The Centralization Of Aspirations

An ordinary person is bombarded with propaganda morning noon and night, from the media, from advertising, from schools. In a Society of the Spectacle, where the inner dreams of the individual are colonized by the central Authority, people lose the habit of independent thought.
Instead of analysing a situation they pick their thoughts off the peg like they might pick a garment off the peg at a shop. They have no more made the thought than they have made the garment. It is simply a thought that fits them well, they believe, and will make them look similar to those in their particular gang.
This is a peculiar phenomenon because in the work place, within certain permitted criteria, people still exercise independent thought.
One aspect of thought that is most colonized is people's aspirations. The schools and the media constantly push certain patterns of behaviour, such as festivals of consumption where people get dressed up and get drunk for no apparent reason. They are simply approved regulated fun times.
People are encouraged to think only about themselves, to resent others, to feel wronged by others, to cling to the embrace of Big Mother and turn their backs on their fellows.
What we believe we want are wishes that are handed down from above. Once upon a time, all humanity shared the same aspiration, for love, home and family.
Then with the patriarchal system and its warrior hierarchy an alternative set of subservient values reared its ugly head. Amongst the rich and the powerful, the aspiration was to achieve a high rank in the army of bullies and sycophants, and a corresponding amount of wealth expropriated from the poor.
In the meantime the poor and the powerless were still blessed with the true aspirations of love, home and family.
Yet today, the poor are being ruthlessly assimilated and colonized, till every activity is graded and all people are urged to reach for success.
Yes, people aspire to a rung on the ladder, but despite all the propaganda, most people do not really care what their fellows have or do not have. Only the perverts of the overseer class resent the wealth and scorn the poverty of others.
The poor, as ever, aspire only to be left alone to love their homes and families.