Erich Fromm: Our values increasingly at odds with our notions about them

In 1958, renowned psychoanalyst and social critic Erich Fromm talked about how dangerous capitalism is why we have ceased to feel love, hate your job and are forced to sell their personality as a thing in the market.





"Capitalist desire to live amidst plenty brought down humanity from the right path. We began to dominate over nature — the production of goods became an end in itself, as well as the endless accumulation of wealth. If you ask an American how he imagines heaven, most likely, he will tell you about the endless Department store, where every week there are new goods, and you have enough money to buy them.

Man's work has become largely meaningless. Man has no any relation to it and is often the only element in the system of mass bureaucracy. Many people hate their job because they feel trapped most of his energy is spent on something you do not see any sense. The sellers impose a meaningless commodity that needs to be spread, even if it is not needed, the buyer, and hate him for it.

Market orientation has penetrated into our personal sphere. Often our communication resembles exchange of goods on the market. Class of white collar workers — all of whom have to manipulate people, signs and words — had to engage in the sale of self. The value of these is determined by the price that willing to pay the market. If they fail, we go one-on-one with a sense of inferiority.

Love was a rarity. We surrounded ourselves with sentimentality, amorousness, we indulge in the illusions of love, without experiencing real, deep feelings. This is due to the fact that we are constantly dealing with things and concerned with success, money and the means to achieve the objectives. To ensure the operation of capitalist society, we have created a class of very educated, intelligent people, but inwardly they are insanely exhausted.





Our values are increasingly at odds with our notions about them. For most people equality is sameness, and you become defective, if different from the majority. In fact, if you do not use theological language, the equality is that a person can not be a means to achieve the goal of another person.Each of us is an end in itself in this world.

Our idea of happiness should not lie in the boundless consumption. They must be the result of a genuine, intense, creative, and attention and responsiveness to ourselves, to nature, to other people, to everything in life. Happiness does not exclude sorrow. People can feel sadness — the main thing is that he reacts". published

 

@ Eric Fromm

P. S. And remember, just changing your mind — together we change the world! © econet

Source: theoryandpractice.ru/posts/7993-erich-fromm