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When reading this interesting article I found my brain ringing "alienation!" so thought I'd comment. Marxists have the theory of "alienation" https://en.wikipe

When reading this interesting article I found my brain ringing "alienation!" so thought I'd comment. Marxists have the theory of "alienation" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marx's_theory_of_alienation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marx's_theory_of_alienation They posit that people are alienated, estranged and invisible. "Alienation is a consequence of the division of labour in a capitalist society" It's alienation that is the driving emotion behind people coming together (leading to things like socialism / communism). Given that it's a core left wing idea, it's a bit strange to see only this applied to right wing populism. Possibly it's a signal of the authors own politics. Maybe the recent adoption of identity and group politics tends to keep people separated and increase alienation than towards a togetherness in a common shared struggle. Reducing alienation could lead to a weakening of certain political stances. Today's technology appears (falsely) to be apolitical, amoral and independent of the traditional things politics are about. But its important to be fair, that was a tiny bit of the article and there's not much politics in this interesting piece which is really about technology and neither "Marx" nor "alienation" nor any old school theoretical background on the phenomena being observed is talked about.

jmyeet 1y ago
The article not talking about alienation is either a failing from shallow analysis or a political statement in and of itself not to criticize capitalism. To blame this solely on technology is somewhat of a Luddite take. That's a symptom. The very fact that you have free time, weekends, paid leave, enough money to enjoy these things (until the last few decades anyway), etc are the result of anti-capitalist collective action. People quite literally died so you can have these things. It's no accident the society is so hyper-individualistic now. That's be design by the capital-owning class to destroy any form of collectivism because it's a threat to the economic order. So things like "third spaces" disappearing can't be viewed in a vacuum. It's a foreseeable consequence of hoarding property (ie ever-increasing housing prices). The powers-that-be love that. You're not forming bonds with your fellow human beings. You're also not "wasting" time on recreation instead of working a third job you hate just to make ends meet and make somebody else more money. A key part of Marx's alienation is the alienation of labor. This is where you're not paid enough to afford the goods or services you produce. We see this in the developing world: literal children being paid pennies to make clothes they can't possibly afford. We are increasingly seeing the alienation of labor in the developed world.

jmyeet 1y ago

The article not talking about alienation is either a failing from shallow analysis or a political statement in and of itself not to criticize capitalism. To blame this solely on technology is somewhat of a Luddite take. That's a symptom. The very fact that you have free time, weekends, paid leave, enough money to enjoy these things (until the last few decades anyway), etc are the result of anti-capitalist collective action. People quite literally died so you can have these things. It's no accident the society is so hyper-individualistic now. That's be design by the capital-owning class to destroy any form of collectivism because it's a threat to the economic order. So things like "third spaces" disappearing can't be viewed in a vacuum. It's a foreseeable consequence of hoarding property (ie ever-increasing housing prices). The powers-that-be love that. You're not forming bonds with your fellow human beings. You're also not "wasting" time on recreation instead of working a third job you hate just to make ends meet and make somebody else more money. A key part of Marx's alienation is the alienation of labor. This is where you're not paid enough to afford the goods or services you produce. We see this in the developing world: literal children being paid pennies to make clothes they can't possibly afford. We are increasingly seeing the alienation of labor in the developed world.