Transcript

Red V Blue · Prompt Air

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Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Today we're looking
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at a report called the Architecture of Stasis.
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And I have to say, the central idea is, well,
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it's pretty cynical. It is cynical, but the source
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argues it's also incredibly functional. Functional
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how? The argument is that the intense red versus
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blue conflict we see everywhere is... effectively
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a simulation. A simulation. Yeah, like a live
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fire exercise. And it's designed for one reason,
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to neutralize the political will of the bottom
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90 % of the population. So the gridlock is a
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containment strategy. You keep the 90 % fighting
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each other so they can't challenge the top 10%.
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Exactly. And the report breaks down two main
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ways this is done, the division of labor and
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the division of subsidy. Okay, let's start with
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the division of labor. The report goes way back
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to 1894. The Pullman strike. Right, with George
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Pullman, the rail car guy. And he hires African
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-American men, many of them former slaves, to
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be porters. But it wasn't just about filling
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jobs, was it? No, not at all. The report says
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he was intentionally creating a racialized service
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caste, a hierarchy. Which set up the wedge. The
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perfect wedge. Because when the white railway
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workers formed their union, they actually wrote
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it into their constitution to exclude the black
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porters. So when they went on strike for better
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wages, Pullman just he used the excluded black
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workers as strike breakers. He turned them against
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each other. It's that idea of the psychological
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wage. Exactly. The white workers got paid less
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in actual money, but they were paid in status
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and whiteness as property. They chose that over
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economic solidarity. And the report argues we
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are still running that same playbook. Which,
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I guess, leads to the second mechanism, the division
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of subsidy. Yeah, this is about what the report
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calls the upside down welfare state. Okay, break
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that down for me. It's pretty simple, actually.
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The people who need government help the least
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get the most. It's just branded differently.
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You mean like social welfare versus corporate
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welfare? Precisely. So if you get something like
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SNAP benefits, it's very visible. It's stigmatized
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as a handout. It's dependency. Right. But then
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you look at something like the mortgage interest
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deduction. Which is a huge subsidy for homeowners
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who are generally more affluent. A massive subsidy.
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But we call it tax relief. It's seen as smart,
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not dependent. And that makes the working class
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angry at the poor for taking their tax money.
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Instead of looking up at the massive wealth extraction
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happening above them, it keeps the 90 % fighting
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over crumbs. Which creates what the report calls
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the twin four fives. The engineered 45 % versus
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45 % deadlock. So neither side can ever get a
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real majority to change the system. And the report
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uses an allegory for this that I actually remember.
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The old web series, red versus blue. Yeah, it's
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a great metaphor. The setting is a place called
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Blood Gulch. The box canyon. Mm -hmm. And you
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have these two teams of soldiers trapped in this
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canyon fighting an endless, pointless war over
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a flag in the middle. A flag that has zero actual
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value. None. And then you get the twist. They're
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simulation troopers. The whole thing is fake.
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The war is being orchestrated by a figure they
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call the director. Representing the top 10%.
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Exactly. As long as red hates blue and blue hates
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red, no one ever thinks to look up and ask who
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built the canyon. Wow. That is a bleak image.
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So if we're all just soldiers in the box, does
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the report offer any way out? It does. It points
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to what it calls a third force. The exhausted
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majority. The 90 percent, the people who are
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just tired of the simulation and are ready to
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stop fighting. It mentions reclaiming the white
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stripe on the flag. Right. Not as the empty void
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of capital, but as a blank slate, a space for
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real solidarity. A recognition that most of us
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are on the same team, economically speaking.
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At the end of the day, yeah. Well. That is a
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lot to think about. I guess we'll just leave
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you with this question then. The next time you
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find yourself angry at the other side, ask yourself,
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are you fighting for the flag? Or are you just
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running drills for the director? Thanks for diving
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in with us.