It’s the American way. Earn more money, buy on credit, the new work ethic, owe more than you can pay.
Not the true spirit of the “American Way” and while I’m sure of that, I’m suspicious of any definition of a lifestyle that touts itself as the American Way. There are several elements that need to be considered when one wants to understand how we got to this point with our excessive debt and loss of what I term meaningful activity. This is what the adverstising and marketing talking heads want you believe justifies our social decline.
Consider where humans are going from here, and where we are going, in my not so humble opinion would be, insane, the loony bin, the ultimate human destination. My thoughts on the subject follow in a rambling discourse.
Have you heard the lines of Henry David Thoreau’s "Economy," where he commented that most men are slaves to their work and enslaved to those for whom they work, concluding;
"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."
He wrote that at Walden Pond, where he stated; "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation..."
We will come back to that in a moment. Now, let’s back up a bit. Back up say several thousands of years, to the Paleolithic era. For the humans of the time life was a bitch, talk about desperation! There was nothing quite about it and the only species of human to survive from that time, through the Neolithic age was of course homo sapiens, us.
So Thoreau went to the woods to live deliberately, to understand the essential facts of life, and learn what they had to teach so that when he came to die he would not feel that he had not lived.
Thoreau missed it. He had a cabin, heat, books, paper, an outhouse, etc… Another thing he had was solitude. I don’t think our distant ancestors had much use for solitude, or many opportunities to consider what a time of self-absorption could provide them. The ancestors had to satisfy Maslow’s basic needs for safety, food and shelter and they were involved in that pursuit seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day.
Not much changed in the Neolithic era or the early days of the metal ages. In the civilizations of the late Neolithic and Bronze age there were cottage industries where slaves or very menial workers toiled for an owner or employer to make goods by hand. For this labor they received food and clothing or some type of agreed upon wage. There were no vacations, no health plans, no nada, work, work, work, desperation and keep quite about it.
That goes on until the age of enlightenment and the discovery of ways to harness power from wind, water, and steam. Now the employer could offer hundreds of jobs and at the same time hold every worker responsible to get’er done. This was followed with the concept that humans should not be treated as beasts of labor but should gain some measure of satisfaction from their efforts.
Enter Thoreau and his whining about dying with the satisfaction of having known that he had lived. That illusion of purpose and a reason for existence has been converted to a string of half-hour situation comedies, a mortgage and a car payment. Which again gets us to Thoreau and coming to die knowing that we have in-fact lived. Blow-up your television, drive a really cheap car, better yet, take the bus. Love, dance, f**k, sing, read, walk, camp under the stars, f**k some more and never let anyone harness you to a labor that diminishes your soul.
Our Paleolithic, Neolithic Bronze, Iron age ancestors lived lives of total desperation, so that we could have two weeks paid vacation every year. Moving to the present era, the great American Revolution that got the current system of government started was supported by less than half of the residents of the original states. While many of our forbearers were freezing their a*s off at Valley Forge, more than a few of the established families were loyal to the English government. The government of George III and his predecessors provided the loyal English citizens with the means to grow their wealth, often at the expense of others who served as indentured or bound slaves.
The revolt in American, driven by a desire for home rule was not necessarily a popular notion. The ideals of modern industry were still in their infancy in seventeen-eighty and life was not always about family and home. The number of poor who lived by their wits or handouts to obtain food, clothing and shelter is not considered when we mention the spirit of American freedom. How many people scraped a living from wherever they could in the late eighteen hundreds? Put a musket in a starving mans hand and a coat of course blue wool on his back and he’ll fight, especially of you march him down a road to where the boys in red can get a shot at him.
As soon as the ink was dry on the declaration of independence there was a line of folks looking for a government handout. Roll forward to eighteen sixty-six an you have the freed slaves looking for “masta Lincoln to provide." Sure, right after you gets Mr. Johnson’s attention.
A day’s wages for a day’s labor, but who gets to say how much a day’s wages should be and for how much labor?
Not the true spirit of the “American Way” and while I’m sure of that, I’m suspicious of any definition of a lifestyle that touts itself as the American Way. There are several elements that need to be considered when one wants to understand how we got to this point with our excessive debt and loss of what I term meaningful activity. This is what the adverstising and marketing talking heads want you believe justifies our social decline.
Consider where humans are going from here, and where we are going, in my not so humble opinion would be, insane, the loony bin, the ultimate human destination. My thoughts on the subject follow in a rambling discourse.
Have you heard the lines of Henry David Thoreau’s "Economy," where he commented that most men are slaves to their work and enslaved to those for whom they work, concluding;
"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."
He wrote that at Walden Pond, where he stated; "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation..."
We will come back to that in a moment. Now, let’s back up a bit. Back up say several thousands of years, to the Paleolithic era. For the humans of the time life was a bitch, talk about desperation! There was nothing quite about it and the only species of human to survive from that time, through the Neolithic age was of course homo sapiens, us.
So Thoreau went to the woods to live deliberately, to understand the essential facts of life, and learn what they had to teach so that when he came to die he would not feel that he had not lived.
Thoreau missed it. He had a cabin, heat, books, paper, an outhouse, etc… Another thing he had was solitude. I don’t think our distant ancestors had much use for solitude, or many opportunities to consider what a time of self-absorption could provide them. The ancestors had to satisfy Maslow’s basic needs for safety, food and shelter and they were involved in that pursuit seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day.
Not much changed in the Neolithic era or the early days of the metal ages. In the civilizations of the late Neolithic and Bronze age there were cottage industries where slaves or very menial workers toiled for an owner or employer to make goods by hand. For this labor they received food and clothing or some type of agreed upon wage. There were no vacations, no health plans, no nada, work, work, work, desperation and keep quite about it.
That goes on until the age of enlightenment and the discovery of ways to harness power from wind, water, and steam. Now the employer could offer hundreds of jobs and at the same time hold every worker responsible to get’er done. This was followed with the concept that humans should not be treated as beasts of labor but should gain some measure of satisfaction from their efforts.
Enter Thoreau and his whining about dying with the satisfaction of having known that he had lived. That illusion of purpose and a reason for existence has been converted to a string of half-hour situation comedies, a mortgage and a car payment. Which again gets us to Thoreau and coming to die knowing that we have in-fact lived. Blow-up your television, drive a really cheap car, better yet, take the bus. Love, dance, f**k, sing, read, walk, camp under the stars, f**k some more and never let anyone harness you to a labor that diminishes your soul.
Our Paleolithic, Neolithic Bronze, Iron age ancestors lived lives of total desperation, so that we could have two weeks paid vacation every year. Moving to the present era, the great American Revolution that got the current system of government started was supported by less than half of the residents of the original states. While many of our forbearers were freezing their a*s off at Valley Forge, more than a few of the established families were loyal to the English government. The government of George III and his predecessors provided the loyal English citizens with the means to grow their wealth, often at the expense of others who served as indentured or bound slaves.
The revolt in American, driven by a desire for home rule was not necessarily a popular notion. The ideals of modern industry were still in their infancy in seventeen-eighty and life was not always about family and home. The number of poor who lived by their wits or handouts to obtain food, clothing and shelter is not considered when we mention the spirit of American freedom. How many people scraped a living from wherever they could in the late eighteen hundreds? Put a musket in a starving mans hand and a coat of course blue wool on his back and he’ll fight, especially of you march him down a road to where the boys in red can get a shot at him.
As soon as the ink was dry on the declaration of independence there was a line of folks looking for a government handout. Roll forward to eighteen sixty-six an you have the freed slaves looking for “masta Lincoln to provide." Sure, right after you gets Mr. Johnson’s attention.
A day’s wages for a day’s labor, but who gets to say how much a day’s wages should be and for how much labor?
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