Genuine question

I'm assuming you're You didn't answer the question, you dodged it to talk about class structure. The question wasn't about class, it's about why someone would choose to follow an ideology that disadvantages them. I just said "working class" because everyone knows roughly what people it refers to. Let me rephrase.

Why would someone, as an individual, who works for a wage willingly support capitalism?

Fuck off, it's an interesting subject with ramifications in history and humanities

I would have thought there was two big barriers to the working class embracing socialism. The first is, even in our current economic predicament, contentment. Most members of the working class are relatively content - and perhaps the fact that they buy into the neoliberal promise of being able to pull yourself up by your bootstraps if you simply work hard enough.

The second is how ineffective socialists in the west are. They speak in esoteric, academic language and are just terrible at engaging the strata of society they see as their greatest ally.

>with ramifications in history and humanities
No, it isn't. It's a modern day question which means it isn't historical and it's political in nature which means it's out of the scope of this board and belongs on /pol/, but you won't post it there because you'll get ran the fuck out. If only MMMMOOOOOOOOOOOODDDDDDDDDSSSSSSSSSS would do their fucking job and ban you.

It's been a hugely important subject since the industrialization and the communist manifesto. This entire subject has basically shaped the political and economic landscape of the western world for almost two centuries. Stop trying to downplay its significance.

>a modern day question
>literally a question that has been asked since the late 18th century
Should we ban threads about existentialism as well? They also discuss current questions and can be political in nature.

That is only the problem for the working class are not fighting for socialism anymore. Not every socialist has to be a thinker like Gramsci nor do they have to an activist and advocate like Helen Keller. You are right in that the socialistic intellectuals are too esoteric but where are the working class socialists to engage with them? Where is my Eugene Debs?

Well I simply ask based on my experiences at university. My background is in law and international relations, so I only ever studied socialism incidentally. I found its criticisms of capitalism valid, but student socialists were extremely off-putting. As I said, esoteric, and far more concerned with confrontational diatribes than actually seeing how they might go about effecting any actual change.

The failure of any sort of socialist engagement means that workers still have faith in the neoliberal system to fix their woes. I wish I could be more nuanced in my criticism, but the candid fact of the matter is that most western socialists you meet these days come across as 'weird'. They're the sort of people who seem to have a chip on their shoulder, and would be social pariahs in a realised socialist utopia just as they are in the current system. If you're a socialist, I'm curious if you might have any thoughts to that? It's certainly an ideology that would be most receptive to uni students, but it hasn't been so far - at least in my experience.

>Workers lives have never been better
>Poverty keeps decreasing around the world
>Technology is advancing at a pace never seen before in human history
>Tolerance is at an all-time high
>Education is easily available
>Following your ambitions has never been easier
>New means of communication and information have exposed censorship and corruption like never before
>protesting for what you believe is right is now common occurrence
"Why aren't people seizing the means of production"?
Why would you do that?

>Because class is heterogenous. There is no homogenous "working class" but rather different occupations with different motives

This sound legit. For example, take welders or plumbers. They belong to the working class, but are better financially than some of those from the middle class office drones. Hell, whole terminology is outdated as fuck. For example, which class would you consider desk service workers to be? Middle class, working class, something else? The modern economy is much more different from that of Marx's times.

It is pointless to envision any solutions when one is powerless to do anything. I can't speak for these people but I have to point out they have to get people to agree with them that capitalism before moving forward with getting them to agree with socialism.

Any real socialism movement has to come from the working class as the bulk. But historically most socialist intellectuals are middle class, which i assume are those students you met, simply for the reason why they have the most insight and arguments against capitalism and for socialism beyond than just their self-interest. I don't want to downplay the working class's importance either.

Tl:DR Any genuine socialist movement has to be backed the working class, any coherent and centralized socialist movement has to be led by the intellectuals. It would be great if you were led with a working class leader, but the last one was Stalin so yea...

>what is means of production?
If anything it becomes even more clearer as offices become more and more like factories. Although I will admit trying to union white collar workers is something nobody expected

Okay, so an officer worker is the working class. But what is a contractor welder then? Small bourgoise?

>investiment bankers are now working class
Ok

If he is freelancer working for himself then just a Small bourgoise who is exploiting no one.

Ayy lmao.
This is only applicable for entry level factory work at best.
And even then, it would become an industrial Haiti

>The only choices are free market burger capitalism or communist central planning

Really fires those neurons. Mixed economies produce the best results.

>investment bankers don't own stocks, property and bonds

What would be like industrial Haiti?

There aren't any workable alternatives. The working class can benefit the most from free flow of money which attempts to combat capitalism can hinder. I don't think the working class really buys into the idea they are oppressed by capitalism or capitalists, or that if they are things would really be any different under another system. The biggest departures from capitalism as most understand it have not really gone hand-in-hand with things being rosy for those at the bottom of the pile.

Capitalism produces businesses and industries.

I've studied up on this -- businesses and industries hire people, and that's how "jobs" are born.

Jobs are something of a prerequisite for a "working class."

They are working class. It is extremely difficult to consistently beat the market average. Successful traders are all on cocaine working 14 hours a day, waking up at 4 in the morning to check on the asian markets.

The only difference between them and a Chinese coal miner is that they earn a bit more.

>investment bankers don't own stocks, property and bonds
Maybe they don't. If that's the definition of a capitalist, everyone who has their money invested in anything is one. That's at least 70% of the people in the first world.

>ask question outside of historical context
>wonder why it isn't a history thread
Seriously, fuck off /leftypol/. No one is buying your shit, faggots.

Sure they are petit-bourgoise, but considering how they have very little invested compared to the truly bourgoise, they are extremely petit-bourgoise

So they would be spared after the socialist recolution? It doesn't seem to me like most socialists wuld be happy to march alongside them, or that bankers would ever want to do it.

Leftists would argue that the ruling classes have successfully convinced the working class that the class divide is irrelevant, but that race, nationality, region and religion are the things that divide us. Any historical materialist would of course see this as a misguided view of the world, because they believe that class (who owns and who works) is the principal variable that divides people.

What's the limit that I am allowed to have invested to be spared? Who defines that?

spared from what? I hope you realize gulag was a very Russian concept

Spared from whatever happens the bourgeoisie, not mecessarily from gulags.

I'll answer your question with another question I've given students before, to which there's no right or wrong answer, it's merely an illustration of your views about the world.

I have two societies. In one, you will be able to eke out a nice existence, able to afford your own house, medical care, and still have a little left over for spending on luxuries. Your neighbor is exceptionally wealthy however, drives 15 cars, lives in a huge private mansion, and flies around in a private jet whenever he wants. He doesn't interact with you in any direct or indirect way, and simply was lucky enough to have this lifestyle.

In the second society, you have all the same things you would have in the first society, and to the same degree. Your neighbor in this society however, has exactly the same stuff you have as well. In fact, everyone does; there's no single person who's got any more or any less than you. Like above, assume no one has any direct or indirect effect on your life.

Now, would you rather live in a society where some people have more than others but everyone lives a decent life, or would you rather have one where everyone gets exactly the same with no one ahead? If it doesn't affect you, why would you care that your neighbor has more than you? Is it jealousy, or greed on your own part? You can take away his share of nice things, but it won't go to you, so all it really is is vain sacrifice in the name of fairness.

Because the world has never been so rich, educated and healthy, user, and all thanks to capitalism.