Live data from Hacker News

Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

robkhenderson.com

111–120 of 396 posts

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#111
Strangely, this reminds me of a book on relationships I read.

It said that only when people were safe and secure in their relationship, were they able to speak freely and voice their true opinions.

Maybe this is similar. If people are financially and physically secure can believe things openly, even if they have little to do with reality.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#112
post #111

Strangely, this reminds me of a book on relationships I read. It said that only when people were safe and secure in their relationship, were they able to speak freely and voice their true opinions. Maybe this is similar. If people are financially and physically secure can believe things openly, even if they have little to do with reality.

Or put another way: after reality is removed, beliefs can become insane.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#113

> When I was growing up in foster homes, or making minimum wage as a > dishwasher, or serving in the military, I never heard words like “cultural > appropriation” or “gendered” or “heteronormative.” > > Working class people could not tell you what these terms mean. But if you > visit an elite university, you’ll find plenty of affluent people who will > eagerly explain them to you. I figured out as soon as I saw the l…

> be associated with a feminist and anti-racist outlook.

Well.. it's not at all clear that those things he mention has anything to do with anti-racism and feminism. In fact, it seems quite clear they are the opposite of that.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#114
On the point of success and the rich believing it is just luck whilst the working-class beliefs it's hard work: Maybe both is true. Becoming successful in working class jobs often *does* require hard work, whilst becoming successful in upper-class jobs depends more on other factors such as luck. For example, to become a great construction worker, you need physical strength, stamina, and a strong work ethic, as the job involves long hours of manual labour. On the other hand, landing a high-paying job in finance or tech might depend more on being in the right place at the right time, networking, having access to resources and opportunities etc.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#115
post #112
post #111

Strangely, this reminds me of a book on relationships I read. It said that only when people were safe and secure in their relationship, were they able to speak freely and voice their true opinions. Maybe this is similar. If people are financially and physically secure can believe things openly, even if they have little to do with reality.

Or put another way: after reality is removed, beliefs can become insane.

This is one potential explanation for why successful people quite often drift towards conspiracy theories and paradoxical bitterness as they get older.

I'm thinking of Rudy Giuliani and Elon Musk, but examples abound.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#117
> They found that individuals with higher income or a higher social status were the most likely to say that success results from luck and connections rather than hard work, while low-income individuals were more likely to say success comes from hard work and individual effort.

This is basically the old paradigm saying that "people don't make money, money makes money." No one became a billionaire without being in the right place and knowing the right people. Access to that environment can be only gained if one already has significant capital. I guess this is what they mean by luck.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're talking a security firm paying minimum wage hired by the HOA to do rounds at a gated townhouse complex, that's not some unattainable luxury for someone making "just" $100K.

it's funny contrasting California expectations with the rest of the country.

It's even more funny seeing it contrast with the rest of the world.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#119
This reminds me of an interesting piece I read last month, which looks at one particular luxury belief that is especially divisive right now, and criticizes it with regards to class: https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/09/25/trans-the-new-ideol...

Like those described in the article above, this is very much a middle-class movement whose proponents have seized the opportunity to sneer at working-class people as bigoted, stupid and reactionary.

Re: Luxury beliefs are status symbols (2022)

#120
> A survey from YouGov found that Americans in the highest income category were by far the most supportive of defunding the police.

> They can afford to hold this position, because they already live in safe, often gated communities. And they can afford to hire private security.

This isn't what defund the police was about at all and is just a strawman to stop inquisitions into the actual point of the defund the police movement.

> In the United States, "defund the police" is a slogan that supports removing funds from police departments and reallocating them to non-policing forms of public safety and community support, such as social services, youth services, housing, education, healthcare and other community resources. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defund_the_police

Defund the police was never a anarcho communist feel good movement despite what articles like this will guide you believe.

That said, the slogan was slightly ambiguous so it was absolutely destroyed in the "marketplace of ideas". Apparently defunding the police actually means get rid of the police entirely. I guess the slogan had to be "decrease the budget, not entirely remove it just less money, for the police and move that money into other prevention and treatment methods for community support".

Post reply on HN