From "there's nothing to see here" to "the keys to the kingdom are at stake" -
does it matter
who's right and who's wrong?
The Keys to the Kingdom and Other Nonsense
A number of people will say: "the keys to the kingdom are at stake". Likewise, a number of people will say: "there's nothing to see here". Not because these are factual statements, per se. For
making statements is neither synonymous with honesty nor integrity, is it?
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Indeed, many individuals 'issue statements' that are outright lies.
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Case in point: consumer pushing.
Businesses in the business of business are explicitly not about morality nor about conscience after all. Whether such businesses are in the business of popular temporary and cosmetic remedies or fossil-fuel-powered tools.
Such that an abundance of 'trust' professedly 'earned' by corporations from loyal consumers through pushy pitches can hardly be said to be the result of contests of facts... so much as contests of popularity, no?
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Needless to say, a nation of consumers subject to endless and dishonest strategic exploitation for increasing share of the domestic and global economy, is invariably likely to come to believe that 'businesses know something' that, say, governments do not. In other words,
what has softened the beaches, so to speak, of our collective senses, if you will, is corporate demand.
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With our senses so 'softened', we accept the unacceptable.
We pay bloated tips that are earnings from labor that should be recovered from shares of employer profits. We pay inflated costs for goods and services that are offsets of regulatory compliance passed onto consumers that should be recovered from shares of profits distributed to executives and shareholders.
Then we say we're adamantly for tip-earning work and tip-earning workers because paying for work burdens employers. Then we say we're unwaveringly for 'de-regulating industries' and banishing nanny-states because ballooning compensatory pricing burdens pocketbooks.
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As for government measures that obligate wages and benefits be accessible to employees by businesses that reap rewards from labor and laborers? We say: "we'd rather champion 'contract work'." As for government measures that mandate adherence to safety standards by businesses that subject consumers to material risks and harms? We say: "we'd rather do without 'red-tape'."
As if these ideas are wholly ours and not in service to calculated strategies that invent the appearance of an uncontrived swelling of popular approval for the unacceptable.
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Including a belief that business-minded hires for government roles makes unreserved sense.
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For while corporate demand governs the business of business, the public good relies on groundswells and momentum and will for its governance.
Such that plucking outstanding talent from businesses that are unapologetically for crusades against the interests of people and planet and nations and governments to execute the interests of the public good is plainly less to do with effecting a 'sensible' government than with legitimizing the unacceptable as 'the will of the people'.
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Deserting our common senses, a number of people will say: "such 'sensible' government is not only 'good', I defy anybody to tell me otherwise".
As if such steadfast conviction sealed through relentless and self-serving campaigns calculated to sow mistrust in efforts to serve 'the public good' that characterize public works as unconditionally bad and wrong... is 'earned'.
After all, a corporation and its bottom line are neither synonymous with trust nor transparency so much as unrepentant apologetics.
Whether such business is in the business of real estate or politics or evangelism or slavered espousal of incoherent nonsense, no?
Then the Wheels Fall Off
I.
A capitalist fever dream is not a 'sensible' government.
Please.
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Insisting that obligating employers, businesses, and corporations be decent is a wasteful exercise in nanny-state overreach is a pushy pitch less to do with governing corporate 'citizens' than with an unceasing crusade against being willfully decent towards people and planet and nations and governments.
As if what's standing in the way of businesses in the business of business realizing their extolled potential for increasing profitability at any cost being regulation is unconscionable.
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Such that when the nuts and bolts of governing corporate 'citizens' is advanced by business-minded talent, to what degree is government 'standing in the way of corporations and their bottom lines' really... and to what degree is government codifying the unacceptable as 'the will of the people'?
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As for oft decried 'out of control' incompetence,
surely a nation of consumers cannot believe that businesses in the business of unrepentant apologetics serve 'the common good' more responsibly than a government of, by, and for the people?
As if the outstanding hand of responsible corporate governance and 'the public good'... are one and the same.
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II.
A populist fever dream isn't a 'sensible' government, either.
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Absurd outrage and howls of 'the sky is falling' and alarmist pandering insult our ask to be seen and heard. Likewise promises of spun candy floss and windbags and blowhards pledging to be geese who lay golden eggs 'for the people'... meet this moment with hollow patter.
That a nation of consumers appears to subsequently shrug, speaks not to what people are asking for so much as to what has become 'business as usual'.
A leaning into 'feelings are facts' and 'vibes are real', never mind nuts and bolts.
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That is to say, infinite variations on the themes of 'rescue' and 'salvation': everybody's demanding rescue and everything's our salvation.
Joyfully. Hopefully. Beautifully. For indulging in fever dreams make our worries and our troubles as ephemeral as frothed foam. Really.
As if a recipe of equal parts faithless vows and aggressive positivity solve real challenges faced by real people.
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There are simply no easy fixes. Still populism attracts fans ecstatic to witness it proclaim: "there, in fact, are."
Because a lie is more palatable than the truth?
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III.
To state the obvious:
if selling to a nation of consumers what it's not buying isn't winning and selling to a nation of consumers what it's buying is winning -
is "there's nothing to see here" and "the keys to the kingdom are at stake" about being honest no matter what? or is "there's nothing to see here" and "the keys to the kingdom are at stake" about winning no matter what?
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So... our public forum, if you will, about 'sensible' government is about making a statement, isn't it? and this is about winning, am I right?
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Namely, a number of people are touting our measurable 'consensus', our professed 'agreement' on advancing and endorsing such 'sensible' government. Never mind
that such 'consensus' is plainly flimsy. Because
our 'consensus' on 'the common good' crashes sideways when we define what matters to us in mundane raw tangible particulars. Likewise our 'agreement' on 'the public good' careens off the rails when we define the role of government and what it protects beyond hazy generalities and fuzzy abstractions. Because
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when we succumb to the fatigue of being pushy pitched, we the people abandon the common sense that cautions against inventions of corporate demand, that favors broadly beneficial public works, because we'd rather
embrace our role as a nation of enthusiastic fans and loyalists, emphatically disinterested in facts and vigorously engaged in contests of popularity. Because
this is what we buy and champion as a nation of consumers. So we shrug when corporate governance eschews good citizenship for 'business as usual'. Then
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windbags and blowhards urge we the masses to save ourselves and rescue each other by choosing a fever dream wrapped in slavered nonsense. Which is to say, then
the wheels fall off.
M
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Epilogue
When so much content before us is a broken record of "there's nothing to see here" and "the keys to the kingdom are at stake" - maybe this is how we go nowhere.
Because buying everything we're sold - hopes, fears, dreams - isn't the key to everything. I mean, content calculated to strategically exploit we the masses, would us give the keys to the kingdom for the materialization of increasing profitability at any cost... while soothed and pacified by lullabies of nothing to see here.
So fever dreams that peddle - hopes, fears, dreams - are not about we the people retaining possession of our 'keys' so much as we the people exercising our choice... to give the keys to the kingdom for the materialization of winning no matter what.
Which is to say, if the rubber isn't hitting the road, maybe the wheels have fallen off and we're going nowhere and everybody's right and everything's wrong and what matters is
Ideological Totality! The March of Tickets! Power!
Because a fiction is a lie.
M
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Note
(i) "Case in point: consumer pushing" references, for example but not exclusively, 'nudge theory' which is an application of 'behavioral science' to the 'psychology of consumer behavior in economics'. Note that applications of 'behavioral science', whether with respect to 'psychology' or 'education' or 'economics', too often ineptly address questions of morality and conscience. For example: "the business of popular temporary and cosmetic remedies or fossil-fuel-powered tools."
(ii) The Epilogue includes links to apropos posts: Ideological Totality (September 18, 2024), The March of Tickets (August 25, 2024), Power (August 18, 2024).
M
Freedom in a society where corporations are not only people, but the kings, is perhaps one of the most insane ideas. And like kings of old, they care only for how big their coffers are, how large their kingdom is, and how much their subjects do exactly what they are told. Freedom and corporations are not too words that go hand in hand, freedom doesn’t exist in a corporation because it simply does not achieve the goal of maximizing shareholder value. Even the more progressive corporations are ones where the best they can do is to simply do no harm. So, why is it shocking that corporations are pumping consumers, employees, cats, dogs, and mice 24/7 with subliminal, thought-out psychological campaigns that are leading the people to what corporations desire the most – a dictatorship where they are kings, and the leader is a mere puppet to enforce the obtainment of greener pastures. No, the people running today are less likely to be sensible and for freedom (as corporations and machines owned by corporations are the real influencers) as they are for just enabling more excess, more greed, and more vice at the expense of the people and their freedoms. And before you know it, you have the same amount of freedom that was found in Maoist China and Stalinist Russia.
ReplyDeleteHumanity has never grasped that there are billions of ways one can get “appropriated,” on from the trail called life. The more you search to become who you are not, to desire what you don’t need, believe you can’t say what you must, and that you can’t change things – the more you feel compelled to desperately find truths you know are lies and to accept things you know that are not right until you are nothing but a pile of dust. And in this state, you are naturally going to ride that bus until the wheels fall off, instead of sensibly stopping, pulling off, and fixing the bus. But then again, that would just be too hard and take too much time. And we now know what the rest of the universe already knows about humanity – it sucks.
ReplyDeleteAmerica is the richest country that history has yet to see. There is so much to spare here that no one person should be left wanting for anything. This great land also stands as a beacon of freedom, equality, and the rights of all. And then you look deeper after posts like these and realize that we have people worth billions of dollars and celebrities and politicians hanging out while millions of people don’t get enough to eat or have a chance at the real American dream.
ReplyDeleteCorporations, populists, and political machines learned a long time ago the secret to their success, the more confusion in government and in life means that they will never receive a demand to change.
ReplyDeleteWheels go round and round,
ReplyDeleteFire goes up and down,
The road goes hiss hiss hiss
All through the town
The people stare at the bus
The wheels grounded lifeless
The burned-out shell of us
All through the land.
No more sound here or there
Everyone is in their gear
Presidents are King Lear
All through the time.
This election has been a complete and utter failure for democracy and government, caused by those that believe only they should be allowed to vote and determine who is in government and who is not. Frankly, all these people need to be shown the door. And the people behind them. And the people behind them. We are better off taking the hit now and then using the anger and angst to drive forward a government that is not sensible but is focused on the people it’s supposed to serve. Where we are now is what happens when people are too fool of themselves, thinking that they are the reason for the success of this or that, instead of realizing that anything that is good was because people stopped listening to them and did what was right.
ReplyDeleteI took a chance and did a search on sensible government. Google in its infinite !@#$ing wisdom returned a realtor based super PAC meant to ensure that progressives keep their hands out of government and big business, another one who speaks to the ill of socialism as the greatest evil of our !@#$ing time (wow, like !@#$ wanting to take care of another person is !@#$. I’m so !@#$ed), two Floridian PACs to combat Socialism, and so on and so forth…. !@#$ I did not know that sensible government was meant to exclude, punish, and disenfranchise people while ensuring that corporations can do whatever they want whenever they want and we should all be grateful for that. Keep up the great fight, you really !@#$ing sticking it to them.
ReplyDeleteA critical, non-affiliated, and thoughtful media is the lynchpin of any free society. They must operate without corporate or societal interference. Alas, what we have is no longer such as media is now wholly owned by corporations and special interests that reduce bold and inquiring thoughts to marketing and behavioral science meant to lead the masses to spend more, give more, and take more of the shit they are slinging.
ReplyDeleteI am not one with the people who wish to go back to a better time and place. Many of you want to turn clock back to when people were segregated, there was no regulation, or when you could just say anything. Unfortunately for me, there is not really a time or place that I can go back to as I wish to live small, with others that also wish to live small, and want to take care of each other. I’m maybe closer to it than most as I live in a place where there are bears, wolves, reindeers, and people who try their best to be good to one another and live in a way that is not excessive.
ReplyDeleteAlas... Not all are... welcomed in that... Village of Bear... and One Handed... Delusionals.
DeleteThe popcorn is... particularly salty and... buttery in this... theater.
ReplyDeleteWhere we come from is who we are. We choose to become who we are. With thoughts like yours and the strength of your conviction behind us, we become something more. Now we just need for you to tailor your message a bit more to the platforms that will make us great again.
ReplyDelete