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/r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

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Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#341

Post by shakes_mcjunkie »

the_snooze wrote: post #160
shakes_mcjunkie wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say literally the same thing about any political slogan. For example, please explain "government accountability" or "serve the people"? That literally could be anything. Another example, "Medicare for All", pretty straight forward, but what does it look like as a policy? https://www.propublica.org/article/medicare-for-all-is-not-m... Or "Make American Great Again" or "Build Back Better". Any slogan can be q…

>Make American Great Again I think this is a really good example of an effective slogan, both in Reagan's initial use and later Trump's. It has some really critical properties: it's easy to comprehend, while also nimble enough to fit anyone's notions, and you can't argue against it directly. If you have to direct people to "Google it," then your slogan is a non-starter. I'm not a marketing expert (hence the rather dr…

My point about "Make America Great Again" is anyone can be like "I don't get it what does it mean though?" which happened a lot from liberals and left for this slogan specifically. Conservatives get the benefit of being easily aligned around their leaders and values, so sure "Make America Great Again" works really well in that context where everyone wants pretty much the same thing.

"Defund the Police" had a specific meaning which was to actually defund the police but, as with any actual implementation, when you get to the specifics people have a lot of different views and opinions. I don't think you combat that by making a better slogan, I think you just deal with it. The handwringing over what "Defund the Police" means was a huge distraction IMO and mostly bad actors who disagreed with the premise fundamentally and weren't looking for real ways to implement policies.

> If it makes sense to demand a lot of accountability at a high standard from teachers (and teacher unions), then the very same demands should be put on police (and police unions). Use the same exact messaging.

Okay, what's the exact, unquestionable slogan you would use here? Good luck.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#342

Post by Havoc »

Great write up.

The point about internet content being written by a 1% in particular is very easy to lose sight of. Somehow public debate on the internet naturally leads to some assumed sense of its representative and “democratic” for lack of better words

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#343

Post by kelseyfrog »

Edman274 wrote: post #55
tgb wrote: post #28

I think this article is trying to have its cake and eat it too. If the sub has been sanewashed and overrun by average left-of-center opinions and become wildly popular, then how can it be true that Doreen still represents the movement? The movement changed, as the article points out, and therefore Doreen was a terrible choice of representative. The fact that she predates the change is exactly the reason she is not re…

> then how can it be true that Doreen still represents the movement Represents the "movement", or represents the sub? They obviously still represented the sub - they were there when it got created, were a moderator, were picked by other moderators to be a representative of the subreddit in media events (which is conflated with the nebulous concept of "the movement") The issue here is that the "movement" may not be re…

Representation is really at the heart of it. What the article left out was that Doreen was asked by mods and by the community(by poll) not to participate in the interview. She did it anyway.

The broader social epistemic question of "what makes someone a representative?" or "How do people gain the social status: representative?" is the most interesting part of this. Reddit itself plays a role in the construction of representative status by visually framing mods in the sidebar under the subreddit rules section leading people to mentally label both as the rules and rule-makers of the space. There are examples of mods in other subreddits also being representatives, making it natural to apply that syllogistically and generally to all Reddit communities.

If a mod created the sub, and actively participates, but is disavowed as a representative, are they still a representative? Would this have changed if the interview had gone well? How does representation work when communities disagree? Antiwork members don't see Doreen as a representative, but individuals outside of antiwork do. Does that make her a representative or not? It's fascinating that what is obvious to one person is a tremendous number of questions to another.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#344

Post by giantg2 »

danenania wrote: post #239
gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

One way to think about it: we already have a basic income in the US. Nobody starves to death in the US. Nobody is denied medical care in the emergency room. In many places (though not everywhere), there are shelters where a person can sleep inside. There are food stamps and a patchwork of welfare programs. However meager they may seem, things like this amount to a form of universal basic income. Does it prevent peopl…

If it's $30k per year, that's not very far off from the median salary in the US. So I think many people would be a fairly pleasant life, particularly for a couple making $60k. I think the dynamics of who would work or not changes considerably from your example of food stamps and homeless shelters (unless substantial inflation happens, which I think would be likely in that scenario).

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#345

Post by piaste »

adamrezich wrote: post #285
dec0dedab0de wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You usually watch news as if it was normal. You look at news anchors as if they were people, not corporate half-robots. Only such contrast gives you a chance to see them for what they are. I haven't been able to watch the news in about 20 years. Pro wrestlers are more sincere than most news anchors

imagine a world where we could tune in to neutrally-moderated longform debate on policy instead of points-scoring five-minute sandwiched-by-advertising talking heads talking through a scripted (at least by the host, if not both parties) sequence of talking points and slogans. instead this is the world we get, the world we're told to accept, the world where people like my dad can watch a night's worth of "news" from e…

> imagine a world where we could tune in to neutrally-moderated longform debate on policy

We had something of that world. Firing Line was on air for thirty years, and many other countries had or have comparable programmes.

It's been a long de-evolution, not a radical destruction. Every innovation in media communication was that little bit faster, that little bit more palatable, but it's a one-way street, and hard to reverse.

My mother (born 1951) can't enjoy any film made after 2000, they're too frantic and they stress her. My ex-girlfriend (born 1996) couldn't enjoy any film made before 1990, they were too slow and they bored her to sleep. I have to put effort into reading books rather than relatively short essays nowadays.

I don't think there can be an implosion, at this point. We need a future generation, sometime after Z, that will grow up thinking that ten-second TikTok videos are the peak of uncool and something only old stodgy zoomers can enjoy.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#346

Post by shakes_mcjunkie »

jcims wrote: post #190
the_snooze wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Defund the Police That slogan was straight up political malpractice. If you have to explain your position, then you're already losing. Something like "government accountability" or "serve the people" probably could have gotten wider support than "defund the police."

These terrible slogans are the product of social media. A good slogan is only going to get juice from one side. A slogan that is supremely dunkable by one side yet scratches the itch on the other is going to surface like curds in spoiled milk.

What slogan have you heard is "A slogan that is supremely dunkable by one side yet scratches the itch on the other is going to surface like curds in spoiled milk". No slogan is going to be 100% perfect because it's compressing an enormous amount of political opinion and legal implementation into a few words. IMO "Defund the Police" worked because it got a lot of people talking. The detractors were bad actors and not actually interested in implementation.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#347

Post by s1artibartfast »

slingnow wrote: post #293
danenania wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way to think about it: we already have a basic income in the US. Nobody starves to death in the US. Nobody is denied medical care in the emergency room. In many places (though not everywhere), there are shelters where a person can sleep inside. There are food stamps and a patchwork of welfare programs. However meager they may seem, things like this amount to a form of universal basic income. Does it prevent peopl…

I think you're being disingenuous if you believe receiving a no-shit check from the government for $30k per year is the same as scraping by through food banks, homeless shelters, and one-time medical care in the emergency room. I would say all of those things absolutely prevent people from not working. No one would willingly want to live their life that way.

There are a lot of other programs at work. Access is a mess, but 0 earners with children qualify for about 50k in benefits between SNAP, childcare assistance, housing assistance, medicaid, and CHIP.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#348

Post by batshit_beaver »

nradov wrote: post #124
JSavageOne wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me antiwork is just anti forced wage labour. If we had a universal basic income, then that would be accomplished and people would be free to work on whatever they want. If technology is advanced enough to be able to afford this which I'd argue is already the case, I don't see why this shouldn't be the case.

Technology isn't advanced enough to be able to afford this. Have you ever actually worked in a factory or on a farm? Have you done the math to calculate how much taxes would have to raise in order to give everyone a UBI at even the US federal poverty level? This is magical thinking disconnected from the reality of how the economy works.

Related to this, but is there ANY explanation out there from proponents of UBI that would clarify how UBI can be done sustainably and perpetually, without causing runaway inflation where UBI is always below poverty level anyway?

I'm obviously too retarded for such an advanced concept, but in my head there's no scenario where a utopian UBI-based society is possible, even with more advanced tech. To allow everyone to have food, shelter, and other necessities regardless of their usefulness to society, at the very least we'd have to have severe birth rate restrictions, strong law enforcement, and other fun authoritarian systems that would no longer qualify the environment as a utopia in the eyes of UBI supporters.

Seems like yet another liberal pipe dream that is entirely disconnected from reality, though I'd love to be proven wrong, if anyone has some good reading suggestions on this subject.

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#349

Post by nameisname »

wing-_-nuts wrote: post #211
gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

You cut most of our bureaucratic social safety net (food stamps, disability, social security, etc) and replace it with a system where everyone gets enough for the bare basics. If you were smart, you'd fund it with a carbon tax. In all honesty I don't see UBI becoming a thing until we start automating ourselves into unemployment. People say this would increase inflation. Maybe. Let's trial it with 1% of the population…

There will still be those who spend all their UBI on drugs or whatever and have nowhere to stay. Do we just let them die on the street since there's no more social safety nets?

Re: /r/antiwork: A tragedy of sanewashing and social gentrification

#350

Post by themaninthedark »

bloaf wrote: post #261
gavinray wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Universal basic income I'm going to sound like I'm being snarky here, and I promise I'm not. How exactly is this supposed to work? The government prints money and gives it away for free, nobody has to work? I don't say this from a place of privilege. I grew up lower class trailer trash and have been homeless. Maybe I don't understand the concept fully but it seems a bit absurd and unfeasible

If you give someone a fish, they starve after a day. Teach someone to fish and they can eat + sell the fish. But if I make a fish-catching machine to catch fish for everyone, does everyone eat, or does everyone starve? UBI is essentially a means of ensuring that in a world where the robots catch all the fish, people can still afford to buy a fish.

I am against UBI because I think we aren't there just yet with technology but I do agree that we need a way to ensure that "everyone can eat" when the time comes.

Right now we also need to look at how we can provide job for those who are affected by automation and not just say that the coal miners need "learn to code" and move.

Edit to add: We have some industries that are highly automated, ie. semiconductor manufacturing. Yet they still have raw inputs that take non-automated work. If we were able to develop a complete automated line, I would support gov/private group "socializing" the output.

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