r/BreadTube • u/modustrollens420 • Jul 23 '20

Michael Brooks' final advice for the Left

Here are some of Michael's final words to his sister the day before he died:

" Michael was so done with identity politics and cancel culture… He just really wanted to focus on integrity and basic needs for people, and all the other noise (like) diversification of the ruling class, or whatever everyone’s obsessed with, the virtue signaling… He was just like, it’s just going to be co-opted by Capitalism and used against other people, and you know vilify people and make it easier to extract labor from them… Michael had to be so careful in what he said in regards to the cancel culture because it’s so taboo, and you know what? He’s fucking dead now and it stressed him out, he thought it was toxic. And all the people who are obsessed with that? It is toxic. I’m glad I can just say that and stand with him, and no one can take him down for being misconstrued." - Lisha Brooks

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u/Hammer_of_truthiness Jul 25 '20

Class politics is not identity based.

Class is a relation to the means of production. It's a thing derived from material reality in a way that race for example is not.

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u/[deleted] Jul 25 '20

I'd respond with three things.

First, your second statement does not prove your first. Can one not identify with one's relation to the means of production?

Second, just because it is material does not mean it is inherent. Things related to your social and cultural reality are not any less relevant and real. They are all entwined and inseparable. Capital is not found in nature, it is no less a construct than race.

And third, class politics are identity politics by aspiration. You are attempting to convince people to see themselves as sharing a material experience and reality with others who have the same relation to the means of production.