Like the other commenters, I think of the oligarchy as the head of the snake but it would be remiss to rank it as more relevant than the others. The other two support the oligarchy, but it is not a one directional movement of power, they all need each other in order to meet the primary objective of supremacy and they are equally dangerous.
Oligarchy
The agenda here is power, not simply wealth and without division among the masses, the oligarchy cannot meet its terms of superiority and command over others. Race and religion are simply the easiest ways to gain control because that is where the fears of the masses are the most potent. Fears relating to class and elitism are strong, but the financially comfortable lack the quantity of votes necessary to support the 1%, the wealthy still need the lower and working classes. Eradicating racism and religion would not change much of anything, the oligarchy would simply adapt and find new fears and anxieties to exploit. As it stands now, however, colonialism and its long term effects, like racism, is part and parcel of the necessary evils in order to make any gains of hegemonic control.
Racism
It was within the throes of colonialism that racism was invented and it has been effective beyond the imagination. It still exists to this day in the same degree as it always has, it just went underground in its most visible regions and took on new forms in the others. Subtle forms. So subtle that racism continues to thrive in bastion liberal cities like Seattle and L.A. as well as in deep blue states like Maryland (think Baltimore). This is the core of the racial tension within the liberal big tent and too many have made the assumption that racism is over. It’s not over, it’s hidden. The thing that keeps it alive is the idea that one person is superior to another - which is an immediate threat to some people, more so than any fat cat that lives miles away in complete ignorance of pocs’ reality of existence. Who can think about Wall Street while dodging police bullets? Keep in mind the historical context; during colonial times, the oligarchy kept getting richer and richer, eventually they couldn’t keep everyone in line because revolt was imminent, so they had to delegate some of the work. They did this by creating racial division (divide and conquer) among the lower classes, the workers. Making some of them higher in rank and putting them on slave patrol (the origin of the American police force) set the standard of inequality, making it seem like an inevitable default. This formula is still going strong, even in the most progressive of progressive places. Therefore, even if the oligarchy fell, racism would continue and those who replace the oligarchs would default to the previous status quo of superiority over people of color. And THAT, would start the whole mess all over again, bringing us full circle. The fall of the oligarchy doesn’t guarantee equality for poc, power abhors a vacuum and the desire to restore the status of (formerly) middle class whites does not necessarily translate into equality for poc. As long as equality is, consciously or otherwise, perceived as a threat to white working class privilege, racism will continue. As long as racism continues, society as a whole keeps right on doing exactly what it is doing now, racism and inequality for poor whites are linked. (see video below) So no, we cannot disregard racism in order to tackle the oligarchy.
Religion
Religion is its own category in a sense because unlike race, it is a distortion rather than an outright fabrication. The oligarchy loves to normalize lies that serve them, such as “survival of the fittest” (on the contrary, the most cooperative tend to thrive) and that workers are commodities rather than living, breathing human beings. They distort things brilliantly and if we are not careful, we can find ourselves believing up is down and left is right. But I digress. The vast majority of religions are positive, calling for humanity, empathy and care for one another. This notion of caring for one another is anathema to what the oligarchy sets out to do, therefore it makes sense for them to undermine it. But why bother doing that when we can be manipulated into undermining it ourselves… again I digress (this subject is one on which can soapbox all day long) …. The evangelical aspect of the conservative end of the spectrum shares an origin with the slave patrol idea, only it otherizes people based not on race directly, but also on sexuality and gender. It’s a nasty trick and sadly, it works. It even has progressives trying to undermine religion itself, which only indicates that the distortion has been successful. As long as people are locked into insider and outsiders (“their God is wrong, ours is right”), the handlers have everyone focused on identity and division. Anyway… the point with religion is that it’s not actually a threat, its distortion is the real danger. When we try to tackle religion, we only tackle shadows and projections. At the end of the day, religion and worship are constitutionally protected rights anyway.
The oligarchy, racism and distorted religion are symptoms, they are not the problems themselves. Greed, a fabrication and a distortion – at their core, every one of those methods of control use division as a tool and division is necessary to keep one idea alive: that a gain for one person is only possible with a loss for another. Ultimately, we need cultural change and in terms of politics, those in power can affect the conversation necessary for cultural change in deeply profound ways. This is why I choose Bernie, the others want to work for incremental change, superficial change. They want to tweak the system that is already in place which would do little for course correction. Obviously, we have to think bigger, we have to do more. A lot more. I realize the risk averse don’t want to take that chance, but I don’t see how we can make fundamental change comfortable. By its very nature, change is uncomfortable. Besides, the way we progress is just as important as progress itself.
Video:
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