Societal Stockholm syndrome?

[Karl Marx's Camel]

Is the proletariat and the peasantry in the world suffering from societal Stockholm syndrome?

Discuss.

[Rawthentic]

Im not sure what the hell societal Stockholm syndrome is. Explain it and we'll be sure to discuss it.

[Zeruzo]

Originally posted by [email protected] 18 2006, 10:16 PM
Im not sure what the hell societal Stockholm syndrome is. Explain it and we'll be sure to discuss it.
It's sympathy for the person that has kidnapped you.

[which doctor]

Or as in the case NWOG is describing, sympathy from the proletarians and peasants to their rulers, the government.

It's an interesting observation, I've never thought about it before.

[Demogorgon]

Now that is an excellent theory. And one I have never even thought of before. Definitely something worth very serious consideration.

My main doubt about it right now is I am not sure the working class feels out and out love or sympathy to the ruing classes. Just apathy.

[Rawthentic]

Oh ok. NWOG, no, the workers of the world do not suffer from the syndrome. They do not hold sympathy for their oppressors. If they are not hostile to them at this period in time, then it is because the historical conditions have not yet been reached, or the social consciousness.

[midnight marauder]

In many countries, I suppose you could say that the OP is true, in effect.

But this isn't as a result of a psychological quirk, it's the result of the natural discourse of states and of rulers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony

I need to read more Gramsci.

[blake 3:17]

Yeah, I think the theory is alright. We're taught our whole lives that those who oppress us act they way they do because they love us. Children are continually physically and verbally assaulted with only the most extreme cases coming to light.

How often do adults say, "Because I said so"? What's the difference between child-adult, worker-boss or prisoner-captor relationships?

[midnight marauder]

Great post, comrade.

[Don't Change Your Name]

Well, I guess something like this happens in very small businesses when workers have a better relationship with their bosses and more sympathy for them.

[Leo]

Well, this concept is called False Consciousness in Marxism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness


False consciousness is a Marxist hypothesis that material and institutional processes in capitalist society mislead the proletariat — and perhaps the other classes — over the nature of capitalism. This is essentially ideological control, which the proletariat do not know they are under.

There are many different kinds of false consciousness; national consciousness, trade union consciousness, individualist consciousness, cultural consciousness, identity consciousness etc. etc. Yet false consciousness is replaced by actual proletarian class consciousness when the working class is struggling for its basic daily needs.

[Lamanov]

Well, not a very "theoretical" concept, but not quite inaccurate, so it could be used rhetorically.

[Janus]

I don't think that ordinary workers actually identify with their bosses or the ruling class to any major extent except for those who seek to emulate them. Rather the issue is that some of them have given in to the system to a degree and have tried to justify its existence with certain irrational views similar to what victims go through.

[blake 3:17]

I won't get into the whole of the 'false consciousness' debate (there are real problems around elitist notions of Truth stratification within both the international and national working classes) but it needs to be acknowledged that vast numbers of working people do identify with the bosses one way or the other.

For socialists the problem is then how to break this relationship and create a democratic egalitarian political and cultural alternative. There's no single answer to this.

[Leo]

I won't get into the whole of the 'false consciousness' debate (there are real problems around elitist notions of Truth stratification within both the international and national working classes

Well, false consciousness debate is not about notions of truth really, it is about class consciousness against national consciousness or religious consciousness etc.

[jamieaskew]

Hi I'm new to everything. Just thought I'd mention that.
I do believe that the prolatariat are very much suffering from societal stokholm syndrome (lovely soundbite by the way). You cannot argue that they are waiting for the right time to stage a revolution, that's absurd. They love our country, all they can compare it too are the inpoverish nations in Africa and the old communist regimes which weren't as successful as maybe we'd like to think. The American working classes are the ones who step up first to fight and die for their nation, the one that has oppressed them so much.

[Karl Marx's Camel]

It seems the theory (or rather the name) has been touched upon before??


For example, Societal Stockholm Syndrome theory explains why many women oppose the Equal Rights Amendment, why most women reject the very theory - feminism - which espouses women's point of view and seeks to increase women's rights, why women work so hard to connect to men when it would be so much easier to get our needs for connection met by other women, why many women have a 'love addiction," and why women love men in the face of men's violence against us." pages xiv-xv

Also:

http://web2.airmail.net/ktrig246/out_of_cave/sss.html

http://www.google.no/search?client=firefox...Google-s%C3%B8k (http://www.google.no/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&channel=s&hl=no&q=++Graham+Stockholm+syndrome&meta=&btnG=Google-s%C3%B8k)


It seems the name has been mentioned "before", but it has been in connection to the feminist movement and women-men relationship, not class struggle.

[manic expression]

If you talk to many workers (especially in the US) today, they will oftentimes feel no ill-will toward those who are extremely wealthy (including the bourgeoisie) at all. Why? Because they think that the rich "got what they deserved", they believe that the bourgeoisie "earned" what they have. It is the delusional belief that the bourgeoisie DESERVE their position that is the problem.

If anyone's read "Nickel and Dimed", there's a telling quote from a woman who works as a maid (which is really, really hard work) about this:

"This is the answer from Lori, who at twenty-four has a serious disk problem and an $8,000 credit card debt: 'All I can think of is like, wow, I'd like to have this stuff someday. It motivates me and I don't fell the slightest resentment because, you know, it's my goal to get to where they are.''" (pg. 118)

THAT is the pervading mentality of the American worker today.

So, really, I would say that this is some sort of Stockholm Syndrome, although not exactly the same. The bourgeoisie are admired by those they exploit and oppress.

I would term it "Horatio Alger Syndrome".

[Luís Henrique]

And then there is the strange phenomenon of popular worship of murderous tyrants - Ivan the Terrible, Juán Domingo Perón, Stalin, Lampião, Vlad Drakul, the Taliban, and so on. As if the reasoning was, "well, as long as they do to the rich at least a fraction of what they do to us, it is some kind of justice".

Luís Henrique

[Hit The North]

Tony Cliff was fond of saying: "On this side of the revolution, the revolutionaries are in the minority." In other words, ideas can change very quickly in revolutionary situations and workers who had illusions in nationalism and reformism suddenly become internationalist and revolutionary in spirit and action. Suddenly, those minority ideas held by us Communists become popular and motivational. They acquire a social force which was completely absent before the revolution.

This is because the level of class consciousness is linked to the level of class struggle. Workers take on the revolutionary transformation of society only when it becomes apparent that the ruling class cannot solve society's problems. At that point, revolutionary ideas are in the ascendancy.

False consciousness is a normal part of the operations of a relatively stable capitalism and we should realize that we will be a tiny minority in those circumstances. Our strength lies in the fact that we know that capitalism cannot maintain stability.