I didn’t own a cell phone until my mid-thirties for two reasons; one privacy, the second I didn’t want to be on call 24/7.
Fast forward to today and I don’t wear my Apple Watch much anymore and many times I elect not to carry my phone on my person because it is invasive.
Elite and corporate predators, supported by the malleable, will sagely point out that no one is forcing anyone to use technology. However, participation in technology is no longer voluntary.
It’s technically true that no one is forced to participate in modern banking, digital communication, algorithmic platforms, or surveillance-based consumer systems, you can refuse. However, the penalties for doing so are very harsh. Employers expect constant availability. Schools assume digital integration. Airlines, banks, healthcare systems, government agencies, businesses, and even personal relationships increasingly operate through apps, tracking systems, digital accounts, biometric devices, and algorithmic infrastructure.
The American definition of “voluntary” has become coercive persuasion marketed as “choice.” Amplified by Citizens United v. FEC, that system has enabled a slow-moving, bloodless transfer of power from the public to concentrated wealth, and foreign and corporate influence.
Present Day Society
I was at the library the other day when an older couple walked in asking for assistance with printing travel documents, luggage tags, and other matters related to the cruise they had previously booked and paid for. It was obvious this was their first cruise adventure. It was equally obvious they were completely lost when it came to technology.
My thought bubble? Up shit creek without a paddle.
The person working at the library looked visibly uncomfortable, caught between wanting to help and not wanting to become responsible for untangling someone else’s travel arrangements, passwords, accounts, and digital paperwork. Yes, libraries let people print documents, but to do that you still need to know where the documents are, how to access them, and how to navigate the systems holding them. The couple was fuzzy on almost every detail.
The more I thought about that older couple at the library, the more unsettling the entire interaction became.
It was obvious from the moment they spoke that someone had taken advantage of them — not necessarily through outright fraud, but through a system designed around confusion, digital dependency, and outsourced customer service.
The modern cruise industry operates inside a maze of international maritime law, foreign corporate registrations, liability waivers, arbitration clauses, and jurisdictional loopholes that often leave ordinary consumers with very little meaningful recourse once something goes wrong.
And standing there watching that vulnerable couple struggle just to access the documents required for their trip, it felt painfully clear that the industry had already taken their money while quietly transferring all responsibility back onto them. I was leaving for an appointment when this drama unfolded so I don’t know how it ended, but I suspect they departed with “why don’t you try this, good luck and have fun on your trip.” Their difficulties left unresolved.
That is the part people rarely talk about. Modern systems increasingly offload labor, risk, troubleshooting, and logistical burden onto the customer while marketing it as “convenience.”
That small interaction felt like a perfect snapshot of modern life. Technology didn’t just change how we live. It quietly restructured society around itself and, in doing so, penalized the people left behind — or those who consciously choose not to participate.
Modern life is now organized in such a way that opting out carries economic, social, and logistical punishment. That is not freedom in any meaningful sense. That is engineered dependency.
The origins of private profit and concentrated wealth.
The enclosure movement was one of the most significant turning points in the development of early capitalism in England. Beginning gradually in the late medieval period and accelerating between the 16th and 19th centuries, enclosure transformed land that had once been shared collectively by villages into privately owned property controlled by wealthy landowners.
Before enclosure, many rural communities relied on “common lands” fields, forests, and pastures that ordinary people could use for grazing animals, gathering firewood, or growing food. These commons were central to survival for peasants and small farmers living under the feudal system.
As demand for wool, agricultural profits, and later industrial production increased, landowners began fencing off and legally claiming these shared lands for private use. Parliament eventually supported the process through a series of Enclosure Acts, which formalized the transfer of common land into private ownership.
The consequences were massive:
- Thousands of peasants and tenant farmers lost access to land that had sustained their families for generations.
- Rural populations were pushed into poverty, displacement, and wage labor.
- Many migrated into growing towns and cities, creating a large labor force for factories during the Industrial Revolution.
- Agriculture became more market-oriented and profit-driven rather than centered on local survival and subsistence.
In practical terms, enclosure helped create two defining features of capitalism:
- A class of private landowners controlling productive resources.
- A landless working population forced to sell its labor for wages.
Critics of enclosure often describe it as the moment communal survival systems were dismantled in favor of private profit and concentrated wealth, while supporters argued it increased agricultural efficiency and economic growth. Both interpretations remain central to debates about capitalism’s origins today.
Nazi Germany on steroids.
Technology is controlled by powerful elites, corporations, and political entities intertwined with government power, creating authoritarian systems far beyond anything seen in previous eras because modern technology influences not only economies and wars, but perception, behavior, and truth itself.
Think: Nazi Germany on steroids, wrapped in convenience, entertainment, branding, and the illusion of choice.
