The Classes

[fschmidt]

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[The Opposition]

fschmidt wrote

The proles are also called serfs, peasants, proletariat, employees, lower class, etc.  They seek comfort and security.  They are not interested in freedom or power.  They are generally stupid and can't think ahead or plan anything.

You wouldn't be interested in freedom either if you could get fired and lose your house tomorrow, starve and die because you said one wrong word. Freedom is a luxury and people who've never been on the front lines of society don't understand that.

In the ancient world everyone was on the front lines - everyone could potentially starve, and no one was insulated. If a famine hit, money could only protect you so much. Before money, money couldn't protect you at all, and in all likelihood, if a bunch of people died, you'd be one of them.

In the modern world some people are completely insulated from risk and some are vulnerable, and those taking the risks (who stand to gain from them) are ironically the ones best insulated from the results of those risks if the ventures fail.

These are your classes: People who can starve and people who cannot.

You think it makes you better than others because you have never been uninsulated, so you think about luxuries before necessities. You have never had to sleep in your car, or live out of a backpack. You have never had to think about where your next meal is coming from; it will always just be there. Understandably you think people who focus on such non-issues as food, water, and shelter are stupid.

[fschmidt]

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[The Opposition]

fschmidt wrote

Simply no.  People with strong values put those values over animal needs.

You would think, but psychology proves otherwise. The Maslow Pyramid shows how only when peoples' basic needs are met at a basic level can they consider other things.

https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html

You can't think about food if you're drowning. Air > Food

You can't think about all those high-minded values if you're starving. And I don't mean living on beans. I mean you have nothing and you're nearly dead.

You don't know what you'd do if you were actually deprived of a basic need and would die if you didn't do X. Most people would do X, even if it violated some moral belief they think they hold.

The Milgram experiment proved that most people will give up a value and hurt people simply when told to do so. You think if they were the ones suffering, and could push a button that shocked another person instead, they'd hold out until they were dead?

I wish there could be that experiment. I dearly wish it. But instead, the world has to stay in its safe, padded room state, so that people who have never been to genuinely horrible places can continue to think they're better than the people who have.