"There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part; you can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!"
Mario Savio, Leader of the Student Anti-Vietnam War Movement Sproul Hall Steps, University of California, Berkeley, December 3, 1964
I can't take the machine anymore. It has control of all of us and all we do and all we consider 'normal'. If normal = reasonable, then anyone who claims what we do as a species as normal is in fact the furthest removed from it, IMHO. There's not much we do as a civilization anymore that makes rational, logical sense.
We're not free at all. We're all caught in a race to the bottom that isn't having the desired effects 'the powers that be' thought it would, or at least is having unintended consequences - good for the few in power, bad for the rest of us.
If we were all able to wake up from our consumption slumbers and see what harm the machine is doing to us, our relationships and our world, we'd very quickly demand change or incite it ourselves.
I'm ready to jump into the gear teeth to stop the fricking thing, are you? SABOTAGE, THY NAME IS REID!
3 comments:
Truth: Humans are greedy, selfish and short sighted. Sometimes I think we don't give a shit about this planet or anything and/or anyone on it. Most of us even realize this fact but choose not to think about it too much. Some of us realize this, think about it, and decide not to do anything about it. Even fewer come to some realization that there probably isn't a whole heck of a lot that we can do to change our nature. So what do I think? Well that often changes over time - but today I'm thinking that, if reincarnation is possible, I'm not so sure that I'd choose to be human next time around.
For now I have to believe that to choose to not to look at the good in humankind is giving up hope. Deep down we all know change is possible and that love and kindness are not lost. These human traits are also a part of our nature. To give up hope is wrong and to stop caring is even worse. Be accountable for your actions - that is all that any of us can do.
...but hope doesn't do anything. It allows people to cling onto inappropriate or obsolete paradigms much longer than they probably should. Hope doesn't spur someone into activity. But neither does fear - or does it? Fear triggers basic responses for personal survival, but doesn't address the social aspect. So how do you get people actively thinking about it? You hang a carrot in front of them. You have to convince them they need the carrot. Marketers have been doing it for years, but now they could but their discipline to some good and get everyone to believe that they need to start following the carrot. Maybe marketing IS good for something! We can start calling them capitalist behaviour modifiers. Hey!
It's like you said on Friday, Jeff. You need to convince the Early Adopters that the change is for the common good and then that shift will force the rest of the masses to comply.
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