Oxymorons “R” us
Or maybe it’s just morons
Holding two opposing thoughts in our heads at the same time has been the working definition of intelligence, even wisdom, for millennia.
We in the 21st Century have, as in many other areas of life, taken that concept to its next, inherently, and preposterously illogical extreme.
Holding two opposing thoughts in our heads at the same time is challenging and exhausting.
Living two opposite ways at the same time is even worse.
This is where many young adults live.
Are they well-off? Or are they on the verge of financial catastrophe?
When I was in my thirties or forties – or fifties – I rarely saw myself in either of those categories.
In the latter 2020s, almost every seems to be in one. Or the other. Or both.
Continually.
Luxury poverty
I thought food that was “empty calories” or YouTube based medical “experts” were about as extreme and inherently absurd as pure self-contradiction could be.
But no.
The 2020s have brought us gold-plated, fashion-accessorized indigence.
How many young adults do you know who go from thrift shop to high end fashion in an afternoon?
Or who go from exotic vacations to welfare appointments?
It’s all part of the routine for those who play two parts in the economic landscape that demands it.
Debt and luxury, in our distended, near fantasy economy, go together, like salt and lime, or sunlight and shadows.
Bankruptcy is no longer a scandal; it has become something like a rite of passage. Having a good credit rating is just another relic of the long-gone Boomer legacy.
Life on the economic edge – of eviction, foreclosure, homelessness – or winning the lottery, becoming viral, has become a generational adrenaline rush – like a crazed, out of control, IRL, carnival ride or 6-D video game.
For better or worse, this financial obstacle course, with life long, even generational consequences has become “normal” – a script for a life of anxiety, wishful thinking and
dread.
With no escape.
AI and cyber currencies only push us all further from reality.
A generation ago, a US college parking lot might be full of cars – but they would be beater cars and pick-up trucks. Usually the family car given to the college student.
Even wealthy students drove older, well-worn cars. In short, even those who could afford new cars, drove older ones.
Now, even those who are strapped financially drive newer and nicer cars.
You almost never see beater cars in college parking lots today.
But the biggest difference between cars now and cars a generation ago cannot be seen; cars back then were paid for.
Like each literal student, each vehicle represents untold thousands of dollars of debt – future debt, long term, paralyzing, life – and career -suffocating debt.
Life in the donut
You’ve probably heard of the “K” shaped economy, the economy where the poor get fleeced, neglected, or scammed and the wealth, almost magnetically, gravitates to those who already hold wealth and power.
This principle holds true in every arena of modern, “normal” life.
From education (at all levels, from day care to grad school) to entertainment (price any concert tickets lately?) to health care and much more.
The poor get suckered, evicted, deported or incarcerated, the wealthy skim off the (tax free) profits, and those of us in the rapidly disintegrating middle, get nothing.
In short, the wealthy and powerful have mastered the “cheat codes” of capitalism.
Or, perhaps the opposite; those who have mastered the “cheat codes” of capitalism have become the wealthy and powerful.
When I was a kid, my dad used to tell me that no one got wealthy by working; it was those who profited from (or “managed”) the labor and sacrifice of others, who acquired wealth.
With apologies to my friends who support unions, the power is not having a “seat at the table” - wealth and power tilts towards those who own – and run – the table.
As many union members, among others, have learned, the one who runs the table makes the rules.
Whether it is pensions or pay scales, someone (usually not visible) at the table makes the decisions.
To put it simply, this is no way to run a stable, fair and prosperous economy.
But it is how to run a gang, a mob or a cult. Or in some extreme cases, a government.
Systems like this do not last very long. Institutionalized injustice is not very durable.
The problem with a “donut” economy is simple; there is no middle.
Cultures and economies with a strong “middle” last almost indefinitely. They are, in practice and by definition, stable.
Cultures and economies with injustice and inequality “baked in) are the ideal cultivars of corruption, deception – and, because they are premised on lies and force, are inherently incompetent.
For several decades the USA held the largest number of people in the middle class – with a corresponding level of home ownership – that the world had ever see,
That is ancient history, of course. Unbelievable ancient history.
No one “works”. No one “knows” anything. No one “owns” anything. No one “cares” – for anything. Why should they?
Force, threats and bribes are the currency these systems are built on; they fill the vacuum left by trust, integrity and competence.
Studying and working, in this system built on force, menace and “rewards”, is for rubes and dolts. The real money – and power – is in the controls – the “software” of the economy.
The oligarchs own – and control – all. And the rest of us, if we want to be on the side of the rising tide, will abandon our values and beliefs and align with them.
In a master stroke of marketing, the poor cheer on the conquests of the rich. By their cheering, they identify with the rich and powerful, and presumably, take themselves off the menu as the next target.
For a while.
In a deliberately designed and maintained system of inequality, some lives, literally and officially, are worth more than others.
And others, obviously, much less.
As some become absurdly, even obscenely wealthy, others become essentially interchangeable, invisible, even disposable.
Every system, from democracies to economies to household gardens, require constant maintenance. Inertia, from weeds to corruption to rust or corrosion (moral or otherwise) will inevitably prevail.
The proverb holds true in every political system; when everyone isn’t safe, no one is safe.
You can see current policies of intended and possible institutionalization of dehumanization in recent headlines or in your neighborhood. More on this here.
In short, in some distorted legal systems, people are not arrested based on charges anymore – ethnicity, accent or place of birth will do.
And we don’t sentence people according to their crimes.
Locking people up for life, with no charge or trial, or anything like due process has become the one-size-fits-all solution to any problem we can imagine.
Law and order, and rule of law have been abandoned and rule by force and whim have become our new primary rule of engagement.
The irony of law and order and rule of law is that laws must be respect by the bulk of citizens – and enforced something approaching fairly.
But if the law is not respected, or the government not trusted, the worst aspects of anarchy are unleashed; chaos becomes dominant when order is most needed.
In other words, survival of any society rests on public trust.
As with personal relationships, trust takes a long time to build – and a short time to destroy.
And you have to ask why anyone would work to erode the one element that holds any and every society together?
In a culture of oxymorons, the answer is in front of us…