Wake Up!

You get what you pay for.

Trash.

A plastic bag of noodles in a box of noodles wrapped in plastic.. I’ve got flour and flax in old jars at home. . Forego the tasteless equality of an anonymous box of noodles? One of a million boxes of noodles that could exist on any shelf..?
But, my shelf? No. Not this box of noodles. Not MY shelf. Not today.
But, it does have pretty pictures, and “flavors added”.. Natural flavors even!
No.
Not Natural. Not from Nature. No, not by a long shot. Natural Flavors. As in, those flavors existed in Nature but they were made in a lab.
Not the noodles.
Not the bottles of water. Damnit, why didn’t I fill my bottle at home? Not again.
Not the paper towels. I could get two or three pretty nice sheets at the thrift shop, cut, hem. done.
“Hang on a sec”
“Sir, would you like to use a different card”
“No. Can I have my card back?”
“Oh, certainly. Here you are. Would you like to use cash today?”
What the fuck is in that toothpaste anyways?
“Sir?”
Not the toothpaste. I’ve got baking soda and some mint.
“Sir?”
Not the mouthwash. I can soak some cinnamon sticks in Vodka for a bit, and water it down.. Gallons for that price…
“Sir?! Would you like me to hang on to this til you get back?”

“Sure.., but I dunno when I’ll be coming back!”

“can you believe that, the guy just left his stuff here…”

I’m leavin all that shit I don’t need in that basket.

There’s a lot we pay for that ends up as trash. So much of what we buy is disposed of, not just water bottles and paper towels, but the packaging, the to-go ware… So much ends up in a landfill sooner than later. How many resources, how many dollars get poured into the trash minutes after reaching the consumer? And that’s taking for granted that we need the shit they sell us. Dollars pumped into landfills, like the rays of ancient sunlight pumped into our autos.
And We pay with more than dollars. All of us.
Somehow with enough dollars, oppression can be distilled not only into the independence of rhetoric and lifestyle, but into profits. Free markets free to plunder of the cheap, abundant resources of illiteracy, malnutrition, and slavery. Someone has to harvest the cocoa in the latte, the diamonds for the bride; our dollars get buried in landfills, or drowned in blood, and in these times where neither landfills or tragedy are scarce it is little surprise that the almighty dollar buys so little of the Dream. I don’t want to dream if it means throwing away Values and value for the pretty picture of convenience, and I’m not alone.
We don’t have to trade shame for a handful of trash and a microwave dinner.
We are not the Last Peoples, we are not those whose times are ending.
But, We are The People.
It is our time
It is morning…

Report this comment

It’s go-time. Zero hour. The world’s messed up and we have a green light to get right to work making it better.

Maybe those people who aren’t commenting can’t cause they gotta keep their eyes on the road.

Don’t text and drive.

Report this comment

Report this comment

I see my government, not mine any more, not the voice of the people, by the people. It’s becoming more oppressive and fascist as Congress grants big business tax breaks at the cost and burden of the other 98% of America.

My virtual self is a step inside a world that equalizes and opens new possibilities for human connection and expression. It is not commercialized, not FB’d, not counted by hits. It may be the place where we will truly burn The Man. We must all see these possibilities and protect the freedom of the internet.

Report this comment

Report this comment

Report this comment

I promise to stop sleeping on the job and use this enormous amount of technological capability for the mass awakening needed to prevent the coming shapocolapse. You’re an amazing human being, I’m sure I’ll enjoy your future works, as I hope one day you’ll enjoy mine!

Report this comment

As a Burner whose default world is overwhelmingly virtual, I am an incarnated example of the dilemma you’ve posed. Here is how I cope:

Virtuality is the medium for manually redirecting the attention of others. At the beginning of Big Media, only those with inordinate resources and influence could control the message. At this late stage, as you’ve pointed out, virtuality is so heavily subsidized that we’re all publishers now, but we’re pissing into the wind. In order for us, the good “us,” that is, to capture any attention, we have to share our influence. We can then use our networked mind to direct some attention in the right direction, i.e. offline, outside, into the immediate and physical world.

Fortunately, Burning Man is a pretty great antenna for this broadcast.

Report this comment