As indicated in the subtitle Tiehrmehlfabrikant Dr. Fred Eicke weiss Auswege, this work centres on the animal food producer Fred Eicke (a part played by Peter Berling). The title refers to The Corrosion of Character (translated into German as Der Flexible Mensch), a book from 1998 by the American sociologist Richard Sennett. In it, Sennett describes the effect of the ‘new’ flexible capitalism on society’s shifting system of norms and values.