Political figures who mock power while holding it normalize class rule

Evidence

I think the thing with Boris is a bit like Franco Berardi said about Berlusconi — the person who mocks the place of power while occupying it. That’s also Boris isn’t it. Somebody who is weirdly popular around young people in a depressing way, because he doesn’t take politics seriously or doesn’t seem to. Of course, what he does take extremely seriously is that of advancing his own position and own class. This form of faux bonhomie and cynical dismissal is an extremely dangerous problem by which class power naturalises itself. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 2263

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the recurring academic library theme of political cynicism and manufactured consent disguising elite interests. — connects to: Elected figures can act as counter-definers within the mainstream; Standardized propaganda appeals survive mockery because their phoniness signals raw power; Politicians now feign working-class authenticity against outdated stereotypes of their own constituents — Arthur Borriello and Anton Jäger, The Populist Moment: The Left After the…, 154 (+3 more)
• SHARE: For someone interested in contemporary British politics or Žižekian cynicism — Berardi’s line about the power-mocking-while-occupying figure is precise.

Broader Connections

• Democracy is power’s technical character normalized in moral terms #expands (0.79) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 745
• Standardized propaganda appeals survive mockery because their phoniness signals raw power #expands (0.78)
• Law-and-order discourse legitimated repressive state power made to seem normal and inevitable. #expands (0.76) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 1065
• Politicians now feign working-class authenticity against outdated stereotypes of their own constituents #exemplifies (0.74) — Arthur Borriello and Anton Jäger, The Populist Moment, 154
• Elected figures can act as counter-definers within the mainstream #complicates (0.72)
• Movements displaced parties by attacking the class system itself #complicates (0.71)