This is Deluded

This essay, which suggests that America's professional manegerial class (PMC) is primed for revolt. (Paywalled, but you can read the code, or just load it in most modern word processors.)

First, the idea that these folks are primed by revolt much in the same way that Taiping Rebellion of 1850.

That rebellion was driven not so much by dissatisfaction with the imperial Chinese system of civil service exams but by ethnic animus between the Manchu rulers and the southern Chinese.

The death toll of the Taiping Rebellion was likely around 50 million, and this guy is predicting a, "Revolt of the Karens" because TikTokker Addison Rae got to do some presenting at a Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) event while many J-School grads are still looking for work.

It sucks to be an unemployed journalist, particularly after dumping years and thousands of dollars into a degree,* it is that the news gathering profession has bought out by asset-stripping Mandarins of finance, who are content to suck the marrow from the bones of their institutions.

The problem there is not that some TikTok non-entity gets to hold a microphone at a media event.

The conclusion of the article, that, "In the long run, buying off some literati can be a lot cheaper than quelling their rebellions," is laughable.

^*As an aside, I believe that becoming a journalist with a college degree is a part of the problem. The requirements, particularly those for internships, tend to mean that the degree holders are white and privileged. I would favor a system of apprenticeship. In the old days, it was paper boy, copy boy, cub reporter, and then full reporter, and I do understand that the first two of these positions have largely vanished, but I think that some sort of apprenticeship would get better results, both for the wannabee journalists, and for the news organizations.

The journalism professors would lose, but who cares.