I saw The Corporation last night, a documentary about the rise of the, duh, corporation as a presence in the world economy and the general social consciousness. The most interesting part about it, aside from the wacky stuff about the 14th Amendment granting rights to coporations as well as slaves, was the morality aspect; that corporations are extra-moral -- as in outside morality, not as in more moral than most -- because they operate outside the framework of human ethics. All the people collectively becoming one body makes the body itself inhuman and therefore releases it from human constraints. Amoral, not immoral.
And I just wonder how that applies more broadly... if groupthink changes us, releases us from society's bonds instead of constraining us the way I always thought it did. I'm used to thinking of society as limiting, not as freeing. This freeing isn't a good thing, necessarily. Definitely not a good thing for the corporations, and probably not a good thing for people.
Oh, society. You're such a drag. And corporations are a drag, too -- the movie was great but, again, a total drag. Once again, a really effective and affecting movie that leaves you nowhere. I have no clue what to do about how deeply corporations have influenced us as individuals and as a collective. There's no escape, as far as I can tell. Let's wear our Nikes to the local McDonald's because we have no choice, but we'll be careful not to step on any third-world children on the way there -- not directly, anyway, just metaphorically. Ugh.
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