When the proles have nothing to lose but their chains, they get restless :-/
Is this empirically true? I am not an expert, but seems to me that many revolutions are caused not by consistent suffering -- which makes people adjust to the "new normal" -- but rather by situations where the quality of life increases a bit -- which gives people expectations of improvement -- and then either fails to increase further, or even falls back a bit. That is when people explode.
A child doesn't throw a tantrum because she never had a chocolate, but she will if you give her one piece and then take away the remaining ones.
seems to me that many revolutions are caused not by consistent suffering
The issue is not the level of suffering, the issue is what do you have to lose. What's the downside to burning the whole system to the ground? If not much, well, why not?
That is when people explode
Middle class doesn't explode. Arguably that's the reason why revolutions (and popular uprisings) in the West have become much more rare than, say, a couple of hundred years ago.
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