Debt Rattle May 9 2014: We’re Not Doing Very Well, Are We?
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Ben Shahn Urbana, Ohio August 1938 We’re not doing very well overall, are we? We’re always busy chasing something, but we don’t know what it is we’re
[See the full post at: Debt Rattle May 9 2014: We’re Not Doing Very Well, Are We?]Of all the places, an old photo of Urbana, Ohio today. It’s not far from where I live, maybe 25 miles. We took a short trip there only a few weeks ago. It is always interesting to see what was then in the photo, compared to what is now.
Great essay today too, really causes one to reflect what we can do better. But for many people in today’s bubble world, it appears the main priority is to buy, buy, buy. That is all most have been conditioned to live for their entire lives. Thus they don’t understand why they should do anything different.
Read many an essay like this. This one is well written too. How do the Dutch do languages so well? Really good. I learn English reading this blog!
You are writing off humanity in a stroke though just because consumer capitalism is so destructive and manipulative. I don’t agree with that.
If you watched over the dinosaurs you’d have said there is no chance of intelligent life on earth and yet a few million years later intelligent life sprung. We do not know the future no matter how much we know. It could be climate change will knock us massively and a few of us may survive the shock and we will evolve out our faults. We may not. We don’t know. I believe we will or another species will because I am an optimist. Like you I think western capitalism will be a flash in the pan. It had the potential to be brilliant but was totally flawed.
In the meantime I despair when my PhD friends believe in creationism, the divinity of Jesus and think the dinosaur fossils were put there to test us by “God”. Your comments about god are pertinent. I liked them.
Mother earth still has a long way to go. She’s not done yet.
Long time ago when I lived in India my grandmother and I travelled to another town. We passed a mango tree bearing young fruit. The tree looked beautiful in the sun. Majestic and vibrant. My grandmother stopped and said a small prayer to give thanks for the abundance of life and the fruit. It was a normal thing to do. She did it often. Almost all the older people did. I thought it was pointless and played while she gave thanks. Now, I look back and realise that’s a way of staying connected with the natural environment. Never forgetting your place in the big picture.
When I tell my English friends this story they laugh.
I’m as much Canadian as Dutch, that’s why, and the Dutch being all that great at languages is a gross exaggeration based on the fact that the rest are so poor. Great story about your nana, it’s all we need to know about what we lost, why that is important, and how the emptiness implicit in that makes us so destructive.
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