Sorry but I think PtolemyKitty is off here, possibly way off if they really believe that this song is about sympathizing with the rich, the bourgeois, or figures of the ancien regime like Marie Antoinette. The lyrics are Marxist, probably influenced by the structuralism that was most in vogue in the 70s, and it's about how we're ALL enmeshed in the strictures of capitalist society - "no escape from society". Even our most basic desires, sex, the body, are repackaged for profit. The "perfect life" is a "dream" used to keep people compliant. The refrain that capitalism is "natural" has always been around and it's addressing that. "We all have good intentions..." is referring to the classic socialist notion that mere good intentions will be bastardized or co-opted under capitalism. The whole album is about how capitalism affects our lives, primarily in the fields of consumption, personal relations, advertising and market purchases than production.
Sorry but I think PtolemyKitty is off here, possibly way off if they really believe that this song is about sympathizing with the rich, the bourgeois, or figures of the ancien regime like Marie Antoinette. The lyrics are Marxist, probably influenced by the structuralism that was most in vogue in the 70s, and it's about how we're ALL enmeshed in the strictures of capitalist society - "no escape from society". Even our most basic desires, sex, the body, are repackaged for profit. The "perfect life" is a "dream" used to keep people compliant. The refrain that capitalism is "natural" has always been around and it's addressing that. "We all have good intentions..." is referring to the classic socialist notion that mere good intentions will be bastardized or co-opted under capitalism. The whole album is about how capitalism affects our lives, primarily in the fields of consumption, personal relations, advertising and market purchases than production.