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Page added on July 28, 2018
American Society Would Collapse If It Weren’t for These 8 Myths
Our society should’ve collapsed by now. You know that, right?
No society should function with this level of inequality (with the possible exception of one of those prison planets in a “Star Wars” movie). Sixty-three percent of Americans can’t afford a $500 emergency. Yet Amazon head Jeff Bezos is now worth a record $141 billion. He could literally end world hunger for multiple years and still have more money left over than he could ever spend on himself.
Worldwide, one in 10 people only make $2 a day. Do you know how long it would take one of those people to make the same amount as Jeff Bezos has? 193 million years. (If they only buy single-ply toilet paper.) Put simply, you cannot comprehend the level of inequality in our current world or even just our nation.
So … shouldn’t there be riots in the streets every day? Shouldn’t it all be collapsing? Look outside. The streets aren’t on fire. No one is running naked and screaming (usually). Does it look like everyone’s going to work at gunpoint? No. We’re all choosing to continue on like this.
Why?
Well, it comes down to the myths we’ve been sold. Myths that are ingrained in our social programming from birth, deeply entrenched, like an impacted wisdom tooth. These myths are accepted and basically never questioned.
I’m going to cover eight of them. There are more than eight. There are probably hundreds. But I’m going to cover eight because (A) no one reads a column titled “Hundreds of Myths of American Society,” (B) these are the most important ones and (C) we all have other shit to do.
Myth No. 8—We have a democracy.
If you think we still have a democracy or a democratic republic, ask yourself this: When was the last time Congress did something that the people of America supported that did not align with corporate interests? … You probably can’t do it. It’s like trying to think of something that rhymes with “orange.” You feel like an answer exists but then slowly realize it doesn’t. Even the Carter Center and former President Jimmy Carter believe that America has been transformed into an oligarchy: A small, corrupt elite control the country with almost no input from the people. The rulers need the myth that we’re a democracy to give us the illusion of control.
Myth No. 7—We have an accountable and legitimate voting system.
Gerrymandering, voter purging, data mining, broken exit polling, push polling, superdelegates, electoral votes, black-box machines, voter ID suppression, provisional ballots, super PACs, dark money, third parties banished from the debates and two corporate parties that stand for the same goddamn pile of fetid crap!
What part of this sounds like a legitimate election system?
No, we have what a large Harvard study called the worst election system in the Western world. Have you ever seen where a parent has a toddler in a car seat, and the toddler has a tiny, brightly colored toy steering wheel so he can feel like he’s driving the car? That’s what our election system is—a toy steering wheel. Not connected to anything. We all sit here like infants, excitedly shouting, “I’m steeeeering!”
And I know it’s counterintuitive, but that’s why you have to vote. We have to vote in such numbers that we beat out what’s stolen through our ridiculous rigged system.
Myth No. 6—We have an independent media that keeps the rulers accountable.
Our media outlets are funded by weapons contractors, big pharma, big banks, big oil and big, fat hard-on pills. (Sorry to go hard on hard-on pills, but we can’t get anything resembling hard news because it’s funded by dicks.) The corporate media’s jobs are to rally for war, cheer for Wall Street and froth at the mouth for consumerism. It’s their mission to actually fortify belief in the myths I’m telling you about right now. Anybody who steps outside that paradigm is treated like they’re standing on a playground wearing nothing but a trench coat.
Myth No. 5—We have an independent judiciary.
The criminal justice system has become a weapon wielded by the corporate state. This is how bankers can foreclose on millions of homes illegally and see no jail time, but activists often serve jail time for nonviolent civil disobedience. Chris Hedges recently noted, “The most basic constitutional rights … have been erased for many. … Our judicial system, as Ralph Nader has pointed out, has legalized secret law, secret courts, secret evidence, secret budgets and secret prisons in the name of national security.”
If you’re not part of the monied class, you’re pressured into releasing what few rights you have left. According to The New York Times, “97 percent of federal cases and 94 percent of state cases end in plea bargains, with defendants pleading guilty in exchange for a lesser sentence.”
That’s the name of the game. Pressure people of color and poor people to just take the plea deal because they don’t have a million dollars to spend on a lawyer. (At least not one who doesn’t advertise on beer coasters.)
Myth No. 4—The police are here to protect you. They’re your friends.
That’s funny. I don’t recall my friend pressuring me into sex to get out of a speeding ticket. (Which is essentially still legal in 32 states.)
The police in our country are primarily designed to do two things: protect the property of the rich and perpetrate the completely immoral war on drugs—which by definition is a war on our own people.
We lock up more people than any other country on earth. Meaning the land of the free is the largest prison state in the world. So all these droopy-faced politicians and rabid-talking heads telling you how awful China is on human rights or Iran or North Korea—none of them match the numbers of people locked up right here under Lady Liberty’s skirt.
Myth No. 3—Buying will make you happy.
This myth is put forward mainly by the floods of advertising we take in but also by our social engineering. Most of us feel a tenacious emptiness, an alienation deep down behind our surface emotions (for a while I thought it was gas). That uneasiness is because most of us are flushing away our lives at jobs we hate before going home to seclusion boxes called houses or apartments. We then flip on the TV to watch reality shows about people who have it worse than we do (which we all find hilarious).
If we’re lucky, we’ll make enough money during the week to afford enough beer on the weekend to help it all make sense. (I find it takes at least four beers for everything to add up.) But that doesn’t truly bring us fulfillment. So what now? Well, the ads say buying will do it. Try to smother the depression and desperation under a blanket of flat-screen TVs, purses and Jet Skis. Now does your life have meaning? No? Well, maybe you have to drive that Jet Ski a little faster! Crank it up until your bathing suit flies off and you’ll feel alive!
The dark truth is that we have to believe the myth that consuming is the answer or else we won’t keep running around the wheel. And if we aren’t running around the wheel, then we start thinking, start asking questions. Those questions are not good for the ruling elite, who enjoy a society based on the daily exploitation of 99 percent of us.
Myth No. 2—If you work hard, things will get better.
According to Deloitte’s Shift Index survey: “80% of people are dissatisfied with their jobs” and “[t]he average person spends 90,000 hours at work over their lifetime.” That’s about one-seventh of your life—and most of it is during your most productive years.
Ask yourself what we’re working for. To make money? For what? Almost none of us are doing jobs for survival anymore. Once upon a time, jobs boiled down to:
I plant the food—>I eat the food—>If I don’t plant food = I die.
But nowadays, if you work at a café—will someone die if they don’t get their super-caf-mocha-frap-almond-piss-latte? I kinda doubt they’ll keel over from a blueberry scone deficiency.
If you work at Macy’s, will customers perish if they don’t get those boxer briefs with the sweat-absorbent-ass fabric? I doubt it. And if they do die from that, then their problems were far greater than you could’ve known. So that means we’re all working to make other people rich because we have a society in which we have to work. Technological advancements can do most everything that truly must get done.
So if we wanted to, we could get rid of most work and have tens of thousands of more hours to enjoy our lives. But we’re not doing that at all. And no one’s allowed to ask these questions—not on your mainstream airwaves at least. Even a half-step like universal basic income is barely discussed because it doesn’t compute with our cultural programming.
Scientists say it’s quite possible artificial intelligence will take away all human jobs in 120 years. I think they know that will happen because bots will take the jobs and then realize that 80 percent of them don’t need to be done! The bots will take over and then say, “Stop it. … Stop spending a seventh of your life folding shirts at Banana Republic.”
One day, we will build monuments to the bot that told us to enjoy our lives and … leave the shirts wrinkly.
And this leads me to the largest myth of our American society.
Myth No. 1—You are free.
And I’m not talking about the millions locked up in our prisons. I’m talking about you and me. If you think you’re free, try running around with your nipples out, ladies. Guys, take a dump on the street and see how free you are.
I understand there are certain restrictions on freedom we actually desire to have in our society—maybe you’re not crazy about everyone leaving a Stanley Steamer in the middle of your walk to work. But a lot of our lack of freedom is not something you would vote for if given the chance.
Try building a fire in a parking lot to keep warm in the winter.
Try sleeping in your car for more than a few hours without being harassed by police.
Try maintaining your privacy for a week without a single email, web search or location data set collected by the NSA and the telecoms.
Try signing up for the military because you need college money and then one day just walking off the base, going, “Yeah, I was bored. Thought I would just not do this anymore.”
Try explaining to Kentucky Fried Chicken that while you don’t have the green pieces of paper they want in exchange for the mashed potatoes, you do have some pictures you’ve drawn on a napkin to give them instead.
Try running for president as a third-party candidate. (Jill Stein was shackled and chained to a chair by police during one of the debates.)
Try using the restroom at Starbucks without buying something … while black.
We are less free than a dog on a leash. We live in one of the hardest-working, most unequal societies on the planet with more billionaires than ever.
Meanwhile, Americans supply 94 percent of the paid blood used worldwide. And it’s almost exclusively coming from very poor people. This abusive vampire system is literally sucking the blood from the poor. Does that sound like a free decision they made? Or does that sound like something people do after immense economic force crushes down around them? (One could argue that sperm donation takes a little less convincing.)
Point is, in order to enforce this illogical, immoral system, the corrupt rulers—most of the time—don’t need guns and tear gas to keep the exploitation mechanisms humming along. All they need are some good, solid bullshit myths for us all to buy into, hook, line and sinker. Some fairy tales for adults.
It’s time to wake up.
60 Comments on "American Society Would Collapse If It Weren’t for These 8 Myths"
Davy on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 5:48 am
“JPMorgan: QE Might Have Devastating Consequences After All”
https://tinyurl.com/y8ltqhfv
“Approximately 9 years after various “tin-foil” wearing blogs first warned that the long-run negative consequences of QE will drown out and vastly outnumber any positive ones (which have mostly been confined to make the rich richer and create the illusion of economic stability built on the cracking foundations of trillions in newly created dollars), none other than JPMorgan today admits that QE may, indeed, have some devastating financial, economic and political consequences. And by some, we mean a lot.”
“1. Results in Asset Bubbles and a Collapse in CapEx: Even as QE has likely exerted downward pressure on bond yields, the significant increase in central banks’ balance sheets makes an exit potentially more difficult, and raises the risk of a policy error or of an increase in perceptions about debt monetization. It potentially creates asset bubbles by lowering asset yields relative to historical norms, that an eventual return to normality could be accompanied by sharp price declines. Perceptions about asset bubbles can thus also increase long term uncertainty. In turn higher uncertainty might prevent economic agents such as businesses from spending, i.e. the collapse in CapEx observed over the past decade as company used cheap debt to purchase their own, making management teams richer.”
“2. Creates Zombie Companies and Crushes Productivity. Low credit spreads and corporate bond yields are an intended consequence of QE but not without distortions. By allowing unproductive and inefficient companies to survive, helped by low debt servicing costs, QE could potentially hinder the creative destruction taking place during a normal economic cycle. In principle, QE could thus make economies less efficient or productive over time. Which should answer the long-running debate over the chronic lack of economic productivity in the new normal. “
“3. Low Rates crush savers, make the rich richer. One of the most visible impacts of QE has been the decline in discount rates, which in turn has created wealth effects via supporting asset prices. However, an argument could be made that these wealth effects are not evenly distributed, and that low discount rates mean savers suffer from an erosion of income.”
“7. Cripples pension funds by increasing funding deficits. Lower bond yields increase pension fund and insurance company deficits putting pressure on pension funds to match assets and liabilities.”
“The current social contract is mired in the quicksand of global finance. It is being kept alive by the corpulent balance sheets of central banks, who do their government’s bidding so that the politicians do not have to put unpleasant choices in front of their electorates. This cowardly behaviour gives rise to slogans and sloganeers, who provide familiar but false checklists of remedies. “Take bank control”…”America First”…”One Belt, One Road”…”Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer”…”One Man – One Kill”. Central banks are currently furnishing the excess credit that, in the past, has been followed by an orgy of blood.”
MASTERMIND on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 6:19 am
Davy
Can you please stop spamming click bait ‘zerohedge”..Why don’t you go argue it out in the comment section with all the other paranoid nutjobs of the world..I am sure you would fit right in..
Davy on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 6:49 am
mm, if you had half a brain then you might debate me off the board with your phony PHD knowledge (cough cough). You are one stupid kid that whenever he finds something he is incapable of debating he folds up and whines. I need to start documenting your “real” comments because they are few and far between. I need to keep a “copy and paste” “redundancy” “noise” list. Of all the poster here you have to be consider the biggest noise maker, loudest mouth, and the crudest commenter. Your stupid adolescent remarks and your sexual dysfunction permeate so many of your comments. I would put you up there at the top of the list of what is taking this forum into the gutter and irrelevancy. Go find a kids site to play at. This place is for adults who are serious about life and not suicidal.
Shortend on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 8:39 am
Secret TSA Tracking Program At Airports, Boston Logan
The Globe reports ordinary US travelers are the focus of a new TSA surveillance program at airports including Boston Logan
https://patch.com/massachusetts/boston/amp/27679583/globe-outs-secret-tsa-tracking-program-airports-boston-logan
The program, called “Quiet Skies,” targets travelers who “are not under investigation by any agency and are not in the Terrorist Screening Data Base,” the Globe reported.
The program’s goals give the agency broad leeway over who to focus on and how closely to track them, Globe reporter Jana Winter writes.
The Gestapo is in place…round up the usual
Suspects
Makati1 on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 8:04 pm
“One obvious cause is that when everyone believes something, or people assume everyone believes something, it is assumed to be correct. This is human nature, which is why propaganda is such a big part of our lives. Our rulers flood the zone with one set of opinions, in an effort to drive out all others, so that people will assume everyone accepts the official dogma. It’s why every TV ad features race mixers and a Google image search of white couples returns race mixers. There can be but one opinion, the approved opinion.”
https://www.theburningplatform.com/2018/07/29/the-power-of-comfortable-beliefs/
It’s called: “Brainwashing”. Something that is common in America today.
MASTERMIND on Sun, 29th Jul 2018 9:43 pm
Madkat
why do you even care what america does to its own people? You dont even live here? what difference does it make to you? You are like a petty loser who can’t get over a girl who dumps them..
Dooma on Mon, 30th Jul 2018 12:22 am
Davy, mate, I am appalled with all First World Countries. Including the Country in which I live.
For some reason, even though I have repeatedly stated it, I feel absolutely no national pride. Australia is no better than any nation who takes advantage of poorer countries such as East Timor (Google it). We have an abysmal environmental record. Still rely on FF’s for the majority of power, treat refugees like criminals by locking them up in disgusting camps. Camps that the UN had visited and condemned.
I bet my left one that millions of patriotic Americans fly the US flag out of the front of their abodes still? Something that is quite rare here. So please don’t lie about how self-critical you can be Davy? If you were honest about your word, then you certainly would not cop any flack from me and probably the majority of other international posters.
In fact, I would see you as a genuine underdog. But time after time I have asked you the most straightforward questions about the atrocities that America has committed, but you REFUSE to answer the question and go back humming stars and stripes while you iron your flag(s).
At least be honest and just come out and say how you think that you live in the greatest nation on earth. I have been honest with you. Australia mines many toxic chemicals (especially uranium oxide). Our carbon footprint per capita is disgusting. We could be world leaders in solar, but our politicians are mainly baby boomers, and I have a sneaking suspicion that they figure that the world will survive long enough for it to become someone else’s problem.
So the well-worn argument of “they never hold a mirror to their own countries” is just that, well-worn and total bullshit. And until of us become critical of first world practices that are destroying the planet then NOTHING positive is going to come from pointing fingers.
Makati1 on Mon, 30th Jul 2018 12:44 am
mm: “Madkat
why do you even care what america does to its own people? You dont even live here? what difference does it make to you? You are like a petty loser who can’t get over a girl who dumps them..””
There is that 12 year old again. Even the poor punctuation and spelling of an uneducated third grader. I guess you can relate to a loser. I never had a girl dump me. lol
I do have family and friends there. You are a poster child for the Us brainwashing sucess.
Osama said the Us would be brought down, not from external foes but by their own citizens. He was so correct!
(Yes, I said OSAMA not OBAMA. Full name: Osama ibn Mohammed ibn Awad ibn Laden or سامة بن محمد بن عوض بن لادن) WIKI
Davy on Mon, 30th Jul 2018 4:43 am
“I bet my left one that millions of patriotic Americans fly the US flag out of the front of their abodes still?”
Yea, so what? Is it bad to be mildly patriotic instead of apathetic like you Anglos? I mean you guys hate yourselves and that is why you hate us.
“So please don’t lie about how self-critical you can be Davy? If you were honest about your word, then you certainly would not cop any flack from me and probably the majority of other international posters.”
AH, dumba, this is an American critical place with both content and emotion. It is the many Anglos, Europeans, and the old liberal American hating Americans that turn it into an anti-American tabloid. Yea then there is Billy 3rd world who is in a mental case all his own.
“In fact, I would see you as a genuine underdog. But time after time I have asked you the most straightforward questions about the atrocities that America has committed, but you REFUSE to answer the question and go back humming stars and stripes while you iron your flag(s).”
Worn out and redundant regurgitate dumba. I admit to American atrocities and crimes against humanity. I want The US to become multipolar in political attitude and with a corresponding reduction in military activity. This is not going to happen overnight even if it were to happen and one thing preventing it is other bad state actors. I dare you to google this board and show where I am proud of the American so called collateral damage which in reality is often just murder.
“At least be honest and just come out and say how you think that you live in the greatest nation on earth.”
Come on and quit it dumba. That is what you want to think but again show me the evidence. Where have I come out and bragged about the US. You rabid anti-Americans cannot accept any balance and objectivity. I can’t come in with a response that mitigates this emotional sickness you numb nuts virulent anti-Americans have. With you extremists it is all or nothing. It is like this hate yourself or we hate you. Dumba, you are among the worst of all of them being a loud mouth kid that is not very accurate or intelligent with any of your comments.
I have been honest with you.
Liar, you are pumping the topic trying to perjure me
“Australia mines many toxic chemicals (especially uranium oxide). Our carbon footprint per capita is disgusting. We could be world leaders in solar, but our politicians are mainly baby boomers, and I have a sneaking suspicion that they figure that the world will survive long enough for it to become someone else’s problem.”
More age class hate mentality with stupidity to match. First this is a globalized world that has self-evolved into the industrial civilization we have become. You don’t stop this activity overnight. We just come to realize in the last decades how bad our footprint is on all levels. Solar is not going to save you dumba. The problem is human nature and your age class has some of the worst behavior I have seen. You are a prime example. You play the whine, blame and complain game. Nothing heroic about that, just dumb and emotional
“So the well-worn argument of “they never hold a mirror to their own countries” is just that, well-worn and total bullshit. And until of us become critical of first world practices that are destroying the planet then NOTHING positive is going to come from pointing fingers.”
I stand by that comment. You virulent anti-American rarely look in the mirror. You spend the majority of your time pointing your grubby fingers our way. In your case you try to act like you don’t which is even worse because you are playing games. You are trying real hard to be objective not to be objective but to give the appearance of objectivity so you can make a stronger point.
Davy on Mon, 30th Jul 2018 4:46 am
“Osama said the Us would be brought down, not from external foes but by their own citizens. He was so correct!”
Got a reference for that billy 3rd world?