with the nature of US society as exemplified in comments like do
your own thing, go it alone, don’t tread on me, the pioneer spirit—
all that deeply individualistic stuff. What does that tell you about
American society and culture?
It tells you that the propaganda system is working full-time,
because there is no such ideology in the US. Business certainly
doesn’t believe it. All the way back to the origins of American
society, business has insisted on a powerful, interventionist state to
support its interests, and it still does.
There’s nothing individualistic about corporations. They’re big
conglomerate institutions, essentially totalitarian in character.
Within them, you’re a cog in a big machine. There are few
institutions in human society that have such strict hierarchy and
top-down control as a business organization. It’s hardly don’t tread
on me—you’re being tread on all the time.
The point of the ideology is to prevent people who are outside
the sectors of coordinated power from associating with each other
and entering into decision-making in the political arena. The point is
to leave the powerful sectors highly integrated and organized, while
atomizing everyone else.
That aside, there is another factor. There’s a streak of
independence and individuality in American culture that I think is a
very good thing. This don’t tread on me feeling is in many respects a
healthy one—up to the point where it keeps you from working
together with other people.
So it’s got a healthy side and a negative side. Naturally it’s the
negative side that’s emphasized in the propaganda and indoctrination.