Is it wrong? Individuals were absolutely getting dehumanized in Kafka's time, but also since then are becoming ever increasingly more so, so it makes sense to speak of it continuing to happen and get worse. It is not binary.
"Individuals were absolutely getting dehumanized ... since then are becoming ever increasingly more so" - do you mind backing this up? I and everyone I know has it a whole lot easier than a couple generations prior.
I don't know a single person working the fields, doing dangerous work in a factory, working a coal mine, etc. Of course, I am fortunate enough to be in this position.
Power is continuing to squeeze people as much as it can, and life is very unaffordable and getting worse for most, but I think we still have it a whole lot better than a century ago (by and large).
You may be talking past each other. You're talking mostly about quality of life. That is different from being (de)humanized.
Dehumanizing is treating other humans as not, or not fully, human. For example, the term "human resources" is dehumanizing because it puts humans on the same level as other resources. If you're treating humans like you'd treat, I don't know, lithium or the ocean, you're dehumanizing them.
The more humans are treated as numbers on spreadsheets and other forms of computation, the more humans are dehumanized.
So both can be true: we're more dehumanized than in 1900, but while that does impact quality of life negatively, the overall quality of life may still be better than back then.
The question should be whether and how we can have both: overall quality of life without being dehumanized.
Agreed - treating humans as "human resources" is dehumanizing. And the most extreme is treating them as resources to be exhausted and discarded. That is exactly how coal miners or even laundry washers were treated in the past. You literally worked yourself into an early grave. That's a fate far worse than some HR lady treating you like a number - at least you're still alive.
Fundamentally it's up to you to find people that respect you (employers, friends, partners), and to find reward and meaning in your life. BigCorp is always going to treat you like disposable shit, and that's nothing new.
I think the quality of life would depend a lot on where you lived. Working a farm? Hard but rewarding (I presume). Nobility? Probably very nice. Working a dangerous machine in a sweaty factory? Probably pretty shitty - as evidenced by the fact that many people fought and died to improve their working conditions.
Certainly tech seems to be on a mission to try to ruin people's lives, addicting them and stealing their attention and drive. This is true, but also pretty easy to avoid once to see the game.
I'm saying that we ought to try to keep a sense of perspective here. Yes, you may be treated as an automaton or a number on a spreadsheet. But on average, you are probably in a much better position than most people through the last few hundred years.
It's also not a bad thing to keep pointing out something that is wrong if it keeps happening. The alternative is just silently deciding to accept it as normal and fine, which is clearly worse!
