Individualism In Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club

Popularized from the theory of mercantilism, capitalism has become the modern day American system of economics and has ultimately shaped the core foundation of America’s development. Operated on a system directed towards profit maximization, capitalism thrives off of a strong degree of competition between privately owned sectors for the consumer market. As a result, the economic system has also developed a classist society in which the wealthy, bourgeoisie, hold the power over the middle and lower class, considered by men such as Karl Marx as the proletariat. Such examples of individuals who dwell within the proletariat are blue-collar workers such as the protagonist of Chuck Palahniuk’s novel Fight Club, known as Joe. Considered by his audience
In a society that encourages the acquisition of goods and services in ever-greater amounts, Fight Club describes the protagonist’s resentful dedication to this philosophy, “they have trapped [you] in your lovely nest, and the things you used to own, now they own you” (Palahniuk 44). The protagonist experiences the dark side of consumerism, an endless search for a feeling of wholeness using the products one purchases to find a satisfactory justification and reason worth living for. Consumerism in Joe’s life has not only led to a feeling of worthlessness once he finds his home and possessions destroyed, but as Marx would argue, has also brought enlightenment in that it has broken free the “shackles” of consumerism that have chained the protagonist for years. Acting as a means of social and economic criticism, Fight Club reveals the pettiness of American’s addiction to what they own. Similar to the protagonist, by losing an expendable possession such as a smart phone, tablet, television, or expensive couch, many would struggle to adjust to such a small change. All in all, Palahniuk uses recurring Marxist ideas of consumerism to perhaps get the readers to identify with the character’s lifestyle and challenge their current “shackles” that may be formed by
One key dynamic found in Fight Club was the protagonist’s recollections of an absent father figure. “Me, I knew my dad for about six years, but I don’t remember anything. My dad, he starts a new family in a new town about every six years…” (Palahniuk 50). In addition Tyler, while later in the novel being found to be sharing the same body as the protagonist when he is asleep, bonds with Joe over his supposed absent father figure as well; this helps cultivate their early relationship with one another. Therefore, with no distinct male role model, it is clear that Tyler and the protagonist experienced a profound effect in that they were forced to accept the role men play in society portrayed by the media. “Even if my father were still alive and had the kind of psychological rebirth that permitted him to give me his love, I would still have to heal the psychological wounds he inflicted over the course of my childhood-my feelings of inadequacy and abandonment before I could benefit from his love” (Tyson 16). Humans are a product of their family dynamics and we ultimately define ourselves as individuals based off of how we see ourselves in our families growing up. As a result, Freudian psychoanalytic elements such as family dynamics can be found thoroughly throughout Fight Club and not only play a lasting effect on the protagonist’s active conscious, but also leave