5 Ways We Are Slaves

We live in times of great abundance and daily marvels accessible to almost everybody. Even people of modest means may fly to any country in the world, listen to music from pocket devices, talk to friends at any distance while walking down the street, and hoard mountains of stuff in their houses.

And yet, for all these impressive abilities, you are not free. In fact, we are the powerful's bitch - the power elite comprising governments, wealthy individuals, corporations and other power centers.

Here are 5 ways in which you and I are slaves; there are many other things I could mention. If the below either completely or partially applies to you or if this is grist for your mental mill then color me happy.

And I'll be clear up front: I say the below because I think we should work together to become free.

1. Your job is unfulfilling

Most people I know dislike the activity in which they spend most of their time engaged - ie. their job. In such a complex society, most jobs are by necessity highly specialized and abstract. How does this bit of computer code fit into the big picture again? Damned if I know. You'll never see a physical real world output, like a chair with little horse heads carved into the heads. The best is that you help facilitate a chair imported from China by Ikea - which is technically a non-profit organization, by the way. You're not making much money - shouldn't you be a non-profit too?

Many fine, intelligent people I know do jobs that are an insult to that person's potential. Their jobs are dull, repetitive, simple, and abstract - and they often do them for ethically unsound employers. I know few people who are happy with their place in their world. Many download music illegally or smoke a bit of pot and get their rush of rebelliousness that way. But nonetheless, they - as with you and I - are bitches. Of the rich. Who have very nice jobs next to swimming pools.

2. The powerful guilt trip you into taking shorter showers but they're taking 97% of the water

I hate "green" advice. I used to be a "green" before I realized that this is dialogue promoted by the rich to their bitch underlings to keep the latter in their place. You take your 5-minute showers when industry uses 97% of the water. Even if you and everyone you know took shorter showers, the effects would be minimal. That goes for eating less meat, driving less, and so on. In 2007, the BBC's Justin Rowlatt and his family did everything they felt was reasonable for a middle class family to do to cut carbon emissions - no meat, no cars, no flying, etc. And they cut their emissions by 20%. 20%! And that's by doing way more than you or I reasonably would.

By all means do those things - I do - but do them because they reflect your honor and integrity, not because they are going to by themselves change the world.

Individual "green" (ah, forget the speech marks, such a discredited word doesn't need them anymore) acts are promoted by the powerful to the people, even though it's the powerful that do the majority of the harm. Pumping such advice to us keeps us divided and busy achieving nothing. My biggest gripe is the idea that you can solve the problems caused by industrialism with more industrialism. That is classic rich to the bitch talk and it's nonsense.

Of course, the powerful would never promote regime-change if that was the real solution (which it is). Instead, they peddle off green crap to us. Them = Rich, You = Bitch.

On a side note - did you realize that smoking is better for the environment than driving a Prius. It's not hard to work out why. Smoke on!

3. They isolate and distract you from what really makes you happy

You have a million songs in your iPod, your iPhone lets you listen to police radio in Wyoming, your iPad lets you move things around on a screen with your fingers. You have an HD TV, you can watch 3D at the movies, you have so many nice clothes. "Pah!", you say. "I'm no bitch".

But, guess what: You're not really happy. It's been shown many times over that it's not gadgets that make us happy. In fact, according to the US General Social Survey, which has taken surveys since 1972, what makes us happy is, in order:-

1. Family relationships
2. Financial situation
3. Work
4. Community and friends
5. Health
(Also listed but are unranked are...)
6. Personal freedom
7. Personal values

I bet you don't have a lot of that, do you? Instead, you're working your butt off in the day and at night you're sitting alone in your house in front of a screen. You've never met your neighbors, you're too tired to do anything interesting other than watch drivel produced by the powerful.

4. We are trapped in Wage Slavery

As I said earlier, you have many trivial liberties at your disposal - such as easy access to songs, movies, or digital representations of other members of your species - but you are lacking in essential liberties like, oh, freedom.

For instance, say you want to work just a little bit, perhaps three days a week instead of five, so you can spend more time with your friends and family. Sorry, you have pay the person who owns your building, the companies that produce your food, the government that lights your streets and wastes your money on wars, and Apple which makes the gadgets without which you will lose credibility in your social sphere. You have been denied access to all essential resources. The rich own those and you will have to pay them for every single one.

You really will have to work very hard for all those things. This is called Wage Slavery. The reason the rich freed black people from bondage is that everybody became systemic slaves, so it was okay to loosen the physical shackles. Now there are systemic shackles and we're all in them.

5. You have no control or oversight over the rich, like they do over you. You do not live in a democracy.

Voting once every four years for one of two very similar candidates (when they don't have the real power anyway) is not democracy. It's a sham. How do you influence which wars we fight? How can you wrap your head around complex financial systems to detect systemic crime? How do you stop local government blowing your money on paying retired police officers to occupy mansions?

"Oh", you say. "We vote in politicians who right the wrongs". No, you don't. Politicians don't make those issues part of their campaigns, so you can't tell who supports what. Of course they're mum on these things: most of them are benefiting from the things you hate.

While you can't touch the powerful, their golden fingers are all over you. While systemic corporate crime goes unpunished, there's a litany of criminal sanctions for every area of your life. And your phone calls are recorded, your internet monitored, your rights consistently eroded. Watch as the noose continues to tighten over the years to come.

Now this is everybody

Realizing that we are indeed slaves is a critical first step in righting the wrongs and winning back our freedom. Liberty is an essential part of a fully realized life. The power structure will do its best to convince you that you're free, but it doesn't seem hard to me to work out that you are not free.

What are you going to do about this? Perhaps you don't care. No worries. Someone else can survive when the powerful want to cash in their assets - and you are one of their assets.

I've been contemplating the beginnings of an approach to deal with these things. Most people could reasonably work out what needs to be done. Throughout history, people have occasionally done exactly that. But this being the internet, I'm not comfortable with vocalizing these things so you'll have to track me down in person to hear my thoughts. I know many of you have the same thoughts because you've told me.

I suggest we get together and do something about it. Despite all the suffering and destruction, this is a beautiful, wonderful world and we are lucky beyond description to be alive. What gifts. It's our responsibility to make the most of our precious time on this blue jewel in the cosmos. And it starts with freedom.