Everyone has their own limitations. If you do not have a clear understanding of yourself, you will be trapped in your class, coerced, and even harvested by the scythe.
01 The Bottom Layer is Anesthetized by Cheap Entertainment#
The bottom layer sells time, physical strength, and mental effort. Being at the bottom does not mean you earn more or less, but rather reflects your thinking and behavior patterns. You will find that people at the bottom are too busy, leaving them no time to think. In such a behavioral pattern, gradually, they become unwilling to think.
When they have time to rest, they indulge in cheap entertainment. Too many people are becoming increasingly dependent on their phones. At work, they often can't help but pick up their phones to scroll through fragmented information, becoming more addicted the longer they scroll. Even during meals and bathroom breaks, their phones are always at hand. On weekends, they lie at home all day, immersed in games, novels, and short videos. If they go a moment without looking at their phones, they feel empty, showing symptoms of addiction.
They effortlessly experience pleasure, sinking deeper into base desires, ultimately trapped in a muddled existence at the bottom. Neil Postman, in his seminal work "Amusing Ourselves to Death," stated: What destroys us is not what we hate, but what we love.
Once you do not remain vigilant and exercise restraint, you will be led by the nose by the cheap dopamine pleasure. One day, under the pull of big data, you will gradually lose your rationality, detach from reality, and continue to fall, sliding into an abyss without bottom. Social injustice is reflected not only in the distribution of material resources but also in the monopoly of cognitive resources.
Capital consumes our attention on cheap entertainment, while those who provide entertainment see you merely as a tool, gaining immense wealth. What to do? To break the deadlock, you need to gain more cognitive resources. Learn to restrain yourself, uninstall the short video apps that consume your attention without limits and make you addicted. You need to adapt to deep thinking like you would with muscle training.
Focus your energy on learning, thinking, and reading. Do more things that go against human nature, do things that cause you pain; pain + reflection = progress.
02 The Middle Class Falls into the Trap of Consumerism#
The middle class is also being hijacked by consumerism. They have certain resources, but consumerism closely associates consumption behavior with personal identity and social status through advertisements, social media, and other channels.
As mentioned in the book "The Crowd," individual thinking in a group is easily driven by suggestion and impulse, lacking rational thought. Therefore, the middle class often seeks to showcase their "elite" identity by purchasing luxury goods and high-end services, but in reality, these purchases do not truly change their class attributes.
The middle class is also very fearful of falling out of their class. This leads to a sense of anxiety, with many families going into debt to buy homes in "elite education" districts or pay exorbitant international school fees, constantly pushing their children. With an income of only 20,000 to 30,000, they can still take out loans to buy properties worth millions.
Thus, even if they possess certain resources, this consumption model driven by desire and comparison makes it difficult for them to accumulate wealth. They are merely harvested by the scythe of capital's consumerism and education, and are forced to remain bound to work. Bauman pointed out in "Work, Consumerism, and the New Poor" that consumer society has constructed a cycle of "work → earn money → consume → more desire → continue working," making it hard for the middle class to escape.
How to break the deadlock? By lowering desires and returning to rationality. The middle class must deeply understand that wealth growth brings more freedom of choice, rather than a form of bondage. If you are bound by a brand on your clothing or a luxury item, sacrificing the freedom of life is the least cost-effective choice.
03 The Upper Class Immersed in the Illusion of Power#
The survival mode of the upper class is to plunder scarce resources and set the rules of the game. However, at this point, it is easy to become addicted to the illusion of power. When a person possesses powerful tools, the desire to harm arises. Because of their immense power, they become accustomed to indulgence, often flaunting their status, misusing public resources, and disregarding everything, bullying others until death.
The incident involving the 2.3 million luxury earrings and the "Miss Dong" incident all exemplify this point. Those who lack virtue will inevitably face disaster. If one lacks "virtue," has shallow morals, and stands too high, they will fall harder and more easily sink into the mire.
If a person's cognition, emotional intelligence, and character have not reached a certain level, yet they enjoy exceptional power and wealth, it actually harms them. For those who lack virtue, money is superficial wealth, and superficial wealth can be deadly.
What is this based on? On one hand, it relies on family education; the quality of the family often determines the next generation. If parents have great wealth and power but poor family education, failing to provide good education to their children, a small mistake by the children can uproot the entire family. On the other hand, it relies on personal cultivation. At all times, one must remain self-aware and not overstep boundaries.