- Self-checkouts are suddenly appearing everywhere.
- Marketed as a convenience or ‘skip the line’ initiative, there are far more sinister intentions.
- Self-checkouts further serve systemic depersonalization and isolation/alienation ‘anti- human’ goals.
- Self-checkouts are big-tech/big-data surveillance tools which are also designed to discourage the use of cash money towards a centralized big-bank/government controlled centralized power center.
I’ve always made a point of never using a self-checkout, mostly to protect the employment and dignity of the actual human workers in the store. I’ve noticed that all of the sudden they are trying to coerce the use of self-checkout in certain stores, not even giving you the choice of using a cashier. Why would they do this? What is the Goal?
Small sample size but the first store we noticed this in was a ‘Shoppers Drug Mart.’ They had no cashier at the front but rather this imposing computer monitor and other tech, with a sign
that read “For debit and credit use the shelf checkout. The other till was just ‘closed.’ The
‘worker’ was not happy that I just stood there and made her process my payment manually.
Incidentally, Shoppers Drug Mart is owned by Loblaws, which is owned by the Weston Family. The late Galen Weston was long-time friend of the Royal Family. (Charter member of the upper echelon elite club)
A recent CBC report revealed that grocery giants Metro and Loblaws “would increase their self-checkouts in select stores to help offset the higher cost of wages.” That certainly is helping working class people isn’t it! According to the World Economic Forum’s 2018 “Future of Jobs Report” many jobs will be replaced with automation, including cashier positions, which they describe as becoming ‘redundant” in the near future.
Next stop was ‘Value Village’ (Savers in the US) which seems to present itself almost like a non- for-profit charity but actually they could not be further from that. It is a ‘thrift store’ but unlike Goodwill which actually is a not-for-profit which employs people with disabilities, Value Village is simply a for profit corporation masquerading as a charity.
In fact, the company which originated in Washington state, was recently sued by the state Attorney General for false advertising. They charged that the company “unfairly and
deceptively” created the impression that Value Village is a charity or non-profit organization. In fact, this store could not be more sterile and antihuman, and actually the prices were not cheap at all but were near retail.
Value Village did not have a single human cashier but had four stations of self-checkout only, forcing customers to use the self-checkout, and ideally the digital debit/credit system. The option of cash or debit was available on a couple of the self-checkout machine, just like a bank machine.
Self-checkouts are being pushed as a kind of convenience or ‘skip the line’ initiative. As one analyst notes “I’m in a lot of supermarkets around the country. I watch people. I can tell you that I’ve been in stores where the lines that have cashiers are very, very long, and people are a little upset, and there are three or four self-checkout units open and nobody is using them.”
So instead of actually serving customers by hiring more cashiers, grocery stores appear to be deliberately limiting the amount of cashiers to coerce you to the self-checkouts to be processed ‘faster’ and ‘more conveniently’.
Obviously such moves push yet another job for human beings to the dumpster. It further isolates and dehumanizes people in the sense that it removes this last vestige of human interaction, community building, the value of face-to-face human exchange.
This is called depersonalization and is a characteristic of systems designed to maximize power, profit, and control. It is far easier to manipulate people when they have become depersonalized simply to a number or statistic. It removes any notion of value or care, or the opportunity to demonstrate and receive/affirm value or care from the exchange.
There are statistics out there on supposed consumer interest in self-checkouts, but one has to watch for the bias and cherry picking in these reports. Apparently, 47% of people use self-
checkouts ‘regularly’ and insider research tends to highlight the ‘benefits’ of self-checkouts and
point to ‘increased consumer interest’ in the technology
One insider study points out that self-checkouts lead to “shorter lines and faster checkout, improved privacy (explain that one to me) reduced labour costs, greater accuracy, better ‘in store optimization’ or shorter lines, and the kicker…‘improved customer service’.”
The lineup and labour cost effects are probably true, but unfortunately most people are so asleep they do not even realize the systemic control manipulating them and the ultimate sinister goals which it serves. It’s not about helping you get through the line and on with your life faster.
An alternative or pro-human point of view is expressed by Craig Lambert, author of ‘Shadow Work”. Self-checkouts de-humanize basic life. One’s sense of self and sense of ‘rights to be’ and express one’s self and be validated as one’s self eroding away bit by bit, by design.
“It often takes the human being out of the equation,” says Lambert. “Those small relationships are part of how you build a community, frankly.” It is much easier to manipulate people who already feel they don’t have any rights or value.
As Lambert further notes, “Robots don’t interchange banter. There’s no pleasantries going back and forth between you and the kiosk. And as a result, it somewhat dehumanizes daily life.”
What is the real reason for a push for self-checkouts? There are several but understand that there is a larger purpose of pushing towards self-checkouts, a systemic goal, and this goal is not in the best interest of the working people.
One goal is increased surveillance and information/data gathering on you, the consumer. All of these self-checkout computers will also be photographing you. They will be gathering a ledger on all your activities during the day, everywhere you went and used you bank card, everyone you were with, what you purchased.
The central bankers and big tech data controllers can, through AI algorithms, determine what your present interests and inclinations are. This of course is already the case, but insisting on self-checkouts is another structural way of enforcing compliance to the intelligence gathering, centralized monitoring of citizens.
A further goal is simply the push to get rid of cash money, which cannot be monitored, and forcing you into the digital banking system. It is still ‘law’, though clearly law and human rights do not matter to this controlling cabal system, to accept any legal tender. But they wish to discourage the anonymity of cash money.
For one, they cannot gain any information from you when you use cash. Secondly, it is part of a larger trend to squeeze humans using cash money out of the centralized banking system and towards only being allowed to use centralized ‘digital’ currency. This is like livestock being herded towards a feedlot.
Remember the Freedom Trucker movement in Canada one year ago. The Government of Canada, specifically Justin Castro and Crystia Freeland (likely under orders from higher authorities and handlers) instructed the banks to freeze the accounts of the protesting truckers.
These truckers and their supporters were legally protesting being forced-vaccinated with an injectable spike protein generating bioweapon simply to cross Provincial borders with cargo.
They also froze the accounts of anyone who supported the truckers with donations, or even with online comments of support. Literally a phone call from the Government to their friends in the Central Banks can seize your money. Note, there is no law against protesting in Canada. We are supposed to have freedom of speech and expression and represented in the Charter of Rights.
That document is obviously meaningless and was designed to give Canadians only the illusion of actual rights and protections. But what we saw here was the complete restriction of financial freedom and movement at the whim of the government and elite global control system, based on political expression
and demonstration against policy. Remember, the truckers, who ship across provincial and international borders, where prevented from doing so unless they had a vaccine passport.
So, the push to use self-checkouts is concealed as ‘convenience’ but reveals a deeper systemic goal of limiting freedoms and centralization of top down control on citizens They are trying to coerce us out of using cash and towards reliance on digital currency exchange even at the local level, which means using the centralized banking system. We have seen how the central banking system can be shut off on a whim based on expression of (in US) first amendment free speech, and simply the right to disagree with the government.
Citizens and workers still have power to change these outcomes. It is not always easy to find alternatives, but they can be found among the awake and aware. Punish them financially by not patronizing their stores, and if you must, do not use the self-checkouts.
The centralized bankers are not your friends. They are not trying to make life more convenient for you. They view you on the same level as cattle, perhaps less. They are tightening their grip on the digital enslavement system, the systemic control of citizens and workers, not just by finances but via free speech, movement, and association.
The unstated goal of the push for self-checkouts is absolutely sinister and is a consolidation of the slave-master system. The willful participation of consumers in a self-checkout model is not just about jobs, not just about depersonalization, it’s actually consenting to slavery.
Resist, and join the movement to rebuild systems that actually serve the interests of greater humanity, the working class, and good people everyone. Join the movement for Truth, Freedom, and Health. Do what you can to leave the slave system and join or create local associations featuring alternate economies.
References/Further Reading:
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/obituaries/value-village-founder-bill-ellison-79- built-chain-on-golden-rule/
https://www.atg.wa.gov/news/news-releases/judge-rules-profit-value-village-violated-law- misled-washingtonians
https://www.tiktok.com/@carriejernigan1/video/7117317088544296235
https://www.weforum.org/reports/the-future-of-jobs-report-2018
https://craiglambert.net/craig-lambert/
https://www.soocial.com/self-checkout-statistics/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1117352/consumer-usage-and-interest-in-using-self- service-checkouts-in-store-us/
https://research.aimultiple.com/author/cem-dilmegani/ https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/self-checkout-cashiers-retail-jobs-technology-1.5020299
https://crosscut.com/news/2022/04/wa-supreme-court-hear-fraud-case-concerning-value- village
https://nypost.com/2022/07/11/avoid-self-serve-checkouts-or-it-could-cost-you-thousands- lawyer-warns/
