Are They Rich Because They're Smart?

by Jack Barnes

Are They Rich Because They're Smart? explains the sharpening class inequalities in the United States and the resulting conflicts accelerated by today s slow-burning world depression. It takes apart the self-serving rationalizations of a growing layer of well-paid professionals that their schooling and brightness equip them to regulate the lives of working people, who can t be trusted to know what s in our own interests.

In the coming battles forced upon us by the capitalist rulers, says Jack Barnes, workers will begin to transform ourselves and our attitudes toward life, work, and each other. Only then will we discover our own worth and learn what we re capable of becoming.

Genres: Politics, Economics

111 pages, Paperback

Published June 1, 2016

Reviews

[Mazdak Paskeh · Rating 4 out of 5]

امان از ترجمه

[Mohammad Sadiq · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good lesson for mid class workers

[Nwaf · Rating 2 out of 5]

هراء شيوعي

[kait · Rating 1 out of 5]

white man’s communism

[Marc Lichtman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Or Are They ‘Smart’ Because They’re Rich?

This simple question is always at the heart of politics, but more so today, because I believe that liberals and the “left” have become far more elitist than conservatives. All of the Wokery, cancel culture, identity politics, critical race theory, “gender” change, and other “political correctness” are not about fighting racism and sexism—they can’t be because they think these things are in people’s heads, not material conditions. They’re about proving one better than others, which is central to capitalist politics and culture. People in these circles are rating themselves and others by how victimized they are. But they’re all middle class, and none of them know what real oppression is. And they glorify victimhood, rather than organizing to fight against it. The #MeToo “movement” was an example of this, and a very dangerous one, since it eats away at what little is left of the concept of “innocent until proven guilty.”

I also suggest Labor, Nature, and the Evolution of Humanity: The Long View of History. And The Clintons' Anti-working-class Record: Why Washington Hates Working People.

The liberal response to the election of Donald Trump was hysterical. The idea that all the people who voted for him did so because they were racist was absurd. Did everyone who voted for Hillary Clinton want a new war? Many who voted for him had voted once or even twice for Obama, but they live in areas where the lifespan is falling, people don’t have jobs, many get addicted to painkillers because life is so miserable … that they couldn’t conceive of voting for the status quo.

Middle class liberals not only don’t suffer under these conditions, and they don’t know anyone who does. The cultural class gap is widening, and they won’t even consider talking to someone who voted for Trump—They applaud when such people are assaulted. They don’t support free speech; they want protection for themselves and those in their bubbles against “microaggression.” And worst of all, they hate the working class who they consider responsible for everything backward, and they condemn all white workers as “privileged” despite the fact that they themselves are far more privileged!

These are three essays by Socialist Workers Party leader Jack Barnes that were originally written for different purposes, but they fit together perfectly as an argument that this country needs to be ruled by a better class of people—the working class.

[Thomas P. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Compré este libro corto en una feria de libros (Chicago Lit Fest) hace seis meses. Primero, quiero aclarar que yo soy más izquierdista que conservador, pero lo he leído, y puedo decir que es algo aburrido, con el autor recorriendo los mismos temas izquierdistas y cansados. Hay un buen argumento o dos, pero más que nada, el autor no parece ofrecer soluciones concretas en cuanto a la batalla de clases sociales en los Estados Unidos.