Santa Claus is destroying the planet. We need to make a choice; Santa or humanity or rather, Santa or the ecosystems that support humanity. We need to really consider what goes in to bringing you, or me, a Christmas present.
We live inside extremely large and wasteful systems and those systems are destroying the planet. Considering the volume of those systems, it's not enough to re-cycle. Our party of consumption has to come to an end and that party reaches its peak once a year, at Christmas time. Most retail sales occur during the Christmas season.
A typical Christmas present requires a monumental effort that happens behind the scenes. The materials to make the item is shipped to the factory from the resource providers. This requires ships, trucks and forklifts. It is packaged in a way that requires cutting trees and processing the paper. The paper is then packed and shipped. It is then made into the specific packaging material for the item. The item itself may depend on various parts shipped from all over the planet. And on Christmas morning we will open it, first by removing the bow and card, then the paper, then a box, another box, perhaps some plastic etc. This insanity happens all year round however. Little by little by little, every day, every week and every year the earth and the eco-systems provide their micro treasures for our macro systems so we humans can consume. We are addicted to hair conditioner and cigarettes and fat. And as the eco-systems offers up their treasures to us we flush them down toilets and burn them and contaminate the source of our existence.
We must abandon our multitude of petty addictions. We have to abandon our spoiled comfort. We have to stop the madness of having toys and convenient snacks and repairing our snack damage with rides to the gym to work off our guilt and excessive fat. We have to stop packing goods inside of packages that are inside of packages. We have to stop cutting tress to make paper to advertise to tell people they must consume what they don’t need and what will make them sick. We have to learn to eat from the local soil, to drink water from our local ground and to stop all the shipping and flushing and burning.
Have an Ivan Pavlov Christmas
As children we are trained by Santa Claus to become hopelessly addicted to junk. As adults, our addiction doesn't fade and we are hell bent to ensure our children are even more addicted than we were. The addiction brought so much joy and we love our children. Each and every year the same stimulus; Christmas carols, the tree and decorations and food are replicated from our own childhood. Our parents had us overwhelmed with a month of carols, decorations, and shopping. All the characteristics of Christmas from 50 or 100 years ago still remain. The very same stimulus and the very same responses are on an endless loop in the culture. On Christmas morning the family scene breaks a month of anticipation into a day of hedonism and gluttony.
As adults we salivate in a similar way to Pavlov's dog. Ivan Pavlov developed the theory of classical conditioning (conditioned reflex). Pavlov measured the rate of salivation when he would present a dog with food. He discovered the dog would learn to salivate with only the sound of a bell once the dog learned to associate the sound with the food. The food was no longer necessary to produce the saliva response. The Christmas spirit is the same conditioned response to stimuli. It has nothing to do with the spirit of Christ - on the contrary. The Christmas spirit is the spirit of selfish giving. We give yes, and we expect as much joy from the gifts we give. As children we got packages of crack, toys that would buzz our minds for hours. Now we get bathoil beads and soap. We get socks, ties, and maybe a book. Our stimulus was once alive, buzzing with excitement. It isn't the same for us anymore and our gifts are listless and drab. We remain responsive to the sound of Pavlov's bell however. We swallow back our dissatisfaction and live vicariously through the children; children that couldn't be happier.
In this spirit we walk past homeless people in the Christmas rush. We are carrying far too many packages to give a beggar a coin. We step by them without really noticing. We are far too busy gathering large volumes of material we will re-cycle. We are, after all, concerned about the environment.
In our defense we provide joy and happiness for family and friends and they do the same for us. This is the time of year we forget about the troubles of the world and we celebrate with family. Sharing the Christmas spirit with family is what its all about.
The point here is, Christmas has been hijacked by crass consumerism and it is the wasteful and excessive orgy of hedonistic materialism that is harmful to the planet. Sharing Christmas time with family and friends does not require multiple trips to Wal Mart.
Our addiction to consumer Christmas has to come to an end. The planet cannot survive with the direct impact Christmas has on the environment nor can can it survive as long as we are addicted to advertising, packaging, and items we don't need. The whole attitude has to change. It is not only climate change that is hurting the earth. Our selfish destruction of ecosystems is poisoning the land, the sea, and the atmosphere. If we gave a damn about our children and their children, we would not addict them to junk. We would pass on to them an environment where they could could survive and where they can enjoy a sane, non addicting Christmas with their families.
Resistance
Not only individuals addicted to Christmas want to keep the party raging. Corporations depending on Christmas sales have some stake in this as well. Together, they make a formidable team. And besides, nobody is going to make you give up Christmas. Environmentalists and left wing loonies can say what they want but you will have a much or as little Christmas as you choose. And this is the key point. This is your choice.
When we consider that even something as minimal as the Kyoto Protocol and opposition from those that are most addicted to the party, we know that we have to win a huge battle before we arrest Santa Claus. Our children and grandchildren and their kids have an enemy in our midst and that enemy is us. This enemy is equal to any coward that puts his own pleasure ahead of the survival of others. They are the selfish and comfortable cowards that we think of as shareholders. They are them and their million lackeys and they are the enemies of humanity and the earth.
In the 21st century, everybody doesn’t have to work to distribute and produce wealth. That idea is archaic and part of capitalistic indoctrination. Capitalism has given us many gifts of technology, know-how, and toys. Thank you capitalism, we appreciate it. But it has come at a price and the sooner we start paying it back to the earth, the less expensive it will be. We have to change our economic systems, our production systems and our distribution systems if we want to save the eco-systems that support us.
We will crush resistance to the detoxification of Christmas even though Santa's fifth column is deep among us. It is a matter of time. Christmas must be restored to its true meaning which is 180 degrees contrary to greed and addictions to bath oil beads. We need to crush the spirit of Santa and replace it with the attitude of Jesus. When that happens we will produce most of what we need locally and we will start living with each other in communities again. We won't walk by the beggar. We will sit and talk to him. We will say good-bye to our alienated lives in front of television sets. We will produce what we need and we will distribute what is needed as it is needed. We may need bicycles and buses, we don’t need cars. We need to distribute water where it isn’t locally available. We don’t need Coke. We don’t need useless items in multiple packages.
We live inside big wasteful production and distribution systems but we also live inside many other systems. We live inside eco-systems and we are destroying them. We cannot continue to abuse the earth because we are as much a part of the earth and the nutrients we put in our mouths and flush down the toilet. As we destroy the earth, we destroy our grandchildren. They are the earth and they will come from the earth long after we return to it.
This blog is an archive of articles I've published in MWC News, Indymedia, and on Newsgroups.
Wednesday, December 10, 2014
Thursday, December 04, 2014
The Calculus of Revolution
We are powerless. The threat of revolution is all we have. Not so long ago we could negotiate but today, established power does not see human needs as a calculation. Yesterday, the corporate/political establishment showed a measure of respect. Today, it is absent. The important message for today is, that respect was earned.
We may have some expectation that we are going through a rough patch and things will get back to normal. What is happening however is the driving force for production, trade, and employment has changed its nature. That driving force is capitalism itself. Even if people with power wanted to, it is very likely the greater capitalist system does not have capacity to turn back the clock to restore adequate pensions, decent wages, and a humane social safety net. That is not to suggest these things are out of reach. Under the status quo however, they are.
Another ongoing change is not a change as much as manifestation as a result of the environment in which it operates. In times of luxury and growth, capitalism is naturally liberal. Liberalism facilitates growth and flexibility. During times of scarcity and fierce competition however, capitalism has a distinct and necessary brutality to it. It becomes increasingly fascistic.
While there is no shortage of individuals, organizations, and even nations wanting to alter the system to be more humane, there is an obvious shortage of respect for those with their hand out. On the other hand, any serious discussion of what wealth is, of how it is created and who owns it will get respect. Actually taking steps to restore social programs and public wealth will turn that respect to fear.
The bottom line is, wealth is not what they think it is. We create it and they take it. If they have seduced you into believing that they create it, read on.
The Bankruptcy of Reform
Reform minded movements and individuals are barely fighting to increase minimum wages and restore social programs. Our collective powerlessness including the powerlessness of the union movement is obvious. Aside from begging we have no strategy at all. Collective begging that consists of complaining to lawmakers, signing petitions, protesting, and various other means garners no respect, nor should it. These tactics are utterly toothless. Our voices of discontent are not treated with respect and all our good, rational, and compassionate arguments are simply ignored.
Reform had been granted in the past as a result of building class consciousness among citizens. In 1936 and 1937 workers in the United States began sit down strikes all over the country. The Communist Party in the United States reached a membership of 50,000. The capitalist class were insecure. They were terrified of revolution and they were cognizant of the power of poorly fed citizenry. Russia revolted twenty years ago and the same thing could happen again.
It wasn't only Roosevelt and the United States that were concerned with the possibility of revolution. Internationally, intellectuals, economists, politicians and business leaders themselves strategized ways to stem the tide. They found those ways and it was articulated by John Maynard Keynes.
Fear of the citizenry and the possibility they may be attracted to communism, which would end their dream completely, compelled changes to mitigate that risk. Joseph Kennedy said of that time, “In those days I felt and said I would be willing to part with half of what I had if I could be sure of keeping, under law and order, the other half”.
Reasonable middle class expectations are that 'they' will do it again. The posture of the citizen beggar and the dynamics of the master/slave mentality that exists between established power and the rest of us must change and we are responsible to make that change happen. Corporate interests and their politicians have done their part; they have shipped our jobs abroad, they are tearing the social safety net to shreds, and they are proceeding to militarize the globe including domestic police forces. The 1% are clearly as class conscious as any Marxist and have shown absolutely no loyalty to workers, consumers, or nations. Our first great revolutionary act is to simply look.
The mess we are living through is not a matter of evil and greedy people becoming ever more callous as they grow. It is not a matter of capitalists or politicians being evil and selfish. The problem is much more serious. The problem is systemic and even if we jailed all the capitalists and the politicians today, the system would run exactly the same way tomorrow.
The system is rapidly changing due to the nature of capitalism itself. This is an energy that has a revolutionary life of its own. Its nature is dynamic and focused. That focus itself is one large problem for human beings. So is its dynamism.
Notwithstanding the depression and World War 2, past reforms were carried out during a period of relative global stability. Even responses to those world shaking events didn't change the nature of the beast. Its nature has been to evolve faster as it matures and today, it has successfully morphed to an inhumane feeding machine that can in no way be satisfied. Part of this monstrosity is due in part to emerging economies that had not been factors in earlier times. In the past, national capitalisms had some domestic control. When it comes to economic matters that is no longer the case.
A substantial factor that has been changing is its efficiency. The invention of new technologies aimed to increase production is changing the very nature of capitalism and its relationship with human beings. Today, those inventions are rapidly reducing and replacing the need for human input for a given volume of goods produced or services rendered. Paradoxically, these efficiencies have a negative influence on the aggregate real profit margin.
Arguments against neo-liberal policies may conclude that extremists like Thatcher or Reagan have ruined our standard of living. They assume a return to standards and regulations and general sanity will right the ship and so, it is a matter of getting the right politicians elected. Somethings amiss however. No matter what social democratic party or good guy politician is elected, like Obama, they always govern for the banks and the corporations and against Main Street. It isn't that the politicians are cruel or cowardly as much as politicians do not govern. They merely sit in a given seat and are told what to do. That is a more serious matter than if we were simply dealing with opportunists and self serving oafs. The best example of this is Obama's Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton. He may be blamed for the deregulation of international capital when he repealed the Glass–Steagall Act, an Act that was passed in 1933 in response to widespread financial fraud and abuse by investors. Under the Act, banks could take deposits and make loans while brokers could sell securities. No entity could do both due to the obvious conflicts of interest. In 1999 Clinton and the GOP controlled Congress were directed by the big banks to repeal the legislation. We may ask ourselves why a leader of the left side of political spectrum would repeal an act that has been a source of safety and financial security for business and ordinary Americans. And we can look at the current Democratic President of the United States and ask ourselves the similar questions. Again, it isn't personal. These are not necessarily evil people. They are simply immersed in a system they barely understand and they are powerless.
After Glass Steagall was repealed, financiers behaved exactly as they did in the 1920s and 30s. Banks created a system of fraudulent lending and sold packages of dirt to their customers in the form of securities. We can see that in many ways the nature of capitalism is exactly as it was almost a century ago. The differences will be most salient when the inevitable reform movements to come try to repeat history in terms of recreating generous social programs and restoring the old Keynsian order. The New Deal is not only old, it is dead.
As we remain bogged down in economic stagnation (notwithstanding the stock market bubble) and danger of another serious financial crash, reformist economic policies are a logical choice. But where is Obama's New Deal or anything like it? It makes perfect sense. The more spending power the consumer has the more the consumer will demand goods and services and this is naturally good for business. Here we are seven years after the shock of 2008 and our great salvation of reform, of change, the heroic Community Organizer, Constitutional Law Professor and President of the United States cannot do anything to stimulate the economy or, apparently, anything else he wants to do. Obama himself is clear evidence of Presidential castration. If he did build another Hoover Dam and if he repaired public infrastructure in the United States, he would lift America out of its financial misery. Main Street would be hopping again. Yet there is no new Hoover Dam or large infrastructure developments while America's streets and bridges continue to crumble. Instead, there is war. From Main Street, it makes no sense whatsoever. From Wall Street, it makes perfect sense and from there, he is directed not to stimulate the economy.
The Pragmatics of Revolution
There are two aspects to the notion of revolution and depending on the temperment and beliefs of an individual, one is more vital than the other. Those two aspects are sincere proletarian revolution with the aim of taking control of production, distribution, and government. The other is the threat of sincere proletarian revolution. The latter has been a governor in Western nations for the past century and we were not even aware of it. The USSR as well as legions of radicals in the 1930s threatened Western capitalism in the USA and abroad. Leaders of the day were forced to throw crumbs to the peasants lest they revolt.
Today, competition for legitimacy from the USSR has disappeared and we are increasingly dominated by Washington. Pressure on ordinary people stemming from vital human needs will continue to increase and at some point a critical mass will be unable to take it anymore. Revolutionary movements will spring up. Although that may seem remote and obscure, there is no overestimating the fickleness of crowds with starving children.
Until that threat is real, until we have a critical mass calling for full revolution against capitalism, we will remain weak, pathetic, and servile as we beg for table scraps from the omnipotent master. If you'd like some crumbs, you ask. If you want the whole cake, you take it. If you want reform, demanding the whole cake might not be a bad idea.
Wealth distribution from the 1% to the rest of us seems like a logical remedy. Problems with that as a remedy are deep however. First of all, the wealth owned by the 1% is empty of substance. If they had to cash it in it wouldn't be available. It is mirage created by bankers and the IMF and its rot will soon be in full view when the stock market bubble bursts and the whole illusion comes crashing down.
Real wealth is usable stuff or services. Money is merely a representation of that wealth. Wealth is created when minerals are removed from the ground, when timber is cut and when fish are caught. It is created when we manufacture, when we cure the ill, and when we build a bridge. And it is ordinary human beings that create that wealth. We seem to think we need our masters to tell us what to do; when to build bridges, when to manufacture medicine for human suffering, when to work and when to beg. The most revolutionary of all realizations is that we do not need the investors. We can build and distribute all we want and need. Simply seeing the truth of that statement is potent and it is revolutionary.
As long as we remain mired in out master/slave mentality we will not be anything more than beggars and slaves.
Look upon hard core radicals with the respect they deserve. Anarchists and communists and left wing radicals of all stripes will demand, they won't ask, what is rightfully the property of the people. It is the threat they present to the comfortable bourgeios nest that forces change. Begging is neither helpful or respectable.
The first step here is to understand the nature of wealth.
We may have some expectation that we are going through a rough patch and things will get back to normal. What is happening however is the driving force for production, trade, and employment has changed its nature. That driving force is capitalism itself. Even if people with power wanted to, it is very likely the greater capitalist system does not have capacity to turn back the clock to restore adequate pensions, decent wages, and a humane social safety net. That is not to suggest these things are out of reach. Under the status quo however, they are.
Another ongoing change is not a change as much as manifestation as a result of the environment in which it operates. In times of luxury and growth, capitalism is naturally liberal. Liberalism facilitates growth and flexibility. During times of scarcity and fierce competition however, capitalism has a distinct and necessary brutality to it. It becomes increasingly fascistic.
While there is no shortage of individuals, organizations, and even nations wanting to alter the system to be more humane, there is an obvious shortage of respect for those with their hand out. On the other hand, any serious discussion of what wealth is, of how it is created and who owns it will get respect. Actually taking steps to restore social programs and public wealth will turn that respect to fear.
The bottom line is, wealth is not what they think it is. We create it and they take it. If they have seduced you into believing that they create it, read on.
The Bankruptcy of Reform
Reform minded movements and individuals are barely fighting to increase minimum wages and restore social programs. Our collective powerlessness including the powerlessness of the union movement is obvious. Aside from begging we have no strategy at all. Collective begging that consists of complaining to lawmakers, signing petitions, protesting, and various other means garners no respect, nor should it. These tactics are utterly toothless. Our voices of discontent are not treated with respect and all our good, rational, and compassionate arguments are simply ignored.
Reform had been granted in the past as a result of building class consciousness among citizens. In 1936 and 1937 workers in the United States began sit down strikes all over the country. The Communist Party in the United States reached a membership of 50,000. The capitalist class were insecure. They were terrified of revolution and they were cognizant of the power of poorly fed citizenry. Russia revolted twenty years ago and the same thing could happen again.
It wasn't only Roosevelt and the United States that were concerned with the possibility of revolution. Internationally, intellectuals, economists, politicians and business leaders themselves strategized ways to stem the tide. They found those ways and it was articulated by John Maynard Keynes.
Fear of the citizenry and the possibility they may be attracted to communism, which would end their dream completely, compelled changes to mitigate that risk. Joseph Kennedy said of that time, “In those days I felt and said I would be willing to part with half of what I had if I could be sure of keeping, under law and order, the other half”.
Reasonable middle class expectations are that 'they' will do it again. The posture of the citizen beggar and the dynamics of the master/slave mentality that exists between established power and the rest of us must change and we are responsible to make that change happen. Corporate interests and their politicians have done their part; they have shipped our jobs abroad, they are tearing the social safety net to shreds, and they are proceeding to militarize the globe including domestic police forces. The 1% are clearly as class conscious as any Marxist and have shown absolutely no loyalty to workers, consumers, or nations. Our first great revolutionary act is to simply look.
The mess we are living through is not a matter of evil and greedy people becoming ever more callous as they grow. It is not a matter of capitalists or politicians being evil and selfish. The problem is much more serious. The problem is systemic and even if we jailed all the capitalists and the politicians today, the system would run exactly the same way tomorrow.
The system is rapidly changing due to the nature of capitalism itself. This is an energy that has a revolutionary life of its own. Its nature is dynamic and focused. That focus itself is one large problem for human beings. So is its dynamism.
Notwithstanding the depression and World War 2, past reforms were carried out during a period of relative global stability. Even responses to those world shaking events didn't change the nature of the beast. Its nature has been to evolve faster as it matures and today, it has successfully morphed to an inhumane feeding machine that can in no way be satisfied. Part of this monstrosity is due in part to emerging economies that had not been factors in earlier times. In the past, national capitalisms had some domestic control. When it comes to economic matters that is no longer the case.
A substantial factor that has been changing is its efficiency. The invention of new technologies aimed to increase production is changing the very nature of capitalism and its relationship with human beings. Today, those inventions are rapidly reducing and replacing the need for human input for a given volume of goods produced or services rendered. Paradoxically, these efficiencies have a negative influence on the aggregate real profit margin.
Arguments against neo-liberal policies may conclude that extremists like Thatcher or Reagan have ruined our standard of living. They assume a return to standards and regulations and general sanity will right the ship and so, it is a matter of getting the right politicians elected. Somethings amiss however. No matter what social democratic party or good guy politician is elected, like Obama, they always govern for the banks and the corporations and against Main Street. It isn't that the politicians are cruel or cowardly as much as politicians do not govern. They merely sit in a given seat and are told what to do. That is a more serious matter than if we were simply dealing with opportunists and self serving oafs. The best example of this is Obama's Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton. He may be blamed for the deregulation of international capital when he repealed the Glass–Steagall Act, an Act that was passed in 1933 in response to widespread financial fraud and abuse by investors. Under the Act, banks could take deposits and make loans while brokers could sell securities. No entity could do both due to the obvious conflicts of interest. In 1999 Clinton and the GOP controlled Congress were directed by the big banks to repeal the legislation. We may ask ourselves why a leader of the left side of political spectrum would repeal an act that has been a source of safety and financial security for business and ordinary Americans. And we can look at the current Democratic President of the United States and ask ourselves the similar questions. Again, it isn't personal. These are not necessarily evil people. They are simply immersed in a system they barely understand and they are powerless.
After Glass Steagall was repealed, financiers behaved exactly as they did in the 1920s and 30s. Banks created a system of fraudulent lending and sold packages of dirt to their customers in the form of securities. We can see that in many ways the nature of capitalism is exactly as it was almost a century ago. The differences will be most salient when the inevitable reform movements to come try to repeat history in terms of recreating generous social programs and restoring the old Keynsian order. The New Deal is not only old, it is dead.
As we remain bogged down in economic stagnation (notwithstanding the stock market bubble) and danger of another serious financial crash, reformist economic policies are a logical choice. But where is Obama's New Deal or anything like it? It makes perfect sense. The more spending power the consumer has the more the consumer will demand goods and services and this is naturally good for business. Here we are seven years after the shock of 2008 and our great salvation of reform, of change, the heroic Community Organizer, Constitutional Law Professor and President of the United States cannot do anything to stimulate the economy or, apparently, anything else he wants to do. Obama himself is clear evidence of Presidential castration. If he did build another Hoover Dam and if he repaired public infrastructure in the United States, he would lift America out of its financial misery. Main Street would be hopping again. Yet there is no new Hoover Dam or large infrastructure developments while America's streets and bridges continue to crumble. Instead, there is war. From Main Street, it makes no sense whatsoever. From Wall Street, it makes perfect sense and from there, he is directed not to stimulate the economy.
The Pragmatics of Revolution
There are two aspects to the notion of revolution and depending on the temperment and beliefs of an individual, one is more vital than the other. Those two aspects are sincere proletarian revolution with the aim of taking control of production, distribution, and government. The other is the threat of sincere proletarian revolution. The latter has been a governor in Western nations for the past century and we were not even aware of it. The USSR as well as legions of radicals in the 1930s threatened Western capitalism in the USA and abroad. Leaders of the day were forced to throw crumbs to the peasants lest they revolt.
Today, competition for legitimacy from the USSR has disappeared and we are increasingly dominated by Washington. Pressure on ordinary people stemming from vital human needs will continue to increase and at some point a critical mass will be unable to take it anymore. Revolutionary movements will spring up. Although that may seem remote and obscure, there is no overestimating the fickleness of crowds with starving children.
Until that threat is real, until we have a critical mass calling for full revolution against capitalism, we will remain weak, pathetic, and servile as we beg for table scraps from the omnipotent master. If you'd like some crumbs, you ask. If you want the whole cake, you take it. If you want reform, demanding the whole cake might not be a bad idea.
Wealth distribution from the 1% to the rest of us seems like a logical remedy. Problems with that as a remedy are deep however. First of all, the wealth owned by the 1% is empty of substance. If they had to cash it in it wouldn't be available. It is mirage created by bankers and the IMF and its rot will soon be in full view when the stock market bubble bursts and the whole illusion comes crashing down.
Real wealth is usable stuff or services. Money is merely a representation of that wealth. Wealth is created when minerals are removed from the ground, when timber is cut and when fish are caught. It is created when we manufacture, when we cure the ill, and when we build a bridge. And it is ordinary human beings that create that wealth. We seem to think we need our masters to tell us what to do; when to build bridges, when to manufacture medicine for human suffering, when to work and when to beg. The most revolutionary of all realizations is that we do not need the investors. We can build and distribute all we want and need. Simply seeing the truth of that statement is potent and it is revolutionary.
As long as we remain mired in out master/slave mentality we will not be anything more than beggars and slaves.
Look upon hard core radicals with the respect they deserve. Anarchists and communists and left wing radicals of all stripes will demand, they won't ask, what is rightfully the property of the people. It is the threat they present to the comfortable bourgeios nest that forces change. Begging is neither helpful or respectable.
The first step here is to understand the nature of wealth.
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