Free Time: Are Humans Free?

___A critique of Consumerism

(Abstract ) 

Ma Huidi

Associate Professor
Director of Editorial Department of Dialectics of Nature
86 Xueyuan Nanlu, 100081 Beijing, China
Tel:  86-10-6317 4651; 86-10-62178877-3518

Email: mahuidi@china.com
[Special thanks to Dr. Marjorie C. Miller of Philosophy Department of Purchase College] 

With the rapid development of science and technology, human free time increases exponentially, day after day.  The limits of human spiritual freedom are expanding more and more.  But, faced with extraordinarily plentiful material wealth, human beings open big, greedy mouths and simply drool with envy.  Human beings have paid a big price for alienating” ourselves because of our unlimited desires.  As a result of this alienation, human free time has been squeezed, and we live far from freedom.  The spiritual home of humanity accommodates only our present comfort and satisfaction.  We have finally given up our reasoning on freedom, as well as our critical spirit and energy.  We are born free, but we are everywhere in chains.

Free time is certainly a form of leisure time.  It means the time that can be allocated freely, beyond humans’ working hours.  In human life, time can be divided generally into two parts: working time and free time.  When productive forces remain at a lower level, humans will have little free time, since we have to spend most of our time in producing necessary products.  With the development of science and technology, human working time has been shortened to its minimum.  Human beings are rich in either wealth or free time. Therefore, the level of how much free time humans possess and spend has become a new measure in judging the quality of life.

It is self-evident that free time is a basic condition of spiritual freedom.  When one has plenty of free time, one will have a vast space in which to exercise all of one's hobbies, interests, abilities and efforts.  In this free world, a person can disentangle oneself from the tangle of external material wealth.  One will no longer run here and there seeking for the materials of life.  As Karl Marx noted, the purpose of having individuality to be released is not to shorten and reduce the necessary working hour for a surplus labor force, but to shorten directly the necessary social work to its minimum.  At that time, in accordance with this, individuals will be able to develop themselves in the aspects of arts and science, for everyone has been provided with time and creative conditions.” (pp. 218-219, vol. 46-b, The Collected Works of Marx and Engels.)

An excess of consumption is a result of current economic developments.  Its moral principles are: to seek for grace through consumption, to desire endless material enjoyment and entertainment, to attempt to utilize material occupations and satisfactions to make social and spiritual demands on others, and to fix human aims and determine life's values on the basis of the enjoyment of material wealth and high levels of consumption.  With the rapid and mystifying development of science and technology, people have created quantities of material wealth such as have never been seen before.  Such wealth entails the opening of the possibility of the practical realization of human liberalization and development in every sphere.  However, humanity has paid a price by developing new forms of self-alienation due to the endless thirst for material wealth.  This thirst causes not only the loss of free time, but also an estrangement from genuine freedom.

In developed countries, one fifth of the world's population consumes about four-fifths of the world's resources and has become the center of the worldwide forces of consumption.  The choice to consume plays an essential role.  We can say that consumption has already soaked into the aspects of production, distribution, desire, acquisition, and use.  Consumption is not only an action satisfying one's material desires and demands, but also a means to an end in exerting control over symbolized material things.  With respect to the so called symbolized materials, Bowman points out: from the aspect of living, consumption is a means to an end for creating one's dignity, personality and relationship with others.  From the aspect of the society, consumption is a means of supporting a social system, community and organization in operation continuously.  From the aspect of the system, consumption is the guarantee of reproduction.” [citation: Tri-links Life week,No.11,1998 Beijing China]   A consumer class is one of the social formations, neither moral nor immoral, from which we can clearly see human beings’ intentions, attitude, pursuits, and relationships between the society and individuals.  As a result, we will be able to make a general judgment and critique on the matter of livelihood.  At present, there is an opinion that consumption has provided the guarantee for human freedom and enriched human free time.  But it is quite probable that consumption is really a deplorable and degenerate state for human beings.  Therefore, consumption is fraudulent in two respects: 1. It seems to have given a kind of happiness to people. It gives permission to the consumer to shop and promises people happiness.  2. Consumption makes a false inference: if you provide freedom to consumers, you have already settled the problem of freedom completely.  So, freedom has actually been reduced to consumption.  Free time becomes an endless routine of consumption.  It seems as if humanity has already achieved our own goals through the processes of consumption. 

In the USA, there is data that shows that about 200,000 people in America make a pornographic call from 9pm to 1am each night.  Each call lasts 6 to 8 minutes on average, and the charges vary from 89 US cents to 4 dollars per minute.  In 1996, Americans consumed about $7,500,000,000-$10,000,000,000  on such pornographic calls.  According to the statistics of the American Movie News for Adults [citation: The Overseas Digest, No.1,1998,Beijing China] rentals of blue” films increased from $75,000,000.00 in 1985 to $4,900,000,000.00  in 1992.  And it had reached the point of $6,650,000,000.00 in 1996.  If we put all such films, performances, sex guides, and computer games together, Americans consumed roughly a maximum of $80,000,000,000.00 on these items.  Sociologists have pointed out that the changes in the sex culture of America within these 20 years has surpassed the total of the past 200 years.

In China, this kind of problem is also prevalent.  China began to follow the five-day work week in May of 1995.  It implies that one third of human's time will be spent at leisure, and people will be able to release themselves more and more from trivial affairs.  However, it is in fact the case that people have little or no free time to budget.  More and more people use the extra time from their first jobs to take on part time employment in order to increase their incomes by earning more pay.  The leisure time available to people today, won after long efforts, was originally intended to bring people more benefits in order to promote the quality of their lives.   But the current situation does not make us optimistic.  People have made enormous efforts to gain maximum wealth in the space of a limited lifetime.  Everyone wants to obtain more and more pleasures and enjoyments within this finite life. Business people want to maximize their chances to earn income.  When we squeeze the time available, human beings are actually squeezing ourselves.

Perhaps, the over-consumers are still just a small percentage of today's world.  But we can see the full consequences of over-consumption by observing their behavior.  Human beings have consumed their enthusiasm at the same time as they have enjoyed material wealth.  Human beings have already given up both our social responsibility and our historical mission.  We have lost the unique thing that only humanity has: the nature which creates for our spiritual life.  Humanity goes forward as an economic animal.  All pondering over the problem of the value of life seems to be nonsense." In a modern industrial society freedom is a chimera and alienation a social fact". 

J.J. Rousseau said, human beings are born free, but are everywhere in chains.”  It is an accurate portrayal of our current situation and its features.