If you’ve been following the news you’ve seen how the Musk-Vivek pro-immigration argument — that USA needs to import skilled immigrants to be competitive against China — has divided the happy MAGA consensus.
"The irony of Vivek's post is that his wrong analysis of how American culture is broken illustrates in itself how American culture is broken.
I mean, how out-of-touch must one be to think people will embrace a vision where childhood must be optimized for corporate success, with less sleepovers, hanging out and fun (what he calls "mediocrity") in favor of shareholder-value-maximizing "excellence"?
Especially when addressing Americans who have seen their lives destroyed en-masse by the same corporate priorities that produced this vision of "excellence". The average American family isn't choosing between math tutoring and sleepovers - they're choosing between paying for basic necessities while both parents work multiple jobs.
His examples unwittingly prove the opposite of his point: shows that he describes as corrupting American culture (Friends, Boy Meets World, Family Matters, etc.) celebrate friendship, family, and community values - exactly what the US has lost in their rush to optimize everything for economic output and create an hyperindividualistic and consumerist society. That's probably why they're popular: they reflect a lost world that people aspire to go back to.
He mentions China as the motivating factor here, because apparently the solution to avoid having their "asses handed to us by China" is more capitalism, treating people even more like cogs who must compete in "the global market for technical talent."
That doesn't only betray a misunderstanding of what Americans want but also of China. China themselves largely hate the extreme competitiveness of their system: the people hate it and the government hates it, they all want to move away from it (hence the government banning the tutoring industry). And in any case this isn't what made China rise - China rose with a largely uneducated population, as mass university-level education is a very recent phenomenon there.
No, I'm convinced that China, at a very fundamental level, rose so unprecedentedly fast for the very reason that it is one of the very few countries in the world which culture wasn't completely denaturalized by the sort of neoliberal dystopia that Vivek seems to idealize. In China's socialist system the market doesn't trump all, individualism doesn't reign supreme and, at a broader level, they still stay faithful to many of the ancestral values that have sustained their civilization for thousands of years. That's the culture that underpins it all and makes it work, not the fact that Chinese kids do too much homework.
All in all, this is what makes this debate so revealing: Vivek, in trying to diagnose America's problems, has instead unwittingly illustrated them. The belief that every human activity must be justified by its contribution to GDP, that collective bonds are mere distractions from the pursuit of "excellence," and that the solution to the problems created by predatory capitalism is, somehow, more predatory capitalism."
Especially during xmas: I mean, who doesn't love when Buddy's dad tells his boss to piss off. My wife had me watch Family Man for the first time this year, that one is probably apropos too.
This nation is built and maintained by incoherency.
Always one group wanting to assimilate with the larger group while shaming others like them. My dad's side (and I've heard this outside family) shame hispanic immigrants, while being hispanic themselves. They're "American" and therefore more pure or something. They want to set the good example not to be sleepy and lazy like immigrant version of hispanic. You see this "house slave" dynamic everywhere. Gays do this when they blend in with straights masking inner Boy George to set the good example.
yeah the way immigrants go against other immigrants has always bothered me — there is always a hierarchy of purity that people to fit into, aping the ruling classes…
I understand needing to survive and that increasing odds but the lack of future reflection or awareness is alarming. I’ve done this behavior in my past life but I eventually identified and ceased it.
Indeed, I repeatedly hear from someone how they got in the "right way" and fuck all these illegals, despite even being related to some (and despite that claim possibly being a lie to fit in better to their right wing community). Sad.
Having grown up and worked with a lot of immigrants from Latin America and India in engineering and business, I've also seen a lot of backbiting and denigration of "the people back home" as compared to their views of "America" and Americans. The analogy I heard most often among Mexican born immigrants was of a bunch of crabs in an aquarium. As they told it, nobody ever gets to climb out because the others constantly grab onto their legs and pull them back down as they try to make it up the glass. Thing is, it was always framed as though it was strictly an inherent fault in individuals and society - and in a vacuum with no influence coming from the neighbor to the north. I.e., not "the system" but a cynical view of their own native people.
I saw this earlier today. Not 100% relevant, but somewhat.
https://x.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1872672262928933312
"The irony of Vivek's post is that his wrong analysis of how American culture is broken illustrates in itself how American culture is broken.
I mean, how out-of-touch must one be to think people will embrace a vision where childhood must be optimized for corporate success, with less sleepovers, hanging out and fun (what he calls "mediocrity") in favor of shareholder-value-maximizing "excellence"?
Especially when addressing Americans who have seen their lives destroyed en-masse by the same corporate priorities that produced this vision of "excellence". The average American family isn't choosing between math tutoring and sleepovers - they're choosing between paying for basic necessities while both parents work multiple jobs.
His examples unwittingly prove the opposite of his point: shows that he describes as corrupting American culture (Friends, Boy Meets World, Family Matters, etc.) celebrate friendship, family, and community values - exactly what the US has lost in their rush to optimize everything for economic output and create an hyperindividualistic and consumerist society. That's probably why they're popular: they reflect a lost world that people aspire to go back to.
He mentions China as the motivating factor here, because apparently the solution to avoid having their "asses handed to us by China" is more capitalism, treating people even more like cogs who must compete in "the global market for technical talent."
That doesn't only betray a misunderstanding of what Americans want but also of China. China themselves largely hate the extreme competitiveness of their system: the people hate it and the government hates it, they all want to move away from it (hence the government banning the tutoring industry). And in any case this isn't what made China rise - China rose with a largely uneducated population, as mass university-level education is a very recent phenomenon there.
No, I'm convinced that China, at a very fundamental level, rose so unprecedentedly fast for the very reason that it is one of the very few countries in the world which culture wasn't completely denaturalized by the sort of neoliberal dystopia that Vivek seems to idealize. In China's socialist system the market doesn't trump all, individualism doesn't reign supreme and, at a broader level, they still stay faithful to many of the ancestral values that have sustained their civilization for thousands of years. That's the culture that underpins it all and makes it work, not the fact that Chinese kids do too much homework.
All in all, this is what makes this debate so revealing: Vivek, in trying to diagnose America's problems, has instead unwittingly illustrated them. The belief that every human activity must be justified by its contribution to GDP, that collective bonds are mere distractions from the pursuit of "excellence," and that the solution to the problems created by predatory capitalism is, somehow, more predatory capitalism."
thanks for sharing that, it's on the money
Especially during xmas: I mean, who doesn't love when Buddy's dad tells his boss to piss off. My wife had me watch Family Man for the first time this year, that one is probably apropos too.
This nation is built and maintained by incoherency.
Always one group wanting to assimilate with the larger group while shaming others like them. My dad's side (and I've heard this outside family) shame hispanic immigrants, while being hispanic themselves. They're "American" and therefore more pure or something. They want to set the good example not to be sleepy and lazy like immigrant version of hispanic. You see this "house slave" dynamic everywhere. Gays do this when they blend in with straights masking inner Boy George to set the good example.
Immigration is a good way to pull at hearts.
yeah the way immigrants go against other immigrants has always bothered me — there is always a hierarchy of purity that people to fit into, aping the ruling classes…
I understand needing to survive and that increasing odds but the lack of future reflection or awareness is alarming. I’ve done this behavior in my past life but I eventually identified and ceased it.
Indeed, I repeatedly hear from someone how they got in the "right way" and fuck all these illegals, despite even being related to some (and despite that claim possibly being a lie to fit in better to their right wing community). Sad.
Their shamed exploitation becomes the survival they once feared.
Having grown up and worked with a lot of immigrants from Latin America and India in engineering and business, I've also seen a lot of backbiting and denigration of "the people back home" as compared to their views of "America" and Americans. The analogy I heard most often among Mexican born immigrants was of a bunch of crabs in an aquarium. As they told it, nobody ever gets to climb out because the others constantly grab onto their legs and pull them back down as they try to make it up the glass. Thing is, it was always framed as though it was strictly an inherent fault in individuals and society - and in a vacuum with no influence coming from the neighbor to the north. I.e., not "the system" but a cynical view of their own native people.