The Freest Slaves in History

One of the weirdest things about Americans is the fact that never before in history have so many people been so enslaved while thinking themselves to be so free. Why is this? One reason has to do with late capitalism, or consumer capitalism. As consumers, in each subcategory of goods we have several choices. The question to ask ourselves is, can we choose to not buy goods? Also, we can choose freely among several jobs, but can we choose not to work for wages? Very few of us can.

Another reason for this is what the great French philosophers, Deleuze and Guattari, have called the capitalist axiomatic. That means that in capitalism, in contrast to other modes or production, the exploitation or the expropriation of surplus takes place with the natural functioning of the system. It doesn't require any intervention. With other forms like feudalism or ancient despotism, supluses had to be expropriated by extra-economic means -- at swordpoint, basically. We therefore now see our exploitation as natural and inevitable.