DtectiveDanny, Marx and Althusser

This is where the plot thickens. Now we are able to really dig deep into the forces that have directed the flow of history. The ideologies of the collective consciousness of certain cultures can be examined and used for comparison with our own current ideologies. That is if we can even prove that ideologies exist in the present state.
The definition of the term ideology is given insightful discussion in the introduction, and I still cant decide which one is my favorite. “A baseline definition of ideology would contrast it with the notion of ideas” which leads me to that surely the word idea came before the word ideology, if that even matters. But, after reading I wonder if a baseline definition of ideology would not directly contrast the term with ideas, but put the term above ideas, or maybe even before ideas. At the end of the introduction comes my favorite piece of advice on the dangers of trying to define the term ideology when Slavoj Zizek “urges us to read all cultural texts as symptoms of a variety of resistant positions.”
From The German Ideology, I would like to explore the idea that “every new class therefore achieves domination only on a broader basis than that of the class ruling previously; on the other hand, the opposition of the non ruling class to the new ruling class then develops all the more sharply and profoundly”. This would imply a social escalation, as time goes on, differences grow. I would like to know what gives us the right to judge our current ruling class over the ruling classes of the past, because if we follow Marx’s and Engel’s ideas then the current ruling class is the greatest ruling class in history. What makes the advent of a sniper rifle that can make its own calculations greater than the invention of the bow and arrow? Only when we take it out of the context of this increasingly violent history could we make that call.