The act (or result of the act) of transforming human properties, relations and actions into properties, relations and actions of man‑produced things which have become independent (and which are imagined as originally independent) of man and govern his life. Also transformation of human beings into thing‑like beings which do not behave in a human way but according to the laws of the thing‑world. Reification is a ‘special’ case of ALIENATION, its most radical and widespread form characteristic of modern capitalist society.
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There are those who prefer to buy only 'brand names'. This is understandable: symbol-standard-quality. But when Mattel contracts for cut-rate production overseas, the brand reputation is devalued. This too is easy to understand.
It is harder, it seems, for us to understand that the same thing applies to the stock market.
Excuse me; I never went to college, so it isn't incumbent on me to pretend I understand Marx or find him old hat. But it seems to me that much of ye olde post-modernism was just slightly dressed-up Marxist thought.
Or something. Whatever the brand name 'Marxist' still means.
Or, to quote the increasingly irresistibly quotable William Gibson:
"You know what really worried me about Second Life? Is that after I'd spent maybe like four or five hours checking it out last December, I was walking around in the Christmas shopping crowds here, and every so often I would see somebody from Second Life walking down the street. There are people, always well under 30, who look like they've escaped from Second Life."
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