Do you think Marx was right about alienation in capitalism?

Question

I'm looking for opinions about the extent to which you believe alienation, in the Marxist sense, exists today in our society. Furthermore, why do you think so? Grounded examples?

Answer 1

Yes. If you work at some very compartmentalized job like putting little toys into boxes, you will soon be losing touch with the fulness of being human. What is that if not alienation?

Capitalism makes it possible for a few people to own the means of production and reap the benefits. The amount a worker gets paid is but a tiny fraction of what he is worth. The corporate society doesn't care about you, only your work. Soon you will try to find meaning in mass entertainment and live for the weekend. Your work life will have no meaning other than making money. If this is not alienati
on, what is it?That doesn't mean that other types of regime
won't create alienation. What about dictatorships, the Communist regimes, and so on? As long as people are not empowered to make choices about their lives, they will feel cut off.

Answer 2

I think it depends entirely upon the attitude of the worker, rather than an inherant aspect of capitalism, which is where Marx is wrong. If I am a mechanic for instance, say I fix someone's car. Now I don't own that car.. I don't get the money for fixing that car.. it's goes to the service station or whatever.. I may never see that car again. Marx would state that I become totally detached from the fruits of my labor, however there's the consideration of doing a good job, and earning raises and promotions at work (which admittedly were hard to come by in the 19th century world Marx endured). I also take some personal satisfaction in doing the job correctly. I know I'm the best mechanic around, or maybe in fixing the car I learned a new skill, or maybe I would just feel guilty that I did a poor job (lord know some mechanics don't feel that way), but there is not neccesarily an alienation (or disassociation) between me and my labor, simply because I do not have direct profit-motive (to use Marx's favorite term) in it.

Answer 3

Alienation has grown from a concept in Marx's time to where it has become almost institutionalized in ours. No? OK then: How many of you feel that corporate capitalists are working for your benifit or for their own no matter the cost to you or your community?

Want an example of alienation?
Look at the T-shirts young kids wear today. Count the ones with signs of death and/or money symbols and count the ones with symbols of contentment and satisfaction. Which is higher?
Capitalism is taught, in this country, as the best system and evidenced by the lifestyle we are supposed to aspire to. We are shown pictures of overweight people in drab clothing waiting in long lines as evidence that socialism doesn't work as well as capitalism.

The truth is, both systems have their strengths and their weaknesses and both work in special environments. But when the community is under great stress, such as the USA in WWII, socialism is the preferred system. (Goods were rationed and price controls put in effect etc) In today's society we couldn't exist without socialism. For instance how would we raise an army if soldiers were expected to create their own income? How about our politicians? And where would the safeguards be that have protected our economy from 1929 style crashes if the government didn't regulate our economy? If we were a pure capitalistic economy then what would happen if you broke your leg and could never work again? What would happen to folks that became too old to work and had their major investments stolen by capitalist privateers? Who would deliver the mail? Repair the roads?

So obviously we need income redistributed in the form of taxes to maintain this country. That is a form of socialism.

But as far as alienation, history clearly shows that the wider the gulf between the rich and the poor, the greater is the alienation and when it reaches a certain point it usually results in some form of violent attempt to bring about more equalibrium. Go into any "inner-city" in this country and you will see a rebellion only needing a trigger to boil over.

Capitalism's focus is singular which makes it strong, but that focus is to create more capital. There are no morals or responsibilities attached other than what an individual brings. For instance, A corporation may work to clean the air or it may work to have laws enacted that will let it pollute without restriction. In any case, the capitalist corporation's goal is still to create more capital. The major flaw in Capitalism is it is based on a belief that people are motivated by greed. Eventually, this flaw will destroy either Capitalsim or the society it feeds off.

Socialism injects an amount of social responsibility into the economic system. What that responsibility is depends on the political system and how effective it is. For instance in most of Europe health care is free or can be had for a very modest sum because government believes it is a right and a healthy people make for a healthy country. The premise of socialism is sustaining over time: The business of people is to sustain each other.

So in the end both systems depend on the people to do the "right" thing. Socialsim under a corrupt government creates those long lines waiting for goods but in a governemtn responsible to the people, the people are united, their welfare is looked after. Same with Capitalism. Where the CEO's are responsible to the community the community thrives and supports the corporation, but where the corporation only htinks of itself, the community suffers and despair, alienation and hopelessness can lead to violent action.

Answer 4

I think that Marx was writing at a time when everyone was feeling alienated. Existential angst coupled with the industrial revolution naturally resulted in a sense of being disconnected. People moving from farms to cities, leaving community behind . . . or even immigrating to other countries, etc., are bound to feel alienated regardless. Marx was writing after the industrial revolution, in a time when workers were experiencing, for the first time, no relationship to what they were doing. Standing in a factory piecing together fragments of an end product you never get to see is different from building something from scratch for your own needs.

Read the literature of the time and look at the art. You see the sense of "aloneness" everywhere and not just in capitalist societies. Marx merely blamed it on a particular form of thinking when it was actually endemic in the era in which he was writing. And like Marx, everyone was trying to find something or someon to blame for their own experiences and feelings.

Answer 5

Marx was full of it. His entire thesis is based on an error -- that labor is the only creator of value -- and since that is both wrong (trade creates value) and the foundation for his entire thesis, the whole thing is crap. This is the most expensive mistake that anyone has ever made in the entire history of the human race: the cost has run to trillions of dollars, and tens of millions of lives, and is continuing to increase every day.

Answer 6

ok communism and capitalism obviously existing on a spectrum, to have both the void and the darkness, we must ultimately come up with a religion.. YES i SaId rEliGiOn!.. to get people into operative focus here.. but then again.. first we must solve for infinite energy and then for the limit of conceptual evolutional constructionalism, and really it boils down to what we agree is the real deal behind energy

there's 6 energies: matter/gravity/magnetism / rotational/velocity/anti-matter

astral/physical planes are merging through mathematical calculation of prime numbers and there's an equation and a process and a differential summation of accelleration of surface area involving vibrating 3-d ellipse of diameter 6-8 units

best place to start ultimately is w/ Uri Geller's web site and info in book by Andrija Puharich, for that knowledge is essentially the up to date briefing for where mankind needs to shift its focus as far as formulating an end to the endless postulation of applied mechanics w/ terminological hellatiousness involving degrading randomness

Answer 7

IDK what "Alien Nation" is (in regards to Karl Marx) ... it's not in any of my "Marx" txtbks. IDT little green men was a big issue back then either.