Workers (even Union workers) who support the bourgeoisie.

[B5C]

What kind of mind set do these people have who really think it's best to work with the owners?

I currently work for a big retail company who is now opening on thanksgiving. I got into a debate with a guy who is an union, but who believes the state has no right to enforce holidays. He believes if the owner wants to open on Thanksgiving. The workers must accept it because it is what the owner wishes or the workers can sell their labour somewhere else.

[Jack]

Identifying with your oppressors.

"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires."

[Yuppie Grinder]

No worker thinks to themselves "Bourgeois rule sure is swell I like this an awful lot". Its just most people don't think of things in terms of class struggle.

[cynicles]

There's also the fact that 40% of the possible voting population doesn't vote or take part in the political system, not surprisingly the majority of which are either working class, poor, or young.

[Eleutheromaniac]

Identifying with your oppressors.

"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires."

I know a whole lot of people who think that socialism is a good idea, but don't think it will work because "American capitalism is obviously the best system". They agree that it has flaws but refuse to acknowledge that there could be a better alternative.

[GoddessCleoLover]

I worked in the retail trade for a number of years and found that while a minority of workers identified with the bourgeoisie, the majority did not. Perhaps this particular worker is a management wannabe.

[Jimmie Higgins]

What kind of mind set do these people have who really think it's best to work with the owners?

I currently work for a big retail company who is now opening on thanksgiving. I got into a debate with a guy who is an union, but who believes the state has no right to enforce holidays. He believes if the owner wants to open on Thanksgiving. The workers must accept it because it is what the owner wishes or the workers can sell their labour somewhere else.

Well most people aren't thinking abstractly like: which economic relations would lead to the best kind of life. Rather they begin by seeing things as they are and our rulers don't so much spend time trying to make capitalism itself seem like the best thing ever (they tend to do it through nationalism, so it's less apparent because they can say "All our interests as X country" rather than "well we should do this because it will be great for the banks or trade or whatnot" as they try and make the current order of the world seem natural and permanent.

So once you accept that "this is the way things are" then you begin to internalize the system and think in terms of what is best given this set-up. So for some that means they will only go as far as reformism under stable times, others will believe the hype and think, well if this is the system we got, let's make sure it's working "like it's supposed to" and so you get people supporting libertarianism or big business itself.

Crisis and even more-so revolt shake the sense of permanence and "naturalness" of the system and so this is part of the reason time periods where this is happening tend to produce rapid changes in political consciousness - not always for the best, but it opens the potential for workers to break free from the logic of the system.

[ComradeScientist]

To answer the OP's question my own understanding is it stems from the false notion of upward mobility of the working class. They believe that they can move up to the strata of the bourgeois and benefit from their own former concessions. The bourgeois of course want to foster this idea because its purely beneficial to themselves as they are better able to extract the marginal value of the workers labor when the worker willing gives into these demands.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I think some people honestly are convinced the rich deserve it or know better. I think young people may think they will become rich later, college students etc, but I don't think a working class tea-party supporter really thinks he's going to be a billionaire someday. That being said, I think the tea-party attracts far more petty-bourgois professionals and small owners and people like that than it does the manufacturing or low level white collar workers not to mention service workers - and the demographic statistics back this up.

But at any rate I think many people buy into trickle-down or even that the rich deserve it, because most workers have few illusions about becoming rich in my experience. People began buying into the stock market hype in the 1990s, but I think a lot of those illusions have been shattered.

[Rafiq]

False consciousness

[GoddessCleoLover]

False consciousness which is reinforced by hundreds of years of cultural hegemony. The bourgeoisie benefits from inheriting centuries of institutions of obedience to the rulers and the wealthy, customs derived not only from feudalism, but going back to antiquity and codified in each of the world's major religions.

[Marxaveli]

Jack said it best.

This is beyond false consciousness at this point, this is straight up STOCKHOLM SYNDROME, the worst and most advanced degree of false consciousness that one can suffer from. It's bordering on psychosis almost, really.

[p0is0n]

False consciousness which is reinforced by hundreds of years of cultural hegemony. The bourgeoisie benefits from inheriting centuries of institutions of obedience to the rulers and the wealthy, customs derived not only from feudalism, but going back to antiquity and codified in each of the world's major religions.

Couldn't have said it better.

I think one certain quote by Luxemburg is in order:

"Those who do not move, do not notice their chains"