Chapter 52 Savior?
Before the promotion meeting started, Lina approached Victor again on behalf of her classmates with great concern:
"Professor Victor, it seems we have made a big mistake."
"What happened?" Victor asked. "Did one of us have a conflict with the workers?"
"No. The workers are very cooperative and respectful to us. But the problem is that they respect us too much now-"
"Because..." Lina's face was full of regret: "In order to encourage apprentices to actively communicate and attract them to take the initiative to participate in our promotion meeting, we got carried away..."
"Tell them in advance about what you and my brother have decided to do to improve the salaries of apprentices, Professor Victor."
"Is there...any problem with this?" Victor didn't realize the problem at first.
He and Levi both felt that the life of Zaun apprentices was too hard, so they planned to improve the treatment of the apprentices after taking over the factory, and immediately achieve equal pay for equal work between Zaun people and Piltover people.
This matter has to be announced sooner or later. Is there any problem with announcing it a few days earlier?
"Yes, and it's a big problem. The main reason is... our propaganda work has not yet been effective, and the workers have not yet awakened to the most basic class consciousness."
"If we raise their wages and treatment and save them from suffering, they will inevitably..."
“They think of us as saviors.”
As she spoke, Lina happened to see something.
She pointed her mouth in that direction, and Victor looked over there:
Mr. Irving, dressed in a suit, a top hat and holding a cane, had just walked into the factory with Seraphine's arm around him when he was enthusiastically stopped by the ragged apprentices.
The apprentices gathered around Erwin and his daughter and asked excitedly:
"Mr. Erwin! I heard that we will be able to get the same salary as the people in Piltover in the future. Is this true?"
After getting a positive answer from Boss Erwin and confirming again and again that this was neither an illusion nor a joke...
The apprentices were so moved that they cried.
It was real crying, not fake at all.
"Mr. Erwin, you, you are such a good person... Thank you! Thank you!" Someone expressed his gratitude with tears.
"May Janna bless you and your family and wish you a lifetime of happiness and peace!" someone prayed devoutly.
"Mr. Erwin... No, Lord Erwin!" Some even acknowledged their master on the spot: "We are all rough people and don't know how to say nice things... Anyway, from now on, our lives will all be sold to you!"
"We eat Lord Erwin's food, so we should be Lord Erwin's soldiers!"
As the owner of the business, Erwin has now become the apprentices' breadwinner... no, his biological parents without blood ties... Even his biological parents are not as close to him as Erwin.
After all, most Zaun people don’t have the opportunity to enjoy the grace of being raised by their parents.
And Erwin, who was not related to them in any way, not only "fed" them, but also led them to live a good life.
The treatment is equivalent to that of workers in Piltover... This is something they never dared to dream of before!
"Ahem, everyone has misunderstood!" Erwin is very self-aware.
He was unwilling and did not dare to take the credit, so he immediately clarified in a clear manner: "It is not my idea , but the will of Goddess Gana--"
"This is Professor Victor over here. These students who are leaders have fought for this benefit for everyone!"
As soon as these words came out, everyone looked at Victor again, and at the students from the Leaders.
Looking at these eyes filled with gratitude and satisfaction, Victor felt a tingling sensation on his scalp.
He was really afraid that everyone would kneel down in front of him in the next second.
"Oh no." Victor finally understood where the problem lay.
Levi said that no matter how the leaders educate the masses, it is not as profound as the bourgeoisie's "direct education" of the masses. The role of truly awakening the masses can only be played by the enemy himself.
And now, before they have explained things clearly to the apprentices, before they have understood what kind of organization the Leaders are and what they should do, they have hastily brought them the life they have always dreamed of.
In the eyes of those apprentices, Victor is their savior.
And in their eyes, Victor is just a business owner.
So before they recognize the true face of the business owner and realize the "direct education" of the business owner to them, they have already received the "welfare package from the business owner".
"Not only that, because they do not understand the theory of labor creating value and surplus value, these workers generally do not know who feeds whom between them and the business owners."
"Mr. Irwin used to take care of the apprentices a little bit, and many people felt that it was the business owners who supported them and gave them the opportunity to have enough food to eat."
"Now that we have significantly increased the salaries of apprentices, more people are thinking:"
"If you pay too little, it's exploitation; if you pay too much, it's not exploitation."
"Giving as much as we have is a great favor."
Zaun is a city ruled by the Alchemist Baron. The people of Zaun are more or less influenced by gang culture and like to be loyal and righteous.
They will work for whoever can feed them and let them live a good life.
As for whether this meal was a gift from the Alchemy Baron or earned with their own lives... they never considered it.
Because in Zaan, even if you are alive, you may not be able to earn a living.
But a bite of food from the Alchemist Baron could always save their lives.
Thus, the combination of ignorant and backward ideas and Zaun's cultural traditions resulted in:
"Not only did they not wake up, they also began to be grateful to 'good business owners' like us... They even willingly regarded us as their masters." Lina sighed helplessly:
“Just like those Piltover workers, they were bought off by the benefits brought by high profits.”
How is this promoting Jana thought?
It's simply the opposite operation, helping Piltover business owners to promote themselves.
"It seems that there is indeed something wrong with our strategy..." Victor fell into deep thought.
Because this is a world where extraordinary power exists, and personal power is greater than everything else, so Levi's strategy from the beginning was to mobilize the masses, but not to mobilize them to fight.
This would have avoided meaningless bloodshed. But now it seems that the victory that was easily achieved without struggle inevitably gave everyone a "savior mentality".
They only knew that they were saved and should thank the savior.
If this idea spreads, some people will probably start to look forward to the coming of a savior, or even rely on the existence of a savior . When faced with difficulties, they will just lie down and do nothing, waiting for the powerful goddess to save them.
"We must find a way to avoid this kind of situation in the future."
"In the future, we must first educate the workers on Janna's ideology, so that they realize that Janna's power is the power of the masses, that it comes from them, and then we can help them... no, lead them to fight for their rights."
"At least we need to let everyone know that they also fought for this victory!"
Victor summarizes experience in practice and plans future publicity strategies.
The young team of Leaders is also gradually maturing.
But that’s all later.
The problem they are facing now is that after this wave of reverse operations, the lives of the apprentices have improved. And when people's lives improve, they naturally don't want to change the status quo.
Unconsciously, the publicity work of the leader has become more difficult.
"We can only keep going forward—" Victor placed his hope on the next promotional meeting: "I hope that complaining...will be useful?"
