A New Order
Insanity is blindly believing in the exponential transgressions that make America the great superpower that it conceivably is today. Capitalism, that avid beast that Americans have embraced so wholly, is what drives this grand contravention. As a society, American and global, we have superimposed natural selection. We have taken the natural cap off of our population controls-diseases and viruses, abortion, land placement (any jungle, Chicago, Mount Kilimanjaro), contraception, homosexuality, starvation, death by exposure, etc.-and because of this our survival is fixed only to the point where we can supply for ourselves. Third World countries are the only ones left that still abide by the natural order of life.
We have been supplied the basic necessities, even though some live so meagerly; and, through sequential actions, we have bastardized the concept of survival; a voluptuous man states, in a restaurant, that he is starving. We supply water, fruit, vegetables, paper to wipe an ass, shampoo, loofahs, meat and meat substitutes, antibiotics and band-aids, blankets, pillows, dolls for girls and trucks for boys, and a steady flow of cheap inebriating liquids, solids, and gases; cancer has become less of a problem and for the past fifty years no one is truly certain as to what consumption is.
Through these modern devices, the list stated, we can survive physically and emotionally. The boy plays with his truck and is happy; the girl plays with her doll and is happy: in order to make a sweeping generalization. We survive; we can survive; however, at all cost, in matters of politics and relationships, we have to learn to accept disgrace.
Now that these basic needs have been met and because we are human and we need to have goals and sets of needs, we have initiated a new model of survival. A Capitalistic version of survival.
What happens to the high school girl that can't fit into the standard 0 Hollister pants? What becomes the boy that isn't up to date on the latest color fad of Air Force Ones? Aren't they both, basically, surviving? What happens to the woman or man that can't pay for Atkins friendly foods? What emotive response comes from a dependency on food stamps?
These people are surviving. They have enough to eat. They have clothing and shelter. They just need to fit into the new concept of survival that has been so aptly provided by American Capitalism. --Justin Weber--
We have been supplied the basic necessities, even though some live so meagerly; and, through sequential actions, we have bastardized the concept of survival; a voluptuous man states, in a restaurant, that he is starving. We supply water, fruit, vegetables, paper to wipe an ass, shampoo, loofahs, meat and meat substitutes, antibiotics and band-aids, blankets, pillows, dolls for girls and trucks for boys, and a steady flow of cheap inebriating liquids, solids, and gases; cancer has become less of a problem and for the past fifty years no one is truly certain as to what consumption is.
Through these modern devices, the list stated, we can survive physically and emotionally. The boy plays with his truck and is happy; the girl plays with her doll and is happy: in order to make a sweeping generalization. We survive; we can survive; however, at all cost, in matters of politics and relationships, we have to learn to accept disgrace.
Now that these basic needs have been met and because we are human and we need to have goals and sets of needs, we have initiated a new model of survival. A Capitalistic version of survival.
What happens to the high school girl that can't fit into the standard 0 Hollister pants? What becomes the boy that isn't up to date on the latest color fad of Air Force Ones? Aren't they both, basically, surviving? What happens to the woman or man that can't pay for Atkins friendly foods? What emotive response comes from a dependency on food stamps?
These people are surviving. They have enough to eat. They have clothing and shelter. They just need to fit into the new concept of survival that has been so aptly provided by American Capitalism. --Justin Weber--
posted by Prometheus Publications at 2:07 PM
14 Comments:
I never thought of consumerism as insane before, but you support that well! Your direct style was really easy to read.
are you making a comment about how the other things I have written are not easy to read? Oh, David. That is a low blow. It is funny though. Subversive and clever.
I wouldn't say that. I enjoyed the style of the previous two; this one was more direct. Were they supposed to be easy to read? I wouldn't imagine that James Joyce wrote things with the intent of being easy to read. It seems that there's a stylistic trade-off--the more sophisticated of a style you have, the more difficult the reading is.
oh David, you are witty.
Is the guy who wrote this a liberal Democrat? His writing certainly bespeaks it.
liberal democrat? I don't like to associate myself with anything because it belittles myself as a person. So, I guess you could classify me as that but I would say that I am something unique and I am a freethinker that has a mind that gets used rather than filled with someone else's ideas.
If, as it says in Ecclesiastes, there is nothing new under the sun, then how can you be a "free thinker" since you're still technically filling your head with, as you put it, "someone else's ideas"?
I think that's a bit of a fallacy. Calling oneself a freethinker doesn't necessarily mean that one is an original thinker, but rather, one who chooses between ideas, extant or otherwise.
I'd have to disagree. Justin said that he uses his mind and doesn't fill it with other people's ideas. That means logically that they have to be filled with his own. All I'm saying is that pretty much anything he thinks, someone else has already thought.
What it all boils down to is that "free thinkers" tend to glorify the term and imagine that they're really innovative, dynamic, forward moving, out-of-the-box thinkers that are so amazing that no one can pigeon hole them, when everybody else can easily see that the "free thinkers" really just fall into that "other" category of disgruntled people who think it's cool to be different.
While I can agree with your latter comment on "free-thinkers" tending to glorify their own specious originality, calling the ideas "someone else's" contradicts your point: either they are no-one else's (given that, as you have said, nothing under the sun is new (additionally, if you choose to interpret it in such literal terms, what do you make of recent scientific theories, and the philosophies based on them, such as Freud's school? While their may be ideas similar to Freud's it seems that only his thoughs on psycho-analysis could have paved the way for similar movements in literary criticism, etc.)) and thus as original to Justin as anyone else, or you are saying that, at one piont, these ideas were actually new. Furthermore, is being the first to think of an idea make you the owner? Rather, I'd contend that it is reaching the idea as a conclusion you would like to adopt after discerning the pros and cons of that and other opposing ideas.
Wow, those are some harsh comments. Free-thinker doesn't mean anything that any of you have defined it as. It is inevitable to have someone else's thoughts in your mind. That is what school is all about. Free-thinker just means to take those thoughts and form your own opinions, rather than regurgitate them. And, I don't think it is "cool" to be different; rather, I think it is necessary to be different. Where would innovation be if we all thought the same things?
This talk of being different as "cool" or nessisary is very interesting. Justin, your post on A New Order was very thought provoking to me and I thank you for submitting it. I just have a few questions on some of your reasoning and positions.
Are you saying Capitalism is a bad thing or just making a statement of the fact that we are living in a Capitalistic society?
Do you think that 3rd world countries are living a better life than we are?
Finally, correct me if I'm wrong, but I really want to understand what you are trying to say, does your argument go like this:
(p1)All humans need to have goals and needs.
(p2)Our basic needs and goals have been met via our Capitalistic society
(c)Therefore, we need to initiate new needs and goals (a model of survival) by trying to fit in by wearing Hollister pants, keeping up to date on Air Force Ones colors etc.
-Mark
Justin, you say that you don't like to associate with anything because it belittles you as a person. I disagree, you must associate with something otherwise you stand for nothing and that is the ultimate belittlement. We find meaning and purpose in the things we associate with, that is why you wrote "A New Order" because you stand for something and want to pursuede others and I commend you for standing for something. Your attempt to not associate with anything is in itself an association.
Well Mark. This is what I have to say in response to that. I think the problem with our society today is that we have forgotten what survival is. In this country, for the most part, we have our needs met. We have plenty of food to go around, even though it doesn't, and wealth is abundant here. Needs=met. And yes. Aside from the bloated stomachs i think that 3rd world countries do have it better than we do. They have a better sense of belonging and they know what it means to need. We have forgotten that. Our needs have changed. that is what I was getting at. Our needs have gone from solving hunger to solving the issue of a demanding fashion sense.
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