Left-wing political attitudes functioned as vicarious satisfaction for workers otherwise conforming to class society

Evidence

One of the findings of the inquiry, for example, would have come as no surprise to a reader of Fromm’s Development of Christian Dogma. Left-wing political attitudes could be shown to be a form of vicarious satisfaction for workers who had otherwise moved into psychological conformity with class society. If published and presented with scientific rigour, the observation that the majority of politically left-wing workers were similar in character to all the other members of bourgeois-capitalist society would not have made the left more watchful and more united; instead, it would have made the right more confident of its victory. For this reason, reservations about methodological faults or uncertainties had to be taken more seriously. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 135

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The finding that politically left-wing workers were psychologically indistinguishable from the rest of bourgeois-capitalist society, and that publishing it would have armed the right, cuts against the premise that political radicalism indexes psychological difference.
• XREF: Connects directly to the reader’s earlier highlights on the Institute’s Weimar workers’ study showing only 15 percent of left-wing voters were radical in both thought and feeling, and to Adorno’s authoritarian personality. — connects to: Whether betrayed workers turn left or right depends on available political outlets — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1852; Publishing left-wing workers’ conformist psychology would have aided the right politically — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 475; Oppositional workers’ organizations mirror capitalist structure and thereby absorb class struggle (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Bourgeois class behavior explains the subjective key to fascism #expands (0.78) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1421
• Publishing left-wing workers’ conformist psychology would have aided the right politically #expands (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 475
• Oppositional workers’ organizations mirror capitalist structure and thereby absorb class struggle #expands (0.72)