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Comment by woko | Hacker News Reader

> do anarchists really work as professors at the London School of Economics? And Yale?

I know a banker who is communist. It does not mean that he behaves like a communist in his actions, but he does in his words. From my perspective, he takes the best (or the worst) of both worlds: the quality of life of a very rich man who can afford living in the most expensive places and whatever leisure he wants, and the ability to punch down on the "lesser" people around him from his morally higher stand-point. Never under-estimate people's hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance, especially when what is at stake is exerting power over other people's lives. One can always find a way to rationalize one's crappy behaviour to try to lower the cognitive dissonance after the fact.

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> I know a banker who is communist.

That's an incontinent position to hold and he must have high cognitive dissonance of schizophrenia. Except if he is duplicitously self-serving, ie happy to receive the payments but not the opprobrium that comes with a high paying system position.

You'd be very surprised how many socialists and communists there are in banking.

On one hand one of the things Proudhon and Marx agreed on was that driving down the cost of credit is an inherently radical act - the cheaper credit becomes the weaker the hold of employers over employees becomes, as it becomes easier to start for yourself.

On the other hand in finance you see the mechanisms at work laid bare.

Nowhere else than in finance and in far left groups have I seen the same extent of shared fear (AND optimism - people tend to be unaware the Communist Manifesto starts with fanboy-level praise for the advances brought by capitalism) about the long term societal effects of automation for example.

I'm not surprised. They see themselves as doing the best for themselves - that's anarchy, right? But they are prepared to harm others to do it. But even so, they want to be thought well of.

I guess bankers and communists share the idea of looking at 'the people' as a group to be governed and managed. Both are wedded to the system. I think communistic thinking is the idea that seems to have won, and (technocratic) governance is going to proceed with that as its basis.

You've totally missed the point of what I wrote.

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