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Noël King's avatar

This is a fantastic post, Monica. It rings true to me, especially this key point you make: “It’s possible that one the most challenging aspect of human progress isn’t fighting against oppression, but learning to live without the meaning and purpose that struggle provides. Learning to find fulfillment in harmony rather than conflict, in bridge-building rather than battling.” Thank you for continuing to add such clarity and insight to what we are all experiencing.

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Christofer Nigro's avatar

Thank you for another great post, Monica. This is what I think in response to this:

"Which brings me back to my questions: Do we inherently crave conflict and challenges, even when our lives are going well and we are making progress? As a society, why is it so difficult for us to acknowledge victory and move on to new challenges that don’t undermine the progress we’ve made?

"Maybe there’s something psychologically compelling about struggle. Maybe being part of a movement fighting for change offers community and a sense of moral clarity that can be addictive. Or, as humans, perhaps conflict and challenge provide meaning, purpose, and identity in our lives that harmony doesn’t."

Let us acknowledge one of the major causes of the constant shifts towards division no matter how much social and economic progress is made by marginalized groups: the capitalist system itself. You noted at one point that we should take advantage of these social advances to unite towards correcting the class-based issues that affect all of us, and always have to varying but often significant degrees.

This is something the capitalist class does not want. It *needs* to sow division between different demographics in the working class so that unification on the economic front never happens. The capitalist class are fully class conscious, whereas the working class as a whole is not. This is proven by the fact that it was uber-corporations like BlackRock, State Street, and JP Morgan that created DEI requirements and pushed the "Woke" mentality. It may have found its academic roots in the post-modern writings of Foucault and his ilk many decades ago, but it always was and remains pushed by the most affluent of society.

In short, the capitalist class and their PMCs -- Personal Managerial Class, the affluent "upper middle class" -- are the main purveyors of this. It's very good for keeping different segments of the working class pissed off at each other and embroiled in conflict so we're all at each other's throats instead of angry at the ruling class. And it allows the two wings of the Duopoly to play these differences in social values against each other, engaging in a faux contest that keeps various segments of the working class tethered to the Duopoly, and therefore capitalism.

Secondly, once a marginalized group comes close to achieving equality, and finally achieves a voice in society, many of them will harbor lingering, sometimes intense resentments towards the group that enjoyed nominal privileges within the capitalist system up to that point. So, once they gain something close to equality to the former oppressing group they lash out at them instead of seeking harmony. "This is our chance to punch the people who used to punch us around."

Thirdly, many soldiers cannot give up a war without losing their sense of purpose, as you noted. As a result, a once important and necessary movement devolves into a racket, with new players taking it over and using it in attempts to acquire power and privilege of their own rather than simply ensuring equality. Hence, the move for equality becomes one for "equity" in its stead. And many members of the former oppressing group enter the racket to acquire and secure their own power so they do not get swept under the rug.

Do we need conflict from a psychological standpoint? I think that largely depends on the type of society we live in. In this one, those that rule over us find it a necessity to keep these conflicts among the lower economic classes going on perpetually, lest we turn our ire towards the handful of people with the truly significant amounts of power and privilege.

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