Phenomenon

1. Why “Not Raise the Lazy”? — Welfare as “Prison Rations”

In normal countries, welfare is the return of rights after citizens pay taxes. But under the logic of “running a prison,” resources are viewed as the property of the Warden (the State):

  • Cost Minimization: The prison’s goal is not to make the inmates comfortable, but to keep them capable of basic labor (surviving and working). Over-issuing welfare (high pensions, high unemployment benefits) is seen as “cost waste” because it cannot directly translate into the strength of the regime.
  • Survival Rights as a Control Mechanism: The “sense of hunger” must be maintained among the populace. When a person must struggle for the next meal or to maintain medical insurance, they have no time to think about freedom, nor the courage to defy the rules. “Starvation if you disobey” is a lower-cost, more normalized management technique than “machine gun fire.”

2. Original Drugs and Medical Downgrade — “Equipment Maintenance” Not “Humanitarian Care”

You mentioned pushing out original drugs (expensive imported innovative drugs) from medical insurance and replacing them with cheap domestic generics. In the eyes of the prison operator:

  • Maintain Operation: The prison infirmary’s goal is not to “extend the highest quality of life,” but to “prevent the basic labor force from collectively breaking down.”
  • Resource Priority: Expensive original drugs and imported medical devices consume precious foreign exchange. In the Warden’s view, this money should be used to upgrade surveillance systems, maintain military (guard) expenses, or engage in geopolitical maneuvering, rather than being consumed by ordinary inmates who “cannot generate political returns.”
  • Privilege Hierarchy: This model is usually accompanied by extreme inequality (such as VIP wards). The best doctors and medicines in the prison are reserved for the Warden and senior guards; ordinary inmates only need to ensure that a large-scale epidemic does not break out.

3. Accountability Upward in Levels — The Contract Between Guards and the Warden

In a democratic society, officials act like waiters, constantly watching the mood of their customers (voters). But in a prison:

  • Management Metrics: The “discipline” within the prison only needs to be accountable to the “Warden.” Their performance metrics are: No Incidents (Stability), Completion of Production Quotas (GDP/Tax Revenue), Obedience (Loyalty).
  • The Populace as a Managed Object: In the eyes of the officials, the populace is not the “employer,” but the “work object” or “management consumable.” As long as the higher-ups are satisfied, the suffering of the people below is merely a “necessary loss” in the management process.

4. Complete “Atomization” and Mutual Surveillance (The Culture of Denunciation)

The primary objective of prison management is: Absolutely prevent the inmates from uniting.

  • Prison Practice: Establishing “Group Leaders” and “Dorm Leaders,” encouraging inmates to denounce each other. Reporting a violation can earn a reduction in sentence or better food (reward); if one person violates rules and their dorm mates do not report it, the entire dorm is punished (collective liability).
  • Life Reflection: Encouraging “denunciation” in schools, companies, and even families. When students report teachers for inappropriate remarks, neighbors report violations of epidemic prevention rules, or netizens collectively mobilize to “target dissenters,” society is shredded into mutually distrustful atoms. Without mutual trust, there is no organization, and therefore, no revolution.

5. Deprivation of Private Space and the “Panopticon”

The “Panopticon,” designed by the British philosopher Bentham, is the pinnacle of modern management: the guard sits in a central tower, able to observe every inmate at any time, yet the inmate does not know when they are being watched.

  • Prison Practice: Lights are never turned off, cameras cover everything, and even using the restroom requires reporting. This creates a psychological suggestion in the inmates that “Big Brother is watching me,” thereby achieving self-censorship.
  • Life Reflection: Facial recognition on every street, background monitoring by social media platforms, and big data profiling of personal preferences. When you think, “Will this be banned?” before posting every Weibo, you have already built a prison inside your own mind.

6. Ritualism and “Secular Religion”

This is the point you mentioned. Prison management heavily relies on repetitive, high-intensity rituals.

  • Prison Practice: Daily morning roll calls, singing reform songs in unison, reciting prison rules. These rituals dissolve logical thinking, putting people into a state of collective unconsciousness.
  • Life Reflection:
    • Symbolic Worship: The Red Book, flag-raising, pilgrimages to sacred sites—these are essentially converting political ideology into muscle memory.
    • Religious Discourse: The mandatory use of specific vocabulary (such as “gratitude,” “positive energy,” “entering the brain, heart, and soul”). These words are not used to exchange information, but to confirm identity and express loyalty.
    • Heroic Mythology: By shaping unquestionable martyrs and deified leaders, a “divine law” is established in the political sphere. To question these myths is “blasphemy,” leading to collective exclusion and punishment.

7. Controlling “Time” and “Information”

  • Prison Practice: Inmates have no time they can freely control; every minute is filled (working, studying, eating, sleeping). When a person falls into a state of extreme fatigue and monotony, the brain stops deep thinking. Simultaneously, the prison only allows inmates to see filtered newspapers and television programs.
  • Life Reflection:
    • 996 and Excessive Involution (Neijuan): When the populace must expend all their physical energy just to survive, they lose the capacity to focus on public affairs (a variant of “the machine gun cannot produce bread”: keep you busy earning bread, and you won’t have time to look at the machine gun).
    • Information Cocoon/Firewall: You are only allowed to hear one voice until you believe that voice is the entire truth of the world.

Conclusion: Where is the “Profit Point” of This Model?

The ultimate goal of the “prison management” model is not to make the inmates happy, but to achieve two objectives:

  1. Regime Survival: All resources (bread and machine guns) are held by the managers, ensuring that no internal force can challenge the Warden.
  2. Power Extraction: By lowering living expenses, the saved wealth is converted into the nation’s competitive strength (such as infrastructure, military, and high-tech competition).

The most tragic aspect of this “prison-like” governance is this: Because the populace has lost all their bargaining chips (even getting medicine when sick depends on the manager’s allocation), it is extremely difficult for them to find a breakthrough, unless this “prison” goes bankrupt due to internal deficits or external shocks.

The Way Out

If a life is born in the desert, the best thing to do is to look for an oasis, rather than trying to water a forest with tears, because their life may not last until the forest grows.