The Facebook experiment. The Hobby Lobby case. The rejection of “gay cure” therapy. The biggest domestic news stories this week were linked by a common theme: the relationship between the state and its people.

The last of the three, however, was arguably the least controversial, because the first two did more harm than good, depending on who you talk to.

And as with most relationships, there were dynamics of power and politics. The state, of course, as a governing body, has the authority to make sweeping decisions about American public life and society. One problem with the Hobby Lobby case, among the many problems, is that it has created a precedent for the the government’s encroachment on private life.

The Hobby Lobby ruling thus obstructed Americans’ access to birth control and, more broadly, sexual agency. It further elevated the colossal power of corporations, giving them the rights of human beings while allowing them to retain immunity from liabilities. As a result, the people themselves and their reproductive health are compromised by corporate America.

It’s worth reiterating: for-profit corporations now have the precedent to exert even more power than before with more impunity, as long as they recycle persuasive (religious) rhetoric. Corporations now have more “liberty” to generate revenue, especially at the expense of people seeking birth control.

A similar scenario played out, with a company of greater influence. When Facebook revealed that it had been playing emotional games with its users, there was revulsion across the board.

Although Facebook didn’t violate any of its terms and conditions to which users agreed, it made the mistake of violating the unspoken relationship that users have developed with Facebook and other social media platforms.

Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr are spaces where users expect to be able to cultivate online identities and curate their personalized news feeds. Facebook’s experiments compromised the presumed agency that users believed they had in both constructing their identities and consuming content of their own volition. While being a public forum that acts as the intermediary between users and the world at large, users can carefully pick and choose what filters in and out of their accounts. This is especially unsavory for those at the margins of society, whose voices are already given less weight; social media represents a chance for them to assert their presence.

Though on a vastly different scale than the Hobby Lobby case, the Facebook experiment reminded us of the power that we don’t actually have.

And more importantly, it reminded us of the way our lives can be molded by more powerful forces, usually at our own expense. The damage that’s been done is again compounded in marginalized communities, like the transgender community, who is already faced with obstacles to health care.

If this trend continues, we may hear fewer news stories like the Supreme Court’s upholding of the ban on “gay conversion therapy” and more stories like Hobby Lobby.

In the 70s, Michel Foucault coined the term “biopower” to put a name to the way political systems can use the oppressed as human fodder for satisfying the needs and desires of the powerful. The Hobby Lobby case and the Facebook experiment attest to the way people can be used as capital for corporate and political gain. In combating this, we have to be aware of what the Supreme Court didn’t realize: power dynamics are seldom absent in the relationship between American institutions and its constituents. In other words, “biopower” is real.

In order to dismantle power systems, we have to recognize where we, as individuals, stand. And more importantly, we have to understand the tools that are being used against us.

Facebook, for one, may seem harmless. But if it can be used to manipulate emotions, what’s stopping Facebook from swaying our political leanings or the civic engagement of youth—its largest demographic of users? Who is to say that Facebook can’t find the right “experiment” to sway who we vote for in 2016?