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Consider the pervasive narratives those people are reacting to: that people who are wealthy/powerful are better humans. Being poor is often seen as a moral fail

Consider the pervasive narratives those people are reacting to: that people who are wealthy/powerful are better humans. Being poor is often seen as a moral failing, whereas people who are wealthy are attractive, intelligent people. In some cases, "better" is even meant literally, like this well-known, only partly tongue-in-cheek new Yorker article (https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/rich-people-really-are-better https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/rich-people-rea...) or the British class system. You're only questioning one half of these ideas.

argentinian 2y ago
Where do you observe the promotion of the absurd narrative that says that the rich are better humans?
- AlotOfReading 2y ago
  Well, you could look at the examples provided, any of various historical (and modern) class systems, great man theory, do a quick search (e.g. https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/05/08/new-psychological-studies-how-the-wealthy-really-are-different-from-everyone-else/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/05/08/new-...), read self-help literature (e.g. rich dad, poor dad), and so on. It might be harder to find media where that narrative isn't either present or intentionally absent. And just because something is present doesn't mean it's an intentional or complete narrative being promoted by the author. This is simply an idea that's virtually omnipresent in Western societies, like the acceptance of capitalism or the system of colors. Things that challenge these sorts of deeply assumed ideas often seem like attacks on society itself. If you want an author who intentionally addresses it, Ursula Guin has made it a big focus of her works (e.g. Omelas, the hainish cycle).
- JadeNB 2y ago
  > Where do you observe the promotion of the absurd narrative that says that the rich are better humans? This is kind of like asking where one observes the promotion of the absurd narrative that white people are better people. It's rare to get an explicit source, but you have to benefit from it or be willfully blind to it not to believe it's there. For one example of a reasonably explicit source, a very loud voice in the US agreed that those who benefits from government services are "the parasite class" (https://www.yahoo.com/news/fact-check-musk-reposted-meme-120000227.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/fact-check-musk-reposted-meme-120...). Leaving, therefore, only the wealthy, who (so the narrative goes) impose no burden on others, to be the virtuous, non-parasitic class.
  - torginus 2y ago
    Dunno, to me it's quite obvious the rich (as in the asset generating wealth owning) class are the parasitic ones, almost by definition - after all they get mony for doing nothing. Them being 'better' in any sense of the word is weirdly orthogonal and juvenile statement. It doesn't matter if you are a breatthakingly handsome hardworking genius, or you are an ugly imbecile - it's about what assets you own - the whole notion of being better on benchmarks of what humans consider better is irrelevant.
- flocciput 2y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology
- pixl97 2y ago
  https://www.christianpost.com/news/prosperity-gospel-on-the-rise-among-us-churchgoers.html https://www.christianpost.com/news/prosperity-gospel-on-the-... https://oxfordre.com/religion/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199340378.001.0001/acrefore-9780199340378-e-429 https://oxfordre.com/religion/display/10.1093/acrefore/97801... The idea of prosperity gospel is strong in the US, it doesn't take much more than looking at US elections and seeing the religious poor voting for Trump and using "because he is rich" as one of the reasons for it. This also ties into Milton Friedman's "everyone runs on greed" idealisms that permeate capitalism. I think some of this is because you don't live in the US and get to see behavior like this daily.
  - argentinian 2y ago
    Yes, I guess I'm not seeing it as many of you do because I live in a society with different values. Curiosly, in Argentina a popular belief is that "nobody became rich by working" and variations. Being rich here is seen as either the result of luck (born rich) or corruption.
torginus 2y ago
I'd assume there's a lot of people here who are rich. And the ones who are honest with themselves probably have enough capacity for self-reflection that they aren't rich because they've worked for it. There's a lot of hard working talented, and well-compensated people here. But that alone doesn't make you rich, merely well-off. What makes you truly rich is investing your wealth in stocks, real estate, or being in the right place in the right time, which is the difference between the guy who built the core systems at a successful startup, and the guy who owns a significant stake of it (which might be one and the same). But being rich isn't earned in the sense that you work hard for it, you might need savvy, connections, luck, and need to fight others for money, but I'm sure most honest rich people wouldn't describe themselves as their money being the result of their hard work. And this is for self-made people. People who inherited wealth are even less responsible for their success.
- no_wizard 2y ago
  >I'd assume there's a lot of people here who are rich. You should define what you mean by rich. Colloquially, when speaking of 'eat the rich' its typically a reference to people with net worths exceeding 25 million or more with substantial cash generating assets there in[0]. Rather than some SWE's making 250-500K a year and perhaps retire with 5-10 million in assets with smart investments over the course of 20-30 years. This gets edged down into 'upper middle class'. Sometimes the term. 'Well off' is used (somewhat nebulously) to refer to people in that bracket. Of course there are exceptions, but these seem to be the common trends in these discussions. Therefore, I ask again, what exactly do you mean by rich? Because the most colloquial definition is unlikely to be common anywhere, even on HN [0]: Whether folks realize it or not, this is approximately where the real difference between 'well off' and truly wealthy start to set in. It differs a bit by state (in the US) and country, but its a decent enough approximation for this conversation.
Miraste 2y ago
That New Yorker article is not "partly" tongue in cheek, good grief. Has Reddit broken reading comprehension so badly it needed an /s?

argentinian 2y ago

Where do you observe the promotion of the absurd narrative that says that the rich are better humans?

AlotOfReading 2y ago
Well, you could look at the examples provided, any of various historical (and modern) class systems, great man theory, do a quick search (e.g. https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/05/08/new-psychological-studies-how-the-wealthy-really-are-different-from-everyone-else/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/05/08/new-...), read self-help literature (e.g. rich dad, poor dad), and so on. It might be harder to find media where that narrative isn't either present or intentionally absent. And just because something is present doesn't mean it's an intentional or complete narrative being promoted by the author. This is simply an idea that's virtually omnipresent in Western societies, like the acceptance of capitalism or the system of colors. Things that challenge these sorts of deeply assumed ideas often seem like attacks on society itself. If you want an author who intentionally addresses it, Ursula Guin has made it a big focus of her works (e.g. Omelas, the hainish cycle).
JadeNB 2y ago
> Where do you observe the promotion of the absurd narrative that says that the rich are better humans? This is kind of like asking where one observes the promotion of the absurd narrative that white people are better people. It's rare to get an explicit source, but you have to benefit from it or be willfully blind to it not to believe it's there. For one example of a reasonably explicit source, a very loud voice in the US agreed that those who benefits from government services are "the parasite class" (https://www.yahoo.com/news/fact-check-musk-reposted-meme-120000227.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/fact-check-musk-reposted-meme-120...). Leaving, therefore, only the wealthy, who (so the narrative goes) impose no burden on others, to be the virtuous, non-parasitic class.
- torginus 2y ago
  Dunno, to me it's quite obvious the rich (as in the asset generating wealth owning) class are the parasitic ones, almost by definition - after all they get mony for doing nothing. Them being 'better' in any sense of the word is weirdly orthogonal and juvenile statement. It doesn't matter if you are a breatthakingly handsome hardworking genius, or you are an ugly imbecile - it's about what assets you own - the whole notion of being better on benchmarks of what humans consider better is irrelevant.
flocciput 2y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology
pixl97 2y ago
https://www.christianpost.com/news/prosperity-gospel-on-the-rise-among-us-churchgoers.html https://www.christianpost.com/news/prosperity-gospel-on-the-... https://oxfordre.com/religion/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199340378.001.0001/acrefore-9780199340378-e-429 https://oxfordre.com/religion/display/10.1093/acrefore/97801... The idea of prosperity gospel is strong in the US, it doesn't take much more than looking at US elections and seeing the religious poor voting for Trump and using "because he is rich" as one of the reasons for it. This also ties into Milton Friedman's "everyone runs on greed" idealisms that permeate capitalism. I think some of this is because you don't live in the US and get to see behavior like this daily.
- argentinian 2y ago
  Yes, I guess I'm not seeing it as many of you do because I live in a society with different values. Curiosly, in Argentina a popular belief is that "nobody became rich by working" and variations. Being rich here is seen as either the result of luck (born rich) or corruption.

torginus 2y ago

I'd assume there's a lot of people here who are rich. And the ones who are honest with themselves probably have enough capacity for self-reflection that they aren't rich because they've worked for it. There's a lot of hard working talented, and well-compensated people here. But that alone doesn't make you rich, merely well-off. What makes you truly rich is investing your wealth in stocks, real estate, or being in the right place in the right time, which is the difference between the guy who built the core systems at a successful startup, and the guy who owns a significant stake of it (which might be one and the same). But being rich isn't earned in the sense that you work hard for it, you might need savvy, connections, luck, and need to fight others for money, but I'm sure most honest rich people wouldn't describe themselves as their money being the result of their hard work. And this is for self-made people. People who inherited wealth are even less responsible for their success.

no_wizard 2y ago
>I'd assume there's a lot of people here who are rich. You should define what you mean by rich. Colloquially, when speaking of 'eat the rich' its typically a reference to people with net worths exceeding 25 million or more with substantial cash generating assets there in[0]. Rather than some SWE's making 250-500K a year and perhaps retire with 5-10 million in assets with smart investments over the course of 20-30 years. This gets edged down into 'upper middle class'. Sometimes the term. 'Well off' is used (somewhat nebulously) to refer to people in that bracket. Of course there are exceptions, but these seem to be the common trends in these discussions. Therefore, I ask again, what exactly do you mean by rich? Because the most colloquial definition is unlikely to be common anywhere, even on HN [0]: Whether folks realize it or not, this is approximately where the real difference between 'well off' and truly wealthy start to set in. It differs a bit by state (in the US) and country, but its a decent enough approximation for this conversation.

Miraste 2y ago

That New Yorker article is not "partly" tongue in cheek, good grief. Has Reddit broken reading comprehension so badly it needed an /s?