Walking down the street, nearly had a stroke when I realized that "support the troops" and "thin blue line" sentiments are, from...
Walking down the street, nearly had a stroke when I realized that “support the troops” and “thin blue line” sentiments are, from a red tribe perspective, expressions of solidarity with workers oft-mistreated and exploited by their bosses – politicians and the citizenry – and they might in fact be the strongest expression of labor solidarity in America today
i -think- this might fall prey to the Sportsfan’s Dilemma: due to the construction of sports fandom, the viewer is invited to identify with the management of the team, not the players. As such, the possible solidarity and identification is in no small part absorbed by the management-controlled intermediation to the event.
Likewise, in this context, the solidarity to cops and soldiers is relatively shallow, based on a thin, heavily propagandized image that serves primarily to benefit entrenched interests and management, not actually an expression of lived solidarity. An opportunity given to perform solidarity with particular actors chosen as worthy of solidarity but held at remove.
Thus, while it may be a strong declaration of solidarity, it is also inherently self-defeating.
on reflection, i want to connect this to Graeber’s reading of the military as the only mode of public service available to the majority of people. the professional classes have thoroughly taken control of the not-for-profit space, and that provides a method to be a do-gooder, even if it is controlled thoroughly by the needs of capital. However, for the average American, public service offerings through the military are the closest you can get to that, satisfying a fundamental human desire to be do good unto others.
Likewise, this is constructed as an acceptable framework for the channeling of solidarity, creating the sense of participation in a social edifice greater than yourself without threatening the relations of production
this one: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-army-of-altruists
Like yeah, this was in Roseburg, I noticed a strong country-club Republican element which makes sense given the timber baron influence.
But I was looking for a pro-labor element from all the workers I’d heard were fairly radical but nothing, and instead there was just this “yay military” sentiment everywhere, to a point that would have been way excessive in any of the otherwise “redder” country I had been passing through earlier this week
But then I realized, when timber harvesting on federal land ended in the 90s (devastating the workers, the mill-owners, but not the private landowners) you had a big, strong blue collar community with no local work. And you know who in America’s always hiring for extra-local blue collar work?
If the workers are troops, then all these signs become “Support [Workers]”, “If you appreciate the good things in life, thank a [worker]”, programs to support [workers]’ families, ubiquitous discounts for [workers in the local industry]. They are the deep pro-labor sentiment I was looking for.
Of course, the famously radical southern Oregon timber workers have mixed their labor sentiment with national identity before, several of their boldest actions in history were essentially pogroms.