Capitalists and Roaches

In Karl Marx's essay on Alienated Labor and Black Mirror's episode of Men Against Fire, we see the damaging effects that alienation and ostracization has on a society. Marx distinguishes four aspects in his discussion on the alienation of labor: alienation from the product of one's labor, alienation from the labor process, alienation from one's basic human nature, and alienation from other human beings. Ultimately, I feel the third and fourth aspects Marx uses to distinguish labor (alienation from one's basic human nature and alienation from other human beings) can be effectively and directly correlated to the Black Mirror's episode of Men Against Fire.

The third aspect Marx discusses of alienation from one's basic human nature focuses on human identity.  Marx believes that work amounts to defining one's life purpose. The human being identifies himself in and through his work. Furthermore, Marx states that in the modern system of private ownership and division of labor, the worker is alienated from the essential source of identity and life purpose for the human species. Henceforth, this third aspect Marx discusses is focused on humans being alienated from themselves or their own personal, human identity.

The fourth aspect focuses on humans being alienated from each other. In this aspect, Marx discusses the root of the foundation of alienation between workers and the 'capitalist' or owners of the worker's product. By this alienation between the capitalists and workers, the worker consequently becomes alienated from the entire system of private property thorough which the capitalist operates. This ultimately results in a loss of the worker's sense of human identity.

In Men Against Fire, we see an example of this alienation of one's human identity and alienation of humans with other humans. In this Black Mirror episode we witness a group of government controlled soldiers, who seek to exterminate the 'Roaches'. In the beginning of the episode, the soldiers slaughter these Roaches who appear to be deformed, monstrous humanoids. However, later we find out these  Roaches are just ordinary human beings. The only difference between these Roaches and the soldiers are that the Roaches are deemed genetically inferior, and consequently they are not 'fully' human.

This is an example of a type of class warfare that Marx is alluding to. The government controlled soldiers do not view these 'Roaches' as humans, they instead see them as expendable. This can be related to how Marx describes the capitalist's relationships with the working class. The working class is viewed as expendable to the capitalists. In other words, they are viewed as sub-human, and consequently this ferments a layer of animosity that contributes to alienation amongst human beings. Ultimately, this can result in the alienation of one's own human identity.

Would it Take a Mask?

A few years ago, I landed in New York City and immediately walked to Times Square. I noticed something was not right. In fact, there was an Occupy Wall Street protest happening before me eyes. It was difficult to walk the streets and there was cops with riot gear walking around. The thing that stood out to me most was this weird mask that some of the protestors were wearing and that was V's mask. At this time I was still in high school and this matter of the "one percenters" was not really something that I worried much about, but after that day I have paid more and more attention to what capitalism does to a nation, and the income gap that is created by it. V's mask is a perfect choice for the protestors because it represents everything that they were trying to accomplish.

The most amazing part about V for Vendetta was the fact that it took only one person in a mask to represent the masses and to convince all of the society to join in his revolution. V recognized the same things that Marx recognizes about government's control and the obsession with labor–it alienates you. He states that labor (in capitalism) alienates the worker from their production, nature, themselves, and others. This can be seen in this film through the character of Evie. First off, she starts the film alone and as you learn what she does, she never discusses the work itself, and the products of her work thus illustrating her alienation from the actual work she does. There is never natural scenery shown in the entire film, the cities look industrialized with no life. The scene where Evie gets harassed by the police, the city itself does not look real but instead completely painted and drawn. This shows the isolation of the society from nature. A huge part of the film is watching Evie break away from her mundane life and actually finding herself and overcoming fear. Before V locks her away she was completely detached from herself and her feelings, she was simply numb living from day to day. And finally, Evie was most definitely alienated from others. She is only shown with a friend or two who never really comes in to play once she goes missing with V. It took her a long time to tear down her walls for V, and to get away from the job in which she was designated to do.

While the film definitely compliments Marx's beliefs, it is important to note that it took a masked individual to make the difference. A common criticism of Marx is that "capitalism is the only way" and "this is just how it is." V made sure that he made everyone joining in his plans would wear the same mask as he did so they could all join forces together, thus completely breaking the alienation that these workers have been experiencing. Would it take a mask to break this chain? Or could some leader come about to help out the 99%?

Systemic Oppression: Government and Wealth Inequality in America

The systemic oppression that we are currently experiencing is a lively and complex system that keeps repeating itself over and over through history. One form of oppression is with the use of the government to control the masses. Another form of oppression, wealth inequality, is a very familiar concept to humans. Throughout history humans have endured one or the other or both. However, we are currently living in a moment in time where the world is experience a systemic oppression that is using both of these types of oppressions to control us. Government and wealth inequality is certainly a system in place today to oppress the people, in fact this mix is embedded in our ideology, traditions, and culture; however, it is in human nature to fight back when they have reached a tipping point as seen in the movie V for Vendetta (2005).

The movie V for Vendetta portrays a time where the government has taken full control of the people and uses the institutions of the government to oppress the people. The movie V for Vendetta is significant to our explication because it shows the governmental form of oppression, totalitarianism. It helps understand how our current situation is so numbing. We do not have it as bad as the people in the movie where they will even be arrested for being outside pass curfew. In the movie, V, one of the protagonist, is responsible for helping the people wake up from the oppression of the government and what is important about this character's behavior is that he promotes a society where we should be seen as people of the state rather than objects of the state. This totalitarian government created a system where everyone turned against everyone. By having everyone as objects against each other the government places the focus on each other instead of the government. Though our form of government is Democracy we too are told to see our neighbor as another object and as competition.

As I said before wealth inequality is another form of oppression and not knew to Americans. In fact we have come to accept it to the point where we promote it. We tend to believe that anyone can achieve the American Dream, if one works hard enough. However, the truth is that some (more like the majority of Americans) are in extremely disadvantage positions to acquiring the American Dream. Though some staunch proponents of the constitution would argue that the U.S. was founded on freedom, equality, and the distribution of wealth; they neglect to see the embedded systemic socioeconomic oppression that wealth inequality creates. History shows that when a community endures oppression, they eventually fight for their liberty. This idea of fighting the systemic oppression is also not knew to the U.S., after all the U.S. did fight a war with its oppressive mother country, Britain, and was founded on principles of equality for all. However, what some neglect to see is that these very same principles are what created the oppressive nature of the wealth inequality in the U.S.

I am not arguing for or against capitalism. What I am arguing is that some of the principles, most specifically Adam Smith's The Invisible Hand, that the founders decided to implant onto the U.S. foundation became counterintuitive. The very principle that was suppose to eliminate monopolies became the principle that assisted monopolies. Capitalism has increased its power through U.S. history by creating the wealth gap. The movie In Time (2011), depicts and advanced global society that uses time as their currency and everyone after their twenty-fifth birthday is chasing it or else they will die. We are not currently chasing time because it is infinite (more on that on a later blog) but we are chasing the dollar bill.

Though Democracy allows for some to participate in making decisions. I would even argue that we are worse off than the two movies because we do not know who are enemies are. We have been turn against each other instead of the people against the oppressors. Some of the wealthy elites that own most of the wealth own the government officials. It is true that we are not in a condition like the move In Time where we work and have no freedom and literally can die any second. That would be too extreme and not profitable for the wealthy elite. The wealthy elites rather keep us in a state of limbo. We are not too bad off as the people In Time or V for Vendetta but the wealthy do have a hand on liberty. Instead of using time or totalitarianism as oppressors, our oppressors use a combination of wealth and governmental inequalities to submerge our heads.

To better understand how these concepts of totalitarianism and wealth inequalities oppresses the masses in similar ways, one can apply Karl Marxist's ideas to the broader context of our current state. Marx's political philosophy is enlightening because it helps the viewer to step back from one's current life and observe the current conditions from a third person point of view. There are some key similarities in the movies In time, V for Vendetta, and our current socioeconomic system that we are currently living under. According to Marx one can not only point fingers to the beholders of power as the institutions or wealthy elites but rather a combination of systemic oppressors, he says, "the forms and the specific situations of the government of men by one another in a given society are multiple; they are superimposed, they cross, impose their own limits, sometimes cancel one another out, sometimes reinforce one another" (793). I chose this sentence because it reveals a lot of Marxist's ideology. It reveals a system where men rule others by imposing constraints on others. As seen in the movies In time, V for Vendetta, and our current situation there are multiple factors that are placing constraints on us and creating a society where we see each other as objects. Men have driven a wedge between men to create a society where we see one another as competition whether that is in an educational, work, or societal setting. Marxist's Alienated Workforce theory is at the very heart of this sentence because it shows how the oppressors have converted the masses into objects that see others as objects and as a means rather than an ends! This theory is seen in the movies In Time, V for Vendetta, and our situation because we are competing with one another while the wealthy and other elites take advantage of us.



The video below is a short clip demonstrating the wealth inequality in the U.S. I felt like adding this piece to my blog because it showed me in numbers how the real American Dream looks like.

The Hustle Is A Lie

When Karl Marx describes the condition of workers under capitalism-- a truly miserable existence, shot through with estrangement and alienation-- he notes a startling paradox at the heart of that condition: the worker becomes poorer the more wealth he produces. Because the ideology of capitalism assumes that human beings are fundamentally self-interested by nature and that their world is primarily characterized by scarcity, capitalist political economy requires workers to compete with one another for resources, for the chance to sell their labor for wages and, ultimately, for survival. Workers have no time to question the legitimacy of these requirements, each of which is supported by a series of myths, because all of their energy and time is devoted to producing. The fact that workers never become wealthy, that they are never rewarded for their production, that they cannot "win" the competition into which they have been involuntarily entered, that they never can (or will) pull themselves out of their miserable station, that individuals workers only ever become poorer and the working class only ever becomes more numerous, even as their production of goods and wealth increases-- all of these together coalesce to form the mind-numbing paradox elucidated by Marx.

Confronted with the paradox that Marx describes, the obvious question is: why does the worker consent to his or her own alienation?  Why compete in a "fixed" game that cannot be won? Every day, millions of workers-- in fact, billions of workers-- continue to sell their labor like any other commodity on the market, only they sell their labor at a price that, at best, can only sustain mere subsistence.  Any surplus value workers produce is taken (stolen) from them by their employers, who own not only the products, the means of production, and the profits, but also in a very real sense own their workers, too.

The worker's life is a never-ending hustle to survive. If you asked the worker-- let's call him "Marcus Miserable"-- why he continues to play in these hunger games, Marcus would say he works for wages. Marcus believes wages (money) is necessary to purchase goods (clothing, shelter, food, etc), which cannot be acquired in any way other than on an market of "free" exchanges.  Money is not directly necessary for survival, but it is indirectly necessary. No one dies from a lack of money alone, Mr. Miserable would tell us.  One dies from hunger, or sickness, or violence, or any other number of ails that may or may not be averted with enough wealth, but one does not die from poverty.

The brilliance of the film In Time (2011) is that it removes the indirect links between money, power, and survival. In doing so, we are able to see how the worker's hustle is directly linked to his or her life-time. When Marcus Miserable watches the dollars in his bank account diminish day by day, he does not fear that he will actually die if the balance reaches zero. ("I'll work an extra shift. I'll get a second job. I'll sell my car, or pawn my wedding ring, or indebt myself to a predatory lender. I'll steal, or sell drugs, or find some other side-hustle," Marcus says to his wife, his children, and himself.) The film In Time presents us with a world in which these sorts of self-assuring stories are clearly shown to be fairy tales, because the film gives us workers who literally see their time of death creeping up on them at all times.

In Time is an excellent example of how film can sometimes communicate an idea (in this case, Marx's idea of workers' alienation and the exploitative nature of capitalism) more effectively and more convincingly than speech or text can. I wonder if the Marcuses of our world would be so committed to the hustle if they wore their life-times on their arm, if they saw how insignificant their deaths were on every payday, and if each purchase they made or bill they paid was directly linked to their survival. I wonder if the Marcuses of our world would take to the streets, revolt, refuse to compete with each other and instead join together to liberate workers from their miserable lives.

And, most importantly, I wonder: if Marcus could see that money is time and time is life, would he be willing to finally admit that one can die of poverty?