— Sunday, December 27, 2009 —
I'm not planning on any kind of Walden-esque simplification of my life as a result of these posts. At least, not yet. :-) I still appreciate many of the things -- not the least of which, safety and stability -- that civilization has provided.
But civilization has also replaced one set of worries -- food, shelter, safety from animal predators -- with another, manufactured set of worries: that you aren't as young, sexy, or attractive as you should be, or that you'll be left behind if you don't have all the latest and greatest consumer goods, or that you won't be happy unless you dress like so and cover your face with toxic chemicals.
Oft-mentioned is the importance of the Christmas shopping season to our national economy. Some absurd percentage of annual revenue comes from people buying presents for one another -- things that, in most cases, are relatively unnecessary luxuries. In fact, societally we see it as inappropriate to buy basic necessities as gifts; think of the dismay with which gifts of clothing are greeted by children and teenagers. Imagine the reaction if you bought someone a bag of rice for Christmas.
Why is it so important that billions of dollars get spend on luxuries every fall? Apparently, if that doesn't happen, the economy stagnates; people whose jobs depend on the production and selling of those luxuries end up out of work. Unemployment soars, crime goes up, everyone wrings their hands about how we're going to get out of this slump/recession/downturn/disaster.
Surely this can't be the only way our civilization can exist. Let's say we, as a society, suddely decided that we just don't need all those commercialized extras -- makeup, consumer electronics, "convenience" devices, processed junk food, DVDs, decorative tchochkes, and so on. We decide that those things distract from the truly important things in life -- being healthy, spending time with friends and family, facing our social problems together instead of trudging to the voting booth once in a while and otherwise letting politicians run amok. What would happen?
Idle hands are the devil's playthings. People need to be doing something or they're going to get up to mischief. "Something" doesn't need to be working in a factory, enriching an oligarchy on the backs up the people. They just need to have their time occupied, but not feel constrained in their choices of what to do.
Radical change almost always entails bloodshed and chaos. How can we transform our society slowly, but in an entirely positive direction? ¶ 09:58
But civilization has also replaced one set of worries -- food, shelter, safety from animal predators -- with another, manufactured set of worries: that you aren't as young, sexy, or attractive as you should be, or that you'll be left behind if you don't have all the latest and greatest consumer goods, or that you won't be happy unless you dress like so and cover your face with toxic chemicals.
Oft-mentioned is the importance of the Christmas shopping season to our national economy. Some absurd percentage of annual revenue comes from people buying presents for one another -- things that, in most cases, are relatively unnecessary luxuries. In fact, societally we see it as inappropriate to buy basic necessities as gifts; think of the dismay with which gifts of clothing are greeted by children and teenagers. Imagine the reaction if you bought someone a bag of rice for Christmas.
Why is it so important that billions of dollars get spend on luxuries every fall? Apparently, if that doesn't happen, the economy stagnates; people whose jobs depend on the production and selling of those luxuries end up out of work. Unemployment soars, crime goes up, everyone wrings their hands about how we're going to get out of this slump/recession/downturn/disaster.
Surely this can't be the only way our civilization can exist. Let's say we, as a society, suddely decided that we just don't need all those commercialized extras -- makeup, consumer electronics, "convenience" devices, processed junk food, DVDs, decorative tchochkes, and so on. We decide that those things distract from the truly important things in life -- being healthy, spending time with friends and family, facing our social problems together instead of trudging to the voting booth once in a while and otherwise letting politicians run amok. What would happen?
Idle hands are the devil's playthings. People need to be doing something or they're going to get up to mischief. "Something" doesn't need to be working in a factory, enriching an oligarchy on the backs up the people. They just need to have their time occupied, but not feel constrained in their choices of what to do.
Radical change almost always entails bloodshed and chaos. How can we transform our society slowly, but in an entirely positive direction? ¶ 09:58
