Revisiting "Modern Times"

Modern Times is an old movie. When I was a child, I was amused by Chaplin's humor and funny. At that time, I didn't seem to be able to understand the hardships of the exploited low-level workers under the background of the industrial era and the economic crisis. In contrast, in our memory, we children were more willing to imitate Chaplin's actions of twisting screws with a wrench. . In the 1970s, we understood capitalist society that way, and took for granted the social reality reflected in this work made in the 1930s as 40 years later. In fact, with the elimination of the economic crisis and the improvement of the relationship between capitalists and workers, with the advancement of Western democratic politics, the situation in capitalist countries has changed a lot.
Therefore, when we review this old film today, perhaps the focus is no longer the struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, but a stage in the development of human society. In such an era, the gap between the rich and the poor was very obvious. In order to survive, people living at the bottom could not maintain civilization and dignity, and had to steal things to maintain their basic needs. And those capitalists and bosses who got rich first do not think more about improving the living and working conditions of their employees, but how to extract more residual value. To this end, in addition to using modern monitoring methods to supervise every corner of the factory, including the bathroom, they also arbitrarily speed up the rhythm of the production process, so that workers can produce as many products as possible within effective working hours, complete more tasks. Fortunately, the automatic feeding machine in the film did not run stably during the test. Otherwise, the poor workers would have turned into mechanized human flesh tools from the moment they stepped into the factory gate. They may be just a symbol and a link in the production process. The only difference between them and the cold machines, gears, and assembly lines is that they still breathe and have life.
Time has entered the 21st century. In today's China, there are probably many factories that have the production conditions and management conditions in "Modern Times", and those workers on the front line are also experiencing Chaplin at the same time. What hardships have we experienced? Think about those workers who have jumped off the building, do they feel that the pressure of work has exceeded their ability to bear, do they feel that their income is far from enough to match their efforts, so they would rather ascend to the heaven of freedom?
The essence of a market economy is profit-seeking. If the socialist market economy should be different from the capitalist market economy, I think it should not be reflected in the public and private ownership of the means of production, but should be reflected in people-oriented. If human nature is eliminated, people will no longer see work as a contribution to society, no longer let people feel the joy of life from work, can not let people experience a sense of accomplishment in work, and can not let people feel at work. If the unit experiences friendship, care and warmth, then such a market economy will also go astray and will eventually be abandoned by people.
People-oriented, scientific development, this direction is correct. Our leaders and decision makers at all levels should revisit the movie "Modern Times" and think about what we are doing and what are we doing?

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