 Oppression, then, is a specific social organization that, as a consequence of the essentially unstable struggle for power, and principally the structure of labor, limits the individual from experiencing the world to the full extent of her or his full capability, a capability Weil describes as “methodical thinking” (pénsee méthodique). By divorcing the understanding from the application of a method, oppression, exercised through force, denies human beings direct contact with reality. Also informing her sense of oppression is her notion of “privilege”, which includes not only money or arms, but also a corpus of knowledge closed to the working masses that, thereby, engenders a culture of specialists. Privilege thus exacerbates oppression in modern societies, which are held together not by shared goals, meaningful relations, or organically developing communities, but through a “religion of power” (OL 69). In this way, both power and prestige contribute to a modern reversal of means and ends. That is, elements like money, technology, and war—all properly speaking “means”—are, through the workings of power, treated as “ends” worthy of furtherance, enhancement, and multiplication without limit.