1. The Repressive State Apparatus is a way of controlling our society through force. Examples include police authority, courts, and the prison system. These institutions enforce laws and punish those who rebel against them or the system. This brings fear into people rebelling as they do not want to face consequences or possibly jail time. Althusser calls it repressive because people are not “free” to do what they want without being governed by a higher authority figure. An example is when police break a protest through using physical force and arresting individuals.

2. Ideological State Apparatuses help shape our minds into believing that the society we are born into is natural and unavoidable. These work through schools, religion, mass media, and culture. We tend to try to fit in with our peers and want to belong to a group without seeming left out. School is one of the biggest factors because we submit to people of higher authority at such a young age, almost every day of our lives.

3. Repressive and Ideological State Apparatuses are different from each other because the Repressive Apparatus uses force, fear, and punishment to govern people and their actions. This is how to deal with rebellion. However, Ideological Apparatus is a more subtle way to control someone by shaping their mind to believe in a capitalist economy by using education and media to follow the correct rules. This is used to prevent rebellion.

4.

I thought this was a great example of Ideological Apparatus. We are all taught that what’s best for us is to always follow the typical “norm,” and that we are free, but we can not be free without the government’s permission first.

1) Ideology is the beliefs and values that an individual holds regarding how a society should function or operate. This often refers to a person’s political views and the political party they support. This is mostly organized by positions on the political spectrum, which are the left, right, and center. Liberal, conservative, or centrist, it all comes down to how a person was either raised to believe is the right way to act in society, or has their mind and morals towards how other people should be treated. These include economic equality, freedom, government regulations, and taxes.

Ideology shapes the world we live in today. Our beliefs are often shaped by our race, how our families were raised, your financial/ living situations, and what we are taught in school. When we take pride in our beliefs and express them openly, it creates opportunities for meaningful conversations between humans. Through open communication, we can share ideas and learn from one another, working together to build a society that benefits everyone. We are fortunate to live in a country where we have the right to vote and speak freely, and we should use that power to make sure that all voices are heard and valued.

2) The difference between conservative and liberal ideology in U.S. politics is that conservatives prefer limited government involvement and individual responsibility, while liberals prefer a more strict government role in promoting equality for all. Conservatives support lower government spending in fields such as environmental protection laws, disability and retirement, minimum wage laws, unemployment compensation, and cutting most human services to lower income groups, because this would lower taxes. They believe in the free market and think too much government involvement will hurt the economy and limit their freedom. They are more patriotic and believe in a strong military defense as well as harsher police authority, extreme prison sentences, and bringing religion into school. They do not support abortion, gay marriage, or other social issues or programs.

Liberals, on the other hand, believe that the government plays a large role in solving problems. They do support social programs like education and healthcare, and support higher taxes for the wealthy. Promoting fairness and equal opportunity for minorities, education, women’s rights, gay rights, ensuring environmental projects, women’s rights, providing jobs for everyone, minimum wage laws, social security, aid for the disabled or children, and affordable medical care should be the government’s responsibility. They believe the free market would not be fair for everyone in our society and would prefer a free trade market. Liberals are not as defensive over our military as conservatives, as they think we spend too much on the military already and to cut their budget into other social programs.

The dividing factor between conservatives and liberals is that conservatives cherish their liberty, as liberals cherish their equality.

3) Althusser explains ideology as something you can describe as a person’s political beliefs, but on a deeper level, it can be described as how we gain knowledge and authority through social structures and practices to form a capitalist ideology society. He described two different ways of controlled behavior. The first is a repressive apparatus, which creates fear in us by using the police, courts, and prisons to punish people who go against the system. The second is through ideological state apparatuses, which include schools, politics and mass media. These help shape your mind, beliefs, and values into knowing that our social system is natural and unavoidable.

We are born into a society where we are “free”, yet have authority constantly making sure we do not do anything wrong or act out. This does not feel any different to us in most cases, as we consciously believe it is normal for all of us to know that there are people born above us, and we will follow their rules to not be disciplined. He says that this authority figure is often started in school, “no other ideological State Apparatus has the obligatory audience of the totality of the children in the capitalist social formation, eight hours a day for five or six days”, Althusser. Starting at a young age, we must devote about 8 hours a day and listen to our teachers. We learn how to obey rules, submit to authority, share with your peers, clean, and ask for permission to do something. If the child behaves badly or rebels, they are forced out of class to face the consequences, and if the teacher is unable to do their job, they will have to face consequences with someone who has even more authority than them.