By Sawraj Singh
Alienation is the Hallmark of Marx’s philosophy. Marx, a great humanist was greatly pained by the dehumanization brought by capitalism which destroyed human spirit, weakened human relations and made human beings extremely self centered and selfish. Even people engaged in the professions which were considered very respectable and noble have been degraded into just money making machines. This pain was the primary motive for Marx to come with his economic theories. Humanism is the essence of Marxism. Marx was so eager to change this dehumanizing system that his conclusion was that this system needs to be changed and it does not matter if it is changed with his theories or any other theory. This conclusion is inscribed on his grave that the “Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways. The point however, is to change it”.
The question arises that where will the force come from to change the world. Alienation of the man comes because of the enslavement of the mind by the capitalist system. The enslaved mind loses the human spirit which is the prime source of the energy which is required to change the world around us. Once capitalism reached the stage of globalization which is the highest state of imperialism, the capitalist consumerist culture has become the dominant culture globally. The consumer culture has completely enslaved our minds. We are completely alienated from nature, society, family and our selves (self alienated). Our only purpose in life becomes to make more money to buy more things which we do not need but which are supposed to make our lives more comfortable and convenient. In other words we are struggling to fulfill our desires instead of our needs.
This approach to life alienates us from nature as nature has made provisions to fulfill our needs and not our desires. Living to fulfill our needs puts us in harmony with nature whereas, living to fulfill our desires brings us in confrontation with nature. Consumerism alienates us from nature. A person who is alienated from nature is set on a course which alienates him from the society, from the family and eventually from his self. The mind of the self alienated mind becomes a complete slave of the capitalist consumer culture. In other words his spirit has been completely devoured by capitalism. This person is no longer fit to be called a man his existence has been reduced to a money making machine. In lay man’s words this person has been lost in the rat race. In other words he has been completely consumed by consumerism.
Marx emphasized that if we want to change this sorry state of affairs or if we want to change the world around us then we have to first liberate our minds. Knowledge is the source of liberation of mind. We have to understand the world around us in order to change it.
This Marxist theory of evolution of knowledge and liberation of mind was given to the world by the Sikh philosophy more than three hundred years before Marx. Liberation of mind is one of the most important teachings of Sri Guru Granth Sahib. Sri Guru Granth Sahib advocates transforming a Manmukh to a Gurmakh. A Manmukh is an egoist person who follows his worldly unenlightened and unliberated mind whereas; a Gurmakh is a person whose mind is enlightened and liberated from the worldly entanglements (Maya). The worldly mind is called In Mann whereas the enlightened mind is called Un Mann. In the In Mann state a person cannot understand reality and therefore, lives in illusion. In the Un Mann state complete reality is revealed to a person.
Marx said that knowledge is the medium through which mind is liberated. Sri Guru Granth Sahib gives the message that the light of knowledge dispels the darkness of ignorance. All the computers, the internet and the smart phones have flooded us with information but we have not become knowledgeable. On the contrary we have become more ignorant because we are not assimilating that information. This is just like a person whose boat gets lost in the ocean. In spite of being surrounded by the water of the ocean he dies of thirst because he cannot absorb that water.
Let us understand these concepts that for information to become knowledge, it needs to be absorbed. Similarly, for knowledge to become wisdom, we need experience. In the Marxist terminology that is called putting theory into practice. To save our spirits from being devoured by the consumerism of capitalism, we have to liberate our minds and come out of the illusion which consumerism has created for us. Let us realize the reality about ourselves as well as about the society.
