Self-interest framing makes citizens appear as undebatable as corporations

Evidence

Much more typical than Ginny was Eleanor, who, as she mourned after the press conference described at the beginning of this book, experienced herself as having truly forgotten her more public-spirited motives when speaking in public. The question of whether claims of ‘‘self-interest’’ soak down into deep feelings might be interesting to ask, but whatever activists felt in their hearts, for all of these activists, if opening up public discussion and debate was part of their goal, emphasizing their own self-interest and fear would not help. Mandatory Momism just made the activists seem to have interests that were just as undebatable as the corporations’. — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1344

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: Eliasoph’s key provocation: activists’ adopted self-interest discourse collapses the very public dimension that would make their claims debatable, ironically mirroring corporate undebatability. This is the chapter’s core paradox worth sitting with.
• XREF: connects to: The discourse of self-interest forces even altruistic citizens to describe themselves as selfish — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1361; Modern avarice consists of stinginess toward others masked as rational self-interest

Broader Connections

• The discourse of self-interest forces even altruistic citizens to describe themselves as selfish #expands (0.85) — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 1361
• Modern avarice consists of stinginess toward others masked as rational self-interest #qualifies (0.72)