> I'm lost. Who's glorifying anything? I'm talking about things that suck.
>
> There's also a certain pleasure - almost a competitive pressure - in
> identifying with the sufferings of the most abused.
>
Well, it ain't me. Gaza's far from the most wretched place in the world, although it happens to be at the core of my current work; there are many respects in which it's a nicer place to live than Brooklyn. And of course I'm well aware that Zionists have no interest in killing international activists - which is not to say they don't on occasion! - and that, unlike Palestinians, we can breeze out of here pretty much any time we like. Or perhaps I misunderstand what you mean by "identify with"?
I think I vaguely get what you and shag are talking about, especially in light of the exchange about identity politics above. A bunch of my generation of anarchists settled on transgenderedism as their cause du jour, for what I gather is this very reason. My personal bias, though, is for battles that are big, hard-fought, and (in the long run) winnable. If the American labor movement were doing anything with those characteristics - specifically the first - I'd probably involve myself in it, as well.
Of course, unlike Carrol, I'd partially attribute the fact that it isn't to the primacy of the "aristocracy of labor" within it. As well as the settler-colonial dynamics of the society, which is probably another conversation altogether ...
-- "Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre, mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen lytlað."