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Comment by SoftTalker | Hacker News Reader

I think it's more self-serving for those in power to encourage a culture of victimhood, where they set themselves up as the saviors.

This is a standard political gambit: create or identify a group of victims, and declare that you will get "payback" for them and make their situation better. Of course you don't, but that's OK, you got their votes and you just recycle and amplify that play next time.

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If this was the universal(or even most common) outcome of people organizing against sources of suffering in their lives, we'd still be living in stone age city states. The process you describe has time and again led to net-positive outcomes. "It has to work 100% of the time or it's not worth doing" isn't a standard we apply anywhere else.

If by "the process you describe" you mean widespread violence and upheaval, then that is pretty much backwards. The Yanomamo are merely one among countless examples of societies that are "stuck in the stone age" due to recurring violence, with tribesfolk fighting to gain control over resources and women. Human development has occurred historically via gradual change, working to subtly shift existing social arrangements over time rather than fighting them outright.

Sure, co-opting a revolution is a common and effective tactic, but so is "fall in line" (or "don't worry about it" or "focus on yourself" -- all identical from a political action perspective). Revolutions can be actually revolutionary. Often they are not, but they can be. "Fall in line" can never be revolutionary.

those exploiting power have no interest in becoming "saviors". trying to appear as one does not last long as victims as in human nature soon looks for someone to blame- often the most visible

Becoming saviors is not a perfect strategy (is there one). It's still used by a lot of those exploiting power. Not all of them are perfect or know the perfect way to exploit power. They make mistakes and sometimes when their mistakes in strategy accumulate, they end up on pitchforks.

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