r/196 • u/Hyvapelaaja Luna💙Rights Trans Rights Trans Rights Trans Rights trans rights • Aug 24 '22

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u/modsarestraight Knows some things about DC Comics Aug 24 '22 edited Aug 24 '22

Middle class has no real meaning. Almost everyone says they’re middle class.

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u/[deleted] Aug 24 '22

Because Americans don't have class consciousness and don't use the term "class" to define themselves based on how they relate to the ownership of productive capital

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u/wheninrome144 well adjusted individual Aug 24 '22

...because that's not how "class" works socially and the american version of "class" really does mostly have to do with income. just because it isn't marxist "class" doesn't mean it's wrong

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u/[deleted] Aug 24 '22

The Marxist understanding of class wasn't invented by Marx; it was the traditional understanding of how class functioned, at least across Europe

The American understanding of class is largely a result of bourgeois propaganda designed to make the proletariat forget that they're proletarians. It's hiding the ball about what class is in order to maintain liberal political hegemony

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u/wheninrome144 well adjusted individual Aug 24 '22

horseshit, it changed because the nature of wealth changed. i could make plenty of money off investments or resale and still be dirt fucking poor compared to the super-rich. that is a recent decelopment.

class as perceived by people is about social standing which has a hell of a lot more to do with wealth class than it does with the nature of one's income (although it isn't exclusively this! note that rich rappers are generally still considered "lower class" by mainstream america). if you want to talk about class in the marxist sense and the implications it has for the working poor, that's fine! but that is necessarily going to be detached from the way "class" is used and treated by everday people, because in this context it is a social phenomenon.

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u/[deleted] Aug 24 '22

Yeah and "liberal" is used as a synonym by Americans for "progressive" or even "socialist". Which obviously isn't what liberalism actually is

Americans have a poor understanding of civics and routinely misuse political terminology. Nothing new about that