[WS:] The fact of the matter is that the so-called white collar work has become taylorized toil. Maybe not as physically demanding as blue collar work, but nonetheless regimented and subject to same managerial control as blue collar work. Harry Braverman - one of the greatest organic intellectuals of the working class - had it right. He described the degradation of skilled blue collar work and predicted that white collar work is next in line. When I taught his ideas in my intro to sociology class some 20 years ago, most students were laughing. They thought of themselves as the future elite. But instead they are becoming the 21st century proletariat, or "cognitariat."
So the trick is not to have organic intellectuals get manual work experience, but to get the white collar workers recognize that they are, in fact, proles or "still fucking peasants as far as I can see" http://www.lyrics007.com/John%20Lennon%20Lyrics/Working%20Class%20Hero%20Lyrics.html
-- Wojtek
"An anarchist is a neoliberal without money."