Mental illness

For those of you who think I've been overly hard on one side of the political aisle, I would hasten to add that conservatives are not the only problem. One of the most inadequate features of modern thinking is the unjustifiable notion that if you don't think one thing, you automatically think it's opposite. This is so widespread, especially in the USA (just listen to any purported political debates going on right now), that it is more than just disconcerting. It's almost frightening ... but that's a topic for another time.

As I pointed out a post or two ago, conservatism is not a political notion. It is simply an attitude that some people have developed. When seen from a political point-of-view, however, the so-called liberals are no better. Why? They buy into the same outdated and outmoded ideas that conservatives do. The conservatives don't want to change anything, and the liberals only want to change how you use money. The winners, in the end, are the same people: those who are keeping resources scarce, lending money, and pushing their political power around. In politics, everybody loses ... except the politicians and the money-people. Politicians themselves don't always win, but their money-people do. Regardless of what it will cost anyone else.

The problem with backward-oriented views and backward thinking is that they provide no solution for the problems we have today. Our biggest problem is that we fail to recognize what are major problems really are. Resource scarcity, debt, nationalism, war, aggression, terrorism ... none of these are the problems. No, they are symptoms. Anyone who has had a major illness knows that you can never get better if your doctor only treats symptoms. The illness has to be treated or things will only get worse. And that's all we do these days: argue about symptoms, but no one wants to get down to actually addressing the root causes, that is, the illness itself.

Our illness is a mental illness. Yes, in a sense, we're all just a bit sick in the head. Our problem is our attitude, no more, no less. We refuse to acknowledge a few simple facts, and as we all know, people who refuse to acknowledge reality are, well, mentally ill. For example, it is a fact that the level of debt in the world is higher than all the goods and services the world can produce. On the other hand, it is a fact that there are enough resources on earth to provide every inhabitant with much more than s/he needs. It is a fact that national interests cause more problems than they solve. It is a fact that private interests are in conflict with the public good.

It would seem, then, that the inmates are running the asylum. And we wonder why things are getting better?

Backward-thinkingness

For all of you who think I was too hard on such a large segment of our modern population, I would suggest you re-read the last post. I, for one, don't want things to stay the way they are. It is obvious to me that too much just doesn't work: income disparity is on the rise (a change, by the way, but not a welcome one), child poverty is on the rise (ditto), some resources are getting scarce (and some people's trigger fingers are getting itchy), too many people die of starvation or go hungry, too much of the world's water is polluted as is too much of its air, the polar caps are melting, and we won't fix any of it because we say it will cost too much. There is not a one of these things that I want to stay the way they are.

All of these issues are the direct result of backward thinking. There is much in the past from which we can learn, to be sure. There is much in the past that have had very positive effects, but wanting to turn back the clock ... well, that's never been a good idea. When something outlives its usefulness, it is time to trade it in on something new. I'm not talking about the built-in obsolescence that modern industry perpetrates on all of us. I'm talking about the natural course of things. There comes at time when what doesn't work needs to be recycled.

Candidates? What about nation-states? Born 1648 (Treaty of Westphalia), and I don't see the evidence that they have been a great boon to mankind: number of war deaths? cause of famine (usually as a result of wars), destruction, resource depletion, redirection of resources to non-productive ends (e.g. weaponry), not to speak of the taking of unnecessary human characteristics to new and hideous ends (greed, power-lust, domination, superiority, prejudice, hatred, just to name a few). It's a 450-year-old idea that has not proven its worth. So, it's time to get rid of it.

Or, what about debt-based economies? Even older than nation-states, and it's not clear to me that this idea has been very helpful either. Based on a notion of scarcity, but one that can only be created artificially (i.e. I'll steal this, you can't have it, so if you want it, you have to buy it from me). If you're honest, you have to admit that this is the fundamental premise. What has it got us: a fixation on money, death, destruction, greed, power-lust, desire for domination, superiority ... wait a minute! Where have I heard that before?

What too many folks fail to see that neither of these "things" are given realities as much as they are simply ideas. Ideas are not permanent, they are simply conserved. Why keep them if they are only causing us problems. We humans have the huge advantage of being able to change our minds. And that's what we need to change right now. After all, if you always think what you always thought, you'll always get what you always got.

The problem with conservatives

I once heard an advertising slogan that caught my ear. I don't know what was being advertised, and it doesn't matter, because the slogan itself was too big for the environment in which it was being forced to live. The slogan? "If you always think what you always thought, you'll always get what you always got."

It's clever, rhythmic, sonorous, memorable, and it applies to a lot of things, not just some silly product or service that someone is trying to hype. In fact, the meaning of that almost pithy phrase, borders on the profound, but most people don't get it. It's not that they're unintelligent or stupid, it's because it describes them, so they just don't notice the phrase, or what it means.

The person being talked about is the conservative. This the person who just doesn't want change. This is the person who wants things to stay as they are. Oh, they might tell you that they embrace technology (washing machines, refrigerators, toilets, maybe even computers), but only if it doesn't change anything else. In other words, they want things to stay the same, hierarchies to remain the same. They want disadvantages to remain, and poverty, and disease, and oppression. Sound drastic? It is. Because while some very few have too much, the vast majority of humankind does not. If you are conservative, you want it to stay that way. That's just what conservatism is. And, it's sad.

Self-centered change is not change at all, it is simply an intensification of what is already. Conservatism is not a political philosophy. It is neither political or philosophical. There is no love of wisdom in this thinking, there is only love of self. Conservatives are people who don't want to share, because they think that when things change, they will have less.

Far-fetched? Over-the-top? Prejudicial? Cranky? Cynical? Not-guilty on all counts. Not wanting change is simply unnatural. Everything changes all the time. Thinking you can stop change isn't really thinking at all.