Chapo Trap House: Episode 95 - Hillbilly Smellegy feat. Matt Sitman

March 30, 2017 4:47 PM

Will, Matt, Felix and Amber are joined by Matt Sitman to deconstruct J.D. Vance's popular critique of the redneck, Hillbilly Elegy. Matt Sitman previously wrote about his own journey away from the blue-collar Republicanism of his upbringing. Premium episode.
posted by grobstein (3 comments total)

Someone on reddit transcribed Matt's rant at 48:00 and I am always amazed at how powerfully he can make a point while sounding like a crazy person.

"I hate the guys who want to make crocodile tears at these lost communities and then try to make half-hearted attempts to contextualize their pain, but at the end of the day say "hey uhhhh, what's gonna happen to them is gonna happen to them", because we've enshrined capital as the protagonist of civilization and actual human lives are just grist in this blood mill to get spit out and do whatever capital decides to do with them. If you believe that capital is the protagonist of history you shouldn't give a shit about any of these people, and you should say "if you're too fucking stupid to make it work, you should get destroyed". As Alan Greenspan said about Atlas Shrugged, "those who lack dignity or purpose perish as they should" and I have a lot more respect for that than for people who want to pretend they give a shit about humans while putting their all behind economic trends that just destroy people."
permali
posted by Space Coyote at 3:28 PM on March 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

reddit discussion their episode threads are usually pretty decent.
posted by Space Coyote at 3:30 PM on March 31, 2017

Like Uber, but for sympathy.
posted by Kitty Stardust at 7:16 PM on April 3, 2017