The system that really runs your life. Blade 2. The Mimetic Parasite: You Want What They Want, Not What You Want. The trap is conspicuous buying or ‘keeping up with the Joneses’.

You think you make choices, but most of what you want was installed in you by the people who get attention, not by the people who are actually free. In practice this means your desires are shaped by repetition, visibility, and the subtle pressure of watching what other humans signal as “the good life,” until your inner compass stops pointing inward and starts pointing toward whatever is most socially rewarded. Entire identities — the way you dress, the opinions you repeat, the goals you chase, even the romantic partners you find impressive — are stitched together from borrowed desires that never passed through your own soul. What you buy can often be interpreted as ‘conspicuous buying.’. You buy not out of real need, but out of desire to keep up with the Joneses.

The system loves this because mimetic humans are easier to steer: you don’t need police when people police themselves by copying the visible winners. The blade cuts deepest when you realize most of your decisions weren’t decisions at all — they were imitations you mistook for authenticity.