A crucial aspect of Democracy - the rule of the people, is "what do The People want"?
But what if you could control what people want?What most people really want, at least at the most basic level, is Health & Happiness. If people were made sick, they'd want health. If they were unhappy, they'd want happiness.
Our world, comprised of the range of poor to affluent, currently suffers from a severe lack of both health and happiness. The poor are sick, if not from disease, then from malnutrition (especially proteins). The affluent are sick too - with rising statistics for cancer, heart and mental diseases which cannot be ignored. Westerners are getting fatter and are already losing their ability to walk healthily and normally at advanced ages due to their lifestyle.
Happiness is certainly linked to health since we cannot imagine being sick and happy. But happiness is certainly not linked to material wealth because if that were true, then most of the western world would lead a peaceful existence. When it comes to "underdeveloped countries", we see a clear pattern of exploitation by richer countries. In the past this kind of exploitation was achieved solely by force, as with any conquest of "colonies". Today, the exploitation is masked by economics. We are all aware of the low pay and poor conditions of the common Chinese worker but choose to ignore it. So, certainly our behavior, as a mass, contributes to other people's unhappiness. But let's look at our own happiness.
Here's a truth - when we are happy, we don't want anything. An extreme example is the orgasm. An experience which leaves us wanting nothing (at least for a while). But look at all the really happy times of your life... how much shopping was involved? Not much.
Then how is it that the modernized and developed world is driven by consumerism and profitability instead of the search for healthier and happier lifestyles? How have 2 pillars of our existence been demolished?
I believe it is due to the hijacking of Democracy by greed.
Health hijacked - When I studied Economics at TAU we were given various theories to prove or disprove, but all worked under the same axiom: The corporation's goal is to maximize profits. No one ever questioned this axiom and no ever talked about morality as any guideline for economic activity. The very word Economics contains the word Eco (meaning 'House') and we also worked under the assumption that the market (our 'house') is ruled by 'forces', of which consumers were independent choice makers. Well. we can now see that this 'house' is ruled by the powerfully rich. Our choices, our health and our welfare as consumers are not taken into account. What is taken into account is the maximization of profit. The profitability of medical research determines all of medicine. Governments are not impervious to economic considerations vs general welfare - a case in point is the
American Private Health Care system which is only now being brought to question by the Obama administration. When comparing technologies we must acknowledge that Medicine's progress in curing chronic illnesses, compared to to other fields, is seriously behind. It would seem pure evil and inconceivable that anyone, from drug companies to doctors and legislatures, would conspire to 'not cure' but 'treat'. The current reality when it comes to chronic illnesses such as cancer and mental sickness is that the majority of the sick are not cured - in the sense of "gone and forgotten", but put on medical drugs 'ad mortem'. If the intention of medicine is to cure, how have we gotten to a place where the result is an endless treatment process?
Another indication that all is not kosher with the powers that be is the disappearance of herbal medicine from medical cosmology. Herbs have been used widely and successfully through the ages, up to the twentieth century. I am standing at the door to the 21st century and ask myself, where have all the plants gone? The evidence for curing with plants is overwhelming, so why did the modern sick man abandon this avenue of cure? Because we have been indoctrinated by doctors, who prescribe medicines that they learned about in medical schools. We are also indoctrinated into believing it is best to leave our health to 'experts'. We no longer feel personal responsibility for our health, but rely on medicine and science to 'fix' us when we break down. If we do not need to concern ourselves with how to stay healthy, we lose old knowledge but more than that - we lose touch with our inner sense. Many people live with constant 'discomforts' which are really sicknesses, just because they lost their ability to make sense of what their body is signaling. Our dulled inner senses signal danger to our consciousness only when we can no longer function properly (which usually means 'going to work'). But we have to admit that we were willing partners in this game, if at least for the fact that we didn't 'see it coming'. I wonder how much of today's youth's overuse of drugs can be linked to their parent's generation embracing the medical drug culture, which really took off in the fifties and sixties.
"Let thy food be thy medicine" - Hyppocrates. Looking at a growing body of research shows increased links between nutrition and health. Yet it seems that while food is abundant in the west, we seem to consume foods that are detrimental to our health. Proteins, starch and carbs are consumed in unproportionate amounts to vegetables, fruits and lentils. Our food is being genetically modified with astonishing speed and with almost nonexistent research into the long term effects. What may be the effect on our immune system? On new food toxins? On allergies? We can point the finger at the various food industries, which promote sweets, snacks, soft drinks and increased food consumption. We can blame the media for becoming a conduit for temptation campaigns, but it is only because we shifted responsibility from ourselves to others.
These were two examples of how our health was hijacked and with it part of any democracy. Now our health depends not on our own robustness, food intake, lifestyle and other free choices but on a medical industry and a food industry which perform a far from an exemplary job, in my opinion.
Our reality has been superimposed with several other realities that shape our perceptions. These promoted relinquishing our control over our health and our core values to advertisers who TELL us what we should want, both in terms of health and in terms of being happy.
If we all want, in essence, to be healthy and happy (or at least not stressed and distracted) and we are not - as a majority of the population - haven't our governments failed us? In allowing large and powerful corporations to shape our ideas, feelings and desires, has not democracy failed us? If we ask ourselves "did we want this?"... to work so much, to see less and less of our children, to suffer from health problems brought in by a polluting industrialized world - and the answer is "No", then someone is screwing with us. George Carlin put it nicely
here.
It is perfectly in our power (at least for now) to evade the wide net of the superimposed realities and it's a Two-Step dance - First recognizing the unreal then shifting our gaze. When you want to go somewhere, you first turn your head, then the rest of the body follows. We can turn our attention to reacquaint ourselves with our inner world of sensations and feelings and the outer world that lies in every direction but the consumer driven society. What we can gain is a clearer understanding of what is truly beneficial to us and a freedom to walk that road.
I was looking for a quote about 'technology' and started out by typing "technology is" in the search bar. The search bar made some suggestions -
