Today, devices exist in homes across the world that work so that humans do not have to. Among these are dish-washers, vacuum-cleaners, lawnmowers, well-water pumps, washing-machines for clothes, and televisions. Rather than having to wash one's dishes by hand, to sweep furiously at one's carpet, to cut one's grass using muscle power, to maintain water-pressure by hand, to clean one's clothes, or to entertain oneself, these machines – which run either on gasoline burning in their innards or on electricity (that is generated by the burning of coal before it is piped via an enormous network of skeletal electrical towers across vast distances to emerge finally from wall-mounted sockets) – do nearly all of the work that people used to do for themselves. In order to buy these devices, to pay to have them repaired, maintained, and upgraded, and to pay for the gasoline and for the electricity required to make them run, their owners must work – depending on their level of skill, influence, luck, and education – at one or more jobs, labor for which they receive financial compensation.
Advertisers market the aforementioned devices as things that will increase the amount of free time available to consumers and as things that are supposed to make life better. In reality, however, these devices do not make life easier for the majority of people who grow accustomed to their use; these devices rob the people of the good, hearty workouts associated with cutting grass using the body's own power, with washing clothes using the body's own power, with washing dishes using the body's own power, and with hauling water using the body's own power; these devices rob the people of the need to maintain the art of storytelling, and of the need to maintain the art of making art. But, aha! I have just had a thought, namely that because these machines exist, and because they reduce the amount of time that people would otherwise have to set aside to take care of their household and garden chores or to come up with clever ways to keep themselves entertained, because of these supposed time-savers, people are able to work longer hours and to work at more than one job in order to maintain their supposedly time-saving devices and to keep buying new ones as the old ones wear out. Therefore, these devices and the oft-repeated lie that they “save time” not only create but also perpetuate the type of wage-slave, consumption-oriented capitalism that, as I type, is being waged against the American people.
I have nothing really against free time, only the way that free time is used. Americans and persons living in industrialized nations similar to ours use their free time to sit around eating highly processed and chemical-laden foodstuffs, watching television, playing video games, and generally getting fatter and unhealthier by the day; if, however these free-time-rich people were to work in community gardens, paint pictures, tell each other stories, go on hikes, or exercise their bodies and minds and make themselves into better and more interesting people instead of poking at touch-screen-equipped tablet computers while turning up the volume on the TV in order to drown out the sound pollution generated by the dishwasher and the washing-machine running at the same time, if these people were to be active and creative and all chip in to make this nation and this planet a greener and quieter place for all then we might slowly redeem ourselves in the opinions and estimations of a candid world. As it stands however, with our federal government owned and operated by the very persons who gain the most – financially – from our brand of wage-slave style capitalism, there is a greater incentive to keep the people fat, stupid, and sold on the idea that there are devices for sale that will make their lives easier or better rather than to encourage them to be self-sufficient, self-reliant, and self-respecting. How much farther down this stinking rabbit-hole of convenience-driven consumerism can we possibly allow ourselves to fall? America delenda est.
agitate – challenge – debunk – restore
場黑麥 mentiri manufactorem fecit
Showing posts with label respecting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label respecting. Show all posts
25 June 2012
23 April 2012
regarding victory gardens
Friends, citizens, patriots: Please join the nationwide movement for greater self-sufficiency and improved life satisfaction by planting a victory garden. In the past, during episodes of perpetual war and stagnant economic possibility, our parents and grandparents rolled up sleeves and sunk fingers deep into the cool and blessed soil. They did not moan, they did not wail, they did not complain – they planted victory gardens.
We – you, I, and all of us – currently endure wars on multiple fronts, wildly fluctuating food prices, foodstuffs genetically modified and contaminated with pesticides and petroleum-based fuels and chemicals, and environmental degradation caused by poor political policies and by short-sighted agricultural and business practices. With the global food-supply-chain growing ever less sustainable, and with food manufacturers seeking to maximize their profits at all cost by saturating their products with fillers such as salts, sugars, and fats, now is the time, and today is the day, to take fate into your own hands and to sew for yourself the seeds of a brighter and more independent future. (Solar, wind, or water generated electricity used to run a water pump or the like can be stored in 12 volt, direct-current batteries, which can themselves be tapped to heat water, to cook, and to recharge the batteries of cellphones, netbooks, headlamps, and tablets; renewable resources abound, coal or crude oil do not.)
Anyone, anywhere, of any age and activity level, has the capacity to plant a garden, and, thereby, to liberate her own little slice of America from self-imposed reliance on foreign food producers, corporate farms, and plasticized, processed foodstuffs. For persons living in urban areas: Research square-foot-gardening (or square-meter-gardening); for persons living anywhere: Research methods of gardening using raised-beds; for persons with available acreage: Research closed-cycle systems, hydro-culture, drip irrigation, and methods for feeding hydroponic crops from a Tilapia pond's runoff. Tips and strategies for planting a victory garden of your own can be found motherearthnews.com, freecycle.org, or at many other gardening, off-the-grid, and self-sufficiency websites.
We cannot wait any longer to free ourselves from our current slavery to petroleum products, corporate farms, corporate food processors, the idea that things are easy, or the idea that someone else must grow our food for us. We must act now, each one of us breaking a single chain in the ever-tightening, ever-restricting bonds of the capitalism-driven enslavement of hard-working, crop-producing people around the world; building a victory garden on your balcony or in your backyard is an easy and fun first step in the process. So join us, fellow Americans, join us, and celebrate increased food Safety and greater personal Happiness by living, and eating, well.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
We – you, I, and all of us – currently endure wars on multiple fronts, wildly fluctuating food prices, foodstuffs genetically modified and contaminated with pesticides and petroleum-based fuels and chemicals, and environmental degradation caused by poor political policies and by short-sighted agricultural and business practices. With the global food-supply-chain growing ever less sustainable, and with food manufacturers seeking to maximize their profits at all cost by saturating their products with fillers such as salts, sugars, and fats, now is the time, and today is the day, to take fate into your own hands and to sew for yourself the seeds of a brighter and more independent future. (Solar, wind, or water generated electricity used to run a water pump or the like can be stored in 12 volt, direct-current batteries, which can themselves be tapped to heat water, to cook, and to recharge the batteries of cellphones, netbooks, headlamps, and tablets; renewable resources abound, coal or crude oil do not.)
Anyone, anywhere, of any age and activity level, has the capacity to plant a garden, and, thereby, to liberate her own little slice of America from self-imposed reliance on foreign food producers, corporate farms, and plasticized, processed foodstuffs. For persons living in urban areas: Research square-foot-gardening (or square-meter-gardening); for persons living anywhere: Research methods of gardening using raised-beds; for persons with available acreage: Research closed-cycle systems, hydro-culture, drip irrigation, and methods for feeding hydroponic crops from a Tilapia pond's runoff. Tips and strategies for planting a victory garden of your own can be found motherearthnews.com, freecycle.org, or at many other gardening, off-the-grid, and self-sufficiency websites.
We cannot wait any longer to free ourselves from our current slavery to petroleum products, corporate farms, corporate food processors, the idea that things are easy, or the idea that someone else must grow our food for us. We must act now, each one of us breaking a single chain in the ever-tightening, ever-restricting bonds of the capitalism-driven enslavement of hard-working, crop-producing people around the world; building a victory garden on your balcony or in your backyard is an easy and fun first step in the process. So join us, fellow Americans, join us, and celebrate increased food Safety and greater personal Happiness by living, and eating, well.
場黑麥 mentiri factorem fecit
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