Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Among my diverse hobbies I can count the art of people watching. You know what I find especially intriguing? It's interesting to watch television with the sound on mute. It's especially interesting when the channel happens to be set on Faux Noise (Fox News). I happened to inadvertently catch a bit of this "news" channel while having lunch at Abbott Northwestern Hospital. And naturally Fox "News" (sorry, I really cannot call it news because it simply is not...it's propaganda designed to confuse, mislead and enrage) was on a roll about Obamacare. The people of Fox Noise seek anything and everything they can find to belittle, impugn and rail against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It seems to be their mission in life. Too bad they expend their precious life energy acting to destroy when they could actually create instead. Such is the power of hate. If you don't have any worthwhile suggestions of your own regarding a critical policy issue what is the point in ripping other people's ideas to shreds?
I have often thought it would be interesting to do a survey of people who work for Fox Noise and pose them questions as obtuse, confusing and stilted as the ones they often pose to people who dare to enter their realm to speak. Some great questions would be the following:
The Affordable Care Act is not a perfect piece of legislation. Indeed there are some serious issues with it. One serious issue is the impact the implementation of the law is having on businesses. Some would rather reduce their employees' hours to part-time status (so they can avoid the requirement) instead of actually providing health insurance to their employees. But if perfection is the only way to appease the vacuous talking heads of Faux Noise then they will always have a job because nothing is perfect. It always amazes me when people confuse the merit of an idea with the implementation of an idea. Listening to Faux News and friends (or even just watching the smug, nasty body language of their drones) you might think the issues with the legislation somehow indicate the inspiration behind the legislation (namely that everyone should have access to affordable healthcare in a wealthy, developed nation such as the United States) is itself flawed. Can you say the word 'conflate'? I wish these buffoons would get a job where telling the truth is considered an asset rather than a liability.
I imagine the term corporate whore was first coined long before I first used it. But I believe it is a great term. There are many who become corporate whores; their unique identities become subsumed in these monolithic structures where you essentially sell your soul in exchange for a livelihood that does little more than provide the means to feed your body. This is often how I think of Fox "News". You only need to give up your integrity and rail against anything and everything you are told to in exchange for a job. Yes indeed, perhaps we should stop all this pernicious "government overreach" and instead promulgate the values of mediocrity, government "underreach" and self-absorption. Let's shred every last bit of the social safety net in this nation and see how that affects our ranking against other nations in terms of critical metrics such as hunger, job skills, wealth, violence and opportunity.
I worked in corporate environments for a brief period earlier in my life. I found it to be such drudgery. But I did it partly because I wanted to see what the fuss was all about. We have become a very strange nation now that people (including unsuccessful politicians such as Mitt Romney) can speak with a straight face about corporations being people. Jerry Mander (one of my thoughtful heroes) has eloquently articulated the fallacy and horrible consequences of allowing law to define corporations in this way. Corporations cannot feel pain. People can. Corporations are not moral creatures. People can be moral though they do not always make wise decisions.
The environmental damage done by corporations operating in developing nations makes for excellent fare in discussions held in environmental policy classes. I should know because I have listened to such dialogue. While taking a course in Norway in the summer of 2010 I was introduced to the idea of corporate social responsibility. This is another idea whose value is perhaps greater in its theoretical form as compared to its implementation. I don't believe the concept is inherently good or bad; I believe it depends on what exactly corporations do, for whom and why.
So what does this have to do with PTSD? That's a good question. I would link the two topics in this way. Jobs in which you become an automaton resembling a cog in a vast machine are not really humane jobs. They might not cause you to develop PTSD but the depersonalization implicit in some types of work (such as working on a manufacturing conveyor belt) certainly does not nurture the human spirit. I have my own experience of this; I briefly worked for Tyson Foods years ago while doing some independent research. The long hours, cold warehouse and automation don't exactly feed the soul.
A move in the direction of the corporate control (or at least invasive influence) of a vast percentage of our human and natural resources seems an inevitable additional step in the direction of continuing to deepen our disassociation from the creative and life sustaining matrix that is this planet on which we came to be. As more and more wealth and power concentrates within the hold of a smaller and smaller group of people in this nation I can only wonder what will be the inevitable outcome.
Such a topic is by no means cheery. And perhaps I am focusing too much lately on what I perceive is wrong with the world at large. In the coming days and weeks I expect I will further refine my writing here.
Thanks for reading!
Among my diverse hobbies I can count the art of people watching. You know what I find especially intriguing? It's interesting to watch television with the sound on mute. It's especially interesting when the channel happens to be set on Faux Noise (Fox News). I happened to inadvertently catch a bit of this "news" channel while having lunch at Abbott Northwestern Hospital. And naturally Fox "News" (sorry, I really cannot call it news because it simply is not...it's propaganda designed to confuse, mislead and enrage) was on a roll about Obamacare. The people of Fox Noise seek anything and everything they can find to belittle, impugn and rail against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It seems to be their mission in life. Too bad they expend their precious life energy acting to destroy when they could actually create instead. Such is the power of hate. If you don't have any worthwhile suggestions of your own regarding a critical policy issue what is the point in ripping other people's ideas to shreds?
I have often thought it would be interesting to do a survey of people who work for Fox Noise and pose them questions as obtuse, confusing and stilted as the ones they often pose to people who dare to enter their realm to speak. Some great questions would be the following:
- "When did you first learn you were a corporate whore?"
- "Did you take a class in selling your soul in school or are you self-taught?"
- "Does scientific inquiry scare you? Are you in therapy because you fear what happens when you learn?"
- "Do you believe having the option of affordable health care is essentially making a deal with Satan? Do you think Justice Scalia might be able to assist you with a complaint you have against the federal government?"
- "How do you distract yourself when you are immersed in the suffering of your fellow human beings?"
- "Have you ever done anything generous for another person without the hope of a reward in return?"
The Affordable Care Act is not a perfect piece of legislation. Indeed there are some serious issues with it. One serious issue is the impact the implementation of the law is having on businesses. Some would rather reduce their employees' hours to part-time status (so they can avoid the requirement) instead of actually providing health insurance to their employees. But if perfection is the only way to appease the vacuous talking heads of Faux Noise then they will always have a job because nothing is perfect. It always amazes me when people confuse the merit of an idea with the implementation of an idea. Listening to Faux News and friends (or even just watching the smug, nasty body language of their drones) you might think the issues with the legislation somehow indicate the inspiration behind the legislation (namely that everyone should have access to affordable healthcare in a wealthy, developed nation such as the United States) is itself flawed. Can you say the word 'conflate'? I wish these buffoons would get a job where telling the truth is considered an asset rather than a liability.
I imagine the term corporate whore was first coined long before I first used it. But I believe it is a great term. There are many who become corporate whores; their unique identities become subsumed in these monolithic structures where you essentially sell your soul in exchange for a livelihood that does little more than provide the means to feed your body. This is often how I think of Fox "News". You only need to give up your integrity and rail against anything and everything you are told to in exchange for a job. Yes indeed, perhaps we should stop all this pernicious "government overreach" and instead promulgate the values of mediocrity, government "underreach" and self-absorption. Let's shred every last bit of the social safety net in this nation and see how that affects our ranking against other nations in terms of critical metrics such as hunger, job skills, wealth, violence and opportunity.
I worked in corporate environments for a brief period earlier in my life. I found it to be such drudgery. But I did it partly because I wanted to see what the fuss was all about. We have become a very strange nation now that people (including unsuccessful politicians such as Mitt Romney) can speak with a straight face about corporations being people. Jerry Mander (one of my thoughtful heroes) has eloquently articulated the fallacy and horrible consequences of allowing law to define corporations in this way. Corporations cannot feel pain. People can. Corporations are not moral creatures. People can be moral though they do not always make wise decisions.
The environmental damage done by corporations operating in developing nations makes for excellent fare in discussions held in environmental policy classes. I should know because I have listened to such dialogue. While taking a course in Norway in the summer of 2010 I was introduced to the idea of corporate social responsibility. This is another idea whose value is perhaps greater in its theoretical form as compared to its implementation. I don't believe the concept is inherently good or bad; I believe it depends on what exactly corporations do, for whom and why.
So what does this have to do with PTSD? That's a good question. I would link the two topics in this way. Jobs in which you become an automaton resembling a cog in a vast machine are not really humane jobs. They might not cause you to develop PTSD but the depersonalization implicit in some types of work (such as working on a manufacturing conveyor belt) certainly does not nurture the human spirit. I have my own experience of this; I briefly worked for Tyson Foods years ago while doing some independent research. The long hours, cold warehouse and automation don't exactly feed the soul.
A move in the direction of the corporate control (or at least invasive influence) of a vast percentage of our human and natural resources seems an inevitable additional step in the direction of continuing to deepen our disassociation from the creative and life sustaining matrix that is this planet on which we came to be. As more and more wealth and power concentrates within the hold of a smaller and smaller group of people in this nation I can only wonder what will be the inevitable outcome.
Such a topic is by no means cheery. And perhaps I am focusing too much lately on what I perceive is wrong with the world at large. In the coming days and weeks I expect I will further refine my writing here.
Thanks for reading!
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