Worry and Monotony and Unsatisfied Longings

Capitalism and classism go hand in hand, and these are not new problems.

This excerpt is from Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys, ©1939:

I go into the other room, this time without knocking.  Salvatini has gone.  Mr Blank is still writing letters.  Is he making dates with all the girls he knows in Paris?  I bet that's what he's doing.

He looks at me with distaste.  Plat du jour-- boiled eyes, served cold…

Well, let's argue this out, Mr Blank.  You, who represent Society, have the right to pay me four hundred francs a month.  That's my market value, for I am an inefficient member of Society, slow in the uptake, uncertain, slightly damaged in the fray, there's no denying it.  So you have the right to pay me four hundred francs a month, to lodge me in a small, dark, room, to clothe me shabbily, to harass me with worry and monotony and unsatisfied longings till you get me to the point when I blush at a look, cry at a word.  We can't all be happy, we can't all be rich, we can't all be lucky-- and it would be so much less fun if it were.  Isn't it so, Mr Blank?  There must be the dark background to show up the bright colours.  Some must cry so that the others may be able to laugh more heartily.  Sacrifices are necessary…  Let's say that you have this mystical right to cut my legs off.  But the right to ridicule me afterwards because I am a cripple-- no, that I think you haven't got.  And that's the right you hold most dearly, isn't it?  You must be able to despise the people you exploit.  But I wish you a lot of trouble, Mr Blank, and just to start off with, your damned shop's going bust.  Alleluia!  Did I say all this?  If course I didn't.  I didn't even think it.

I say that I'm ill and want to go.

And that reminded me of this:

“It is not enough merely to win; others must lose.”  ~Gore Vidal

Consisteth Possesseth

Luke 12:15:  And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.

Blame and blame and blame

"Americans, like human beings everywhere, believe many things that are obviously untrue…  Their most destructive untruth is that it is very easy for any American to make money. They will not acknowledge how in fact hard money is to come by, and, therefore, those who have no money blame and blame and blame themselves. This inward blame has been a treasure for the rich and powerful, who have had to do less for their poor, publicly and privately, than any other ruling class since, say, Napoleonic times."  ~Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five ©1969

Quality Quantity

“What does the money machine eat? It eats youth, spontaneity, life, beauty, and above all, it eats creativity. It eats quality and shits quantity.”  ~William S. Burroughs

Weep and Howl

 James 5: 1-6

Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.  Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.  Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.  Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.  Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.  Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.

Changing Colors

Maybe I'm wrong, and the Democrats really are doing their best.  Maybe they're just impossibly naive and hopelessly inept. 

It doesn't really matter "why" anymore.

In the short term, we need to find ways to circumvent the government to get the things we need.

In the long term we need chop away at the root of our problems:  capitalism.

Christianity and Capitalism

 

There's a wonderful graphical essay on Christianity and capitalism posted to The Nib, which you can read HERE.

The Winner

The United States just passed a massive spending bill to boost the tech industry (source).

I thought the beauty of Capitalism was that the Free Market would take care of these things.  I thought that a centralized economy was a bad thing.  I must have it confused with something else.

I wonder who will reap the rewards of this investment:  the taxpayers or the stock holders?

"I believe that this legislation will enable the United States to out-innovate, out-produce, and out-compete the world in the industries of the future."  ~Chuck Schumer

"We are in a competition to win the 21st century, and the starting gun has gone off."  ~Joe Biden

Oh, let's just sit this one out. 

What I want is for everybody who's sick to be able to see a doctor, for everyone who works to be able to afford a home, for everybody who's hungry to have a sandwich.

I don't want to compete anymore.  The cost of winning is too high.

Tetris

Executives with multimillion-dollar stock packages often treat their employees like Tetris pieces, to be put into place as efficiently as possible, then promptly disposed of.

That's from an opinion piece about the video game industry Jason Schreier wrote for the New York Times (online HERE), but he could have been talking about almost anyplace.

The Outward Sign Of Inward Grace

In this excerpt from Americans: A Book of Lives, ©1946, Hermann Hagedorn describes the business environment of Theodore Roosevelt's America:

To these men the rapid development of the country seemed a definite good in itself and became, indeed, a kind of religion, not superseding so much as fulfilling the Christian principles on which most of them had been brought up. Like the capitalists of the Old World, they had been taught that thrift was among the noblest of the Christian virtues. Financial success, which could be regarded as the effect of thrift (though actually it was more often its direct antithesis, the profit of a shrewd gamble), was therefore regarded by them as the outward sign of inward grace. If their methods were challenged, they answered that progress could not wait on fine ethical distinction, very certain that the increase of the material comforts which they promoted, was progress, and therefore of God.

I wish I could say, "What a strange and incomprehensible time!"

But I can't.

Pinkos

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.  (Acts 4:32-35)

Pillars of the Community

"To steal from a brother or sister is evil. To not steal from the institutions that are the pillars of the Pig Empire is equally immoral."  ~Abbie Hoffman

The city in East Texas where I live has over 100,000 people, but we only have two grocery stores to choose from: Walmart, and Brookshire's.

Brookshire's is ungodly expensive, and I believe that has more to do with the local social strata than anything else. There's a saying here, only partly in jest, that if you're less than third-generation then you're still the new kid. Brookshire's customers are willing to pay more not because of better quality or better choices, but simply because the higher prices keep out the riff-raff.

So those of us in the working class don't really have a choice. We have to go to Walmart because it's the only place we can afford.

The local Walmart recently remodeled, and only have three manned checkout lanes now. All the rest are self-checkout. The cashier told me that the last remaining three are going to be phased out, and everyone will have to scan and sack their own groceries.

I asked about my 88-year-old father. She said he'd have to learn to do it himself. I said he can't. She said he'll have to.

Walmart is one of the most profitable chains in America, and they're going to lay off their most underpaid workers.  They are counting on their customers to do their work for them, for free, so the stockholders can enjoy larger dividends.

Be super careful as you check out your own groceries. You sure don't want to make a mistake.

Cargo Cult

Cat and Girl is on the web HERE.

(If you're not familiar with the term "cargo cult," Wikipedia has a nice article HERE.)