3 ms·

The thing is though, a bridge with large cracks in it hasn't fallen down. You can always reinforce it and then it doesn't fall down. Same is true for the US. I

The thing is though, a bridge with large cracks in it hasn't fallen down. You can always reinforce it and then it doesn't fall down. Same is true for the US. If the elected officials and their hired civil servants actually went around reinforcing the US then we're fine. If they continue to neglect the decaying roads, neglect the growing trusts, and etc then the bridge will collapse.

maiar 2y ago
The capitalists have found a way to make 51+% of the justifiably furious people vote for further dismantling of the institutions that work (as well as anti-DEI witch hunts and other nonsense) and, therefore, more abandon and decay.
- AnimalMuppet 2y ago
  But the thing is that, if the institutions collapse, that isn't actually going to be good for the capitalists. They're making far more money from the working system than they would from a collapsed one. So either those capitalists are very stupidly short-sighted, or blaming all this on the capitalists is mistaken. I find the explanation of foreign agitprop to be more believable. At least with that explanation, you're dealing with an actor who actually benefits from the collapse.
  - lamontcg 2y ago
    1. They don't believe the systems will collapse. Musk (to just use him as an example) has a meme-level understanding of the government and macroeconomics, so they may not be judging the risks very correctly. 2. They don't care if the systems collapse, as long as they wind up with more than everyone else.
  - unclebucknasty 2y ago
    There are select capitalists who want to replace the current order with something that further empowers them. I'm not sure it's accurate to continue calling them capitalists, though they certainly benefited from capitalism. If you consider, for example, the current AI push and its goal to essentially eliminate the need for human labor, you find that such a result would not be a form of capitalism that we recognize. In fact, those pushing this outcome have talked of the need for UBI, which would seem the ultimate socialist scenario. But, even socialism doesn't quite fit, because it wouldn't be society that owns the means of production and distributes resources, but those who own the technology. All of this to say, I'm not sure our current economic frame still applies to what may be happening, and this is one more example of the dramatic change the article talks about that we appear to be dealing with via normalization.
swatcoder 2y ago
Yes, but the tension is that you can't always reinforce the bridge. There are a lot of contingencies that need to be satisfied to be able to do that, some about the bridge, some about the environment (people, resources, conviction, interest, etc) around the bridge. And among those environmental contingencies, because they're so numerous and imprecise, the failing bridge increasingly invites people advocating to just accelerate retirement of the bridge on their preferred terms, towards their preferred replacement. Ultimately, there is some point of no return, where you can no longer reasonably expect anybody to be able to gather enough resources to repair the bridge as it stands, even though it still hasn't spontaneously collapsed just yet. It's very hard to know where you are on this progression though, and for many people, they don't have much effective potency in doing anything about it anyway. Hence, they just kinda get by and hope that they still have some way to cross the river tomorrow, with the inkling sense that they very well may not.
mcphage 2y ago
> If they continue to neglect the decaying roads, neglect the growing trusts, and etc then the bridge will collapse. Keeping with this metaphor, “they” have taken to knocking down the bridge supports, as many as they can.

maiar 2y ago

The capitalists have found a way to make 51+% of the justifiably furious people vote for further dismantling of the institutions that work (as well as anti-DEI witch hunts and other nonsense) and, therefore, more abandon and decay.

AnimalMuppet 2y ago
But the thing is that, if the institutions collapse, that isn't actually going to be good for the capitalists. They're making far more money from the working system than they would from a collapsed one. So either those capitalists are very stupidly short-sighted, or blaming all this on the capitalists is mistaken. I find the explanation of foreign agitprop to be more believable. At least with that explanation, you're dealing with an actor who actually benefits from the collapse.
- lamontcg 2y ago
  1. They don't believe the systems will collapse. Musk (to just use him as an example) has a meme-level understanding of the government and macroeconomics, so they may not be judging the risks very correctly. 2. They don't care if the systems collapse, as long as they wind up with more than everyone else.
- unclebucknasty 2y ago
  There are select capitalists who want to replace the current order with something that further empowers them. I'm not sure it's accurate to continue calling them capitalists, though they certainly benefited from capitalism. If you consider, for example, the current AI push and its goal to essentially eliminate the need for human labor, you find that such a result would not be a form of capitalism that we recognize. In fact, those pushing this outcome have talked of the need for UBI, which would seem the ultimate socialist scenario. But, even socialism doesn't quite fit, because it wouldn't be society that owns the means of production and distributes resources, but those who own the technology. All of this to say, I'm not sure our current economic frame still applies to what may be happening, and this is one more example of the dramatic change the article talks about that we appear to be dealing with via normalization.

swatcoder 2y ago

Yes, but the tension is that you can't always reinforce the bridge. There are a lot of contingencies that need to be satisfied to be able to do that, some about the bridge, some about the environment (people, resources, conviction, interest, etc) around the bridge. And among those environmental contingencies, because they're so numerous and imprecise, the failing bridge increasingly invites people advocating to just accelerate retirement of the bridge on their preferred terms, towards their preferred replacement. Ultimately, there is some point of no return, where you can no longer reasonably expect anybody to be able to gather enough resources to repair the bridge as it stands, even though it still hasn't spontaneously collapsed just yet. It's very hard to know where you are on this progression though, and for many people, they don't have much effective potency in doing anything about it anyway. Hence, they just kinda get by and hope that they still have some way to cross the river tomorrow, with the inkling sense that they very well may not.

mcphage 2y ago

> If they continue to neglect the decaying roads, neglect the growing trusts, and etc then the bridge will collapse. Keeping with this metaphor, “they” have taken to knocking down the bridge supports, as many as they can.