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  3. Most Americans believe that our society of consumption-happy, fun-loving, je

Most Americans believe that our society of consumption-happy, fun-loving, je

游客2025-04-14  18
问题     Most Americans believe that our society of consumption-happy, fun-loving, jet-traveling people creates the greats happiness for the greatest number. Contrary to this view, I believe that our present way of life leads to increasing anxiety, helplessness and, eventually, to the disintegration of our cultures. I refuse to identify fun with pleasure, consumption with joy, busyness with happiness, or the faceless, buck-passing "organization man" with an independent individual.
    Modern industrialism has succeeded in producing this kind of man. He is the "alienated" man. He is alienated in the sense that his actions, and his own forces have become estranged from him; they stand above him and against him, and rule him rather than being ruled by him. His life forces have been transformed into things and institutions, and these things and institutions have become idols. They are something apart from him, which he worships and to which he submits. Alienated man bows down before the works of his own hands. He experiences himself not as the active bearer of his own forces and riches but as an impoverished "thing" , dependent on other things outside of himself. He is the prisoner of the very economic and political circumstances which he has created.
    Since our economic organizations is based on continuous and ever-increasing consumption(think of the threat to our economy if people did not buy a new car until their old one was really obsolete), contemporary industrial man is encouraged to be consumption-crazy. Without any real enjoyment, he "takes in" drink, food, cigarettes, sights, lectures, books, movies, television, any new kind of gadget. The world has become one great maternal breast, and man has become the eternal suckling, forever expectant, forever disappointed.
    In general, our society is becoming one of giant enterprises directed by a bureaucracy in which man becomes a small, well-oiled cog in the machinery. The oiling is done with higher wages, fringe benefits, well-ventilated factories and piped music, and by psychologists and " human relations" experts; yet all this oiling does not alter the fact that man has become powerless, that he does not wholeheartedly participate in his work and that he is bored with it. In fact, the blue — and white-collar workers have become economic puppets who dance to the tune of automated machines and bureaucratic management. [br] Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of modern industrial society?
选项 A、Ever increasing consumption.
B、Bureaucracy.
C、Ever-increasing power of man.
D、Automated machines.
答案 C
解析 细节判断题。原文第三段首句中的ever—increasing consumption与选项A对应；原文尾段首句中的bureaucracy与选项B对应；原文尾段首句中的well—oiled cog in the machinery与选项D对应。原文尾段第二句提到man has become powerless，选项C与此矛盾。故答案为C。
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