Economic System Overhaul 1
How Predator Profits lead to diminishing returns for all.
It’s quite simple really. Pure common sense. First people discover something good, something that thrills them or tastes good. Could be the discovery of a new coast line as a tourist, or a new food with a great taste. After the discovery more tourists or eaters follow, jummy. And then the growth begins. Hotels are build or new plantages set up. And with the growth follows decay from within. The need to make money of opportunity, what we tend to call good business, in times turns out to be a monster, a plague of locusts. It’s very much like them city building games. Expansion is good, nature seems just a frozen obstacle to remove for progress. That thought itself is one of our biggest misconceptions. And corporations love to leave it that way. You may get depressed when reading, though it ends as call for action. :)
1. ‘White Fungus’
Can you tell which beach is in which country?
Take the beaches. Once a new beach is discovered, more and more people go there. Sometimes not even a decade later we have ‘White Fungus’ on the beach, the name for the plague of white hotels and beach resorts eating away the colour locale and making each beach more like all beaches.
The orginal culture disappears behind walls, the locals will be working in the hotels (in the lower ranks) and tourists keep on demanding lower prices as the lack of difference with the other white fungus increases. Like leaving the Costa Brava for poor elderly or drunken teenagers. The rest will have moved on. I saw it starting on the Riviera, move to Costa Brava, move on to Turkey, Thailand, Mexico and now coasts all over the world, Asia, Africa, South America, etc. This value deprevation also happens in many other fields. And there the consequences are worse.
2. Top Soil Destruction
The real price of a profit driven economy
The white fungus at the least is not killing. This next plague does really kill and will kill millions(!) in a foreseeable future. Because any succesful food sees industrial farming enter. Their methods are ruthlessly aimed at profit, while hollowing out the wealth of the land. The managers look at sales and profits, not at long term costs for the locals. Hey, they’ll move on when the source is depleted. The first the West will notice are more and more desperate refugees. Then we’ll all see more and more poisoned land, demising returns, deminishing quality of food and finally poisoned food, water and air. All discussions and actions to eat more plantlife from the sea show how real the the danger may be. If you want to imagine the same economy at work in our oceans, right on top of the jelly fish plagues (not so much in the news) and plastic sea (it’s size perhaps mentioned once a year) please watch Soylent Green. Our robbing the earth bare of life, for profits, when alternatives are present is deeply mad. And the companies doing it, lie, cheat, kill, and market their ways onward, while pointing at the people: “You the consumers, watching our commercials, you the politicians bribed and fed by our science, you have the power to change it. Since you don’t, we are normal. We’ll keep on feeding you with our crap, …. as long as we can, for profit.” Our consumerism makes us part of their swarm. We are locusts. And the pattern described above is everywhere.
The predatory logic
How the drive for profits benefits less and less people.
You want cheap stuff? Cheaper and cheaper labour to make that possible leads to sweat shops, filled up private prisons and the return of large scale slavery (or choke contracts) hidden out of sight. You want to fly, drive, energy? Sure we’ll build more roads, cars and planes. You want 1 portion? One portion packaging, from meals to coffee caps has probably more than doubled the waste mountain, all for convenience. You want to celebrate? Most holidays have become coupled with products. Parties have become less personal and more consumer product driven. “Hey I love you, here’s stuff to prove it!” Etc. You want more meat? Sure, some industries will chop some forests, start breeding with hormones and antibiotics and treat animals like stuff. Each demand or inconvenience of people with money is met a service or product. We the consumers seem to have a hard time taking time to do some work ourselves. And the businesses can’t say ‘no’ either. They play the innocent victims of our longings, who buy and buy. ‘Victims’ of us, who are definately spurned on by their overwhelming advertising. We are just graving monkeys, they greedy manipulators; together a deadly combination.
And that’s just thinking we all do our best. Sadly it’s worse. Despite best intentions of many managers have many companies as a whole seem to forgotten they exist primarely to offer a service or offer goods people need. Sadly most have shareholders or owners who think that’s not enough. Companies can be like crooks in movies where the crooks get a golden gleam in their eyes, when they smell treasure and are willing to cross lines to get it.
Companies lie. They have lied about oil spills (almost all oil companies), levels of nuclear radiation (many radioactive accidents were down played of hidden), how, not, healthy certain foods and medicines were (death tolls through wrong medication are must higher than you think: “most commonly abused prescription drugs like OxyContin, Vicodin, Xanax and Soma now cause more deaths than heroin and cocaine combined. Pharmageddon is upon us”), costs for climate. Companies have taken part in politics, murder, suppression, supporting dictators and whatever is needed to keep the ‘act’ in the air. And they will continue to do so in the future, as long as profits are the drive.
And then, with the wars in the Middle East in our minds: do we all realize how much of those was created for access to oil, for the benefit of Western interests and companies? That the USA is one of the main aggressors in the world. Was that ever clearly enough in your papers? Don’t believe ANY reason for war.
“Earth is a Space Ship and We’re All Crew.”
Economic Overhaul
Tips for Government, Public and Business
There’s an immense and growing amount of people who want fair play, healthy nature, restrain themselves with meat eating waste and travel; who move from stuff demand to experience and community. They want to live. If you are among these, here’s some tips:
For Government Officials: If you are really a government for and by the people, stop the corporate monsters killing the planet! Seriously. No bribe or pressure should stand against the interest of a healthy nature for us all. Tax, fine, pressure the shit out of the destructive practices, even when they only seem damaging on long term (perhaps even worse). If companies are so damned innovative, have them innovate planetary health and make all their practices support flourishing of the whole. Don’t think your population believes buying for plastic bags solves the plastic crisis in the oceans. You need not fear to kill of some damaging dinosaurs. It’ll help the warm blooded caring (mammal) companies with green solutions to grow and change the world for the better. We’ll lose jobs here, but will win many, many more there, when we really go for a green overhaul of our whole system.
Think about it: Businesses that pollute, ravage natural resources are stealing from our shared future. Every tax payer that doesn’t want their products, pays with taxes for cleaning up the damages of another. That’s organized theft again. Perhaps laws that apply for smoking in the same room, should aply for dropping plastics on the same street and burning benzine on the same road. Also take on lying and bribing, as done by lobbyists. If not legal (after convenient changes of the law), then surely the practice is immoral. Common sense says, this has to stop. Heroic if you do, corruption if you don’t.
For Citizens: If you’re a citizen, just loving to live in peace, health and safety, than think about how your children will want the same, but, most likely, will have less of it. When you still trust capitalism, start reading “23 Things They Don’t tell You About Capitalism.” Or just search the internet for Corporate Fascism, Corporate Lies, Global Pollution, Corporate political interventions, etc. There’s too much dirt there to just believe in the best intentions of corporations. Even when Climate Change were a hoax, then still nature is degrading, disappearing and even our huge oceans are in deep trouble. Profit trumps care for people and planet and it really should be the other way around. Do anything to help that hierarchy of common sense to come closer; at home, at work & in your political voice.
For Employees: I know many people at work fear getting fired (Sounds much like executed doesn’t it? That’s because most corporations are internally dictatorships) so don’t speak up. Yet your work may well assist slavery, suppression, pollution, manipulating politics, seducing an audience, etc. Business needs way more whistle blowers, way more protest inside, and way more pressure to innovate towards a healthy, clean, honest way of doing business. So if you work for a dinoraur seek to innovate to caring mammal level, because that’s were real long term profits lay.
For all: Because slowly, slowly after news and governments aren’t believed any more, they’ll not believe the parties that bought them anymore. It will become harder and harder to blame foreign populations for global effects, that clearly originate through human enterprise, indeed the price of capitalism. 7 million a year die of just air pollution alone. Just add hunger, global warming, wars, lack of healthy foods to the mix and the people will get mad. The current generation of millenials is getting more and more worried. Recent elections may have bypassed them, but it’s clear, they are a growing and very worried force. They’ll want retribution ;) even when they themselves might be just as much to blame.
Focus on what’s healthy for the whole. Don’t lie, cheat or kill to avoid the truth. Look it straight in the eye. You may have to risk profits, security, work, to help the one living organism that we all are part of: Earth! Dot.
Comment of the Sage: “If man is wise, he’ll integrate dealing with his inner animals, with his politics and business laws.
Comment of the fool: “I think I want an ice cream to cool down. Where can I buy one? Wait I’ll get the car and drive over to the nearest parlor.”
NOTES:
The idea we all need to understand deeper.
More on prescription drugs. More on deforestation.
Each list here after has new names, new crimes and worries: More on bad food (for you and or the world) companies. 10 companies with the worst reputations (banks, arms, oil etc) 15 worst corporations for the planet. 20 worst to buy from. Top 10 corporate criminals list. And here the 14 worst evil doers around the world. Guess how many are American? So the bigger the sicker. Power corrupts and all that. And the drive for profit and growth doesn’t incent any of them to change their ways.
