The Case Against Capitalist Hegemony
Morning Comrades.
It’s been an interesting few days in regards to what is happening all over the world, or rather, what circus’ we are told to enjoy and rage over. I was debating with myself which one of the pre-arranged talking points to invest any time in and throughout it all I couldn’t help but shake a feeling of irrelevance and being toyed with. Whilst I will be touching upon “events” such as the World Cup in Qatar, the war in Ukraine, the “destruction” of social media, the dark ass pit of another Crypto scheme shortly, I won’t be doing so to add another powerless scream to the void but rather use them as examples to offer you an alternative perspective, solely to aid you and us in our collective fight against our oppression.
For the time being, as per usual, a new Weekly Jams, presented without comments because at this point, you know what you are in for.
The Case Against Capitalist Hegemony
Before I dissect the current talking points presented by the ruling classes to keep us all busy whilst the wolves are having a party in the chicken pen, a few short words defining the term capitalist hegemony.
The capitalist hegemony is our perception of metaphysical and material reality that we engage with. Despite the romantic idea of Free Will that so many people cling to, this reality is shaped and defined by the ruling classes, no matter where you live and who you are. No matter how free you think you are, and this most definitely includes myself, and no matter how developed your ability for critical thinking & analysis all of our actions are still defined and shaped by the capitalist hegemony on reality. I may say, “all of you are the enemy and I refuse to act according to the childish gameplay of good vs evil to keep me from thinking and merely consuming”, yet the moment I act upon the only logical consequence of this analysis ( overthrowing said ruling classes ) I will be either killed or locked away. In order to not only understand our reality, draw analysis’ from it and ideally create a strategy with logical tactics to change this, we absolutely have to acknowledge this reality.
With that, I wanted to offer you an alternative way of engaging in the most current realities being spun that I know are occupying me and potentially yourself. It doesn’t actually really matter which one of the above mentioned examples we start with or focus on, one underlying reality ties them all together and its one that is vital to understand.
The case against capitalist hegemony is this: within the context of our1 narrative that constitutes our metaphysical and material reality none of the characterization of good and evil is relevant, let alone real. All structures and individuals that hold power work to always not only maintain and expand that power, again, the true nature of the capitalist ideology and can only do so by suppressing any and all movements for a place at their table. Much of ruling classes work isn't so much innovation for new products to sell but the the above, maintaining power and this takes shape in a multifold of ways. From genuine war against "the people"- for example, fanatic religious minority dictatorships as seen in Iran on the one extreme side to the most effective, brutal brainwashing via corporate propaganda in the United States that has turned a nation of some 300million plus people into drug addicted, brainwashed individualists scarier than a horde of borgs.
If we can agree on this reality, that all power in the hands of the capitalists is inherently against you and me, at the very least being allowed to create the tools for our individual, let alone communal, self-determination ( aka the freedom they keep ranting about when they want to incite another violent mob ) and can acknowledge that the ruling class is engaged in a class based war against us, then the following examples of “current events” take on a while different shape.
Let’s take the World Cup in Qatar for example. I care very little or rather nothing at all about Football however, I know a lot of people that care deeply about it and the “discourse” around this World Cup has been interesting. In the sense that most people acknowledge the hypocrisy and corruption of FIFA that brought the WC to Qatar. Yet, when the WC takes places in France or in the US for example, no criticism is allowed in the so-called free market square of ideas - and I’ll get to that little bite of sarcasm after - yet, in the case of France, a country whose leadership has assassinated over 30 African leaders since the end of WW2 and maintains a colonial economic stranglehold on the majority of their old colonies and whose most recent leadership under Sarkozy was involved in love triangle between Qaddafi and Qatar up until 2007 the capitalist hegemony determines that this is not worthy to allow in the free market of ideas. The same can be said about the U.S., a country with the highest incarceration rate of the world, an utterly destructive and violent foreign policy ( if you think Qatar is sexist and homophobic, wait till you find out who the U.S. government have been sending weapons to in Syria and Ukraine ) and so on. The criticism would just be as valid and relevant and yet does not take place. The fact is, that the ruling classes decide the framework of our realities and the discourse that we are led to believe shapes reality. It’s neither the people of Qatar, France or the U.S. that are to be blamed here but the colluding ruling classes in each of these places that create this insanity in the first place.
The same then can be applied to the war in Ukraine, the crypto realities, the wilful destruction of social media- all of which are created realities where the ruling class determine whose side we are on, what we can say and discuss for us to not even realize that we hold no actual power of this class. This is the fascinating part about the Gramscian understanding of Hegemony that the current crop of capitalists have created. Previously, power was denied by sheer force and violence, and no this did not end with the end of Feudalism but continued well into the 20th Century, these days, power and authority and predominately denied through accentuating our alienation from everything, drowning our void humanity with consumerist individuality and identity that gives most people the sense of power where there is none. Occasionally, someone acts against this and this is where the ruling class employs the state and its moralized violence to stop this.
The point is this: we have to understand that whatever reality is being offered is one pre-determined by the ruling classes. Positively, all this means is that we are engaged in a class struggle taking place within man-made material realities and if they are man made that be undone and re-made to benefit the needs of all, by the combined abilities of all without the inherent violence and oppression of capitalism. A solid class analysis of whatever “discourse” is being thrown at you to keep you busy will usually, if not always, immediately allow you to see through their bullshit and importantly, allow you to convey this to your fellow comrades. The more that know, the better.
Yours, as always, warming my fingers and love on the smoldering ashes of their immoral kingdom,
V.
And by “our” I specifically mean the readership here which by around 95% comes from the Global North West.