[ssf] Capitalism; just the way it is?

[worldwarfree at riseup.net]

Capitalism; just the way it is? http://alexmorrisroe.wordpress.com/

I met a young man in Manchester called Dennon. His face was creased and
stressed like an old leather satchel; he was as jumpy and wide-eyed as a
rabbit before vivisection. He was also eighteen and homeless. He’d been
stabbed in the head the week before for fifty pence. The night before,
rats had eaten a hole in his leg. He’d been reduced to a piece of meat by
his poverty; he’d become part of the city’s food-chain.

“It’s just the way it goes innit?” He said, when I asked him how he had
ended up sleeping rough.

“I guess so” I said.

The police had given him a mobile phone to wear round his neck, like a
modern day amulet, in case the man who stabbed him came back to finish the
job. It was only capable of dialling 999 in case he was crafty enough to
sell it for food. I took his number, passed him onto a friend of mine at
Victim Support, and never forgot him. That’s the way our society is for
some people. They are a product of its structure, churned up and spat out
like some bitter chewing tobacco. Most people don’t like to think about
it; it evokes feelings of sympathy and sadness. So why then do we put up
with our fellow human-beings being treated so appallingly by a society we
are all meant to have a say in creating? Surely none of us would agree
with homelessness, so why do we actively support the political system
which creates it?

It’s naive to think economics doesn’t drive our cultural ideals. Religion,
politics, education, housing, our work-lives and all our personal
relationships are tainted, influenced and animated by the harsh merciless
hyper-capitalist culture we have long accepted as the proper natural order
of a free society. Greedily we accept this way of living, desperately we
protect it despite the fact we live in an openly cruel, unjust, &
blatantly unequal society. Time and time again we fly in the face of
anthropological reason & cling by the skin of our non-NHS dentures to
capitalism only to be left wondering why we feel so disenfranchised,
disillusioned, and not to mention fuckin’ miserable all the time.

Capitalism is like so many other ideologies; an illusion dressed up as
common-sense logic. Just as a whore wears make-up to hide the scars of
intolerable hardship, this country hid its blemishes with cheap credit,
anti-working-class propaganda, and manic-consumerism. If you are wondering
why your country has deserted you in the seventh circle of
job-centre-plus, just know it’s the natural order of the political system
which endorses the soulless new-age religion of over-consumption and
glorification of tat and bullshit over substance and truth. If you are
facing hardship it’s because of capitalism, not in spite of it, not due to
the greed of a few, but due to the greed of entire nations. Your poverty
is necessary to the rich. Boom and bust’s a must. You are expendable,
obsolete, and easily silenced. Do you really think otherwise? Do you
really think those in power care? And more to the point, who do you think
has the power? The banks? The politicians? The media? The multi-national
corporations?

It’s not even a question of which political party will fix things so we
can all go back to spending money we don’t have on accumulating bits of
plastic shit we don’t really need, made by oppressed slaves from far off
lands we’ll never meet. It is a question of which political ideal do you
want? Do we really want this weak phonie impression of democracy or the
real deal? Do you want a fairer society with genuine re-distribution of
wealth or to be party to a society where the richest 10% earn nine times
more than the poorest 10%. Do you want real equality of the sexes or an
economically driven divide? Do you want a fair education system where
children’s growth and learning is dictated by their innate capacity rather
than their parent’s occupation or heritage? Are you really happy that a
third of M.P’s were privately educated? Do you think it’s fair we have a
benefit-cheat hotline while the super-rich squirreling money away in
off-shores? Are you happy 2 million families can’t meet their housing
costs & 400,000 have fallen behind with rent or mortgage re-payments while
a minority of others have second & third homes? Do you think the rich
deserve their wealth, standing, and power? Do you really think they work
harder; are naturally smarter? Perhaps you think they have superior genes?
What responsibility do we the poor have to change things? Do we hold onto
the status-quo in the hope of one day becoming part of the elite? Or do we
all feel so de-moralized and powerless we don’t demand our right to a fair
society?

I hope the credit-crunch sparks a change in society. As the middle-classes
lose their jobs and become ‘benefit scroungers’, the working-class lose
their homes and jobs, and the underclass becomes the majority class, I
hold out for a movement of minds. Long held ideas of superiority and the
idiotic beliefs that hard work and tenacity is enough to make it in the
world will fall to ruins and our collective humanity will shine. We may
starve as one nation – unless of course you have a wee bit stashed away in
Swiss-account – but we can also rise as one by demanding change and
forming a fairer society for all, not just the few.