What will you never give away? What will you never sell?
As we rampage on into the yearly madness and carnage called the "Christmas Season," as we once again are deluged with incessant stimuli of our soft spots and desires, as we are encouraged to buy, buy, buy, I of course become cynical.
Amazing the way that works...
Now I don't have any problem with a season dedicated to giving nice things to the people we love. I'm not even hugely concerned with the idea of remembering generosity and "putting Christ back in Christmas." After all, Jesus is a big boy --a demigod in fact-- and I figure he can take care of himself. If he wants back into Christmas, he'll pretty much find a way.
So it's not that I oppose Christmas, per se. It's that the season makes me that much more aware of the fundamental problem with our society.
What is this Grand Unified Problem (GUP)? Well look around you. Listen to what people complain about: taxes, of course, and the breakdown of family values, or the trade balance, or maybe some personal problem, and how society is to blame.
The fact is that every problem in our society, and the worsening of our situation can be directly linked to the fact that every aspect of what was once human decency has been turned into a branch of the School of Business and Management.
Take health care, for instance. How did healing ever become an industry? Or hospitality? Sixty bucks just to lay down in a bed and get some sleep? What ever happened to the idea of helping out a traveler? How about religion? Since when is God for sale? How much is he worth? Or what about education? Will you refuse me your knowledge if I fail to pay you seventy one dollars per "credit-hour?" And how about insurance? Do you actually dare attempt to sell me the illusion of security.
A while back, when I lived in Sitka, I got a really bad cramp in my neck from working sideways in cold storage compartments of fishing boats. I decided to get a massage, maybe work the kinks out, you know what I mean? Fifty bucks the woman wanted just for a neck-rub. Fifty bucks! But, hey, she had this cool picture of Buddha on her wall. I guess that made her spiritual, eh?
This, my friends, is the Grand Unified Problem. Its roots lie deep in history, and in the way we developed as a collective intelligence, but its ultimate result has been to insure that we neither gain freedom from those who seek to enslave and dominate us, nor do we become free from our own selves.
There are those who complain that I never offer solutions to the problems I cite. This is true, and it's because all solutions are only answers to fragments of the unified whole. Actually I'm working on my Grand Unified Solution Theory (GUST) right now, and I've almost got it. When I do, watch out. Until then, just watch.
Happy Thanksgiving. Isn't it grand that we can sit around and complain? I bet they don't have any GUP theoreticians in Zaire...