Jokes on graffiti guy. I know exactly how shackled I am.

From my experience working with people of different backgrounds, a lot of people don’t give two shits about what system. As a matter of fact, they don’t even realise it. I worked with Somalis and while I appreciate their excellent work ethic, they work too hard and wish to work seven days straight if they could. But given the worsening cost of living crisis and the pay rise barely budged, what is the point? And the thing is, my Somali colleagues don’t even realise this because they are still new to the country. Moreover, they came from a culture that is not class conscious. And most importantly, their culture is still very traditional. When I say very traditional, I mean that they are still trapped by the expectation that an individual’s worth is tied to how “useful” you are to society. In other words, how useful you are as a worker. So, they work and work and question those who don’t do overtime (I do overtime but I don’t do it every week).

Capital-owners know the inherent nature of humans to feel to belong as long as one is “earning their keep”, and exploit this nature especially on those who came from background that are not class conscious or not well-to-do. You are shamed if you don’t want to do overtime. It is taboo to say it, but this is why businesses love immigrants because A) they don’t complain due to desperate economic predicament they are put into and therefore less likely to unionise. Then B) their backgrounds are traditional and hierarchical so they are less likely to question authority. And finally C) because immigrants tend to accept low pay because they benchmark their adopted country’s minimum wage to that of their home country which is much lower, and thus think they are “rich” working in factories or cleaners in developed countries (but will they even return to their home countries, which are still too racked by instability to enjoy their new found wealth?). Perhaps more importantly, speaking as someone coming from a poor country myself, many immigrants are materialistic. Many workers think they are becoming rich by working 10x hard and doing overtime seven days straight. This benefits the capitalist system’s self-perpetuating cycle of exploitation. But really, the workers are only enriching their bosses who earn 100x more salary for little work and pay them pittance in return, while also paying half their monthly wages to their landlords.

It sounds like I am scapegoating immigrants. I am not, because of course immigrants do the job that locals don’t like to do, like in farms, nursing homes, factories and house keeping. But expecting a class conscious and socialist utopia is a nigh impossible sell because other cultures simply value things far too differently. Even in supposedly communist China, they have produced more billionaires than the USA in the past five years, and many Chinese with their new found wealth love to flaunt their newly bought status symbols.

Uh, then explain my hobo fight gambling ring?

Almost no one on lemmy calls themselves capitalists…

most of the people who need to come to this realization don’t know what stockholm syndrome is

and most of them don’t care

Do you own your house? or do you still pay a mortgage?

Do you own your car? or do you still pay for it through the bank?

Do you have debt you can’t finish paying until the day you die?

Then you are you not a capitalist because you own nothing … you own no capital.

wtf you want me to do about it honestly?