Is there a link between capitalism, violence and individuality?
Some people wonder why the USA is so violent. Mass murder occurs it seems every week. Gun owners see no connection between murder and gun ownership. It is often said that people kill people and not guns, but guns make the matter so much easier.
Individuality is the fundamental driver for this behavior. It is no coincidence that the US places higher emphasis on individuality than any other country in the world. How does this work?
Individuality is the primary consequence of the personal monotheistic religions. Few can see in this country why this is so because they have been trained from infancy to embrace individuality. There are none so blind than those that can’t see.
Individuality is reinforced by capitalism and it is in their interest to do so. A consumer society must reinforce self-centeredness and vanity. Conceit rules the day. Self- love in the US is the primary form of love. Love for others is a poor second. This atomization is necessary for the institutionalization of competition. Inculcating desire in the individual at the expense of the “other” is the pimary motivator for action. As one of my professors said humming the Disney tune “Hi Ho Hi Ho it’s off to work I go” replacing it with “I own I owe it’s off to work I go” illustrated the human condition that exists in the US economy. It was not that former president Bushes plea for people to “spend” as their patriotic duty simply encouraging others to acquire more goods so as to bring about greater happiness, but rather the admonition to spend was rooted in forcing people farther into the depths of debt forcing them to work harder and harder and enable even greater debt assumption. Thus is the yoke of capitalism and wage slavery.
People are inculcated with the desire to acquire material possessions. This is no accident due to the materialistic worldview of techno-scientism. As most know one’s personal worth is assessed based on their material acquisitions. Keeping up with the Joneses is a standard and well known commercial affair.
But like Hegel’s supposition that all things lie wait in the constant state of transition, the capitalistic worldview holds traps for the capitalists themselves. While the proletariats are consumed with modes of acquisiton to prove their worth to themselves and to God above, firearms are necessary to protect these material things from the aquisitive others and the government beyond. The leveling of Socialism is often the battle cry. It is fine when these unfortunates can be herded by the capitalists as they have in the past to support fascist regimes, but also this can backfire and result in a frontal attack on the capitalists themselves.
While perhaps it would be unfair to attribute to the capitalists the result of the weekly murderous rampage found easily in the press, the culpability of capitalism cannot be overlooked as being the result of class appeal and resulting ultimately in the other isms which are unpopular at the time. Loss of the herd can have terrible consequences and I admonish the capitalists to take this into consideration when trying to drive the herd. Too easily can the populace turn against the government and ultimately the capitalists if they clearly can see their lot. Capitalists are encouraged to to be aware that that which drives the individual in the acquistion of goods can errrantly have the object of this conceit and anger turned against it.
We exist. This we know for sure but the question that comes up often is why? A likely response would be “does there need to be a reason?” Perhaps we need to look at some sort of divine intelligence to explain our existence, for if we are here we must have a purpose. For what would our lives mean if we didn’t have a purpose?
But it would not seem prudent to posit a purpose in order to feel better. But it would surely seem to be a cold world without some sort of meaning. When feeling so alone one wants solace in their travail. When one is friendless it is comforting to have a friend that can listen. When one has reached the end in their life it would be nice if there were someone or something caring enough to greet them on the other side.
People find themselves so alone in western culture, especially American (US) culture. The world is foreign, their friends are competitors, their wives and husbands are potential philanderers. And of course to show any real emotion with someone of your own gender could make you an outsider, someone not man enough.
But God can be trusted. God loves you unconditionally. God hates the sin but loves “his” creation. God will never forsake you and God will never cross you. God is your perfect friend. And since God is not physical but is spirit you cannot be worried about having your relationship with God questioned as being swishy.
People live their lives largely alone. Some have fortunately been able to cultivate a lifelong relationship with a significant other (if they so choose). But life is not fair, even those you love and trust can be torn from you in an instant because of a mistake, or an accident, or because of some unnamable disease. Then where is one to turn?
One turns to God the creator. God loves you or so we are told. But can we know that God is there to hear us? Like our father who protected us this God in heaven protects us. Like our father who provided the semen which instigated our birth so our holy father created all and loves all his creation. Yet God is transcendent and the world is immanent and never the twain shall meet.
In the West we depend on dualism. In philosophy this is the idea where the mind (e.g., one’s spiritual nature) is separate from the body (e.g., our physical nature). This idea of dualism has been very effective in increasing our capital and subjugating our enemies. Dualism is a very effective way of manipulating the world. With dualism we have the subject (ourselves) and the object (everything else). We embody the mental sphere and the world and in some sense the uneducated masses composing physical inert matter. But this presentation does not adequately explain the genesis of dualism.
In the Judeo-Christian tradition God is worshipped. Some people take this God so seriously you can’t even spell the word “God” out, that this is some sort of sacrilege. It seems to some people at least to even try to understand God is sacrilege. After all it was the downfall of “man” from eating of the apple of knowledge that ended paradise.
So now we have to find our way out of the wilderness. How is one to do it? It is either through faith or reason. Speaking of reason it seems “reasonable” to use ones God given abilities to the extent they are possible. This seems to do this is a fitting tribute to God. Faith is satisfying for many or most but in fact how can we know that faith is the answer? We are often compelled to accept things without thinking about them which of course is what faith is all about. Yet it should be noted that the teaching of Jesus are very different from the story told about his life and especially his resurrection.
Jesus certainly was a thinker, perhaps the most profound of all time, but the thing that sets Jesus apart in Christian tradition is the redemption promised to “man” through Jesus for man’s sin of eating of the apple of knowledge. Jesus on the contrary was a teacher with wisdom to dispense although he has become through Holy tradition to be the sacrificial lamb.
To be human is to think. Everyone thinks differently. Everyone depends on a base of dogma from which their whole life radiates. Yet what we think or more importantly “the way we think” determines the way we understand the world. But for the ardent believers thinking becomes dogmatic constructions.
Fortunately or not the world does not need a world of thinkers. It doesn’t make sense in a society driven by profit to educate the masses. It is better that those that are driven don’t think at all. For if we were all to think we would probably not accomplish much of anything and society would most certainly fail. These non-thinkers can and are compelled do all the work and provide for those that don’t work.
Though it is not in society’s interest to have all people highly educated it is necessary to have an educated class. Like Odysseus bound to the ships mast so as not to have the ship and crew lured to destruction by the entrancing songs of the sirens, in society those that must follow orders are driven by one bound to the mast of knowledge. But now the ship may still founder with captain and crew if the sound of the sirens cannot be overcome. The echoing of the singing pervades the sinews of our bodies and reverberates in our soul. The distance between body and spirit has been compromised. This sound echoing in a cacophony of inspiration threatens the very foundation of our civilization. Now postmodernism and the death of capitalism is upon us. Maybe still it is not too late. Maybe still the myth of dualism can still be exposed.