Two major collapses in 75 years. At least eleven downturns in the intervening years. In the words of economist Richard Wolff: if you lived with someone this unstable, by now you’d have ditched them and insisted they seek help.
If you have a spare 90 minutes, you could do worse than to watch this talk. It’s something everyone should needs to be aware of. He discusses (among other things):
- why wages for the 99% haven’t risen in over 30 years, whilst productivity has soared;
- how the 1% reaped the rewards of the pay/productivity gap, and what they bought with the proceeds
- the alternative to “austerity”
- how we can prevent this happening again
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Neil Gaiman: “Make Good Art” (by The University of the Arts (Phl)) [via]
IN_ERROR
Life imitates Art
Photo: Smoke & Mirrors (2006) by me
Turns out the pants bomber that was foiled by the CIA this week was actually working for the CIA all along.
You couldn’t make it up. That is, unless your name is G K Chesterton and you wrote The Man Who Was Thursday 100+ years ago.
If it turns out that Al-Qaida is staffed entirely by CIA operatives… well, at this stage, I wouldn’t be all that surprised.
Cassandra Syndrome
Photo: Visions of Apocalypse Haunt Me Still
A few years ago, I was writing a story set in the all-too-near future. I was working on it, on and off, throughout university. It was a kind of thinly-veiled warning of where things seemed (to me) to be heading. It was in the tradition of 1984, or so I liked to think.
In the end, I abandoned it. Not because it was a bad idea, but because it seemed that all my worst fears were coming to pass. It didn’t help that the story itself was about a self-fulfilling prophesy. It was no longer just an escapist’s dystopian fantasy. In the end, it just became too real.
In it, there was a economic collapse, the worst since the Great Depression. At first the government insisted that it would all blow over - business as usual - but as the recession dragged on, it became apparent that this was something different. A National Government was formed to deal with the crisis, and democracy was all but suspended. Riots broke out, and private security companies were brought in to protect people (read: businesses). The UK broke apart, and England took a leap to the Right as a result. Refugees fleeing the resulting brutality fled to Europe. The population that remained were monitored by drones and cameras. Those who attempted to fight back were quickly arrested, discredited, and forgotten about. In short, it was a corporate coup, of the kind attempted in the Great Depression, only this time it was successful.
I’m not trying to say “I told you so”. For one thing, I didn’t really tell anyone anything, and for another, many of my more outlandish predictions never actually came true. But that’s beside the point. The fact that any of them came true terrifies me.
That’s where Cassandra comes in. She was cursed to see the future but powerless to do anything about it. Cassandra’s condition describes perfectly, not only my own experience, but the experience of humanity. We are each powerful - but fundamentally broken - pattern recognition machines. As I read the news, I found it continually confirming and reinforcing my deepest fears. It might have been bias on my part, but I know I wasn’t the only one who felt this way. There was sinister scenario taking shape.
My point - if there is one - is that we are all Cassandras. We connect the dots. Often we jump to incorrect conclusions. Conspiracy theories abound: always complex, often constructed. But we do it out of a desire to avert disaster. I couldn’t see it through, but even now, years later, I feel the need to sound the alarm.
No one’s listening, but I must speak. Even if it is just shitting in the dark.
™
He said, ‘You were right, no one’s running this whole thing.’
John Cleese on creativity.
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