Political theory explains election upsetfrom @pleasedontmakemefocus

Transcript

Understand how Ziram Omdani went from pulling at 1% to winning the New York City election is to understand how the biggest threat to American politics on both sides is hope. So he's clearly operating with this belief that politics is supposed to materially serve people and not emotionally manipulate them. So in this article by David Brooks, he explains how after World War two, America decided that moral formation, this idea that status is tied to character, reputation, and how well you show up for others, America decided that that idea needed to no. And instead, society shifted into this belief that people are just naturally good and just need to find themselves. So people start to prioritize self fulfillment instead of community obligation. And if you fast forward to the two thousands, social scientists were showing that negative emotional charge like shame, disgust, humiliation worse all more psychologically powerful and socially bonding than any positive feelings, and that became politically useful. Because as Adam Better wrote, in Trumpism, cruelty is the point. Like, it doesn't rely on competence. It relies on the shared emotional pleasure in somebody else's pain. And Republicans understand that cruelty will keep their followers manageable because you will never organize with people that you've been taught to hate. And Democrats also quietly benefit from the same culture because if people don't believe in collective action, they'll never demand better from the institutions that fail them. And Ziran's ideology rejects all of that where his politics is organized people over organized money. And I think just reasserting the fact that politicians are public servants, and they should feel obligated to build housing and transit and better childcare options and more public services. And seen through effect theory, his politics really reroute the emotional charge away from humiliation as bonding towards dignity. And that's why the world of Ziran is so threatening because it reminds people that we actually should feel a collective obligation to one another, that we really should be investing and reinvesting more in moral formation because that is the most dangerous thing to a system that depends on keeping people manipulated.