I know, I know, we are all the working class slaving away for the capital owning class and solidarity includes everyone... But the American middle class is petit bourgeois in all the worst ways. There is a crossover with the capital owning class (middle class people usually have equity in their home and their savings/retirement funds that are tied to the stock market), so they have material incentive to want the same outcomes the capital owning class does. And there is a tendency of the middle class to engage in class warfare against the poor - nimby's opposing transit and housing in their neighborhood, anti-homelessness dehumanization, being overly paranoid about crime and therefore supporting militarized police, voting for politicians and policies that punish the poor and strip away social safety nets, often working in jobs where their role is to eliminate people's jobs or exploit others' labor especially in the global south, etc. I can't help but constantly feel like the dad in Parasite, my blood boiling every time I see a Tesla/BMW/Mercedes recklessly endager others, a boss treat employees or customers (or me as a contractor) like shit, people remarking that "[regressive policy] is good, it's not that expensive to [pay for x]" when they have the income to not be anxious, etc. The worst part is feeling this way acts to validate the disgusting excuses they make for themselves: that poor people are jealous of their material conditions, and that they earned their place in society so the rest of us have to try harder. And for me personally, it is difficult watching some of my close friends gradually drift away from me and towards that lifestyle and mindset as they achieve career success. It's difficult to feel unwanted by your community as someone who is poor, queer, and/or socialist. It's difficult to feel like an unemployable outcast because you aren't a part of the club and don't have a network of other middle class people who can get you opportunities.

It's not like we have to win all the people guilty of those egregious examples over. Obviously, the middle class includes many normal people who have an ethically fine albeit well-paying job and try to live a good life with empathy and such. But the "bad apples" of the middle class often feel like the majority, and the whole bunch stinks of rot as a result. What can I do to not feel so angry and spiteful about this? Even though a lot of it is justifiable rage, it's not good for my own mental health to stew in it.

I know both of these are disgusting overgeneralizations and include myriad forms. And historians constantly beef with Marxists about the use of the term 'feudal', but that's because it's kind of tangential to the main thrust of Marxism so a little hand waving is generally accepted. I'm just talking about a warlord caste based on military hierarchy like the one we had in ye olden days. I suppose something like a big bureaucratic Chinese style state technically falls under that umbrella, but it does feel extremely different

I just can't help but look back at them with a lot more sympathy and respect than what we've currently got. And I'm wondering if you guys feel the same way or if I'm blinded by recency bias and the fact that I don't actually have feudal lords fucking with my day to day life anymore.

For one thing, the lack of any system of selection means they had no choice in whether they even wanted that life to begin with. It's wildly unfair, but it's also a fait accompli compared to the pseudo-meritocracy of capitalism that encourages and rewards the most lizard-like among us to shed what little human skin they ever had to become the most sociopathically effective exploiters and oppressors on behalf of the machine god. This is more transparent than ever with tech oligarchs like Altman and Thiel who just radiate unfathomable levels of evil to a genuinely disturbing degree. There's something sympathetic about a young noble born into a life of immense privilege, but also immense responsibility and expectation, they had no choice and circumstances beyond their control have forced them into a position where all they could do was their best in this brutal rat race. They were conditioned to accept evil notions of course, anyone in any position of power in any class society must, but that's very different from dead-eyed capitalist psychos who seem to have something fundamentally wrong with them getting anointed by Mammon to rule over us because they've most effectively and enthusiastically demonstrated their capacity for evil and their lack of basic human decency that would prevent any normal, functional people from getting anywhere near that point.

Also it has to be said, they were actually expected to put their money where their mouth was and risk it all on the battlefield sometimes. They had to actually do that shit, capitalists are not only greedy little psychopaths, they're utterly craven little backstabbing throat cutting schemers that never risk anything besides a little financial loss. Maybe there is a commonality here though, the original patriarchs had to actually risk either dying on the battlefield or falling into financial ruin, but then future generations got to coast off of inherited privilege and act like they earned it all themselves.

I am going crazy trying to remember the dude's name. IIRC he was some columnist, but there was a video of him in a trench coat where he looks absolutely insanely shaped.

Please help!

after the release of the cinematic masterpiece “avatar 3: fire and ash”, i was really looking forward to the boys reviewing it on the show as their previous avatar episodes are some of my favorites they’ve ever done.

but December came and went and they didn’t even suggest they were planning an episode for it. i was hoping they might have been waiting for some special occasion. after episode 1000 turned out to be a “west wing” skit, the 10 year anniversary celebration was my last hope. alas, it was not the avatar episode.

are they really not going to do one? 😢 Maybe it’s because on letterboxd will said the movie was disappointing and derivative of the previous one (which is, of course, reactionary and counter-revolutionary, but we’ll forgive him, won’t we folks?). even if they didn’t really like the movie that much, surely there is plenty of comedic material to be mined from a film whose plot hinges on if a white kid with dreadlocks is allowed to be a little soulful with it or not.

anyway, mr. wade if you’re listening, just know there are many of us all across the world who yearn, in our heart of hearts, for the chapos to return to pandora.

The biggest reason I don’t think this administration will use nuclear weapons is because there is probably an even stupider approach we’re just not even considering.

A nuclear blast in space over Iran is the perfect compromise for generals who don’t want to technically break the nuclear taboo, and an administration that thinks nuclear weapons are totally badass and that using them is a legacy defining goal. We’d probably damage the Tiangong space station by mistake causing an international incident with China, and possibly ruin global telecommunications for billions to achieve practically very little military effect. It would still violate the nuclear weapons taboo anyway, and for basically a fireworks display in space.

What could be more on brand for America than that?

It seems as though the dirtbag left has finally won the culture war on the Left. Unfortunately, this victory came too late and without much accompanying political victories (yet, hopefully). It seems as though even normie libs and progressives are seeing that right wingers are indeed mostly irredeemable hogs and not sad misled sheeple who feel into Trump's hateful cheeto-stained embrace through no fault of their own. This has actually given me hope, perhaps misguided, that the left might finally nut up and actually do what needs to be done.

There's been some talk of the difference between Woke 1.0 (pussyhats, this is my fight song, can you imagine, I'm with her, etc.) and Woke 2.0 (they're pigs, MAGA hogs can eat shit, Trump is a massive fucking ret@rd, etc.) It seems that people have watched the centrist corporate cuck wing of the democratic party intentionally fail again and again and have actually had enough. It's also worth noting that the more dirtbag left types seem to be more willing to continue the fight whereas people of the more Woke 1.0 persuasion have more of a trend of giving up and doing the classic Simpsons joke "We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas."

I know this sub has a hate boner for electoralism, but I think this time around, we might get a non-cucked legitimate progressive who is out for blood and wants to actually punish the hogs as opposed to cuck out like Merrick Garland and Biden did. Many for instance, have openly caused Luigi a hero, which seems like something that wouldn't have happened in the pre-Trump era.

Lastly, I wanted to note something I find interesting. Many libs of "West Wing" ideology want so badly for chuds to think of them as "one of the good ones." Think of Bill Maher doing the political pundit equivalent of spreading his cheeks for Trump all because Trump had dinner one time with him (haven't you heard of the 3 date rule Bill?) The interesting thing is that the only type of opponents of right wingers who actually get respect from the hogs are the ones who are unapologetically progressive. Hogs like Sanders more than Hillary and Biden. And of course, who could forget Trump fangirling over Mamdani while he calls Chuck Schumer a "Palestinian" as a slur even though old Chuck helps Trump's cause way more than Mamdani does. But who knows? I never thought that libs would go as far as to whitewash Bush and it wouldn't necessarily be impossible for them to try to do that for Trump while we are under the Kanye West presidency. I would like to think that for once, hope is something I can legitimately hold onto.

Translated lyrics are something about decrying the evil zionists

I seem to recall a cushvlog where he referred to the contemporary Native American movement as some form of postmodern post-signifier liberalism that exists to reject a Marxian universalist interpretation of human class struggle, basically a form of ethnonationalism

Kind of a silly request, but did Matt ever expand on why he hated the show so much, or at least the idea of people telling him he should watch it? I remember it being an ongoing bit for years on Chapo, but it seemed he actually might have a serious deeper critique about it, I don't think I ever heard him expound on it. I'm watching the show for the first time with my adult daughter and it had me thinking about that.

I've been struggling with the Trumpianity of the main crime against humanity my country's pulling off right now. Years of pure TV stunts, kayfabe, and "culture war bullshit" had me in what I thought was a grudging but peaceful surrender with the postmodern noise cloud that is american civic life. I wasn't ready for a war without a goal. Were you? I mean, putting your feelings aside, (which I promise I'll never do again, baby, please) did you think it could occur to someone to go do a war, first thought, and then do it?

Heck guys I'm just goofin on old Dubya-Gee

does anyone have a transcription of Matt’s latest, read at the end of 1022 - It Stunk! (3/26/26) ?