My city subreddit isn’t even the worst, but someone asks how to ride the trolley for free and gets downvoted to shit and shamed.
The US is so broken that having shit is the only thing that keeps people feeling good about themselves. If people get the shit for free then they realize how worthless all the shit has been and how empty their lives are.
Edit: gonna add this quote from an article someone just posted go upbear it
PMC are “salaried mental workers” who reproduce the essentials of capitalism without owning the means of production, the PMC, argues Liu, has for decades “been happy to abandon mass politics to reproduce the social division of labor and the widening gulf between those who prosper under late capitalism and those who do not.” Ever-ingratiating themselves to the capitalist masters who reward them
PMC are “salaried mental workers” who reproduce the essentials of capitalism without owning the means of production,
The PMC very frequently overlap with the petit-bourg, many of them are landlords, and most of them have pretty significant assets. The latter is a relatively recent phenomenon because access to capital markets is so much easier now than it was even 20 years ago, let alone 100+. If you don’t own any individual means of production, but you have several hundred grand in a stock portfolio, you still reap the rewards. A lot of class analysis ignores this point and just pretends that PMCs are just workers like me and you.
There are two things going on here:
- “Cop energy” – overtly pro-police sentiment, Blue Lives Matter shit, that sort of thing.
- People who want others to follow the rules, because they perceive themselves as following the rules and they don’t want to be a rube.
While the second can lead to the first, the two are distinguishable. Cop energy, for instance, is often more of an extension of racial and class prejudice (“they beat up the right people”) than an extension of placing importance on rule following. This is why you get chuds who’ll back the blue but then turn around and talk about cheating on taxes, skirting gun laws, and otherwise flaunting any rule they personally disagree with. That second, “rule following” motivation is more of a liberal trait – they believe more in government and try harder to stay within the lines, which leads to resentment of those who don’t. They pay their trolley fare, so why shouldn’t you?
So of course asking how to ride the trolley for free gets downvoted – chuds downvote it because they hate the poors, and and libs downvote it because they feel taken advantage of if they pay while someone else doesn’t.
hat second, “rule following” motivation is more of a liberal trait – they believe more in government and try harder to stay within the lines, which leads to resentment of those who don’t. They pay their trolley fare, so why shouldn’t you?
These aren’t mutually exclusive, though, I think you’re missing some class analysis.
You’re forgetting the conservative Law and Order crowd where, especially in the context OP posted, it’s about the dang poors contributing their part to the trolley they personally sustain by doing the excel at the office they drive their car to (over the roads that just fall from the sky).
Which is how this agrees with cheating on taxes and the other laws. Obviously they have earned this freedom and so did everybody richer than them.
Yeah, it’s the same energy as the libs that oppose free college. “I paid for college, I followed the rules, why shouldn’t you just because the rules are arbitrary and cruel?”
It’s the psychology of different sorts of humans. The kind that we today call right-wing has respect for legitimate authority as one of its core values. The kind that we today call left-wing sees that there is no such thing as “legitimate” authority and that all power must devolve to the people. Thus the right’s values look like fascism. Which they pretty much are.
Reddit is full of complete dorks, if you want people who value not snitching, work shitty fast food
