Appartenenza 2.0
Belonging 2.0
Jul 2nd, 2009 by Ivo Quartiroli | 
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Several news sites recently reported that British Airways is asking its staff to work for free up to a month in order to cut the company’s costs. Such news would have been unbelievable just a few years ago. Here in Europe, having a solid trade union tradition, such a proposal would have been mocked as something suitable at most for Japanese people who are willing to sacrifice for their company.
But this is the brave new world of 2.0 where we are becoming more and more eager to participate and contribute. We are not only viewers anymore, but actors in the society of the spectacle. On the Net, we feed social networks with our “user-generated content” and help companies to advertise their products. “More than four in five bloggers post product or brand reviews, and blog about brands they love or hate,” according to the State of the Blogosphere 2008.
To feel a sense of belonging and to contribute to our community is an authentic human need which gets exploited by companies. It is easy to obtain: first, real communities have been impoverished by a massified urban living – family members themselves have been isolated by TV, video games and other media, and individuals have been relegated to an indoor life connecting with each other mainly through the Internet.
In such a condition, our sense of belonging can easily slip to social networks, companies and brands which don’t actually care about us, apart from being instruments of promotion and sites-filling.
C’è da dire che dei dipendenti BA disposti al collaborazionismo aziendale molti hanno preferito - piuttosto che lavorare gratis - prendere delle ferie non pagate.
Osservo anche che per i manager di vertice “dare l’esempio” non è tanto difficile, visti gli stipendi stratosferici che hanno.
Per gli altri pesa molto il ricatto della messa in liquidazione dell’azienda e non escludo che mostrandosi così proni alle richieste padronali sperino di essere salvati se si arrivasse a licenziamenti di massa. In poche parole, trovandosi sotto ricatto fanno i crumiri lecchini.
Comunque è vero che l’dentificazione con i modelli imposti dalla “società dello spettacolo” (by the way, Debord è noiosissimo da leggere ma quello che scriveva nei Sixties era quasi una profezia) è sempre più diffusa, viviamo in una società mercificata in cui la coscienza è un bene raro e l’alienazione è la normalità.
Non so se fosse proprio Debord o qualcun altro a dire che “il dominio reale del capitale è il capitale fatto uomo”. Comunque siamo lì.
Ananddeva
I think it illustrate the difference between cooperation and corporation. In one, everyone care about everyone, in the other, one care only about himself and try to made people care for him too, without ever thinking about giving back.