Imo it’s important to remember that the bourgeois are not a monolith, and they do not always act rationally. Trump is driven by pure ego, and RFK is a crank who sincerely believes his own bullshit, and how many other billionaires are Elon Musk-level detached from reality? To the extent that they do act rationally, we can look at the early days of the pandemic where the focus was on people just going to work normally because a disruption of day-to-day life was seen as disastrous to “the economy” (read: the stock market). I think this is just more trying to memory hole COVID so that they can cling to the status quo, which is going well for them.
A similar question is that if climate change is going to, at bare minimum, cause massive economic damage and an ensuing crash, why are those in the haute bourgeoisie not trying to avoid the worst outcomes? Again, I think it comes down to just wanting the status quo to continue, regardless of whether that’s actually tenable.
There’s been a surplus of workers in the United States for a very long time at this point from the perspective of capital. As has been argued for a decade or more, the massive rise in prison population in the United States is in part because they’re just holding sells for surplus reserve army of labour. They think they can afford to lose a lot more.
This is really starting to look like the only plausible explanation for some of these choices. Like sure RFK and some his constellation of grifter/wellness quacks might actually believe some of bullshit they say, but ultimately, all the other powerful forces that really govern must sort of be ok with this sort of thing for it to happen… which means they certainly know it’s bullshit and will kill more people, but they don’t have a problem with that outcome.
I think they are well aware of climate change and the coming water wars and mass migrations so they are looking towards a future where mass death is inevitable
Increasingly not in the amounts they have so think of this as a cull not extermination.
They’re afraid of what happens if they do perfect robotics and AI and fire half the population (something they desperately DO WANT to do to forever resolve things in their favor). Unless they kill a hell of a lot of people there will be a revolution or they’ll be forced to make extraordinary concessions like universal basic income at which point the proles start thinking about other basics needing to be free like medical care and gasp nice things.
So their choices are a massive war (may still be coming with China) though presently that mainly kills young men (not ideal as you’ve already spent money educating and raising them to the minimum age for compulsory service and that’s basically throwing away what’s considered an important investment before its matured, though it does have the benefit of resolving problems of too many angry young men without romantic/sexual partners by creating a surplus of women to men and thus also increasing the value of the remaining men and beating down further feminist impulses among women in favor of settling) and disease (which disproportionately kills the elderly and disabled who are considered of lesser value to these monsters) for quickly killing off a lot of the unneeded excess labor pool.
As usual the bourgeoisie will be able to fly to Europe to get a vaccine for themselves so this really only impacts the workers most likely to be targeted by automation at the lower rungs who absolutely cannot afford to even go to Mexico for a weekend to get some shots. Service workers, retail workers will get this disease repeatedly and be weakened by it and perhaps killed off at younger ages just in time for the imagined dawn of automation and the final triumph of the bourgeoisie over labor (as they imagine it anyways).
this is a time of great confusion, there’s rational terrifying fascists laying the groundwork for mass slaughter but also a lot of genuinely unhinged believers in all kinds of magic, who can say who is what when they’re all working together?
smart money’s on RFK just believing though, the worm compells him
I genuinely don’t understand what the bourgeoise has to gain by spreading disease among its population. Doesn’t it need workers?
Imo it’s important to remember that the bourgeois are not a monolith, and they do not always act rationally. Trump is driven by pure ego, and RFK is a crank who sincerely believes his own bullshit, and how many other billionaires are Elon Musk-level detached from reality? To the extent that they do act rationally, we can look at the early days of the pandemic where the focus was on people just going to work normally because a disruption of day-to-day life was seen as disastrous to “the economy” (read: the stock market). I think this is just more trying to memory hole COVID so that they can cling to the status quo, which is going well for them.
A similar question is that if climate change is going to, at bare minimum, cause massive economic damage and an ensuing crash, why are those in the haute bourgeoisie not trying to avoid the worst outcomes? Again, I think it comes down to just wanting the status quo to continue, regardless of whether that’s actually tenable.
There’s been a surplus of workers in the United States for a very long time at this point from the perspective of capital. As has been argued for a decade or more, the massive rise in prison population in the United States is in part because they’re just holding sells for surplus reserve army of labour. They think they can afford to lose a lot more.
It is eugenics, they are doing a “survival of the fittest” purge to get rid of the “undesirables”
Most of them probably also think every worker can be replaced by ai by end of quarter
This is really starting to look like the only plausible explanation for some of these choices. Like sure RFK and some his constellation of grifter/wellness quacks might actually believe some of bullshit they say, but ultimately, all the other powerful forces that really govern must sort of be ok with this sort of thing for it to happen… which means they certainly know it’s bullshit and will kill more people, but they don’t have a problem with that outcome.
I think they are well aware of climate change and the coming water wars and mass migrations so they are looking towards a future where mass death is inevitable
Increasingly not in the amounts they have so think of this as a cull not extermination.
They’re afraid of what happens if they do perfect robotics and AI and fire half the population (something they desperately DO WANT to do to forever resolve things in their favor). Unless they kill a hell of a lot of people there will be a revolution or they’ll be forced to make extraordinary concessions like universal basic income at which point the proles start thinking about other basics needing to be free like medical care and gasp nice things.
So their choices are a massive war (may still be coming with China) though presently that mainly kills young men (not ideal as you’ve already spent money educating and raising them to the minimum age for compulsory service and that’s basically throwing away what’s considered an important investment before its matured, though it does have the benefit of resolving problems of too many angry young men without romantic/sexual partners by creating a surplus of women to men and thus also increasing the value of the remaining men and beating down further feminist impulses among women in favor of settling) and disease (which disproportionately kills the elderly and disabled who are considered of lesser value to these monsters) for quickly killing off a lot of the unneeded excess labor pool.
As usual the bourgeoisie will be able to fly to Europe to get a vaccine for themselves so this really only impacts the workers most likely to be targeted by automation at the lower rungs who absolutely cannot afford to even go to Mexico for a weekend to get some shots. Service workers, retail workers will get this disease repeatedly and be weakened by it and perhaps killed off at younger ages just in time for the imagined dawn of automation and the final triumph of the bourgeoisie over labor (as they imagine it anyways).
this is a time of great confusion, there’s rational terrifying fascists laying the groundwork for mass slaughter but also a lot of genuinely unhinged believers in all kinds of magic, who can say who is what when they’re all working together?
smart money’s on RFK just believing though, the worm compells him
I don’t think there’s specific logic to it, they’re just listening to the wild hogs that make up the anti-vax right wing.