Welcome to America where, leaving aside the ultra-rich and the underclass, luxury beliefs are the only way in which the upper middle class distinguishes itself from the working class.
The basis of luxury beliefs is the elite valorization of toxic femininity: I am woman, hear me whine. Don’t talk tough, don’t play rough, cultivate sensitivity and compassion, commit to self-care, obsess about physical and mental health, care for the environment—the realm of Mother Earth. Weakness is chic: let everyone know about how you have been traumatized by micro-aggressions and how careless remarks have made you feel ‘unsafe’, go to therapy and do yoga.
In this scheme, the police and the military are or course bad because they use force. Elites can afford to defund the police because they don’t live cheek-to-jowl with a criminal underclass. Open borders are of course good because elites don’t have to deal with lower class immigrants turning their neighborhoods turned into casbahs or favillas. In any case, they can make the noises and be applauded for their smarmy-feminine compassion and sensitivity.
In my class last semester I had to deal with a student, a good student, who wanted to write her term paper on ‘My Mental Heath Journey’. I was polite and helpful, and got her on to a better topic. But this disgusting smarm is a feature of weak chic among the elite and the promotion of toxic femininity.
Well, sensitivity and compassion are good habits to cultivate, surely? Except that the new cultural imperative of empathy above all, in the absence of any set of ground rules, obliges us to empathize with just about anyone who can put forth a claim, which is how we end up with male sex offenders in female prisons…
Compassion is certainly good but sensitivity is not. And empathy is fine so long as it's impartial and we calculate in not only the costs and benefits to individuals in our immediate environment but the overall costs and benefits to others overall. That's just good Utilitarianism.
Welcome to America where, leaving aside the ultra-rich and the underclass, luxury beliefs are the only way in which the upper middle class distinguishes itself from the working class.
The basis of luxury beliefs is the elite valorization of toxic femininity: I am woman, hear me whine. Don’t talk tough, don’t play rough, cultivate sensitivity and compassion, commit to self-care, obsess about physical and mental health, care for the environment—the realm of Mother Earth. Weakness is chic: let everyone know about how you have been traumatized by micro-aggressions and how careless remarks have made you feel ‘unsafe’, go to therapy and do yoga.
In this scheme, the police and the military are or course bad because they use force. Elites can afford to defund the police because they don’t live cheek-to-jowl with a criminal underclass. Open borders are of course good because elites don’t have to deal with lower class immigrants turning their neighborhoods turned into casbahs or favillas. In any case, they can make the noises and be applauded for their smarmy-feminine compassion and sensitivity.
In my class last semester I had to deal with a student, a good student, who wanted to write her term paper on ‘My Mental Heath Journey’. I was polite and helpful, and got her on to a better topic. But this disgusting smarm is a feature of weak chic among the elite and the promotion of toxic femininity.
"cultivate sensitivity and compassion"
Well, sensitivity and compassion are good habits to cultivate, surely? Except that the new cultural imperative of empathy above all, in the absence of any set of ground rules, obliges us to empathize with just about anyone who can put forth a claim, which is how we end up with male sex offenders in female prisons…
Compassion is certainly good but sensitivity is not. And empathy is fine so long as it's impartial and we calculate in not only the costs and benefits to individuals in our immediate environment but the overall costs and benefits to others overall. That's just good Utilitarianism.