There are all kinds of ways to work hard, but a lot of blue-collar workers do physically hard things for a living. After all, after breaking 100 degrees for the past few days, I’d hate to be doing anything outside, such as HVAC repair or construction.
But I recently saw this on Facebook and…oh holy crap.
Oh, you sweet summer child, you.
OK, so let’s break this down. Why is it that blue-collar workers tend to reject socialism and become far more “manly” than socialist soybois?
Well, let’s remember that socialism is basically summed up with the quote, “From each according to their ability, to each according to their need.” In theory, this would mean blue-collar workers would get some of the wages from the Wall Street types to make millions doing work that doesn’t actually produce something.
In reality, though, those blue-collar workers aren’t stupid. They know that they’re making pretty good money, especially in relation to how soon they could enter the workforce after undergoing their training. They also recognize that while they aren’t making as much as some fat cat on Wall Street, they’re making a whole lot more than the welfare queen who refuses to work.
As a result, socialism would take money out of their pockets—money they worked insanely hard to earn—and then give it to people who have done almost nothing.
That’s not sustainable.
Eventually, people figure out that they don’t have to do anything to survive, so they’ll just stop producing themselves. They might not live as well as they did before socialism, but since they won’t be allowed to live that well anyway, why kill yourself for nothing?
The truth is that most people don’t enjoy their work. They work to live, not live to work. I’m quite fortunate that I’m an exception to that, but I’ve been on the other side of that equation, too. It’s not the worst fate in the world, to be honest, so long as you don’t actively hate where you work or what you do.
Been there, too.
Blue-collar workers—the people socialists routinely say they represent—don’t want to break their backs taking care of people who can’t be bothered to do anything productive. It’s why the Soviet Union had to actually require people to work, even if they couldn’t gain wealth through that hard work. Without a requirement, almost no one would do any of those blue-collar jobs with a handful of exceptions.
As for them acting more “manly,” what we need to remember is that part of this is pride. They work hard and they leave work at the end of the week knowing they’ve earned their pay. They support their family with the sweat of their brown and all those other cliches. That reflects in who they are and how they carry themselves.
They’re more stoic because they’ve seen a world where the universe doesn’t really care about whether they’re suffering or not, so whining about it doesn’t do anything. They live and work in an environment where the job doesn’t have time for safe spaces and affinity groups. There’s a task to do and you have to do it and no one has time for your problems.
As a result, that spills over into one’s life in general. They know that some random buddy isn’t really interested in all of their problems in life.
Because, frankly, the world doesn’t give a damn.
Our socialist soy boi here is upset about the potential for “controversial jokes,” but so what? You might not like the joke, but that doesn’t mean that anyone’s hurt by it. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if they tell those jokes when you’re around just to annoy your socialist ass.
But the reason they’re like that isn’t because of some nonsense like “conservative narratives” being “shoved” into them. The truth is that blue-collar workers tend to be conservative because they want to keep what they earn and they value actually earning what they get.
That’s not exactly in line with the Democratic Party.
Yes, unions tend to represent blue-collar workers and support Democrats, but unions don’t dictate blue-collar politics. Union members, even if they do vote for Democrats or other flavors of progressives, tend to simply want to make sure they can collectively bargain with the companies they work for to keep from being screwed by their employers, which is a separate topic for discussion.
They’re not going to favor socialism all that much, though, because they work. Socialism doesn’t.
Tilting at Windmills is 100% reader-supported. If you enjoyed this article, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription for 15% off the first year or making a one-time donation here. Your support is greatly appreciated.
Are there no women in this blue-collar world? :)