there is something wrong with the way the world works? to me, this is a fundamental question that I need answered. I don't think class consciousness is the issue. It is that they seem to be okay with their understanding of their class.


This is a pretty massive question that I won't start to answer. From a Left perspective on the US, I think Mike Davis and Piven & Cloward have done some of the best work. I can get you references if you'd like.


In addition, It seems that material wealth has little to do with happiness (I know ive been told that since 1st grade, but I didnt believe it until I actually started looking at the world.) and if happiness, as I understand it, is really the end goal of every endeavor, what is the significance in. Trying to increase the working class's material wealth if it doesn't correlate well with happiness (http://www.cornelldailysun.com/secti...uy-happiness)? (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.cornelldailysun.com/section/opinion/content/2011/04/25/money-cant-buy-happiness)?) This seems to fuck up my entire understanding of right and wrong

This is tricky territory and there are a few different knee jerk responses that people on the Left tend to have. From a class perspective, immediate social and economic demands should be around full employment, universal access to good quality public services and a reduction in the work week. One of the problems of people working crazy over time is getting lost in work.

Once one can meet many fairly basic survival/subsistence and social necessities, I don't think wealth or wages contribute all that much to being happy. A sense of belonging, being part of a community, friendships, meaningful free time, health all matter more.

Edited to add: None of the above is to dismiss the need for labour, social movement or political organization for oppressed and exploited people.