The current wave of industrial fetishism in the West bears a striking resemblance to the hippie movement of the 1970s. This generation, the first to grow up without direct experience of farm life, romanticized subsistence agriculture, often ignoring its harsh realities. They overlooked the desperate poverty and brutal logic of agrarian life, where families might have to sell off a child due to drought or crop failure, viewing children as assets rather than individuals. This idealized vision of rural life was far removed from the actual experiences of landless peasants.
J.R.R. Tolkien, although not part of the hippie generation, contributed to this agrarian nostalgia through his works like "The Lord of the Rings." His portrayal of hobbits living in comfortable, spacious homes, spending their days reading or smoking pipes, presented a sanitized view of rural life. This vision was shaped by Tolkien's limited exposure to rural life, primarily through family vacation homes, rather than the harsh realities faced by those who worked the land.
A similar phenomenon is occurring today with the nostalgia for the 1950s and the industrial age. The myth of the sole male breadwinner with a factory job is just that—a myth. In reality, most working-class families had both parents working, with women often holding part-time jobs. The 1950s TV shows that perpetuate this myth were aimed at the upper middle class, as only a small percentage of the population owned televisions at the time. These shows featured male leads in upper-middle-class professions like lawyers or advertising executives, further distorting the reality of the era.
Having grown up in Bangladesh and lived in Dhaka during the early stages of industrialization, I witnessed the brutality of the system firsthand, although I was shielded from its worst effects due to my upper-middle-class upbringing. Despite this, I support the Asian industrial revolution, recognizing it as a transition from an extremely brutal and Malthusian world to a less harsh one.
This perspective fuels my distaste for low-income countries in Africa that view manufacturing as a get-rich-quick scheme, seemingly unwilling to make the enormous sacrifices required for such a transition. Similarly, I have little patience for first-world elites who romanticize the industrial age from their air-conditioned offices, seeking to bring back this era to reassert their cultural power or masculinity. Their nostalgia is informed by a sanitized, TV-shaped view of history, far removed from the realities of industrial life.
I feel similarly. I grew up in a steel-and-coal city of Ostrava, during the last decade of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic.
Heavy industry is extremely polluting, all the kids suffered from cough, infections etc., and there was not a butterfly to be seen - the air was too toxic for them. The jobs were also dangerous, coal miners would sometimes die in mass casualty events and steel workers more individually, but still. The local university hospital still has a big burn unit, because it was needed.
Romanticizing this kind of life indicates that real knowledge has disappeared.
I feel like I learned ten things per minute reading this. My worldview has been shaken about and dropped on its head just a bit. Thanks so much for writing it.
> "What's even more concerning is that even these elite intellectuals still lack basic concepts of what "modern urban life" should look like. They may have never truly internalized the daily experience of "stepping out and taking clean, safe subway, walking freely in dense urban neighborhoods." They still view "cities" as dirty, dangerous, anxiety-inducing places, while treating "suburbs" as safe, clean, ideal residential areas.
This deeply rooted cultural cognitive structure is the biggest resistance we face when promoting public lifestyle transformation."
I don't quite understand why this is framed as a failure of imagination on the part of American elites, rather than a reflection of empirical reality in many parts of the USA. In many big American cities, subways ARE unclean and unsafe, and the suburbs are much more attractive by comparison. If Americans have a bleak opinion about public transit and urban living, I don't think this is because they are insufficiently imaginative in grasping what things could be like if Chicago were more like Tokyo... I think it's more because they are pessimistic about America's public works capabilities and incentives.
"We have to dismantle this binary thinking: cities can be both safe and free; public life can be both efficient and democratic. This kind of life exists not only in Tokyo, Seoul, Amsterdam, Zurich."
.
may wish to dispute that it requires a "strongman" to have safe streets - but face facts, you do have to have strong, effective, crime control.
Agree. Yet very multicultural Amsterdam (probably the best comparison to a major American city because it is more diverse than the others listed) still manages a pretty low crime rate some how.
Humans are more important than trees - thus industrialization is a moral imperative. The example you gave of the silly Michigan town that gave up a lithium battery factory over some silly environmental concerns is a prime example of luddism - people hating on technology and refusing to recognize the benefits and absolute moral righteousness of industry. Every battery built is an affirmation of the power of man over nature.
As for workers conditions: history has shown that whenever industrialism shows up, the poorest of the poor vote with their feet and move to work in factories. There’s nothing more pitilessly cruel than the countryside.
The simple (but unacceptable to articulate) truth is that if American cities were populated by white people they would be as safe as cities in China and Japan. There is one factor which accounts for the difference. Young black men. Young black men (15-34) are only 2% of the population but account for half of the nation’s homicides and other crime. A rate an astounding 50 times higher than that of the average American. As a result of that where white people decide to live, shop, vacation and even if they are willing to use public transit (especially women) has been for decades largely based on avoiding large groups of black people because of their perceived and actual tendency to engage in violence. The term white flight in housing patterns has always been used as a disparaging reference when, in truth, it means white common sense.
If you have watched The Sopranos you saw the Italian community begin to distance itself from the crime ridden Mafia. When does the apparent tolerance for crime within the black community which includes jury nullification of black criminal cases along with the acceptance by black school administrators of the disruption of classrooms by out of control individuals begin to end? Finally, when will fathers who fail to care for and love their children and especially their boy children be openly censured by black leadership? The young Chris Rock joked openly about these issues but he clearly now censors himself as does the entire black community.
Until and unless this problem is corrected America will not enjoy the safe urban experience that is common in Asia and Europe.
In terms of reimaging the American dream, I feel this comment is misunderstanding the American ethos. Internally there is a lot of fight over what the American dream is but the fight will always have an individualist character in nature. That is what the suburban house represents, it is the modern day yeomen farmer which can hope to establish a sphere of independence. This view of independence will look weird to a Confucian society that focuses more on conforming to the whole but should be viewed a limiting. Rather I would argue the cultural (and possibly self selecting genetic trend because of immigration) trend towards individualism will give America more dynamism in the long run. China is too often used a simple heal so I appreciate the nuanced perspective given.
“In my experience, racially-homogenous suburban liberals, who swear they are “progressive” have an incomprehensible and irrational fear of “the city.” But we all know what and who “the city” represents, in their mind.”
Racially homogenous? Maybe still in some northern cities, but it’s not the 1970s anymore out there.
The current wave of industrial fetishism in the West bears a striking resemblance to the hippie movement of the 1970s. This generation, the first to grow up without direct experience of farm life, romanticized subsistence agriculture, often ignoring its harsh realities. They overlooked the desperate poverty and brutal logic of agrarian life, where families might have to sell off a child due to drought or crop failure, viewing children as assets rather than individuals. This idealized vision of rural life was far removed from the actual experiences of landless peasants.
J.R.R. Tolkien, although not part of the hippie generation, contributed to this agrarian nostalgia through his works like "The Lord of the Rings." His portrayal of hobbits living in comfortable, spacious homes, spending their days reading or smoking pipes, presented a sanitized view of rural life. This vision was shaped by Tolkien's limited exposure to rural life, primarily through family vacation homes, rather than the harsh realities faced by those who worked the land.
A similar phenomenon is occurring today with the nostalgia for the 1950s and the industrial age. The myth of the sole male breadwinner with a factory job is just that—a myth. In reality, most working-class families had both parents working, with women often holding part-time jobs. The 1950s TV shows that perpetuate this myth were aimed at the upper middle class, as only a small percentage of the population owned televisions at the time. These shows featured male leads in upper-middle-class professions like lawyers or advertising executives, further distorting the reality of the era.
Having grown up in Bangladesh and lived in Dhaka during the early stages of industrialization, I witnessed the brutality of the system firsthand, although I was shielded from its worst effects due to my upper-middle-class upbringing. Despite this, I support the Asian industrial revolution, recognizing it as a transition from an extremely brutal and Malthusian world to a less harsh one.
This perspective fuels my distaste for low-income countries in Africa that view manufacturing as a get-rich-quick scheme, seemingly unwilling to make the enormous sacrifices required for such a transition. Similarly, I have little patience for first-world elites who romanticize the industrial age from their air-conditioned offices, seeking to bring back this era to reassert their cultural power or masculinity. Their nostalgia is informed by a sanitized, TV-shaped view of history, far removed from the realities of industrial life.
I feel similarly. I grew up in a steel-and-coal city of Ostrava, during the last decade of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic.
Heavy industry is extremely polluting, all the kids suffered from cough, infections etc., and there was not a butterfly to be seen - the air was too toxic for them. The jobs were also dangerous, coal miners would sometimes die in mass casualty events and steel workers more individually, but still. The local university hospital still has a big burn unit, because it was needed.
Romanticizing this kind of life indicates that real knowledge has disappeared.
This must be a cool book club
It really is!
I feel like I learned ten things per minute reading this. My worldview has been shaken about and dropped on its head just a bit. Thanks so much for writing it.
i am glad you learned a lot of things from this post Kent. Which aspect you find most shocking?
> "What's even more concerning is that even these elite intellectuals still lack basic concepts of what "modern urban life" should look like. They may have never truly internalized the daily experience of "stepping out and taking clean, safe subway, walking freely in dense urban neighborhoods." They still view "cities" as dirty, dangerous, anxiety-inducing places, while treating "suburbs" as safe, clean, ideal residential areas.
This deeply rooted cultural cognitive structure is the biggest resistance we face when promoting public lifestyle transformation."
I don't quite understand why this is framed as a failure of imagination on the part of American elites, rather than a reflection of empirical reality in many parts of the USA. In many big American cities, subways ARE unclean and unsafe, and the suburbs are much more attractive by comparison. If Americans have a bleak opinion about public transit and urban living, I don't think this is because they are insufficiently imaginative in grasping what things could be like if Chicago were more like Tokyo... I think it's more because they are pessimistic about America's public works capabilities and incentives.
"We have to dismantle this binary thinking: cities can be both safe and free; public life can be both efficient and democratic. This kind of life exists not only in Tokyo, Seoul, Amsterdam, Zurich."
.
may wish to dispute that it requires a "strongman" to have safe streets - but face facts, you do have to have strong, effective, crime control.
.
Yes precisely!
Agree. Yet very multicultural Amsterdam (probably the best comparison to a major American city because it is more diverse than the others listed) still manages a pretty low crime rate some how.
Had no idea you hosted CyberPink and American Roulette! Blew my mind hahaha
yes lol! thanks for following and supporting the podcast Leon!
Humans are more important than trees - thus industrialization is a moral imperative. The example you gave of the silly Michigan town that gave up a lithium battery factory over some silly environmental concerns is a prime example of luddism - people hating on technology and refusing to recognize the benefits and absolute moral righteousness of industry. Every battery built is an affirmation of the power of man over nature.
As for workers conditions: history has shown that whenever industrialism shows up, the poorest of the poor vote with their feet and move to work in factories. There’s nothing more pitilessly cruel than the countryside.
The simple (but unacceptable to articulate) truth is that if American cities were populated by white people they would be as safe as cities in China and Japan. There is one factor which accounts for the difference. Young black men. Young black men (15-34) are only 2% of the population but account for half of the nation’s homicides and other crime. A rate an astounding 50 times higher than that of the average American. As a result of that where white people decide to live, shop, vacation and even if they are willing to use public transit (especially women) has been for decades largely based on avoiding large groups of black people because of their perceived and actual tendency to engage in violence. The term white flight in housing patterns has always been used as a disparaging reference when, in truth, it means white common sense.
If you have watched The Sopranos you saw the Italian community begin to distance itself from the crime ridden Mafia. When does the apparent tolerance for crime within the black community which includes jury nullification of black criminal cases along with the acceptance by black school administrators of the disruption of classrooms by out of control individuals begin to end? Finally, when will fathers who fail to care for and love their children and especially their boy children be openly censured by black leadership? The young Chris Rock joked openly about these issues but he clearly now censors himself as does the entire black community.
Until and unless this problem is corrected America will not enjoy the safe urban experience that is common in Asia and Europe.
In terms of reimaging the American dream, I feel this comment is misunderstanding the American ethos. Internally there is a lot of fight over what the American dream is but the fight will always have an individualist character in nature. That is what the suburban house represents, it is the modern day yeomen farmer which can hope to establish a sphere of independence. This view of independence will look weird to a Confucian society that focuses more on conforming to the whole but should be viewed a limiting. Rather I would argue the cultural (and possibly self selecting genetic trend because of immigration) trend towards individualism will give America more dynamism in the long run. China is too often used a simple heal so I appreciate the nuanced perspective given.
sounds like a cool community and club, how might I join? I subscribed to concurrent
dope post, learned a lot, subscribed
Thank you Frank!!!
“In my experience, racially-homogenous suburban liberals, who swear they are “progressive” have an incomprehensible and irrational fear of “the city.” But we all know what and who “the city” represents, in their mind.”
Racially homogenous? Maybe still in some northern cities, but it’s not the 1970s anymore out there.