Imagine, it's Christmas morning. You're in the prime of your youth. You wake up and you don't even rub your eyes, stretch, or go brush your teeth. As soon as you crack your eyes open your feet strike the ground before your eyes are fully open. You run to your Christmas tree hoping for the one gift you really wanted and open your first gift. To your surprise it's a brand new video game! You're filled with excitement and can't wait to spend hours, days, or months striving to beat the game. Everyone has a favorite game, whether it's a board game, video game, or card game. Games take people into a new world, they promote good competition, they jog our minds, strengthen our critical thinking (sometimes). Some games allow us to make our own rules and sometimes people make their own rules for games *cough* *cough* uno. But there's one game that I'd say most of have never been able to play. That being the game of life, im not talking about the board game I'm talking about real life on this big blue marble. The elites in this country are all part of one huge global game amongst elites world wide. The regular people, the vast majority of us are just fodder or side characters at best. Now I don't know if my take on anti-capitalism is nuanced or not. You may have heard something along these lines before but not structured in this way.
Recently I read an article expressing the failure of innovation in America and it got my mind jogging. The premise of the article was basically this; with money being the sole motivating factor for most businesses in modern day America innovation has stagnated. People stick to safe subjects that they know will sell to the masses aka the consumer whether it's in research and development, medicine, art, music. These groups of people in different fields take the same or similar approach in fear of failing their investors. This is a microcosm of capitalism, in each of these industries money was the bottom line and in the end the consumers are the ones that pay the price.
Now people will point to many reasons why this may be the case. Economists might say the market follows the consumers, hedge fund managers might say that this model will boost the economy's growth. Politicians may debate that it's beneficial to the people and that if these multinational, multimillion or billion dollar companies make it their sole mission because of "trickle down economics". My point of view is that it's detrimental to our mental health, physical health and our over all quality of life. If drug companies have no motivation to innovate, and create new drugs because they don't want to risk their bottom line; they're more than likely not going to take the risk. That leaves them one option to hold on to patents for drugs as long as they can and price gouge the people. That's one example but you can apply that logic to many industries.
We live in an America where our elected officials can openly and brazenly commit crimes and continue to serve office. We had a former president attempt a coup, and there are talks of him running again in the next election. We have congress members trading with companies that they have special interests with. Some congress members own businesses and sit on the boards that regulate the business. While regular people suffer the consequences of the law our elected officials who are supposed to be the embodiment of law are above it. The people we have elected to congress are not there to be servants of the people. They're there because they saw it as a means to an end which is to benefit themselves financially. With a few rare exceptions this is happening almost unanimously and in a bipartisan fashion. They flaunt it in out face, after they leave their elected position most of them then go on to be lobbyists in the businesses they were regulating. A smack in our face as they showboat that they can do as their please with diplomatic immunity.
While we all watch from the sidelines as these elites play their game they're damning us and our future generations to come. While we struggle to pay bills and drown in debt the rich and elites come to collect on the back end. While we suffer with a pandemic, economic hardships and death billionaires and millionaires cash out on the stock market. They've convinced the masses that stock market growth on finite resources is infinite and we can grow each and every quarter. This pushes businesses to make calls that negatively effect their workers, with layoffs, pay cuts and no benefits. While the C suite of businesses make millions and billions because their pay is based off their stock. Then they have the ability to buy their stocks back to inflate their prices and in the end make more money for themselves.
All of these entities wouldn't be able to thrive in this big game without their most valued partner, the media. The media has been their key factor in achieving the status they hold now. The media has convinced us that the heads of these companies made it big on meritocracy alone. They worked hard and earned it even though most businesses are passed on to heirs who solemnly run them well. They keep up the infighting between marginalized groups by propagating culture war nonsense non stop. They're in it for the ratings and they broadcast what they know people will tune in for so we have endless media cycles of the same nonsensical celebrity gossip or endless fear mongering. The substantive issues are scarcely covered because if the people knew about the ongoings of big business and congress the media would lose their bottom line. As their main ad revenue comes from these big businesses themselves.
Now in the 21st century they're attacking our minds in a new way, social media. No one knows for sure whether or not social media negatively effects our mental health. The way social media companies come off as, are platforms that can connect with with that long lost family member or friend and build a sense of community. In reality they distort images of self, they promote consumer and lavish lifestyles. They're riddled with ads that make you feel like you must buy such and such product which is so spot on to what's going on in your life. These targeted ads only get better and better at selling you stuff you don't need over time they build the best algorithm for you. Apps like Instagram and Twitter have people comparing their lives to strangers they never would've other wise met. They put the wealth inequality front and center, inadvertently they push the meritocracy narrative as well. People think "maybe one day I'll achieve what such and such person has" or on the contrary it shows how social media can destroy a person. Everyone has a platform now and that's not always a good thing, people are "canceled" for mistakes they made in their youth and lose their livelihood sometimes. Yes some people should be punished for their actions but people are now tried in the court of online opinion and most times unfairly. Tiktok is the new fad, it was once an app called musically targeted for children. Now it's caught the attention of users far and wide on the age spectrum which comes with some negative aspects. Kids are now exposed to a lot of sexualization especially young girls. They see these "influencers" flaunt their bodies and have these skewed sense of reality and beauty. I truly fear for our future generation, we have little boys and girls infinitely scrolling hours on end of content that when i grew up would've never been available to me at the age of 13 and under. The attention spans of our beloved young ones are failing, now shorter than that of a gold fish. Growing up it was a harsh joke to say someone had less of an attention span than a goldfish and now most of our children do.
Now we have the wealthy with so much money they don't even know what to do with it anymore. Jeff Bezos is blowing cash on trips to space and a yacht with its own yacht inside because he couldn't fit a helipad on the big one. All the while his workers defecate in bags and die of heatstroke all for the benefit of one man and the selfishness of people who need their packages in one day but are too lazy to go to a store. The consolidation of business also contributes to this wealth inequality, as the booms and busts of capitalism ebb and flow we the people will drown. While companies run away with the resources and the wealth and live in their utopia at the cost of lives and subjecting the poor to a dystopia. They're so incredibly wealthy they purchase half a million dollar VIRTUAL homes. They're throw money at fake currency and digital art with the hope that they convince the poor that these things have value so they can make more money on the back end. While we continue to be force-fed the lies of these executives and moguls like pigs in a slaughter house blind to the destruction of life as we know it.
So as we continue our day to day in this game, wandering around like NPCs the elites continue to steal from us. At this point its like stealing candy from a baby for them, everyone lives in their own reality curated by social media bubbles and social circles. Everyone hates each other and xenophobia is rampant, it's classic divide and conquer and we're too idiotic to realize what's happening. One day we'll be fighting wars over water and food and the rich will have been one step ahead of the masses. As they aquire all the farm land and lobby the government for more privatization they'll have set up their utopia while we live in squalor. So I ask you dear reader, will continue to be mindless fodder and side characters or will you pick up a remote and play this game? We can't beat the bosses of this game without playing in co-op mode, the mindset of many need to change and it won't happen over night but we musnt give up or stand by. Standing back and watching is akin to giving up and losing. Don't lose this game, as the great George Carlin said "its a big club and we aren't in it" but we can start our own club and be the underdogs that win it big.