Comment by b800h | Hacker News Reader

Comment by b800h | Hacker News Reader

This is quite interesting. I'm not convinced of the core hypothesis, ie. "Psychological Progressives" and "Psychological Conservatives" based on desire to create vs. a desire to preserve.

People who are associated with the current "Progressive" culture are in a lot of cases involved in the project of preserving a number of traditions which have persisted for some time, e.g. access to abortion, or "centralised control of education policy". In this instance, "Conservatives" here are the ones calling for a change.

I think that Carl Schmitt's view of politics as a set of interest groups which are naturally opposed to each other is much more valuable. The middle classes are now default-progressive, whereas the working classes are now default-conservative. Why has this changed? It's changed because the interests of these groups are now served by different policies than was the case 50 years ago as a result of structural economic changes, not because the big-5 personality characteristics of the working class have changed en masse.

access to safe abortions has less tenure as a ‘tradition’ than the previous policy of only unsafe and illegal ocurring. not sure how advancing an enlightened society stands to be categorized as stubborn and traditional resisting change when progress is sought to be repealed.

I'm not sure I'm totally convinced by the overall political analysis either. It can be both, though, right? There's a material-interests part of politics and there can also be an epistemic culture or worldview part of political divides.

Yes. There's an interesting question here of how basic realpolitik interacts with existential priors.

Is it a question of "who does this belief serve?" In other words, socialism served the working classes in the 20th century. It was in their interest to hold the beliefs which underpin it.

Is it simply that a intersectional coalition of the newly-empowered find postmodernism the most plausible philosophy to explain their new-found virtue?

Perhaps that's too cynical. It probably works in both directions.

>I think that Carl Schmitt's view of politics as a set of interest groups which are naturally opposed to each other is much more valuable.

I think that is the marxist view of politics, where society is divided in classes that have different views, different interests and a struggle appears between them.

I never seen this theory work in practice.

I don’t think that the theory is meant to hold true across individuals or betweeen societies/cultures, but rather meant to explain differences. I suppose that is not my point, which is, what views do you hold if you disagree?

I don't have a model which is supposed to describe how society works. I do believe that individuals can share some views and beliefs on some matters and have different views and opinions on some other matters.

Trying to divide society into categories and assigning strong views, beliefs and interests to each category and explaining everything trough that lens might be easy and comfortable but not right.

I appreciate your candor. Your points seem simple and are yet worth noting. I appreciate the way you framed and worded your reply, as it takes a difficult topic and explains the issues without resorting to generalities. It gives more light than heat, to invert the common expectation.

The current mode of public discourse incentivizes reactionary rhetorical swipes at the expense of debate itself. Wedge issues perform an alarming amount of work under these conditions, and once constructed, they continue working even in the absence of effort by their originator.

Do you have any recommendations for readings on topics that seem relevant to your views or points made in this discussion, or that are perhaps adjacent?

The Marxists do take alot from Schmitt, as is Schmitt taking another angle to the same response as the Marxists to the same "problem", towards Liberalism.

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