OF A GOLDEN AGE

Is Marx’s position as a member of the middle class an inherent problem with his commentary on the working class?

well, who the hell knows. even an anthropologist can only learn so much, and as someone in class pointed out, if you haven’t lived it you just haven’t lived it, end of story. a particularly boisterous (read: ANNOYING) member of the class, who always plays extreme devil’s advocate out of a big martyr complex, spent a long time griping about this and how it was stupid to say experience merits authority.

since we largely and historically agree with marx’s observations (i.e. working in factories in the 1800s was terrible in virtually every way), are we more likely to accept him as an authority? if he said, “I’ve thought about working-class life a lot and I’m pretty sure they’re making this into too big of a deal,” everyone would criticize that as a limited, uninformed perspective. advocacy is an interesting concept.

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