"Don't feel bad, most species of large mammal die off ... it's just our turn."
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Dr Herb Ruhs is The Compassionate Misanthrope "Don't feel bad, most species of large mammal die off ... it's just our turn." |
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Undo the damage done by daydreams of wealth by Herb Ruhs, MD I find it the worst of signs and the best of signs when the ranting of a conspiracy wingnut like myself starts sounding more mainstream. Imagine the discomfort of someone like myself, who has been talking for decades in terms of tyranny, vast schemes to loot the country, and
But, please folks, think about it, if history has any lesson for us it is that grand schemes of control and domination ALWAYS fall apart. Have heart, the collapse you see around you, and may be experiencing yourself, is just the symptom of freedom being born. Those very few folks who have managed to corner the market in power, who are ultimately just like you and me biologically, are actually very, very sick people. They are trapped in an unending psychotic episode induced by the very power that they seek. All of us have the potential for psychosis, a break with objective reality, the sudden inability to conduct reality testing, and more than are willing to admit have been there as the result of severe psychological stress and/or powerful psychoactive drugs. Hey buds, it was a bad place to visit, but imagine having to live there permanently.
What they do terrifies us, but it makes them victims of self induced terror as well. A inner terror of loss that pursues them constantly. Pray for us indeed, but pray harder for the super elite of our day who find themselves without a shred of humanity left to comfort themselves with. If you have read this far you no doubt harbor some feelings of derision for my grand generalizations. Good for you! It means to me that you have some powers of critical judgement left in spite of thousands of hours of TV. This reflexive negativity is rooted in the fact that, from the frame of reference of an ordinary life, my characterizations of the uber-powerful seem fantastic, too speculative to believe, and without a basis in evidence. I agree. But before abandoning this train of thought please try a little thought experiment. Think of people you have known who may have suddenly been tempted by, or achieved, a sudden, relatively large, windfall of power and control. Maybe you yourself had a fling at some time with more power than you could handle, a promotion to your level of incompetence, a sudden inheritance or prize money. How much power and money does it take to push someone off the deep end? It varies greatly, but we are all susceptible by virtue of our natural primate natures. In gangster lore everyone "has a price." Based on experience and observation, I don't believe that this is actually true, but it is true that the vast majority of us experience a weakening of our moral and ethical fabric when confronted by the possibility of inordinate reward, and thereby lose, if only temporarily, part of what we know as our self-respect. Even ordinary people these days can conceive of a million dollars, a thousand thousands. We can easily picture in our minds some of the really big houses sometimes glimpsed from the road at the end of a long curving driveway, or what seems to be the average standard of living in a usual TV drama. A million dollars is only the cash price for three ordinary homes. There are a lot of things, deliberate genocide, serial child mutilation and rape, that most people would not consider doing for a million dollars even if they could be guaranteed to get away with the crimes. A thousand million dollars, a billion, is outside the frame of reference of most of us. A thousand mansions? But a billion is chump change in today's financial markets. Billionaires are reproducing like rabbits. Unlike most of us, these billionaires can conceive of the worth of a trillion dollars in the same way that ordinary people can conceive of the worth of a million. It is within their frame of reference. But in today's world of super-saturated concentrations of wealth, the transfer by fair means (or more usually foul) of a trillion, or even multiple trillions of dollars of wealth into the control of just a few hands is the norm. To paraphrase the questionable quote by Everett Dirksen, a hundred billion here, a hundred billion there and pretty soon we are talking about serious money. Which brings us to the point of the thought experiment. And what would a person you know well, but think of as having poor character, do for a billion dollars? Now, what do you suppose someone would do for a trillion dollars? I submit that they would easily part company with their sanity and come to regard the moral restraint exercised by ordinary people dealing with ordinary temptations as insane. They would be psychotic by virtue of having abandoned any frame of moral or ethical reference.
The simple, and as far as I can tell the only, way to accomplish this is for ordinary people to begin a commercial boycott of all centralized institutions. If you can manage to earn less taxable income, do so. Barter, trade, plant gardens. Shop locally at locally owned stores. Bank locally at small sized banking institutions and credit unions. Don't gamble for anything but fun. Don't daydream of riches. All this is becoming more difficult even as it becomes more important. It is hardest of all for those of us on the economic edge where big box stores allow us to stretch our few dollars a little bit more. But this need not, in fact should not, be a uniform, heavily enforced boycott. Better that people come to the realization that their dollars are being used to enslave them first, and only then begin to invent individualized, creative ways of boycotting concentrated power and wealth. If you have to get it at Wal-Mart, you don't need it. When it becomes a matter of shame to drive a new car we will have seriously started down the road to freedom. Oh, we ain't got a barrel of money, Maybe we're ragged and funny But we'll travel along Singing a song Side by side. So stop with the Horatio Alger dreams. That was a scam. Better we should identify with Frodo. We DO have the ring of power, and we CAN destroy it. Stop spending, start simplifying, keep singing. Herb Ruhs, MD PERMANENT LINK My own daydreams often involve great wealth and doing some good with it, some greater good that I can't accomplish now, but I think most people dream of wealth for its own sake ...This is the dilemma. This was the main theme of The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien had character after character speak to the reality that, even though their intention would be to do great good with the ring of power, the mere possession of the ring would turn them to the dark side. That said, I am not a Leveler, though I share their values personally. Rather my sense of things is that everyone must be free to pursue their demons, be that sloth or greed, in order to complete their personal spiritual path. One would hope that once these demons were confronted that everyone would find the Leveler creed comfortable, but attempting to force it on people just causes unnecessary trouble. Still, at the level of societies, of our world society now, enabling folks to chase their greed demon into the stratosphere of wealth is the cause of gigantic suffering and, at the societal level, as opposed to the personal one, any sustainable society must confront the need to prevent inordinate concentrations of power lest it eventually sink into a primitive state of feudalism and lost potentials. We like to think in the industrial West that we are so advanced, but we are not. Great swaths of the world molder in a feudalistic miasma and the imperial West, that sucks much of its wealth from these feudalistic societies, likes to feel superior to these unfortunate people. However, when we strip away the veneer of sophistication, we in the West are just as susceptible to feudalism as anyone else. Most of us still struggle with demon greed, if only in our dreams. That said, I wish for you to discover the magic lamp and have the genie fulfill your dreams of wealth. No doubt you would expend that wealth in a more graceful manner than the vast majority of us. For me, I would just as soon remain without means as that seems the path that beckons me forward toward my spiritual health. The wealth that I see needed most is public wealth in service of human needs. Herb Ruhs, MD PERMANENT LINK  | Latest entry | Recent entries | Older entries |
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