Naomi Klein

Democracy Now! | Naomi Klein: Wall St. Crisis Should Be for Neoliberalism What Fall of Berlin Wall Was for Communism

this is another failure of Friedmanism, because the idea of the ownership society was that class-consciousness was supposed to disappear, right? Because union members were not going to think of themselves as workers, because everybody owned a piece of the stock market, and everybody was going to have a mortgage, so they would think like owners, they would think like bosses, they would think like landlords, not like tenants, not like workers. Class is suddenly back in America, with a vengeance, and it is the result of this class war that was waged from this school.

A couple of days ago Democracy Now showed a video of Naomi Klein talking about the links between Milton Friedman and the current economic crisis. I thought that passage about class was particularly interesting. For as long as I can remember I've been resistant to capitalism, and have felt a desire to stay as removed from it as possible. A basic principle of democratic freedom is the right to choose, but there are very few options for those wishing to live outside the established economic system, and the worst part of this crisis is that the bankers have been gambling with our money, and we are told that these loses will affect us, but when were we asked if we wanted our money gambled away in this fashion? People just accept that this is how the system works and we have no choice. Anyway my point Friedmanism was clever in drawing people further into the web of capitalism, to make people think like "bosses...landlords, not like tenants, not like workers".

I don't want to think like a boss, a capitalist, but do I have a choice?

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