Business Quote by Marshall McLuhan
““It is just when people are all engaged in snooping on themselves and one another that they become anesthetized to the whole process. Tranquilizers and anesthetics, private and corporate, become the largest business in the world just as the world is attempting to maximize every form of alert. Sound-light shows, as new cliché, are in effect mergers, retrievers of the tribal condition. It is a state that has already overtaken private enterprise, as individual businesses form into massive conglomerates. As information itself becomes the largest business in the world, data banks know more about individual people than the people do themselves. The more the data banks record about each one of us, the less we exist.””
About This Quote
Source Book: Understanding Media, Marshall McLuhan, 1964
The quote warns that pervasive self‑surveillance and data collection numb awareness, turning information into a dominant industry that eclipses personal identity.
In simple terms: Data overload erodes self‑knowledge.
Key Takeaway
Guard personal data and stay critical of surveillance.
Themes
surveillance
identity
technology
privacy
media
Mood
cautious
critical
reflective
Type
philosophical
warning
observational
When to use this quote
- social media use
- corporate data analytics
- personal privacy management
- public policy debates
Key Concepts
information overload
anesthetization
corporate power
digital capitalism
Questions to Reflect On
- How does constant monitoring change our sense of self?
- What balance should exist between data utility and privacy?
A Different Perspective
It assumes all data collection is harmful, ignoring beneficial uses like health monitoring.
![“[T]here is both an intrinsic and instrumental value to privacy. Intrinsically, privacy is precious to the extent that it is a component of a liberty. Part of citizenship in a free society is the expectation that one's personal affairs and physical person are inviolable so long as one remains…” quote by John W. Whitehead](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/b70/john-w-whitehead-64581_american-society_t-here-is-both-an-intrinsic-and-instrume_2437494.jpg)
![“Every time I do an interview people ask similar questions, such as "What is the most significant story that you have revealed?" […] There really is only one overarching point that all of these stories have revealed, and that is–and I say this without the slightest bit of hyperbole or melodrama…” quote by Glenn Greenwald](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/eb7/glenn-greenwald-1215_american-politics_every-time-i-do-an-interview-people-ask_2405639.jpg)
![“[S]ometimes, when you are a food person, the possible irrelevance of what you are doing doesn’t cross your mind until it’s too late. (Once, for example, when I was just starting out in the food business, I was hired by the caper people to develop a lot of recipes using capers, and it was weeks of…” quote by Nora Ephron](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/d79/nora-ephron-1217_business_s-ometimes-when-you-are-a-food-person-th_980.jpg)
![“If the State does not acquire supremacy over [vast private] enterprises, it becomes their puppet, and they become the real State.” quote by Bertrand Russell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/bad/bertrand-russell-69_acquire_if-the-state-does-not-acquire-supremacy_1379.jpg)