So...Andrew Yang had a recent article on the Washington post called "The boys are not all right", which talked about the plight of the modern American male. Now, I know this article is gonna cause feminists to lose their crap, and a lot on the left will call this "alt right talking points", but...it's true. And it's one of the reasons I like Yang. I am one of the boys he mentioned. Grew up middle class, went to college, couldn't find a job, became a nihilistic drop out, just like he mentions men do when they don't succeed. It's a real problem in American society. I wouldn't frame it just as a "male" problem, but an economic problem among young people today, but being a relatively young male, I get it, and that's one of the reasons I like Yang so much. He actually understands the problems we go through, and offers very similar solutions to me, most of the time.
However, with him being someone who has not experienced these problems directly and merely looked at the data, and me actually living this first hand, I have a different outlook than him on this situation. Seeing how he never experienced the problems, never went through the nihilism himself, he kind of has this idea that we need to preserve faith in American society as it is. And it kind of rubs me the wrong way. At one point he said the following:
Drives for national service and contribution, such as an American Exchange Program or national service years, should be resuscitated. And businesses and industries that employ large numbers of men, such as manufacturing, should be invested in and reinvigorated.
And uh..., no dude, no. You wanna know what the nihilism does to you? It kind of makes you question everything you've ever known about life. Being an educated male who went through these problems, I took the opportunity, during my own period of "male dysfunction" as he calls it, to really think hard about life, and in some ways it did make me nihilistic. But let's frame this another way. It allowed me to exit...plato's cave, and understand that the illusion of society that we live with, IS an illusion. That this culture that celebrates work and jobs, is all a convenient fiction. And what is Yang talking about here? Well, in my eyes, he's talking about preserving that illusion. Now, I can get behind talking about investing in businesses to some extent, given Yang is also for the solutions I champion, namely UBI and M4A, but, I'm gonna be honest, that American Exchange program or national service years? He's talking about coercing all young adults to give years of service to their country. Not a military draft per se, but a civilian draft. He wants to basically coerce people to participate in massive jobs programs. He believes that this will build solidarity among people in out country. And I'm going to be honest, this is a TERRIBLE IDEA.
You wanna know what my period of "male dysfunction" made me realize? That this system of work and jobs that we have is a farce. And I feel like some people would rather create work to keep up this illusion, rather than actually confront society as it exists and change it. I'm going to be honest, he's not wrong about male dysfunction and what he does for people, but he also seems to miss a lot in my opinion. Like...the fact that this is a problem, is because we have a society that has certain expectations of people, and when they fail those expectations, we punish them and fill their heads with feelings of unworthiness. Really, we're the ones who insist people with no jobs are losers. We're the ones who insist they're bad romantic partners. We're the ones who tell them that they need to derive their purpose from their jobs. What we have here is anomie. We have a society where we have all of these expectations of how people will live, and then on the other hand we have a harsh reality that doesn't fit that picture. There are two ways to solve this. We can either change the circumstances so that they match the norms better, or we can change the norms to match the circumstances.
Most people who talk about these problems still believe in the system. And sadly, while Yang is more realistic than most, he is still a believer in that system. So, for him, it's a matter of changing the circumstances in men's lives so that they never experience the same existential issues I did in the first place. So he wants more jobs, and he wants a national service program. But for me? I just want an end to this BS system of our lives relying on work so much. I honestly wouldn't have many issues if I could just live as I wanted, and be given respect for doing it. I wouldn't feel so worthless if I had money to live on. I wouldnt care about purpose as much if I wasn't coerced to work for basic needs. I wouldn't worry as much if women would see me as a better romantic partner for who I am, rather than demanding I fit some societal norm as a "breadwinner". We structured our society in such a way to punish and sanction people for not working, and while I appreciate yang for drawing attention to those problems and offering some solutions I agree with in UBI, I really just have a different take on the problem. In my opinion, it would be better to normalize not having a job, and stop demanding that people participate in the system and sanction them if they don't. The jobist paradigm, the idea of life around work, is not worth saving for me. I've become so disaffected with it, I reject it outright. And I support many of yang's goals in order to forward an indepentarian idea of freedom based on the idea of being able to say no, rather than trying to create more BS make work schemes in order to keep people from becoming nihilistic in the system.
As I see it, our society is like a cult, and some people are more interested in retention in that cult, than about recognizing the cult for what it is, and liberating people from it. I want freedom to live my life as I want. Some of Yang's policy proposals would move us in that direction. It's why I support him. I'm with him like 80-90% of the time these days. Especially on the big issues. But this is the one time that I'm gonna say that Andrew is just completely and utterly wrong. I'm sorry but the work centric jobist paradigm is not worth saving.
Thankfully, Yang is, otherwise, one of the most forward thinking candidates on this stuff. He recognizes realities and offers solutions that still advance my goals, rather than relying on the same old delusional nonsense. Socialists and socdems want job guarantees. Liberals deny there is a problem. Conservatives think the problem is people being lazy and we need to be more coercive to people to force them to work. All the old ideologies buy into the cult. They just do it in different ways. Ultimately though, I'm just so disillusioned with it I see it as it is and just want my freedom. I don't even wanna freaking participate in this crapshow. I mean, jobs aren't rewarding to me. They're just de facto slave labor to occupy our time so we don't spend time questioning things, like I have spent questioning things. They dont want people to reach the conclusions I reach, because then society would change and then the gravy train for the rich and powerful would come to an end. So...for me...Yang is wrong on this one. It's only one issue, but he's wrong.
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