What keeps us too busy? Our jobs, our lives, taking the kids to soccer practice, making money to buy all the extras in life that we think we need. Making money is behind most things that we do, that and preparing our children to follow in our footsteps.
Is it a conspiracy? Sort of. I don’t think that some secret group sat down and decided to make us all wage-slaves by addicting us to the pleasures of the consumer culture. But employees who are not too aware of the evil things done on their behalf around the world are preferable to employees who are politically active and take the time to understand the consequences of their actions. Citizens who are satisfied by consumerism are preferable (from the perspective of the government) to citizens who are asking if there is more to life than the culture of consumption and making enough money to pay for it.
Too many of us are…
- Too focused on career and family to think about our place in the world, what our country stands for, what our country is doing so we can enjoy cheap gas and cheap food.
- Too busy to think about where our food comes from.
- Too busy to make good food choices.
- Too busy to learn the difference between good food and bad food.
- Too busy to learn that the food choices we make affect the way other people live in other parts of the world and the whole world’s environment.
- Too busy to care that watching mainstream news for 30 minutes does not make you well-informed.
I confess that I’ve rarely been that busy. I’ve always taken time when I wanted to and never been obsessed with winning the rat race…or even entering the rat race. If I had, I would have accomplished much more than I have in common cultural terms.
Of course I’m busy now, with two kids and a full-time job and getting ready to be poor.
Ending and Beginning 