Are you feeling bad? Sad? Lonely? Despondent about your life? Anxious about politics? Angry about the state of the world? The gurus and influencers and deep thinkers of the internet have identified the culprit, the reason, the overarching explanation for why everything, everywhere sucks all the time. 

“Do you feel horrible? That’s capitalism, baby!” says the wildly popular mental health influencer TherapyJeff in a TikTok with nearly 50,000 likes. “Is your self-worth based on who you are or what you do? If it’s what you do and the value you create, that’s internalized capitalism.” 

In another video on the platform, two attractive 20-something women discuss how “late-stage capitalism” has affected their social lives and complain that there’s a lack of public “third spaces.” The video was filmed in what appears to be a public park. 

In another video, this time with over 14,500 likes, a young woman declares that “capitalism is the root of all evil” before adding, “I’m also a business owner. But fuck capitalism, right?”

@therapyjeff

Do you feel horrible? That’s capitalism, baby! #capitalism #america #mentalhealth #therapy #therapytok #therapist #burnout

♬ original sound – TherapyJeff

Online, “capitalism” has become a shorthand for just about every disliked cultural trend, no matter how universal or eternal. Unrealistic beauty standards? Capitalism. Monogamy? Capitalism. People not wanting to give you a ride to the airport? Capitalism.  

Capitalism gets conflated with everything from consumerism and government corruption to the concept of work itself. Online anticapitalism is not so much a reaction against economic reality as a reaction against, well, reality. It’s the all-purpose villain ruining everything that should be good about modern life. 

@ameliamontooth

if ur my friend and ur seeing this lets b radical anticapitalists together while you drive me home from LAX ???? #wlw #friends #friendship #20s #femalefriends #friendgroup

♬ original sound – Amelia

Hatred of capitalism has coincided with a boom in popularity for socialism and even communism. In a recent Pew poll, only 40 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds had a positive view of capitalism, while 44 percent viewed socialism positively. In another poll, 34 percent of young people reported a favorable view of communism, which in Josef Stalin’s Soviet Union killed millions of people from famine alone. 

This sort of thinking has already had real-world political consequences. In June, self-identified socialist Zohran Mamdani handily won New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary on a platform of state-run grocery stores and a rent freeze. Some polls now indicate he’s the front-runner for the city’s top elected office. 

It’s hard not to read this shift as downstream of a real malaise among many Americans, especially young adults. Surveys consistently find that young people feel lost and forgotten. They’re having a hard time finding jobs they like and friends they can count on. Young Americans frequently feel that “the system” simply isn’t working. And so they blame that system for their fears, frustrations, and anxieties.

But capitalism isn’t the reason why you, or anyone else, is unhappy. Blaming capitalism is a fantasy, a rhetorical escape, that allows people to shift the blame from their own choices to a powerful external force outside their control. The capitalist blame game is a social-media-friendly cover for a lack of personal meaning and social connection, a crutch for those who have not made their lives their own. 

By arguing that capitalism is the cause of your dissatisfaction, you deny your own agency. Your problems become both unsolvable and someone else’s fault. And if your problems are intractable and insurmountable, you no longer have a duty to try to overcome them. This lack of agency is comforting, but only leads to more unhappiness in the long term. The solution is not to blame capitalism—or any other shadowy, conspiratorial force—for your problems, but to accept that you’re in the driver’s seat of your own life. 

Capitalism vs. Fun? 

“There’s no way that you’re going to tell me I’m going to work my whole life,” says one 20-something travel influencer in a nearly manic viral video. “I’m going to sit behind a fucking desk and work nine-to-five each day of my life until retirement. There is no way that is what life is about….I want to have fun, like I actually want to have fun, and I don’t understand why this is the norm and we’re putting up with this.”

In another popular video, a young woman films herself lip-synching from her cubicle, with the caption “When I tell my parents I’m sick of working and they say some dumb shit like ‘welcome to adulthood’ or ‘you’re just getting started’ like bro I genuinely have nightmares about having to work for the next 60 years.” In the comments, “it’s actually very upsetting, i cry abt this all the time” and “Like y’all KNEW how much it sucked and y’all STILL had me” have more than 2,000 and 1,000 likes, respectively. 

@ellaajaee

capitalism is hitting hard today tbh #quit #travel #9to5 #zoocosis #life

♬ original sound – Ella Jae

@tsahailayne

Ive had a job for 6 years like what do you mean “just getting started” ???? #fypシ #fyp #help #xyzbca #whywasntibornrich???? #capitalism

♬ HAVE SOME COMPASSION – erica┊͙ ˘͈ᵕ˘͈

In the discourse of internet anticapitalism, this feeling—that adulthood should somehow just be more fun—comes up time and time again. It’s often paired with a general aversion to having a standard nine-to-five job at all, even one that pays well.

So it’s no wonder that many young people seem to share a politically left-leaning sense that just about anything is better than the American middle-class standard, whether that’s Europe, communist Cuba, or even prehistoric hunter-gatherer tribes. You might remind one of these creators that Spain’s youth unemployment rate is over 25 percent, that 10 percent of Cuba’s population fled the country in 2022–2023, and that Stone Age life was no lovefest, but you probably won’t convince them to extoll the virtues of free markets and the dramatic reduction in poverty wrought by global capitalism. 

And that’s because this kind of anticapitalism is fundamentally an escapist fantasy. It’s a form of utopian thinking that irrationally assumes capitalism is the only thing standing between you and a life without real problems. 

You can find utopian anticapitalism on the far right as well. Instead of dreaming of a world without work or consumerism, right-wing trad bros fantasize about a past when women were financially dependent on men and immigrants didn’t compete with native-born Americans for jobs. 

On the left, though, a world without capitalism is often imagined as a world without responsibilities of any kind.

This view is laid bare in one viral 18-second TikTok in which a young woman creates a mock dialogue between “humans” and “capitalism.”

@sara.grace.young

Can I please just get paid to make videos and do art? #fyp #capitalism #wlw #curlyh

Read More

Article from Reason.com

Reason Magazine

The Reason Magazine website is a go-to destination for libertarians seeking cogent analysis, investigative reporting, and thought-provoking commentary. Championing the principles of individual freedom, limited government, and free markets, the site offers a diverse range of articles, videos, and podcasts that challenge conventional wisdom and advocate for libertarian solutions. Whether you’re interested in politics, culture, or technology, Reason provides a unique lens that prioritizes liberty and rational discourse. It’s an essential resource for those who value critical thinking and nuanced debate in the pursuit of a freer society.