I live in a fairly conservative area that’s working class.
People intuitively understand when you describe how much capitalism sucks because they’re living it.
If you say “capitalism sucks”, you are going to get reactionary thought and action. You have to say things in a way to engage their experience and understanding without tripping the propagandized brain worms.
If you can do that, you’ll find that they’re primed to reject capitalism, they just don’t know it yet.
“These rich fuckers don’t give a shit about us, but they have no problems helping each other out.”
“Everybody’s boss is the same, they want you to work harder, more hours, and do it all for less money. They want us to be able to barely survive.”
“The only way we can make them change is to all work together. They’ll screw over each one of us individually, but if we’re together they’ll know it’s actually them who needs us.”
To my endless frustration leftwing thought and policy is popular until someone knows it’s left wing.
I spend so much time talking to people and skirting around terminology/avoiding describing things in clear terms because they set off alarm bells.
As you say everyone gets that we’re screwed and pitted against each other while dipshits up top have their snouts in the trough. There is a spectrum on how far we ought to go to address this but it’s also really hard to get any action out of people because they’ll nod along until you try point them at a union or something and then the propaganda kicks in.
If you say “capitalism sucks”, you are going to get reactionary thought and action. You have to say things in a way to engage their experience and understanding without tripping the propagandized brain worms.
Extending your metaphor, this is what your average American’s brain looks like. There is a lot of propaganda and social conditioning working against you here.
Extending even farther, there’s nothing especially different about the American brain. Propaganda and social conditioning are natural to human cognitive bias and on the other side of the coin is our ability to learn.
Now the environment of conditioning and propaganda may be another story.
Shame is also important. Laugh at these people. Call them idiots and treat them like children when they start talking about politics. Shame is a great motivator and was a big part of my transition to anti-capitalism. Not joking.
Guilt helps people change. Shame gets them to more deeply entrench themselves into their current behaviors because they’re going to seek out ways to alleviate that shame through social connections that alleviate the pain of shame. The thing to understand is that guilt is a feeling of wrong doing, and shame is a feeling of lacking social value. When deprogramming someone from their previously held propagandized views, you have to give them an avenue to travel from their current position to where they are going. They need the opportunity to apologize and make amends. This is the process for atonement.
All that said, you also have to not give out too many chances. That just lets people continue to perpetuate their harm. If someone shows no sign of being willing to go through the atonement process you have to find ways to keep your community safe from the things that they do. How to do that is a discussion for another forum. Mostly in person discussions in mutual aid or community defense space, as this process is also context dependent.
I live in a fairly conservative area that’s working class.
People intuitively understand when you describe how much capitalism sucks because they’re living it.
If you say “capitalism sucks”, you are going to get reactionary thought and action. You have to say things in a way to engage their experience and understanding without tripping the propagandized brain worms.
If you can do that, you’ll find that they’re primed to reject capitalism, they just don’t know it yet.
“These rich fuckers don’t give a shit about us, but they have no problems helping each other out.”
“Everybody’s boss is the same, they want you to work harder, more hours, and do it all for less money. They want us to be able to barely survive.”
“The only way we can make them change is to all work together. They’ll screw over each one of us individually, but if we’re together they’ll know it’s actually them who needs us.”
To my endless frustration leftwing thought and policy is popular until someone knows it’s left wing.
I spend so much time talking to people and skirting around terminology/avoiding describing things in clear terms because they set off alarm bells.
As you say everyone gets that we’re screwed and pitted against each other while dipshits up top have their snouts in the trough. There is a spectrum on how far we ought to go to address this but it’s also really hard to get any action out of people because they’ll nod along until you try point them at a union or something and then the propaganda kicks in.
Extending your metaphor, this is what your average American’s brain looks like. There is a lot of propaganda and social conditioning working against you here.
I know the gif isn’t from Entrament, but it reminded me of this.
https://youtube.com/shorts/i3_76dZBD-U
Extending even farther, there’s nothing especially different about the American brain. Propaganda and social conditioning are natural to human cognitive bias and on the other side of the coin is our ability to learn.
Now the environment of conditioning and propaganda may be another story.
GOOD post
This! You can’t teach someone without appealing to their lived experiences and current understanding of the material conditions.
Well said, and thanks for including some examples at the end!
Shame is also important. Laugh at these people. Call them idiots and treat them like children when they start talking about politics. Shame is a great motivator and was a big part of my transition to anti-capitalism. Not joking.
That’s close, but not quite correct
Guilt helps people change. Shame gets them to more deeply entrench themselves into their current behaviors because they’re going to seek out ways to alleviate that shame through social connections that alleviate the pain of shame. The thing to understand is that guilt is a feeling of wrong doing, and shame is a feeling of lacking social value. When deprogramming someone from their previously held propagandized views, you have to give them an avenue to travel from their current position to where they are going. They need the opportunity to apologize and make amends. This is the process for atonement.
All that said, you also have to not give out too many chances. That just lets people continue to perpetuate their harm. If someone shows no sign of being willing to go through the atonement process you have to find ways to keep your community safe from the things that they do. How to do that is a discussion for another forum. Mostly in person discussions in mutual aid or community defense space, as this process is also context dependent.
In my experience belittling and shaming disenfranchised people results in them harboring deeper resentment.
Obviously mileage varies. It worked for you, but not everyone is willing or able to do self crit in response to their beliefs being attacked.
Many times people need to come to the shameful realization themselves.