You have a great points, though your scenario is a bit too simple.
It’s not that we’re so fat and lethargic that we can’t be bothered to get off the sofa long enough to effect meaningful change. It’s that “the media” is gargantuan and goes far beyond the synthesized news cycles and reports. The OG social media outlets like churches, work culture, family structure, regional Identities, and every other socialized structure you can think of manifests itself into these ideals that have been pummeled into our head since the first time we stood up in preschool and recited the pledge of allegiance.
Making it more complicated is that our real concerns like, paying our bills, feeding our families, getting Timmy to soccer practice, protecting our kids, being a good employee so we don’t lose our job, being a good dad, being a good son, keeping our relationships healthy, etc., etc. is condensed into an infantesimally small amount of time. When you finally get to stop you’ve only got the bandwidth for bullet points. It’s not laziness, it’s exhaustion. It’s not lack of self-reflection, it’s overclocking. We have an entire backbone population that’s absolutely exhausted and still feeling like failures because somehow the American dream is feeling like a greasy, over-hustled nightmare that we’re constantly struggling to live up to.
This cycle does lend itself to your headlines of gun violence, gladiator arena us v. them politics, and on, and on. The system with which we now live is a constant grinder that no longer leaves time for, nor praises individualism and ideas. It’s a finely tuned revenue machine built on an overhauled slavery model that instead praises corporatism, classism, ruling parties, and residual monthly income… with a smiley face of nationalistic exceptionalism posted on the packaging.
Apologies for being so long winded, but some sympathy for the devil might be in order. We’re largely not a bad people. Most of us are kind, optimistic, and try very hard to change the things we see out of place. The problem is we’re becoming more and more just white noise in the background. A sort of spectre of idealisms past.
You make it sound like you’re just a cog in a machine with no agency and I do believe that’s what it feels like (other countries are in late capitalism, too) but you’re not if enough of you band together. You’re not forced to watch your life pass before your eyes, you choose to play along with the machine’s game. Hell, you even got the guns to take what should be yours and you just use them to shoot at little paper targets.
I don’t think of you as fat and lazy or the devil. It’s just frustrating to see your potential go to waste like that.
You have a great points, though your scenario is a bit too simple.
It’s not that we’re so fat and lethargic that we can’t be bothered to get off the sofa long enough to effect meaningful change. It’s that “the media” is gargantuan and goes far beyond the synthesized news cycles and reports. The OG social media outlets like churches, work culture, family structure, regional Identities, and every other socialized structure you can think of manifests itself into these ideals that have been pummeled into our head since the first time we stood up in preschool and recited the pledge of allegiance.
Making it more complicated is that our real concerns like, paying our bills, feeding our families, getting Timmy to soccer practice, protecting our kids, being a good employee so we don’t lose our job, being a good dad, being a good son, keeping our relationships healthy, etc., etc. is condensed into an infantesimally small amount of time. When you finally get to stop you’ve only got the bandwidth for bullet points. It’s not laziness, it’s exhaustion. It’s not lack of self-reflection, it’s overclocking. We have an entire backbone population that’s absolutely exhausted and still feeling like failures because somehow the American dream is feeling like a greasy, over-hustled nightmare that we’re constantly struggling to live up to.
This cycle does lend itself to your headlines of gun violence, gladiator arena us v. them politics, and on, and on. The system with which we now live is a constant grinder that no longer leaves time for, nor praises individualism and ideas. It’s a finely tuned revenue machine built on an overhauled slavery model that instead praises corporatism, classism, ruling parties, and residual monthly income… with a smiley face of nationalistic exceptionalism posted on the packaging.
Apologies for being so long winded, but some sympathy for the devil might be in order. We’re largely not a bad people. Most of us are kind, optimistic, and try very hard to change the things we see out of place. The problem is we’re becoming more and more just white noise in the background. A sort of spectre of idealisms past.
You make it sound like you’re just a cog in a machine with no agency and I do believe that’s what it feels like (other countries are in late capitalism, too) but you’re not if enough of you band together. You’re not forced to watch your life pass before your eyes, you choose to play along with the machine’s game. Hell, you even got the guns to take what should be yours and you just use them to shoot at little paper targets.
I don’t think of you as fat and lazy or the devil. It’s just frustrating to see your potential go to waste like that.
I concur with all of your statements, to include the one concerning the realization of being a cog in the machine.
I have several errands to run, and would love to continue the discussion when I return, if you’re amenable, of course.
I am and I’m looking forward to it. It might take a while before I can reply, though, so please don’t think I’m ghosting you.