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This blog used to be about politics. Not so much anymore as I have worked through my fascination with that subject. It now seems appropriate that with a new president and the end of the Bush nightmare that I move on to new subjects that are more in line with my current interests. I may still occasionally express an opinion about political matters but for the most part I will be commenting on music, photography and personal observations. Thank you for reading.


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6.10.2004
 
The Why and the Buy

Orion > Curmudgeon in the Wild > James Howard Kunstler > Cargo Karma:

"Today the cargo cult is exemplified by the American economy as a whole. The UFOs now land here in the form of Wal-Marts and Target Stores, but the underlying theme is the same: The magical appearance of goodies. They aren't exactly free, but they come at supernatural discount prices that are the next best thing to free. The prices are so low because of an anomalous conjunction of circumstances. Cheap energy and surplus labor have allowed Asian nations, China in particular, to ramp up the last industrial manufacturing economies of the oil age. The decay of banking and lending standards has allowed Americans bearing credit cards to hallucinate unearned wealth, and to buy goods manufactured cheaply elsewhere. For Americans, every day can be like Christmas, an orgy of consumer cargo; and the Chinese get to enjoy the illusion that they are building an economy with a future."

[...]

Jobs are not prizes handed out by a government. They are roles in a social matrix. A big box store is not a social matrix. It is a parasitical economic swarm organism like a cloud of locusts that descends on a locality and picks it clean.


The other day a customer from Trinidad made the remark that if he lived here he would shop all the time, amongst the plnetiful riches of cheap goods. Some of us do just that. We shop as our being. But you cannot just be a consumer. Its a hollow life. You have to be a consumer with a purpose. I see mindless consumption day after day. Custmers come to me with a vague desire to purchase and want me to convince them that buying yet another product will fulfill them. Some customers get upset that I don't persuade them to buy. I give them information instead ask them for a reason why they are making the purchase.

"Why do you want what you want?"

The answer to that question should never be "I don't know".


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bruce
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