I feel like labeling myself as a "brain" is rather pompous (especially with the article's focus on medicinal, which is significantly more important for society), but I do have a degree in computer...
I feel like labeling myself as a "brain" is rather pompous (especially with the article's focus on medicinal, which is significantly more important for society), but I do have a degree in computer science. Florida Man born and raised and thought I would die there, left at the end of 2021. And I have a lot of STEM degree-holding friends that have as well - one specifically after a friend of his was very badly assaulted with no justice (both my friend and his friend are gay). Almost all my trans friends have also left the state. Majority of teachers I know has either moved, retired, or changed jobs. The influx of hate starting in 2020 that infiltrated the state was just too much to feel safe anymore.
I also originally left for Oklahoma and was actually really enjoying Tulsa (which is surprisingly progressive for being in Oklahoma and from talking to people who work for the city is very much held back by the state), but then with Roe being struck down that was yet another move.
Have now lived in a blue state for a year and it's been great, and it really is amazing being the "normal" now instead of the "other"
Hospitals run on IT infrastructure too. At the risk of derailing the topic at hand; I think medical doctors carry too much prestige in our society. Are they a critical resource? Sure. But...
Hospitals run on IT infrastructure too.
At the risk of derailing the topic at hand; I think medical doctors carry too much prestige in our society. Are they a critical resource? Sure. But hospitals and other critical infrastructure only operate with IT. I know a fair few medical doctors and a lot of PhDs in math/physics/chem/bio. The medical doctors I know are the most insufferable group to be around. High on their own credentials, making sure you don't forget that they're A DOCTOR. Mean while you hang out with the STEM folk supporting each other's mental health while struggling with imposter syndrome despite mountains of subject leading research.
All that is to say: I agree being called "a brain" sounds pompous, but your skills are a valuable resource.
There are those in STEM who obsess over credentials too, but I tend to think they don’t remain “in the trenches” as ICs for very long and instead climb the corporate ladder into management and...
There are those in STEM who obsess over credentials too, but I tend to think they don’t remain “in the trenches” as ICs for very long and instead climb the corporate ladder into management and above. Most STEM types who’ve been on the front lines for extended periods don’t care about credentials as much as they do with an individual’s ability to perform.
I'll acknowledge what I posted above is purely anecdotal. My perspective is definitely skewed by coming from an academic environment where 98% of people dispose of the "Dr." honorific even when...
I'll acknowledge what I posted above is purely anecdotal. My perspective is definitely skewed by coming from an academic environment where 98% of people dispose of the "Dr." honorific even when dealing with undergrads. And the industry I ended up in is very blue collar so trying to emphasize your credentials too much will probably get you an unwanted nickname.
Given the decision between an above average doctor without a janitor or any infrastructure or an average doctor with internet and a janitor I'm taking the average guy.
Given the decision between an above average doctor without a janitor or any infrastructure or an average doctor with internet and a janitor I'm taking the average guy.
Having had a pediatrician tell me not to feed my kid frozen fruit because "god knows what chemicals they use to do that," I'll take my chance with the good doctor (and nurses) and no IT. Nurses...
Having had a pediatrician tell me not to feed my kid frozen fruit because "god knows what chemicals they use to do that," I'll take my chance with the good doctor (and nurses) and no IT. Nurses cover the gaps in a way IT does not.
Hosptials generally have pretty good fallback if IT infrastructure fails. It's definitely useful, don't get me wrong. But I'll take an IT-free hospital with competant staff any day....provided they still have appropriate medical tools at their disposal.
If my doctor needs to consult the internet in the ER, I want a new doctor.
I see it as in indicator of lack of confidence in one of the most time-critical sections of medical care. I'll stick with my "second opinion" option. The time for research is not while I'm in the...
I see it as in indicator of lack of confidence in one of the most time-critical sections of medical care. I'll stick with my "second opinion" option.
The time for research is not while I'm in the ER. I'd feel a bit different if I'm going to a specialist to evaluate cancer treatments, but that's not the ER is it?
I don't want my timely medical care dependent on Verizon and Comcast.
Yes it is, because if they don't do the research the alternative is to just give you a one-size-fits all solution based on a best guess that hasn't exhaustively ruled out all alternative options....
The time for research is not while I'm in the ER.
Yes it is, because if they don't do the research the alternative is to just give you a one-size-fits all solution based on a best guess that hasn't exhaustively ruled out all alternative options. Some doctors do, in fact, do this. They are the lazy ones.
Critical care is very much about making judgement calls around what you can do in the limited time you have. ER visits aren't just stabbings and heart attacks. There are also a lot of types of infectious diseases with complex progressions and presentations that can vary widely based on a variety of environmental factors, sometimes even involving new diseases or things prevalent in other regions that a patient has traveled to.
I’m not trying to change your mind here, I’m just curious about your feelings and where their boundaries might be… Would you feel differently if they instead quickly whipped out a single laminated...
I’m not trying to change your mind here, I’m just curious about your feelings and where their boundaries might be…
Would you feel differently if they instead quickly whipped out a single laminated page with infographics of various related diseases or injuries?
What about if instead, they consulted a hefty 500+ page diagnostic book?
I guess what I’m trying to dig at is, is your gut feeling here due to the research (at all), or is it due to being online?
To be honest, it's any at all. I'll admit its mostly gut feeling. That said, I still don't want my life in the hands of Comcast/Verizon, so I'd still appreciate a hosptial library existing.
To be honest, it's any at all. I'll admit its mostly gut feeling.
That said, I still don't want my life in the hands of Comcast/Verizon, so I'd still appreciate a hosptial library existing.
TBH the work of a janitor in a hospital, probably directly impacts outcomes more than in many other kinds of worksites. You're gonna be way more likely to go through an invasive procedure without...
TBH the work of a janitor in a hospital, probably directly impacts outcomes more than in many other kinds of worksites. You're gonna be way more likely to go through an invasive procedure without complications or sepsis in a place where the space is regularly kept clean and sanitized.
I'm not convinced this is correct. I think IT allows healthcare to track outcomes somewhat better, but I would not say it improves efficiency. Just the time we all spend answering the same...
Without IT, you'd have a much more inefficient or difficult healthcare system.
I'm not convinced this is correct. I think IT allows healthcare to track outcomes somewhat better, but I would not say it improves efficiency. Just the time we all spend answering the same questions (fill out this form online before you come, then answer the same questions with the nurse, then probably some of the same questions with the doctor) is a huge time sink that did not really occur before electronic health records became the norm.
If you want to look at the efficiency of getting to a correct diagnosis, that may be the case but I have no idea or not. But from a purely "time spent doing X" type of efficiency metric, I don't think IT helps hospitals much.
As far as difficulty, I know watching doctors and nurses get over the hump of logging in/out, using the software, typing while also trying to be attentive to the patient, etc. appeared to be a struggle. None of that seems "less difficult" than not having computers in every room. That said, this problem is somewhat temporary as staff get used to these types of systems, and upcoming doctors train on them from the start.
Losing electronic health data would set clinical and translational research back by decades. So maybe it wouldn't help in any individual care event, but it would make the science of medicine much...
If you want to look at the efficiency of getting to a correct diagnosis, that may be the case but I have no idea or not. But from a purely "time spent doing X" type of efficiency metric, I don't think IT helps hospitals much.
Losing electronic health data would set clinical and translational research back by decades. So maybe it wouldn't help in any individual care event, but it would make the science of medicine much slower and the quality of medical training much less effective.
Plus there's the issue of medical errors that come through poor documentation and gaps in knowledge transfer as well as general operational efficiencies you lose by losing out on a lot of the administrative improvements that IT infrastructure provides.
I've not read or heard about any studies related to this, but my anecdotal observation is that documentation errors are still common, and while the information may be stored somewhere in an EHR...
Plus there's the issue of medical errors that come through poor documentation and gaps in knowledge transfer
I've not read or heard about any studies related to this, but my anecdotal observation is that documentation errors are still common, and while the information may be stored somewhere in an EHR system, it does not mean that the knowledge will be transferred between providers effectively (due to input errors or other problems with the record, for example).
Errors still happen but, once people got used to electronic records, they went way way down. At the very least you don't have to worry about errors due to bad handwriting anymore. FWIW, my first...
Errors still happen but, once people got used to electronic records, they went way way down.
At the very least you don't have to worry about errors due to bad handwriting anymore.
FWIW, my first job as a high schooler was sorting and managing paper records at the hospital. And today I work in health IT. I've been doing medical records in one form or another for most of my life.
Electronic record management software is not the only technology IT would be involved with in healthcare, though. EDIT: reworded to be less unnecessarily snarky
Electronic record management software is not the only technology IT would be involved with in healthcare, though.
Very true. I've worked in healthcare IT before, so I get what you're saying. But in my experience the biggest piece of technology that touches all of healthcare is EMR/EHR software. Sure other...
Very true. I've worked in healthcare IT before, so I get what you're saying. But in my experience the biggest piece of technology that touches all of healthcare is EMR/EHR software.
Sure other functions of IT improve efficiency, but I would argue that those are not "healthcare IT" specifically, just "general IT" that you would get at any business. I suppose that's splitting hairs in regards to the larger conversation, but it was how I framed my original response.
kinddaaaaa feels a bit biased here. There's a reason the "techbro" stereotype exists. I'm a developer myself and 90% of my friends are in the medical field.
Mean while you hang out with the STEM folk supporting each other's mental health while struggling with imposter syndrome despite mountains of subject leading research.
kinddaaaaa feels a bit biased here. There's a reason the "techbro" stereotype exists. I'm a developer myself and 90% of my friends are in the medical field.
At least in the US there are institutional pressures against doctors acknowledging or being diagnosed with various mental health conditions. This doesn't prevent them from having them, of course,...
At least in the US there are institutional pressures against doctors acknowledging or being diagnosed with various mental health conditions. This doesn't prevent them from having them, of course, but it's a huge problem with that field as a whole.
oh yeah there are a ton of mentally ill doctors directly as a result of how fucked-up residency is. But the questionnaires for a medical license in various states ALSO often include a question...
No doubt. Bit different but still in the realm of people in medicine carrying too much prestige - I grew up in a college town that has a massive nursing program and went to said school. I've...
No doubt. Bit different but still in the realm of people in medicine carrying too much prestige - I grew up in a college town that has a massive nursing program and went to said school. I've always had a lot of respect for the profession...not so much for a lot of the people in the profession. As the saying go, male bullies in high school become cops and females become nurses. I was kind of happy that COVID showed more people that and the "my shit don't stink" mentality a lot of them have.
Still some amazing nurses though. It's annoying that the medical field is so enticing for insufferable people, with how important the field is.
The state I live in (currently, planning on moving next year) will kick of endless studies and programs to analyze the brain drain and when you look at the composition of these bodies and panels...
The state I live in (currently, planning on moving next year) will kick of endless studies and programs to analyze the brain drain and when you look at the composition of these bodies and panels they never actually include anyone who I'd consider to be in my cohort, its always a bunch of old people confused why people my age would ever consider leaving this wonderful land of opportunity (only if you are old, white, and wealthy) what could we possibly want?
A brain drain is typically bad because you need both educated workers and skilled laborers (regardless of education level) but this article had me thinking of how remote work changes that...
A brain drain is typically bad because you need both educated workers and skilled laborers (regardless of education level) but this article had me thinking of how remote work changes that paradigm. Yes, you still need a manager or two to keep line running but they don't need to be particularly smart, just a manager. You could feasibly remote work all the 'educated' jobs so that you could still take advantage of third-(this would normally say world, but I guess we'd need to call them)state wages.
Yes, the state would still lose the high paid jobs and their related taxes but I'm sure the oligarchs in charge would gladly cut pubic health programs for their, ahem, donations from interested companies.
I think you vastly overestimate the amount of educated workers you need to operate a functioning economy, though I don't think your overall premise is wrong. In a lot of the red states, farming is...
I think you vastly overestimate the amount of educated workers you need to operate a functioning economy, though I don't think your overall premise is wrong.
In a lot of the red states, farming is the top industry. And they need a lot of slaves migrant workers.
They'll have good educational systems. But they'll be private and only for the upper class. Now that they've gutted affirmitive action we'll start seeing it in action more and more.
Well, that's why I separated skilled and educated. You need more skilled workers to do work and manage workers will less skill but I would say that, while skilled workers are more important,...
Well, that's why I separated skilled and educated. You need more skilled workers to do work and manage workers will less skill but I would say that, while skilled workers are more important, educated workers drive innovation. Even educated skilled workers will drive innovation in the field, albeit in my opinion, at a smaller scale.
The number of applications for OB-GYN residencies is down more than 10 percent in states that have banned abortion since Dobbs. Forty-eight teachers in Hernando County, Florida, fed up with “Don’t Say Gay” and other new laws restricting what they can teach, resigned or retired at the end of the last school year. A North Carolina law confining transgender people to bathrooms in accordance with what it said on their birth certificate was projected, before it was repealed, to cost that state $3.76 billion in business investment, including the loss of a planned global operations center for PayPal in Charlotte. A survey of college faculty in four red states (Texas, Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina) about political interference in higher education found a falloff in the number of job candidates for faculty positions, and 67 percent of the respondents said they would not recommend their state to colleagues as a place to work. Indeed, nearly one-third said they were actively considering employment elsewhere.
...
OB-GYN salaries, Kate and Caroline explained to me, vary dramatically according to local demand. Washington has plenty of OB-GYNs; the nation’s capital is too urban and too geographically small to be a maternity care desert. Oklahoma, on the other hand, suffers a desperate shortage of OB-GYNs, and therefore must pay top dollar.
Mississippi is the poorest state in the country. But the average base salary for an ob-gyn at Wayne General Hospital in Waynesboro, Mississippi, is $350,000. (I take this and the salary figures that follow from the workforce data company Glassdoor, because the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ information is one year out of date.) Compare Waynesboro’s largesse to the average base salary for an OB-GYN at ClearMD Health Center in Manhattan: $275,000, or 21 percent less. (Even that’s a little high for New York City, where, according to Glassdoor, average ob-gyn pay is $243,000.) In Oklahoma City, average base salary for an OB-GYN at CompHealth Physician Obstetrics and Gynecology is $325,000. In Fort Smith, Arkansas, average base salary for an OB-GYN at CompHealth Physician Obstetrics and Gynecology is $312,500. Meanwhile, average base pay for an OB-GYN in Los Angeles is $235,000.
Throwing money at OB-GYNs helps red states manage the problem, but it doesn’t fix it. One Mississippi-based OB-GYN told the nonprofit news site Mississippi Today in September that the metropolitan area around Meridian (pop. 33,816) has six obstetric providers; as recently as five years ago, it had 12 or 13.
...
A 2022 study led by Tuan D. Nguyen of Kansas State University found that Florida had the most teacher vacancies in the country, followed by Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama [...]. Florida also logged the highest number of underqualified teachers.
...
There are 10 states that import more college graduates than they export, and all of them except Texas are blue. (I’m counting Georgia, which is one of the 10, as a blue state because it went for Joe Biden in 2020.) Indeed, the three states logging the largest net population losses overall—New York, California, and Illinois—are simultaneously logging the largest net gains of college graduates.
A not uncommon sub plot in speculative fiction involves a future US that has fractured along red/blue lines. Sometimes literally splitting into two countries, or alternatively it's a defacto...
A not uncommon sub plot in speculative fiction involves a future US that has fractured along red/blue lines. Sometimes literally splitting into two countries, or alternatively it's a defacto division rather an official split.
It's easy to see why, given the last 20 years, but until recently it always seemed, if not far fetched, then at least far in the future.
Now it's getting easier to imagine. If educated, wealthy people keep leaving, at some point it's going to create a snowball effect. Worse healthcare, lower tax revenue, collapsing industries, and so on... Leading to increased poverty, disease, voilence and addiction. The sort of environment where far right ideologies tend to land the best. Also an ideal breeding ground for extremist religious cults.
You could even argue that it's nearing the point where gravity takes over already, having been working up to it for decades.
I hope the pendulum swings back before dystopia arrives.
They are presumably leaving because at minimum they don’t feel welcome where they live. Surely you wouldn’t advocate for them to be slowly but increasingly ostracized from society by living there?...
They are presumably leaving because at minimum they don’t feel welcome where they live. Surely you wouldn’t advocate for them to be slowly but increasingly ostracized from society by living there?
I worked with a right winger who absolutely hated being in the liberal area where our job was. It was causing depression and anxiety. I can easily imagine the same thing happening with the reverse.
It's a tricky problem though. If you only lean into your comfort zone, partisanship will only get worse. We intentionally moved from a 90%+ Democrat stronghold to a 60/40 Republican stronghold....
It's a tricky problem though. If you only lean into your comfort zone, partisanship will only get worse.
We intentionally moved from a 90%+ Democrat stronghold to a 60/40 Republican stronghold. It's a small enough area that between me and a few other imports it's down to a 55/45 or better.
It helps that this area is more wealthy-Republicans than "yall don't look like yall from round here" Republicans. It means the school system is functioning and helping smooth things out instead of making things worse.
I'm not comfortable with referring to people leaving states that have criminalized necessary medical care and forbidden schools from mentioning tjeir existence as "leaning into their comfort...
If you only lean into your comfort zone, partisanship will only get worse.
I'm not comfortable with referring to people leaving states that have criminalized necessary medical care and forbidden schools from mentioning tjeir existence as "leaning into their comfort zones". That comes off as blaming people for leaving states that are arguably perpetuating humanitarian abuses against them. Not having state laws that target you and your loved ones in these states is a privilege. I don't think it's productive to moralize about how it's better to live among people with diverse points of view when the actual stuff that's happening is people moving away from states whose governments are directly persecuting them.
You make a good point, but I just wanted to point out that even if those weren't issues, one's mental health is very important. Being in a crowd of people who don't like you can very bad for you,...
You make a good point, but I just wanted to point out that even if those weren't issues, one's mental health is very important. Being in a crowd of people who don't like you can very bad for you, and in this case we're talking about living with that every moment of every day one steps outside of their home (or even within it if they live in shared housing).
Absolutely agree with you there. I just think it's particularly pernicious in light of the types of legislation that are triggering many to leave these states at the moment, sinxe they're not...
Absolutely agree with you there. I just think it's particularly pernicious in light of the types of legislation that are triggering many to leave these states at the moment, sinxe they're not remotely trivial issues.
It's not about blame, especially since I was commenting on the 'Fish out of water' rightwinger case, not the 'I fear for my life' case. There's a spectrum to be sure. I wouldn't expect someone...
It's not about blame, especially since I was commenting on the 'Fish out of water' rightwinger case, not the 'I fear for my life' case.
There's a spectrum to be sure. I wouldn't expect someone fearing for their lives to remain. Some of those states are lost causes. But maybe don't move directly into a 90% democrat stronghold like New York or California and move to a purple area that barely leans Republican? Especially if you're an active voter.
There are plenty of swingy areas to move that are perfectly safe, like Ohio, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and 'escaping' from them will make problems worse, not better.
I'm born and raised in Ohio (and I escaped even further than the people you're talking about, as I now live in Europe). "Swingy" states like that still absolutely have detrimental laws and...
I'm born and raised in Ohio (and I escaped even further than the people you're talking about, as I now live in Europe). "Swingy" states like that still absolutely have detrimental laws and disadvantages compared to more overtly progressive counterparts. Ohio has plenty of anti-LGBT legislation on the table, especially concerning children. Ohio is full of valiant progressives who fight against legislation like this -- but even when successful, fighting such legislation can take years of advocacy, elections, and court cases. Years that can have a hugely negative impact on a trans kid.
Escaping places like these can have huge positive impacts on the lives of the families and individuals actually making these decisions. People are not obligated to sacrifice that to accomplish some abstract political goal of depolarization.
At first I thought "obligated is a strong word", but there is something to be said about leaving others to fight your battles for you, you know? Do you only expect unaffected people to care as...
At first I thought "obligated is a strong word", but there is something to be said about leaving others to fight your battles for you, you know? Do you only expect unaffected people to care as much when all the affected people leave? LGBTQ folks migrating away from conservative areas making their lives harder are giving the conservatives what they want. It's not unreasonable to migrate away for one's safety, but to migrate all the way away means conceding the war.
I'm not saying others have the right to judge what is right for one's self and family. But internally? Yes, they probably should feel some shame and regret that they were unwilling/unable to make a stand for their own justice.
The idea that someone should feel ashamed for leaving someplace that is actively harming them and their loved ones because the people actively harming them want them to not be there (because they...
The idea that someone should feel ashamed for leaving someplace that is actively harming them and their loved ones because the people actively harming them want them to not be there (because they hate them and also want them to not exist at all) is honestly abhorrent to me. The policies in these red states are killing people like us.
Should gay refugees from countries where sodomy is punishable by execution also feel shame and regret? What about slaves who fled to Canada rather than make a stand for their own justice in the American South? Why are the most vulnerable of us obligated to suffer as a consequence of the place they were born to appease the political goals of liberals?
While our conception of "Left" and "Right" are very historically contingent, it does seem to me that regardless of region, culture, year or government, there seem to be three large political...
Exemplary
Their political leaders are not only fine with losing intellectuals it's actually an important part of their political beliefs.
While our conception of "Left" and "Right" are very historically contingent, it does seem to me that regardless of region, culture, year or government, there seem to be three large political forces relating to how groups interact with a society's intelligentsia:
Those who believe society was structured better in the past. Changes have made society worse off, and we need to get back to doing things the way they were done when times were better. Think Confucianism, Unabomber, luddites, primitivists, fascists, etc.
Those who think society is pretty good now, and may need incremental changes at best. These folks typically hold the dominant ideology of their society, and are resistant to meaningful change or challenges to this ideology. For an example, any society and their dominant ideology will do, but liberalism would be ours.
Those who think society need revolutionary change or new ways of being structured. Often governments, including the US government, start here. Obviously "successful" innovations eventually become the status quo. Modern examples include anarchists and communists.
Those in the first group tend to be the most hostile to education. They often burn books and oppose the poisoning or degeneration of society through education (e.g., the Unabomber advocated burning technical manuals.) It's education that has caused our society to decline, and we need to get back to our roots, to tradition and to religion to fix this.
Those in the last group tend to embrace education the most. They spend most of their time focused on academic political theory (e.g., the so-called founding fathers being students of Locke and political philosophy). In fact, their ideologies for understanding society and for thinking about how it can be restructured often come from the current society's intelligentsia.
This is a long comment to say that what the "right" in America is doing is not novel or new, but a basic implication for how they view the world. This isn't to say that there aren't "intellectuals" on that side, heck, I put the Unabomber and Confucius in their camp. However "conservatism" must be, at least generally, anti-intellectual, or must believe that intellectuals have damaged society.
This one doesn't really belong. If anything, they go in group #3. They were a labor movement, not an anti-technology movement, destroying machines only of exploitative employers that used them to...
luddites
This one doesn't really belong. If anything, they go in group #3. They were a labor movement, not an anti-technology movement, destroying machines only of exploitative employers that used them to create shoddy goods that undermined the ability to sell quality goods at reasonable prices. Maybe our clothes would suck less if the Luddites won.
They're only seen as backwards technology-haters because that's what the victors (the murderous industrialists) painted them as.
Never forget: When labor destroys machines, Capitalists kill people.
Frankly, you can lump pretty much all conservativism into group 1. The overlap between 1 and 2 is huge. They might not be extremists, but I've never met a conservative that doesn't yearn for "the good old days." In America, this often includes centrists, whom view even minor steps forward as "too extreme," which usually is followed by the hidden words "because it risks my livelihood to improve someone else's."
Which is why the White Moderate is the ultimately the biggest obstacle of justice.
I picture a political compass, but rather than the economic/power I see it as X axis of "willingness to progress (not regress)", and Y axis of "feels persecuted by society".
I think it works because people whom are actually persecuted are rarely hesitant to make changes.
Puts a lot of American conservatives far in the upper left quad, and most American centrists in the bottom left quad. Together they form the status quo. I suppose if I flipped X and Y we could map a nice little "anchor theory".
If one seeks the restructuring of society, then groups 1 and 2 are largely indistinguishable, as they both will oppose your goals with equal fervor. This isn't because 1 and 2 are similar in a...
Frankly, you can lump pretty much all conservativism into group 1. The overlap between 1 and 2 is huge.
If one seeks the restructuring of society, then groups 1 and 2 are largely indistinguishable, as they both will oppose your goals with equal fervor. This isn't because 1 and 2 are similar in a vacuum (they are very different), but they are nearly identical in their reactionary backlash against group 3.
Labor movement != group #3. It does in the US and largely has in the modern day. Would you consider the Unabomber group #3? How about ecofascists? There will be an overlap of rhetoric between...
This one doesn't really belong. If anything, they go in group #3. They were a labor movement, destroying machines only of exploititive employers that used them to create shoddy goods that underminded the ability to sell quality goods at reasonable prices. Maybe our clothes would suck less if the Luddites won.
Labor movement != group #3. It does in the US and largely has in the modern day. Would you consider the Unabomber group #3? How about ecofascists? There will be an overlap of rhetoric between group #1 and group #3 because they both vehemently hate the status quo for completely different reasons.
No, because the Unabomber was obviously a terrorist (also regressive). He might have had a philosophy, but not a sane one. You'd have to define Ecofascist, cause I hear that being thrown around at...
No, because the Unabomber was obviously a terrorist (also regressive). He might have had a philosophy, but not a sane one. You'd have to define Ecofascist, cause I hear that being thrown around at people who think phasing out gas cars is a good idea. There is Ecoterrorist, like bombing test labs, which I'd count as group 3 extremists.
Group 1/3 are not neccessarily extremists. I want radical change in society, but I'm not gonna go bombing RNC conventions either.
I'll put it this way...
If the state feels the need to shoot a collective group of people whom want progressive change, and are not killing people, they're in group 3. Because they were dangerous enough to the status quo to have the state shoot them.
Defining ecofascism in a precise way that captures the context of the political theory analyzing it would be nearly impossible. These are the "reject modernity, embrace tradition" folks. I'll try...
You'd have to define Ecofascist, cause I hear that being thrown around at people who think phasing out gas cars is a good idea.
Defining ecofascism in a precise way that captures the context of the political theory analyzing it would be nearly impossible. These are the "reject modernity, embrace tradition" folks. I'll try to find a good intro breakdown of the subject and edit my comment with it. Generally, the view is that modern society is degenerate, technology is bad, and "unnatural" aspects of modern society such as the destruction of the environment, multiculturalism and support of LGBTQ folks are symptoms of how modern society has gone astray of the traditional, more natural way of living.
Obviously, these people wind up with monstrous beliefs that are hallmarks of all fascists (how do you think they intend to "undo" multiculturalism?), but the explanation above isn't a sufficient introduction to the subject.
Perhaps one can be a luddite for group #3 reasons, but one also can for group #1 reasons.
Before I largely stopped using Reddit, this group of individuals had a substantial footing in /r/solarpunk. They seem to think that anything short of reverting society to scattered tiny villages...
Before I largely stopped using Reddit, this group of individuals had a substantial footing in /r/solarpunk. They seem to think that anything short of reverting society to scattered tiny villages composed of unpowered thatch-roof huts complete with the reduction of population implied by that isn’t doing enough to address climate change. As you said, it’s total rejection of every aspect of urbanism and modernity, even the positive ones.
Edit: To be clear, the solarpunk movement is not ecofacism and is more about advancing humanity to a point where it can live well, but also in harmony with the planet (think Star Trek utopia, but greener) and as a whole is pretty cool. It however sometimes gets co-opted by ecofacist/accelerationist/prepper types.
Gotcha. While I get your explanation is a brief scrape (as identifying fascists usually is), they're only tangentially scooping in environmentalism as an alternative way to hook into the typical...
Gotcha. While I get your explanation is a brief scrape (as identifying fascists usually is), they're only tangentially scooping in environmentalism as an alternative way to hook into the typical fascist rhetoric. You eliminate "technology is bad" and "destruction of environment" and you've just described regular fascists.
There's reasonable discussions to be had about the good/neutrality/evil of technology and environmental destruction, but not with fascists.
That's part of why my initial comment also delved into why I look at a somewhat different model. I see too much overlap between 1 and 2, while insufficiently distinguishing between extremists and moderates. Fascists always push for regressive change, though they're happy to lie about the progressive nature of it, to recruit more fascists. See: Trump's 2016 pitch.
Fascists, of all types, would appear on the far left of my X axis of (regression/progression) and up top on the "perceived/actually persecuted" Y axis.
I understand the intuitive force for believing that this is just fascism with environmentalism bolted on. But I don't think this is what's happening. There are many cases of reactionary...
they're only tangentially scooping in environmentalism as an alternative way to hook into the typical fascist rhetoric
I understand the intuitive force for believing that this is just fascism with environmentalism bolted on. But I don't think this is what's happening.
There are many cases of reactionary environmentalism. If you think humanity was better off before modern society, better off before the excesses of modernity, then critiquing the modern world's problems including it's destruction of the environment is perfectly in line with your worldview.
The reason #1 and #3 share this critique is that they don't view modernity as a good state of affairs. Those these critiques are towards diametrically-opposed ends.
Fascists absolutely had a strong environmentalist streak running through them. The whole movement is premised on a nostalgia for a pristine past and kids being able to run around with clean air...
Fascists absolutely had a strong environmentalist streak running through them. The whole movement is premised on a nostalgia for a pristine past and kids being able to run around with clean air and water and wide open, natural spaces is a big part of that. As is the hyper-masculine, rugged aesthetic requiring you to have outdoorsy activities to be rugged in.
The luddites had a point, they started out as championing the workers' cause asking for manufactories to keep skilled people employed and not replace them all with subpar machinery. They weren't...
The luddites had a point, they started out as championing the workers' cause asking for manufactories to keep skilled people employed and not replace them all with subpar machinery. They weren't completely unwilling to move with the times either making them fit more into group 2.
Ultimately they were radicalised and started destroying these machines and is when they entered group 1.
They're just so dissimilar from fascists, the Unabomber, and your other examples that they stick out like a sore thumb.. even if it's not entirely incorrect.
I mean, they also include Confucianism, which similarly differs a ton from fascists and the Unabomber particularly with regards to intellectualism, even if I can understand assigning them to group...
I mean, they also include Confucianism, which similarly differs a ton from fascists and the Unabomber particularly with regards to intellectualism, even if I can understand assigning them to group 1 based on their beliefs. So at least the comment is weird about these categories in a consistent way?
I didn't intend to convey that being in group #1 implied that one was "bad" or "didn't have a point". I'd imagine a number of group #3 people would agree with some of the principle criticisms...
I didn't intend to convey that being in group #1 implied that one was "bad" or "didn't have a point". I'd imagine a number of group #3 people would agree with some of the principle criticisms Kaczynski made. It was meant to be neutral language that most people regardless of their group might agree on.
Modern group #3 people like Luddites since they have shared critiques of modern society. Group #3 wants to push past the problems of modernity, and group #1 wants to revert back from the problems of modernity.
I think this is a constructive way of deconstructing (har har) political movements. I find the left–right paradigm to be too limited in its ability to describe the impulses and desires of society....
I think this is a constructive way of deconstructing (har har) political movements. I find the left–right paradigm to be too limited in its ability to describe the impulses and desires of society.
Furthermore, the left vs. right dichotomy makes it difficult to tease apart subgroups that have meaningfully fundamental differences and distinctions. In such crude categories, there's bound to be self-contradiction, which can be interpreted as hypocrisy.
I don't believe this to be true. It might seem that way from the outside, but my take is that both sides (left and right) are enjoyors of intellectuals that share their ideological world views.
Their political leaders are not only fine with losing intellectuals it's actually an important part of their political beliefs.
I don't believe this to be true. It might seem that way from the outside, but my take is that both sides (left and right) are enjoyors of intellectuals that share their ideological world views.
Not when it comes as a basis of their power. Free Media and education are always the first to go in a power grab. You want "the people" not questioning what you serve them in the TV and...
Not when it comes as a basis of their power. Free Media and education are always the first to go in a power grab. You want "the people" not questioning what you serve them in the TV and newspapers.
Usually the intellectual thinkers themselves are so well off that they can afford to abstract a lot of the cruelty in the system away.
The "share" part is key, I think. It's not the concern of intellectuals to share and align their worldview with the public, so seeking out ones that do are disingenuous. It also assumes that all...
are enjoyors of intellectuals that share their ideological world views
The "share" part is key, I think. It's not the concern of intellectuals to share and align their worldview with the public, so seeking out ones that do are disingenuous. It also assumes that all worldviews are equally valid, which isn't true.
I feel like labeling myself as a "brain" is rather pompous (especially with the article's focus on medicinal, which is significantly more important for society), but I do have a degree in computer science. Florida Man born and raised and thought I would die there, left at the end of 2021. And I have a lot of STEM degree-holding friends that have as well - one specifically after a friend of his was very badly assaulted with no justice (both my friend and his friend are gay). Almost all my trans friends have also left the state. Majority of teachers I know has either moved, retired, or changed jobs. The influx of hate starting in 2020 that infiltrated the state was just too much to feel safe anymore.
I also originally left for Oklahoma and was actually really enjoying Tulsa (which is surprisingly progressive for being in Oklahoma and from talking to people who work for the city is very much held back by the state), but then with Roe being struck down that was yet another move.
Have now lived in a blue state for a year and it's been great, and it really is amazing being the "normal" now instead of the "other"
Hospitals run on IT infrastructure too.
At the risk of derailing the topic at hand; I think medical doctors carry too much prestige in our society. Are they a critical resource? Sure. But hospitals and other critical infrastructure only operate with IT. I know a fair few medical doctors and a lot of PhDs in math/physics/chem/bio. The medical doctors I know are the most insufferable group to be around. High on their own credentials, making sure you don't forget that they're A DOCTOR. Mean while you hang out with the STEM folk supporting each other's mental health while struggling with imposter syndrome despite mountains of subject leading research.
All that is to say: I agree being called "a brain" sounds pompous, but your skills are a valuable resource.
There are those in STEM who obsess over credentials too, but I tend to think they don’t remain “in the trenches” as ICs for very long and instead climb the corporate ladder into management and above. Most STEM types who’ve been on the front lines for extended periods don’t care about credentials as much as they do with an individual’s ability to perform.
I'll acknowledge what I posted above is purely anecdotal. My perspective is definitely skewed by coming from an academic environment where 98% of people dispose of the "Dr." honorific even when dealing with undergrads. And the industry I ended up in is very blue collar so trying to emphasize your credentials too much will probably get you an unwanted nickname.
Given the decision between an above average doctor without a janitor or any infrastructure or an average doctor with internet and a janitor I'm taking the average guy.
Having had a pediatrician tell me not to feed my kid frozen fruit because "god knows what chemicals they use to do that," I'll take my chance with the good doctor (and nurses) and no IT. Nurses cover the gaps in a way IT does not.
Hosptials generally have pretty good fallback if IT infrastructure fails. It's definitely useful, don't get me wrong. But I'll take an IT-free hospital with competant staff any day....provided they still have appropriate medical tools at their disposal.
If my doctor needs to consult the internet in the ER, I want a new doctor.
Consulting the internet is an indicator that your doctor is being thorough, not of incompetence.
I see it as in indicator of lack of confidence in one of the most time-critical sections of medical care. I'll stick with my "second opinion" option.
The time for research is not while I'm in the ER. I'd feel a bit different if I'm going to a specialist to evaluate cancer treatments, but that's not the ER is it?
I don't want my timely medical care dependent on Verizon and Comcast.
Yes it is, because if they don't do the research the alternative is to just give you a one-size-fits all solution based on a best guess that hasn't exhaustively ruled out all alternative options. Some doctors do, in fact, do this. They are the lazy ones.
Critical care is very much about making judgement calls around what you can do in the limited time you have. ER visits aren't just stabbings and heart attacks. There are also a lot of types of infectious diseases with complex progressions and presentations that can vary widely based on a variety of environmental factors, sometimes even involving new diseases or things prevalent in other regions that a patient has traveled to.
I’m not trying to change your mind here, I’m just curious about your feelings and where their boundaries might be…
Would you feel differently if they instead quickly whipped out a single laminated page with infographics of various related diseases or injuries?
What about if instead, they consulted a hefty 500+ page diagnostic book?
I guess what I’m trying to dig at is, is your gut feeling here due to the research (at all), or is it due to being online?
To be honest, it's any at all. I'll admit its mostly gut feeling.
That said, I still don't want my life in the hands of Comcast/Verizon, so I'd still appreciate a hosptial library existing.
TBH the work of a janitor in a hospital, probably directly impacts outcomes more than in many other kinds of worksites. You're gonna be way more likely to go through an invasive procedure without complications or sepsis in a place where the space is regularly kept clean and sanitized.
I'm not convinced this is correct. I think IT allows healthcare to track outcomes somewhat better, but I would not say it improves efficiency. Just the time we all spend answering the same questions (fill out this form online before you come, then answer the same questions with the nurse, then probably some of the same questions with the doctor) is a huge time sink that did not really occur before electronic health records became the norm.
If you want to look at the efficiency of getting to a correct diagnosis, that may be the case but I have no idea or not. But from a purely "time spent doing X" type of efficiency metric, I don't think IT helps hospitals much.
As far as difficulty, I know watching doctors and nurses get over the hump of logging in/out, using the software, typing while also trying to be attentive to the patient, etc. appeared to be a struggle. None of that seems "less difficult" than not having computers in every room. That said, this problem is somewhat temporary as staff get used to these types of systems, and upcoming doctors train on them from the start.
Losing electronic health data would set clinical and translational research back by decades. So maybe it wouldn't help in any individual care event, but it would make the science of medicine much slower and the quality of medical training much less effective.
Plus there's the issue of medical errors that come through poor documentation and gaps in knowledge transfer as well as general operational efficiencies you lose by losing out on a lot of the administrative improvements that IT infrastructure provides.
I've not read or heard about any studies related to this, but my anecdotal observation is that documentation errors are still common, and while the information may be stored somewhere in an EHR system, it does not mean that the knowledge will be transferred between providers effectively (due to input errors or other problems with the record, for example).
Errors still happen but, once people got used to electronic records, they went way way down.
At the very least you don't have to worry about errors due to bad handwriting anymore.
FWIW, my first job as a high schooler was sorting and managing paper records at the hospital. And today I work in health IT. I've been doing medical records in one form or another for most of my life.
Electronic record management software is not the only technology IT would be involved with in healthcare, though.
EDIT: reworded to be less unnecessarily snarky
Very true. I've worked in healthcare IT before, so I get what you're saying. But in my experience the biggest piece of technology that touches all of healthcare is EMR/EHR software.
Sure other functions of IT improve efficiency, but I would argue that those are not "healthcare IT" specifically, just "general IT" that you would get at any business. I suppose that's splitting hairs in regards to the larger conversation, but it was how I framed my original response.
kinddaaaaa feels a bit biased here. There's a reason the "techbro" stereotype exists. I'm a developer myself and 90% of my friends are in the medical field.
It's definitely biased. Completely anecdotal based on my 6 years as mathematician and the medical doctors in my family.
you should definitely check in on the mental health of your doctor friends, mental health isn't exclusive to us STEM people
At least in the US there are institutional pressures against doctors acknowledging or being diagnosed with various mental health conditions. This doesn't prevent them from having them, of course, but it's a huge problem with that field as a whole.
Every doctor I've met has some degree of PTSD. Residency as currently done is borderline inhumane.
oh yeah there are a ton of mentally ill doctors directly as a result of how fucked-up residency is. But the questionnaires for a medical license in various states ALSO often include a question about whether you've been treated for mental illness in the past -- in ways that facilitate discrimination. Here's an example thread on a student doctor forum about this issue in which an OP is worried they'll get denied for taking an SSRI. Though while googling for this I found an article about how some states have removed this question precisely because it can prevent doctors from getting help for their issues. That's good progress at least.
No doubt. Bit different but still in the realm of people in medicine carrying too much prestige - I grew up in a college town that has a massive nursing program and went to said school. I've always had a lot of respect for the profession...not so much for a lot of the people in the profession. As the saying go, male bullies in high school become cops and females become nurses. I was kind of happy that COVID showed more people that and the "my shit don't stink" mentality a lot of them have.
Still some amazing nurses though. It's annoying that the medical field is so enticing for insufferable people, with how important the field is.
The state I live in (currently, planning on moving next year) will kick of endless studies and programs to analyze the brain drain and when you look at the composition of these bodies and panels they never actually include anyone who I'd consider to be in my cohort, its always a bunch of old people confused why people my age would ever consider leaving this wonderful land of opportunity (only if you are old, white, and wealthy) what could we possibly want?
A brain drain is typically bad because you need both educated workers and skilled laborers (regardless of education level) but this article had me thinking of how remote work changes that paradigm. Yes, you still need a manager or two to keep line running but they don't need to be particularly smart, just a manager. You could feasibly remote work all the 'educated' jobs so that you could still take advantage of third-(this would normally say world, but I guess we'd need to call them)state wages.
Yes, the state would still lose the high paid jobs and their related taxes but I'm sure the oligarchs in charge would gladly cut pubic health programs for their, ahem, donations from interested companies.
I think you vastly overestimate the amount of educated workers you need to operate a functioning economy, though I don't think your overall premise is wrong.
In a lot of the red states, farming is the top industry. And they need a lot of
slavesmigrant workers.They'll have good educational systems. But they'll be private and only for the upper class. Now that they've gutted affirmitive action we'll start seeing it in action more and more.
Well, that's why I separated skilled and educated. You need more skilled workers to do work and manage workers will less skill but I would say that, while skilled workers are more important, educated workers drive innovation. Even educated skilled workers will drive innovation in the field, albeit in my opinion, at a smaller scale.
But, yeah, with you on all the other points.
From the article:
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A not uncommon sub plot in speculative fiction involves a future US that has fractured along red/blue lines. Sometimes literally splitting into two countries, or alternatively it's a defacto division rather an official split.
It's easy to see why, given the last 20 years, but until recently it always seemed, if not far fetched, then at least far in the future.
Now it's getting easier to imagine. If educated, wealthy people keep leaving, at some point it's going to create a snowball effect. Worse healthcare, lower tax revenue, collapsing industries, and so on... Leading to increased poverty, disease, voilence and addiction. The sort of environment where far right ideologies tend to land the best. Also an ideal breeding ground for extremist religious cults.
You could even argue that it's nearing the point where gravity takes over already, having been working up to it for decades.
I hope the pendulum swings back before dystopia arrives.
They are presumably leaving because at minimum they don’t feel welcome where they live. Surely you wouldn’t advocate for them to be slowly but increasingly ostracized from society by living there?
I worked with a right winger who absolutely hated being in the liberal area where our job was. It was causing depression and anxiety. I can easily imagine the same thing happening with the reverse.
Definitely not. By the pendulum swinging I was referring to political sentiment, resulting in better policies and therefore less need for an exodus.
It's a tricky problem though. If you only lean into your comfort zone, partisanship will only get worse.
We intentionally moved from a 90%+ Democrat stronghold to a 60/40 Republican stronghold. It's a small enough area that between me and a few other imports it's down to a 55/45 or better.
It helps that this area is more wealthy-Republicans than "yall don't look like yall from round here" Republicans. It means the school system is functioning and helping smooth things out instead of making things worse.
I'm not comfortable with referring to people leaving states that have criminalized necessary medical care and forbidden schools from mentioning tjeir existence as "leaning into their comfort zones". That comes off as blaming people for leaving states that are arguably perpetuating humanitarian abuses against them. Not having state laws that target you and your loved ones in these states is a privilege. I don't think it's productive to moralize about how it's better to live among people with diverse points of view when the actual stuff that's happening is people moving away from states whose governments are directly persecuting them.
You make a good point, but I just wanted to point out that even if those weren't issues, one's mental health is very important. Being in a crowd of people who don't like you can very bad for you, and in this case we're talking about living with that every moment of every day one steps outside of their home (or even within it if they live in shared housing).
Absolutely agree with you there. I just think it's particularly pernicious in light of the types of legislation that are triggering many to leave these states at the moment, sinxe they're not remotely trivial issues.
It's not about blame, especially since I was commenting on the 'Fish out of water' rightwinger case, not the 'I fear for my life' case.
There's a spectrum to be sure. I wouldn't expect someone fearing for their lives to remain. Some of those states are lost causes. But maybe don't move directly into a 90% democrat stronghold like New York or California and move to a purple area that barely leans Republican? Especially if you're an active voter.
There are plenty of swingy areas to move that are perfectly safe, like Ohio, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, and 'escaping' from them will make problems worse, not better.
I'm born and raised in Ohio (and I escaped even further than the people you're talking about, as I now live in Europe). "Swingy" states like that still absolutely have detrimental laws and disadvantages compared to more overtly progressive counterparts. Ohio has plenty of anti-LGBT legislation on the table, especially concerning children. Ohio is full of valiant progressives who fight against legislation like this -- but even when successful, fighting such legislation can take years of advocacy, elections, and court cases. Years that can have a hugely negative impact on a trans kid.
Escaping places like these can have huge positive impacts on the lives of the families and individuals actually making these decisions. People are not obligated to sacrifice that to accomplish some abstract political goal of depolarization.
At first I thought "obligated is a strong word", but there is something to be said about leaving others to fight your battles for you, you know? Do you only expect unaffected people to care as much when all the affected people leave? LGBTQ folks migrating away from conservative areas making their lives harder are giving the conservatives what they want. It's not unreasonable to migrate away for one's safety, but to migrate all the way away means conceding the war.
I'm not saying others have the right to judge what is right for one's self and family. But internally? Yes, they probably should feel some shame and regret that they were unwilling/unable to make a stand for their own justice.
The idea that someone should feel ashamed for leaving someplace that is actively harming them and their loved ones because the people actively harming them want them to not be there (because they hate them and also want them to not exist at all) is honestly abhorrent to me. The policies in these red states are killing people like us.
Should gay refugees from countries where sodomy is punishable by execution also feel shame and regret? What about slaves who fled to Canada rather than make a stand for their own justice in the American South? Why are the most vulnerable of us obligated to suffer as a consequence of the place they were born to appease the political goals of liberals?
Neal Stephenson's take on this in Fall; or, Dodge In Hell is one I keep thinking of.
Agreed, it feels particularly prescient at the moment.
Hasn't it been around forever?
People who could ( smart, educated ) have always left the red states for better jobs and more things to do after work.
I don't have much to add except that I found this quote funny:
While our conception of "Left" and "Right" are very historically contingent, it does seem to me that regardless of region, culture, year or government, there seem to be three large political forces relating to how groups interact with a society's intelligentsia:
Those who believe society was structured better in the past. Changes have made society worse off, and we need to get back to doing things the way they were done when times were better. Think Confucianism, Unabomber, luddites, primitivists, fascists, etc.
Those who think society is pretty good now, and may need incremental changes at best. These folks typically hold the dominant ideology of their society, and are resistant to meaningful change or challenges to this ideology. For an example, any society and their dominant ideology will do, but liberalism would be ours.
Those who think society need revolutionary change or new ways of being structured. Often governments, including the US government, start here. Obviously "successful" innovations eventually become the status quo. Modern examples include anarchists and communists.
Those in the first group tend to be the most hostile to education. They often burn books and oppose the poisoning or degeneration of society through education (e.g., the Unabomber advocated burning technical manuals.) It's education that has caused our society to decline, and we need to get back to our roots, to tradition and to religion to fix this.
Those in the last group tend to embrace education the most. They spend most of their time focused on academic political theory (e.g., the so-called founding fathers being students of Locke and political philosophy). In fact, their ideologies for understanding society and for thinking about how it can be restructured often come from the current society's intelligentsia.
This is a long comment to say that what the "right" in America is doing is not novel or new, but a basic implication for how they view the world. This isn't to say that there aren't "intellectuals" on that side, heck, I put the Unabomber and Confucius in their camp. However "conservatism" must be, at least generally, anti-intellectual, or must believe that intellectuals have damaged society.
This one doesn't really belong. If anything, they go in group #3. They were a labor movement, not an anti-technology movement, destroying machines only of exploitative employers that used them to create shoddy goods that undermined the ability to sell quality goods at reasonable prices. Maybe our clothes would suck less if the Luddites won.
They're only seen as backwards technology-haters because that's what the victors (the murderous industrialists) painted them as.
Never forget: When labor destroys machines, Capitalists kill people.
Frankly, you can lump pretty much all conservativism into group 1. The overlap between 1 and 2 is huge. They might not be extremists, but I've never met a conservative that doesn't yearn for "the good old days." In America, this often includes centrists, whom view even minor steps forward as "too extreme," which usually is followed by the hidden words "because it risks my livelihood to improve someone else's."
Which is why the White Moderate is the ultimately the biggest obstacle of justice.
I picture a political compass, but rather than the economic/power I see it as X axis of "willingness to progress (not regress)", and Y axis of "feels persecuted by society".
I think it works because people whom are actually persecuted are rarely hesitant to make changes.
Puts a lot of American conservatives far in the upper left quad, and most American centrists in the bottom left quad. Together they form the status quo. I suppose if I flipped X and Y we could map a nice little "anchor theory".
If one seeks the restructuring of society, then groups 1 and 2 are largely indistinguishable, as they both will oppose your goals with equal fervor. This isn't because 1 and 2 are similar in a vacuum (they are very different), but they are nearly identical in their reactionary backlash against group 3.
Labor movement != group #3. It does in the US and largely has in the modern day. Would you consider the Unabomber group #3? How about ecofascists? There will be an overlap of rhetoric between group #1 and group #3 because they both vehemently hate the status quo for completely different reasons.
No, because the Unabomber was obviously a terrorist (also regressive). He might have had a philosophy, but not a sane one. You'd have to define Ecofascist, cause I hear that being thrown around at people who think phasing out gas cars is a good idea. There is Ecoterrorist, like bombing test labs, which I'd count as group 3 extremists.
Group 1/3 are not neccessarily extremists. I want radical change in society, but I'm not gonna go bombing RNC conventions either.
I'll put it this way...
If the state feels the need to shoot a collective group of people whom want progressive change, and are not killing people, they're in group 3. Because they were dangerous enough to the status quo to have the state shoot them.
Defining ecofascism in a precise way that captures the context of the political theory analyzing it would be nearly impossible. These are the "reject modernity, embrace tradition" folks. I'll try to find a good intro breakdown of the subject and edit my comment with it. Generally, the view is that modern society is degenerate, technology is bad, and "unnatural" aspects of modern society such as the destruction of the environment, multiculturalism and support of LGBTQ folks are symptoms of how modern society has gone astray of the traditional, more natural way of living.
Obviously, these people wind up with monstrous beliefs that are hallmarks of all fascists (how do you think they intend to "undo" multiculturalism?), but the explanation above isn't a sufficient introduction to the subject.
Perhaps one can be a luddite for group #3 reasons, but one also can for group #1 reasons.
Before I largely stopped using Reddit, this group of individuals had a substantial footing in /r/solarpunk. They seem to think that anything short of reverting society to scattered tiny villages composed of unpowered thatch-roof huts complete with the reduction of population implied by that isn’t doing enough to address climate change. As you said, it’s total rejection of every aspect of urbanism and modernity, even the positive ones.
Edit: To be clear, the solarpunk movement is not ecofacism and is more about advancing humanity to a point where it can live well, but also in harmony with the planet (think Star Trek utopia, but greener) and as a whole is pretty cool. It however sometimes gets co-opted by ecofacist/accelerationist/prepper types.
This corresponds to my experience in the real world. Ecofascism is a huge problem in many environmental activist, anarchist, and anti-civ movements.
Gotcha. While I get your explanation is a brief scrape (as identifying fascists usually is), they're only tangentially scooping in environmentalism as an alternative way to hook into the typical fascist rhetoric. You eliminate "technology is bad" and "destruction of environment" and you've just described regular fascists.
There's reasonable discussions to be had about the good/neutrality/evil of technology and environmental destruction, but not with fascists.
That's part of why my initial comment also delved into why I look at a somewhat different model. I see too much overlap between 1 and 2, while insufficiently distinguishing between extremists and moderates. Fascists always push for regressive change, though they're happy to lie about the progressive nature of it, to recruit more fascists. See: Trump's 2016 pitch.
Fascists, of all types, would appear on the far left of my X axis of (regression/progression) and up top on the "perceived/actually persecuted" Y axis.
I understand the intuitive force for believing that this is just fascism with environmentalism bolted on. But I don't think this is what's happening.
There are many cases of reactionary environmentalism. If you think humanity was better off before modern society, better off before the excesses of modernity, then critiquing the modern world's problems including it's destruction of the environment is perfectly in line with your worldview.
The reason #1 and #3 share this critique is that they don't view modernity as a good state of affairs. Those these critiques are towards diametrically-opposed ends.
Fascists absolutely had a strong environmentalist streak running through them. The whole movement is premised on a nostalgia for a pristine past and kids being able to run around with clean air and water and wide open, natural spaces is a big part of that. As is the hyper-masculine, rugged aesthetic requiring you to have outdoorsy activities to be rugged in.
The luddites had a point, they started out as championing the workers' cause asking for manufactories to keep skilled people employed and not replace them all with subpar machinery. They weren't completely unwilling to move with the times either making them fit more into group 2.
Ultimately they were radicalised and started destroying these machines and is when they entered group 1.
They're just so dissimilar from fascists, the Unabomber, and your other examples that they stick out like a sore thumb.. even if it's not entirely incorrect.
I mean, they also include Confucianism, which similarly differs a ton from fascists and the Unabomber particularly with regards to intellectualism, even if I can understand assigning them to group 1 based on their beliefs. So at least the comment is weird about these categories in a consistent way?
I didn't intend to convey that being in group #1 implied that one was "bad" or "didn't have a point". I'd imagine a number of group #3 people would agree with some of the principle criticisms Kaczynski made. It was meant to be neutral language that most people regardless of their group might agree on.
Modern group #3 people like Luddites since they have shared critiques of modern society. Group #3 wants to push past the problems of modernity, and group #1 wants to revert back from the problems of modernity.
I think this is a constructive way of deconstructing (har har) political movements. I find the left–right paradigm to be too limited in its ability to describe the impulses and desires of society.
Furthermore, the left vs. right dichotomy makes it difficult to tease apart subgroups that have meaningfully fundamental differences and distinctions. In such crude categories, there's bound to be self-contradiction, which can be interpreted as hypocrisy.
I don't believe this to be true. It might seem that way from the outside, but my take is that both sides (left and right) are enjoyors of intellectuals that share their ideological world views.
Not when it comes as a basis of their power. Free Media and education are always the first to go in a power grab. You want "the people" not questioning what you serve them in the TV and newspapers.
Usually the intellectual thinkers themselves are so well off that they can afford to abstract a lot of the cruelty in the system away.
The "share" part is key, I think. It's not the concern of intellectuals to share and align their worldview with the public, so seeking out ones that do are disingenuous. It also assumes that all worldviews are equally valid, which isn't true.