From the Socialism 101 Reddit, a question of crushing import:  

Are cashiers working class? I know this sounds like it should be obvious, but think about it. Cashiers do not produce any commodities. Under a non-capitalistic society, nobody would do what they do. In fact, their job is almost more like a cop. They keep commodities away from people and demand that you pay a fee to the bourgeois to access them. And if you refuse, they will use the violence of the state against you by reporting you to the authorities for shoplifting. So how are they, in a Marxist analysis, working class?

Yes, it’s real, or was, until deleted for attracting attention from unclean heathens. And needless to say, earnest rumblings ensued. You do, I think, have to marvel at the thought of someone going through life continually scanning for class enemies, obstructers of the Great Proletarian Revolution, and concluding that checkout assistants have just made the list.

Note the line,

Under a non-capitalistic society, nobody would do what they do.

Note too that the implications of this claim, for all manner of unglamorous but necessary tasks, are somehow not explored.

Consider this an open thread, in which to share links and bicker. 

Chronic self-flatterers mystified by mockery of chronic self-flatterers:  

Update, via the comments:

Welcome to Seattle, where a dislike of being robbed, or seeing others being robbed, is disdained as “anti-poverty bias.” 

It’s called “the poverty defence,” and would not only make stealing legal, but apparently fencing items as well, and would cover over 100 misdemeanour crimes.

Because enabling criminals and demoralising their victims will result in flourishing neighbourhoods, a boom in employment, and a future that’s more progressive and compassionate. Full of hugs and puppies.

Update: via the comments: 

As noted in the piece, the most enthusiastic supporters of the proposal, the ones disdaining objections as “anti-poverty bias,” are remarkably contemptuous of the people whose lives will be degraded, should the proposal succeed. And who almost certainly have a much clearer understanding of the proposal’s supposed beneficiaries, having encountered them first-hand, most likely more than once. But the compulsion to indulge criminal choices, from a safe distance, and to then bask in the subsequent in-group elevation, is, for some, quite strong, despite the contortions it can entail.

And regardless of the consequences for the victims of such posturing.

Update 2:

Mr Bob Chipman, a woke scold, avowed feminist, and film reviewer – in pretty much that order these days – shares his deep, uplifting philosophy. The dynamic may not be entirely unfamiliar.

Mr Chipman is an enthusiast of socialism (albeit, it seems, for others) and a man entranced by his own allegedly vast intelligence, which he mentions frequently. He is, he assures us, “an American of intelligence,” unlike people who are insufficiently leftwing, whom he views as “not redeemable” and indeed subhuman. His favoured terms for those who would dare to vote differently include “obsolete trash,” “backward people,” “obsolete whites” and “Nazi motherfuckers.” These lively definitions would most likely be applied to the readers of this blog, its host, and presumably our friends and families.

When not sharing his eugenic fantasies of a world forcibly depopulated of people who disagree with him, Mr Chipman suggests that his fellow leftists pleasure themselves by finding a non-leftwing person, any non-leftwing person, and making their “day/week/life a little bit miserable.”

Mr Chipman appears to have difficulty being happy and struggles to understand why anyone might dislike him.

Also, open thread. Share ye links and bicker.

A group of 13 “abolitionist librarians” from Ivy League universities… is demanding that their colleagues “immediately begin the work of divesting from police and prisons.” […] The group wants Ivy League librarians to “explicitly name policing itself as the problem” and take actions that will lead to the “complete abolition of law enforcement.”

Something-something “white supremacy” something-something “privilege.” I’m paraphrasing, of course. But really, it’s the same doctrinaire horseshit we’ve seen a hundred times. And according to which, the world will be enormously improved by the “abolition of policing in all its forms.” If that isn’t sufficiently unambiguous, our Ivy League librarians insist that their “ultimate goal” is, and I quote, “the complete abolition of law enforcement… everywhere.” Because “a world without policing” will somehow, rather conveniently, be a world without crime. And because helping people find the books that they’d like to borrow is just too boring and insufficiently high-status for minds such as these.

More than 700 individuals and organisations have signed the petition.

By the way, and before you ask, that sickly-sweet odour is the ongoing decay of your civilisation. A society in which the children of the elite are immersed in such dogma – and are told that their civilisation shouldn’t defend itself against sociopathy and predation – isn’t, I’d suggest, in the best of health. And when these mouthings are deemed high-status, both sophisticated and aspirational, a marker of in-group belonging, then the words preening degeneracy seem entirely apt. 

Previously in the world of uppity librarians.