Resentment of unions can express democratic individualism rather than pre-fascism

Evidence

Can it be demonstrated that resentment of unions' or of income limitations’ are `potentially fascist persuasions’? Here one would not be convinced by the argument that they are correlated with other points of view that are undeniably fascist. For why may not these attitudes conceivably be the ones in a generally authoritarian personality that offer hope for action in behalf of democracy? If a person is resentful of unions he may be resentful of what he conceives of as an illegitimate infringement of his liberties; perhaps he is protecting his individuality, his sense of his own capacity to make his own way, perhaps he thinks he is resisting becoming part of a mass. Similarly, even in this book one can find evidence indicating that resentment of the limitation of one’s income may not be a pre-fascist trait; for example, the non-authoritarians are more interested in sensual and material pleasures, less interested in status and power, than the authoritarians. And in fact, is not income sought for pleasure as well as status and power? — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1823

Categorization

• QUESTION: The premise that income resentment signals authoritarianism is vulnerable because income serves pleasure as well as status, per the book’s own data on non-authoritarians.
• XREF: Connects to critique of the F-scale / California School construct validity, and to later critiques like Shils’ that psychometric measures of authoritarianism conflated political attitudes with personality structure. — connects to: Attitudes called potentially fascist may actually be democratic resistance.; Neoliberal ideas reframed anti-union business positions as good judgment rather than reactionary politics — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 1474; Pseudoconservatives misdirect resentment at democratic form rather than economic inequality — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 1797 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Neoliberal ideas reframed anti-union business positions as good judgment rather than reactionary politics #corroborates (0.90) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1474
• Pseudoconservatives misdirect resentment at democratic form rather than economic inequality #corroborates (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1797
• Individualism becomes a defense of the status quo by delegitimizing group-based demands #corroborates (0.75)