Marxism > Capitalism... Well at least that's what a Marxist would say.

In this video, Alec Baldwin’s speech exemplifies various aspects of a capitalist society. First and foremost the separation between classes is strictly drawn and painfully played out. In The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, divide the capitalist society into two classes, the bourgeois and the proletarians (Marx and Engels 657). The bourgeois are the people in society (owners) who own production, while the proletarians are the people in society (workers/laborers) who do not own production. Alec Baldwin’s character identifies himself only though his material belongings such as his eighty thousand dollar BMW, his expensive watch, and his nine hundred thousand dollar plus yearly salary. In order to achieve a well thought out communist society this separation should be eliminated. A society should be classless and this idea of ownership should cease to exist (Marx and Engels 660).

Here, the “leads” (the people whom they must sell the products to) and the workers themselves are reduced to a commodity. People are seen only as a product and if the workers do not or cannot achieve their goals they can easily be replaced. Marx and Engels suggest that, “ the mode of production in which the product takes the form of a commodity, or is produced directly for exchange, is the most general and most embryonic form of a bourgeois production (Marx and Engels 670). The value of a family is also challenged when Baldwin expresses “ you’re a good father, fuck you go play with your kids,” (Glengarry Ross). Suggesting that this employee is not viewed as a human being, he is only a part of a product whose goal in life is to supply the company with his labor. Proving that the “bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation to a mere money relation,” (Marx and Engels 659).

In a capitalist society the bourgeois benefit only from the workers labour power. The workers in this video are not cared for by their employers. They are only paid enough and looked after enough in order to keep them alive so they can fulfill their duties at work. Marx and Engels conclude, "it is self evident that the labourer is nothing else, his whole life through, than labour-power, that therefore all his disposable time is by nature and law labour-time, to be devoted to the self-expansion of capital," (Marx and Engels 671).

Works Cited:

Marx Karl, and Friedrich Engels. “Capital, Volume 1, Chapter . Commodities.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed, Vincent B. Leitch. 2nd ed. W.W. Norton & Company, Inc.: New York, 2001. 663-670. Print.


Marx Karl, and Friedrich Engels. “Capital, Volume 1, Chapter 10. The Working Day.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed, Vincent B. Leitch. 2nd ed. W.W. Norton & Company, Inc.: New York, 2001. 671-674. Print.

Marx Karl, and Friedrich Engels. “ The Communist Manifesto.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed, Vincent B. Leitch. 2nd ed. W.W. Norton & Company, Inc.: New York, 2001. 657-660. Print.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKzMd328bMw