Capitalist Individualism Is Killing Us
In an individualized economy, there is no social fabric to unite society.
Capitalism is not just an economic structure. It is a social system. What makes capitalism capitalism is not the existence of private capital, nor is it the presence of markets. Both of these existed long before capitalism and will likely outlive it. What makes capitalism capitalism is the relationship between the worker and their workplace. If the workplace commands the worker through tyrannical control and only pays them a portion of what their labor is worth, then that is a capitalist relationship. If the relationship is reversed and the worker democratically commands the workplace and receives the full value of their labor, then that wouldn’t be a capitalist relationship, but something closer to a socialist one. If the democratic relationship were present throughout an economy, you would have a socialist society. I regret to bear bad news, but that is not our situation. We live in a capitalist society where workers are subjected to anti-democracy five out of seven days a week. Often, more.
Compared to a democratic society, in which workers recognize each other as peers and respect each other’s right to control the conditions of their lives, capitalism rewires our brains to misconstrue one another as foreign objects, as disconnected as glimmering, distant stars whose gravity will never affect us. The relationship between workers in an Amazon warehouse is a matter of proximity: Jeff and I work the same shift. We hate-watch Love Is Blind and spend lunch mocking the fame-seeking cast. Beyond that, I have no interest in his well-being. Why should I? Amazon is my master, as it is his. Sure, I’ll pity him if he’s one of the many workers in need of an ambulance at our warehouse, but why should I stick my neck out for him? Capitalism gives me no incentive to care about his welfare, never mind advocate for him in the workplace — or outside it. If Jeff’s injuries prevent him from returning, he’ll be replaced before the next shift. As individualism denies human nature, capitalism defies logic. Our overlords celebrate “full employment” when *only* 17 million Americans don’t have a job, guaranteeing a surplus of hungry workers willing to risk life and limb for poverty wages.
Just as the Master-Servant relationship between Amazon and its workers is expanded to create a capitalist economy, so is the relationship — or rather, the lack thereof — between worker and worker expanded to create a capitalist society. Aside from a loose notion of being “Americans,” we have no reason to care about our contrypersons’ well-being. But it has given us every reason to view each other with suspicion, contempt, and, most destructive of all, hatred.
The hyper-individualism America is built on has replaced the social fabric that holds most other societies, past and present, intact. We have no solidarity. There is quite literally no reason for a working-class American in Massachusetts to care about a working-class American in Utah, or even the working-class Americans of the future. Society is supposed to be a compact between generations. Each generation builds upon the last, planting trees whose shade they will never sit in, propelling the nation into prosperity. Then capitalism conquered every aspect of daily life and bombarded us with the lie that we are each an island. Expectedly there is revolution against the basic civil actions that separates humanity from cave-dwelling troglodytes.
Beyond its superior economic organization and, in my opinion, morality, socialism is necessary to cure the cancer of individualism eating away at America’s soul. Under capitalism, individualism is the highest virtue. The more ruthless the better. Caring for others is a weakness. Step on their necks for a penny, and your “ambition” will be celebrated longer than your life.
Capitalist individualism indoctrinates us to idolize businessmen who ‘pulled themselves up by their bootstraps’ and scorn the poor. Welfare recipients are lazy conmen, ripping you off! That’s not a single mother: it’s a whore who wants you to pay for her sinful lust! By design, this national paranoia ushers our country right into rule under a thuggish billionaire. If the beggar on the corner, whose dirty hands and ugly demeanor symbolize his slothful unworthiness, then there must be none more trustworthy and righteous than his opposite, the well-groomed businessman whose name is written in gold on hotels and handkerchiefs.
While some argue that American individualism is beneficial, they misrepresent the limits of self-prioritization. Not everyone can be a millionaire, never mind a billionaire. Companies need workers. They always have and they always will. Those who successfully used their trust fund “ambition” to climb the capitalist mountain quickly pull the ladder up after them: wages are suppressed, lobbying raises barriers to competitive entry, and financial independence, never mind true wealth, will be harder to achieve as social programs are cut, infrastructure crumbles, and the cost of living skyrockets. The form of capitalism we live under, neoliberalism, cuts our national identity into 350 million individuals — consumers, hours of labor to be sold, instruments for profit — leaving us vulnerable to threats from within and without. As every American is encouraged to view others as competitors, when it’s time to rally the country for the public good — such as supporting Social Security or masking during COVID — Americans have no reason to sacrifice for others’ sake. As a result, what are routine social functions in other modern nations, such as combating a pandemic or ensuring seniors don’t go hungry, are impossible in the United States. After centuries of relentless promotion of individualism as virtue, a reasonable request for social distancing is not understood as protection of others’ lives, but a restriction on the individual, the highest sovereign in the capitalist system. As a result, conspiracy theories about vaccines and suicidal attempts at herd immunity have killed more Americans than Osama Bin Laden or any terrorist ever could. Because America’s meager public retirement program, Social Security, is discussed only as a benefit for seniors, younger generations see no value in protecting it. Hence, it’s easily maligned as a “Ponzi scheme,” threatening one of the few anti-poverty measures available to American retirees.
As is the cure for capitalist greed, so is the cure for capitalist individualism: socialism.
By intertwining the fates of all Americans, socialism can create a cohesive, unified nation underpinned by a strong social fabric of collaboration and solidarity. Democratic workplaces, a strong welfare state, and the recognition that a better life for our neighbors fosters a better life for our children will protect society from those who seek to further divide us. As is evident by our current predicament, capitalism cannot provide a social foundation. It preaches individualism, preemptively dividing the citizenry so they may be pulled further apart by conmen and fascists. Collective efforts, such as Medicare For All, universal childcare, or, hopefully one day, a fully democratic society shatter this illusion by proving to every American that their life is better when everyone’s life is better.
Capitalism demeans society to elevate the individual, immiserating both. Socialism recognizes society and individuals cannot be separated. So it elevates both.
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In Solidarity — Joe
"conspiracy theories about vaccines and suicidal attempts at herd immunity have killed more Americans ..." -- Thanks for this!
Not to mention the fact that the employment relationship is also killing us!