Workers compensated for meaningless rationalized jobs with glittering distractions instead of class consciousness

Evidence

Capitalism, it seemed, could no longer continue in its old forms, and even its supporters were at least discussing its possible collapse, in view of the world economic crisis and the emergence of authoritarian governments. But higher-level employees seemed to want a new economic order less than ever. White-collar workers were compensating for `the unnoticed horror of normal existence’ by adding the business of amusement, with its glitter and its distractions, to the business of work. It seemed that this was becoming an example which blue-collar workers were also wanting to follow, rather than that white-collar workers were moving closer to the attitudes of class-conscious proletariansalthough the offices of white-collar workers in larger firms had also been the victims of machinery and assembly-line methods during the period of rationalization between 1925 and 1928. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 469

Categorization

• XREF: Direct pre-echo of the later culture-industry argument in Dialectic of Enlightenment; also connects to Horkheimer’s ‘apes of their gaolers’ observation two paragraphs on. — connects to: Berlin entertainment palaces rationalized leisure to console white-collar workers’ powerlessness; Wages compensate time but not enthusiasm workers contribute freely — Yanis Varoufakis, Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism, 65; Enlightened capitalism captures workers with diversions that dissipate their transcendence — Simone de Beauvoir, The Ethics of Ambiguity, 89 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Enlightened capitalism captures workers with diversions that dissipate their transcendence #expands (0.90) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Ethics of Ambiguity, 89
• Alienated consumption compensates for alienated labour #corroborates (0.85) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2304
• Wages compensate time but not enthusiasm workers contribute freely #expands (0.75) — Yanis Varoufakis, Technofeudalism, 65
• Cognitive capitalism blurs the work-play divide by investing in minds and social relations #complicates (0.72) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 366
• Working class people rationalize the status quo through meritocratic beliefs #complicates (0.70) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2232