Christopher Odette

@ccodette.bsky.social

159 Followers 193 Following

Politics, philosophy, math, entertainment.

In Soviet socialist states, Marxist historical materialism was treated as a deterministic account of history. The state 𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘭𝘺 administered ideology, and with it, administered the lived experience of time. People knew the narrative was constructed: It was explicit, taught, and ritualized. In Western capitalist societies, the mechanism is subtler. The state does not announce its narrative role; instead, ideology is embedded in media, markets, and political storytelling. Its power comes from 𝘒𝘱𝘱𝘦𝘒𝘳π˜ͺ𝘯𝘨 𝘯𝘒𝘡𝘢𝘳𝘒𝘭, from the sense that the historical β€œplot” simply unfolds by itself. This produces a kind of temporal suspension of disbelief. Like watching a film for the first time: the story feels spontaneous, but the script was written long before you took your seat. Perhaps instead of always asking which system produces faster growth, we should occasionally ask a different question: Which configuration produces a healthier psychological experience of time for the people living inside it? This is not an argument for one system over another, but an attempt to understand how different forms of narrative construction shape the temporal lives of the people inside them.
πΆπ‘Ÿπ‘–π‘‘π‘–π‘žπ‘’π‘’ π‘œπ‘“ π‘ƒπ‘’π‘Ÿπ‘’ π‘…π‘’π‘Žπ‘ π‘œπ‘›, Immanuel Kant
Using publicly available contribution-level data from the New York City Campaign Finance Board, I normalized contributions within each state rather than across the entire campaign. One heatmap shows the distribution of π‘’π‘›π‘–π‘žπ‘’π‘’ π‘‘π‘œπ‘›π‘œπ‘Ÿπ‘  by candidate; the other shows the distribution of π‘‘π‘œπ‘‘π‘Žπ‘™ π‘π‘œπ‘›π‘‘π‘Ÿπ‘–π‘π‘’π‘‘π‘–π‘œπ‘› π‘‘π‘œπ‘™π‘™π‘Žπ‘Ÿπ‘  by candidate. This is not tested for statistical significance, and It’s important to distinguish this form of support, which reflects engagement from a highly active participation subset, from proportional support within the broader voting electorate, which this analysis does not measure.