Thoughts on production, alienation, and ideology
I’m sure some readers know about the planned ‘general strike’ on October 15. Or is it a fake strike? At least, many know that a group claims it’s planning one. Is it really planning one? Maybe. Probably not. Will there be a general strike on October 15?
No.
And that’s my topic for today. In fact, the October 15 event looks like a fake strike. I want to talk for a bit about the ‘fake strike‘: why it keeps happening, what it means, and what it says about the left.
So, many of us already know that the concept of ‘generations’ is just something marketing agencies cooked up to better sell products and services. Companies needed to understand broad trends. Trends tend to vary by age. Then, toss in some science and buzzwords. Stir. Out comes ‘Baby Boomers,’ ‘Millennials,’ and so on.
But companies also use this wicked troll to sell business ideology. And they do it through creating those fun little listicles. Here’s a link to one that I’ll use as my starting point for this one.
Let’s suppose you’re a manager of Millennial workers, and they’re catching on to your bullshit. What can you do about it?
I regularly criticize leftist electoralism. Usually that criticism concerns strategic blunders and naive campaigns. I’m going to return to this topic in a couple of ways. First, I’m going to (once again) clear up some misconceptions about class and voting. After that, in a second post, I’ll address the left’s flawed view of the electorate.
So, we know there’s a huge political space in the U.S. to the left of Joe Biden. Many of the groups in this space talk about how to build a political majority. Progressives talk about building a coalition majority. Leftists talk about building a working-class majority.
The DSA uses the term ‘multiracial working class’ to get at its target political group. But this term raises as many questions as it answers. Each DSA faction adopts it, and then uses it in varying ways.
Where does this leave us? We don’t know what a working-class majority looks like. At least, not in any settled way. Some leftists seem to think it’s already there for the taking. Others think we need to do far more work to form it. In this post, I’ll see what the data can tell us. Is there a working-class majority out there? What does a working-class majority look like?
The business literature often tells us that most people don’t like their jobs. Business leaders take a mixed attitude toward this. But what they don’t like – and what the literature also shows – is workers who are actively disengaged from their work. Among other things, disengaged workers show less productivity.
This doesn’t interest me much. As a leftist, though, I’m a lot more interested in the kind of advice the literature provides. It usually recommends a kind of propaganda campaign aimed at workers. These campaigns try to tell workers they have good jobs. They try to get workers more excited and engaged.
Maybe. But, as we know, work won’t love you back. A recent book even tells us as much. Many of us – especially white-collar workers – might consider a different strategy. Why not work a merely tolerable job, complete it quickly and efficiently, and then organize in our own time?
I think lots of people run some version of this playbook. They work a regular job and then organize with the DSA, for example.
Any readers have luck with this strategy?
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