“Negative thinking” exists in relation to positive thinking through a dialectical relation. Negative thinking is thus not bad or pessimistic; rather, it is in tension with positive thinking. Prior to advanced industrial society, people were able to maintain an “inner” thinking that was constantly aware of the system under which they lived in which they were repressed. This occurred in relation to positive thinking, which allowed the person to internalize the status quo so that they could exist in that world. A synonym for “negative” is “critical.” This negative, or critical, part of thinking has been “whittled down” in advanced industrial society, resulting in a “one-dimensional man.”

Society and people’s thinking are “one-dimensional” because advanced industrial society is totalitarian. There are no critiques, or negative thinking, that exist outside of this totalitarian regime. What might look like negative thinking is actually only masquerading as negative thinking and is, instead, part of the fabric of totalitarianism. Marcuse believes that the totalitarianism of industrial society is so great that all are engulfed by it. Unlike Marx, who argues that the proletariat suffers under totalitarianism, Marcuse insists that all are unable to escape the ideology of advanced industrial society, though the proletariat may of course suffer more materially.