Urbanization Part II (Conformity)

"The greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior." -Thoreau
“Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag and begin to slit throats.”-HL Mencken
So the year is 2007 and half the worlds population has gone behind the concrete curtain. "So it goes". I've noticed that within' these cities status is somehow derived from how much one consumes. People kill, lie, deceive, cheat and do all manner of horrific things in the pursuit of whatever they feel will secure them some modicum of happiness. I'm a little fuzzy on why exactly owning a lot of things and spending lots of money makes you anything but decadent profligate, but it seems to be the name of the game. The crazy part of it is that such an overwhelming majority of the city buys into this that you get conformity on a staggering level. Because everyone is on the money-go-round it's sort of like a universal language. Thus can a city like San Francisco speak many languages but still function like a well built clock. From the outside it resembles a beehive or anthill more than anything else. Thousands upon thousands of creatures scurrying about doing a thousand different things, all amazingly without any overt orders. Of course, conformity always has consent as its prime mover. All those who really can't take it or refuse to buy in move out or are incarcerated in even more packed miniature cities called prisons. All manner of desperate deviants have evolved from the casually consenting majority, but they are fighting an uphill battle that simply can't be won. What's their plan? Convince, coerce, convert, cajole and coax the entire hive to their way of thought thereby accomplishing a total change in how the thing works? It seems to me something like fighting the war to end all wars. . No small wonder then that the warm embrace of conformity is a comfort to billions living in the cities across the landmasses of Earth's crust. You can't deny that they are part of something big, certainly the biggest thing we humans have done in memory at least. I hate to start and end with a quote, but the following one says it better than I know how- "In our own time we have seen domination spread over the social landscape to a point where it is beyond all human control. Compared to this stupendous mobilization of materials, of wealth, of human intellect, of human labor for the single goal of domination, all other recent human achievements pale to almost trivial significance. Our art, science, medicine, literature, music and "charitable" acts seem like mere droppings from a table on which gory feasts on the spoils of conquest have engaged the attention of a system whose appetite for rule is utterly unrestrained." -Bookchin