Post Class Marx/Althussar

One point that really stood out to me and led me on a little bit of a whirl was a proposition made in Tuesday’s classing concerning Marx’s idea of systemic ideology and the notion of collective consciousness: does our brain determine our being?, or does our being determine our brain?. I think, as explored by a number of our theorists, that the human being, at least where we experience the world, is so very much and above all a “social” being that his status as a “societal member” as part of this larger ideological-based situation rules just exactly how he will think and consequently how he will act. It is impossible to separate one’s position in the hierarchy of class and status from the thoughts he will possess, for these “thoughts” are part of a manipulated belief system that are so ingrained and enforced time and time again generationally, that it seems to simply appear “natural” or just “the way things are”. It is not realized that this consciousness is artfully created to support the ruling power and their ideology, and it is just this massive “acceptance” by society that allows for such ideology to function. What the leaders in power think , is that which is assumed “true,” and thus, never questioned: through this process of blind individual acceptance, “their” thought manifests itself among our own thought. To think of it in this respect, frightfully poses the human “social” being almost as a robot in which he can successfully complete tasks and follow orders yet is incapable of generating his own thought based on his own opinion. If we are all ignorant conformists reliant on a hegemonic-based, one-dimensional ideology that’s sole purpose is to keep the authorities in authoritative positions, are we capable of making any degree of progress or even forward-thinking change? Or are we just a band of robots who are unable to be individuals? And with this type of discourse in mind, how do we even define “the individual”?