This documentary by recently deceased filmaker Aaron Russo crysallized some fears of ours concerning the abuses of big capital and our public government. Essentially, the documentary tracks exactly how economic forces have warped and perverted how our government operates and what it does. Guess who suffers?
There's some really shocking stuff here and the arguments are very persusasive. Many of the legal cases cited are public record and easily verifiable. It's truly scary! Mainly, the documentary tracks specific abuses of power which are perpetuated to maintain the ever increasing distance between the rich and the poor. One of the most disturbing is how the Federal Reserve system was created. Did you know it's a private institution beholden to a group of unnamed banking clans? Did you know that it is this private organization (and not our own government) who mints the money? Did you know that there has not been an accounting of the bullion in Fort Knox, leaving many to believe that there isn't gold backing to our dollars. Think about that for a second!
Russo makes a good point: as individuals we used to have autonomy, privacy, and tangible assets. Now we live in a semi-police state which can take your assets at any time, which will spy on you if it wants (this is legal!), and which wants you to become mired and dependent. The new national ID card coming in May 2008 is one of many attempts to localize our identities in very easy to track databases where every single financial transaction can be monitored and controlled. What's scary about this is that given the electronic nature of how money circulates, it's very possible that undesirables could be X'd from the system if they irritate the wrong people. Sounds a little like Revelations to me!
But beyond the worst case scenerios, the documentary argues persuasively what happens when money and power are centered in elitist and unaccountable agencies. And it ain't good for the rest of us!
9/13/2007
9/09/2007
Let's Be Idle!
“In Praise of Idleness” By Bertrand Russell
Now before you go out and buy yourself a Lazyboy chair with refrigerated, beer holding armflaps, know that Russell demands we actually DO something worthwhile with our time!
I bought a book called Why Work? at a used bookstore in Asheville, NC one weekend. It’s a real gem: it’s a collection of essays about work, capitalism, and consumerism. The introductory essay is called “In Praise of Idleness” written by philosopher Bertrand Russell, originally published in Harper’s Magazine in 1932. I’d like to take a few moments to summarize his argument below.
Russell begins by explaining that there are three classes: the first works, the second works mostly by telling the first what to do, and the third lives by owning land and capital, forcing the others to pay him while he does just about absolutely nothing. Although this creates a space for leisure, it is not desirable. See below.
Essentially, according to Russell, the history of man up until the Industrial Revolution has been one whereby the peasant class has worked just enough to be able to subsist. Any surplus has gone to the warrior and priest class. Russell states that the peasant class—to further perpetuate the idleness of the warriors and priests—is fed a certain amount of ideological persuasion in the form of the value and benefit of WORK (or toil). This justifies the peasant’s suffering while others idle. He can comfort himself with the knowledge he is being ethical. It is his duty to work hard. This has been the primary economic situation for just about all of pre-industrial history. As Russell states, “The conception of duty, speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own” (26). The peasants toil, and the warrior and priest classes leisure.
Here’s the rub: a civilization actually NEEDS a certain amount of leisure to advance itself. As Russell states, Athenian slave owners used their time in a way which would not have been possible without slaves. It opened up time for philosophy, the arts, and debate, all at the expense of a toiling, suffering working class. But certainly this state of affairs is not desirable. What to do?
Answer: “By the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world” (27). Because of modern technology, we are able to produce more by working less, so why don’t we work less? The answer to that is above: our pre-industrial attitudes about work persist. We MUST work because it is our duty to our nation and our government. To add to Russell’s explanation one might add we work to continue the consumption cycle that we have unwittingly entered into. Our desires immediately fill any kind of surplus state that is opened up when we make more money. We make more money; we expand, stretching ourselves like some monstrous balloon.
Russell proposes: “If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment—assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization” (28-29). “Moving matter about” just isn’t the point to our lives, argues Russell. It is unjust that so few should idle while so many toil. It is also less productive, paradoxically.
If we worked less, we would become more active. Russell states that the reason we are so passive in our leisurely pursuits is that we are so drained and active during our work. If we worked less, we could be more active in our leisure pursuits, pursuing all forms of leisure which make a civilization civilized; after all, it was the leisure class which “cultivated the arts and discovered the sciences; it wrote the books, invented the philosophies, and refined social relations. Even the liberation of the oppressed has usually been inaugurated [by the leisure class]” (33).
Above all, an individual could be more happy and joyful, leading interesting, fulfilling lives instead of dreary, depressing ones.
To put it simply: To be idle is to have the freedom to work hard at what makes us most human.
Works Cited
Russell, Bertrand. “In Praise of Idleness.” Why Work? London: Aldgate Press, 1983.
25-32.
Now before you go out and buy yourself a Lazyboy chair with refrigerated, beer holding armflaps, know that Russell demands we actually DO something worthwhile with our time!
I bought a book called Why Work? at a used bookstore in Asheville, NC one weekend. It’s a real gem: it’s a collection of essays about work, capitalism, and consumerism. The introductory essay is called “In Praise of Idleness” written by philosopher Bertrand Russell, originally published in Harper’s Magazine in 1932. I’d like to take a few moments to summarize his argument below.
Russell begins by explaining that there are three classes: the first works, the second works mostly by telling the first what to do, and the third lives by owning land and capital, forcing the others to pay him while he does just about absolutely nothing. Although this creates a space for leisure, it is not desirable. See below.
Essentially, according to Russell, the history of man up until the Industrial Revolution has been one whereby the peasant class has worked just enough to be able to subsist. Any surplus has gone to the warrior and priest class. Russell states that the peasant class—to further perpetuate the idleness of the warriors and priests—is fed a certain amount of ideological persuasion in the form of the value and benefit of WORK (or toil). This justifies the peasant’s suffering while others idle. He can comfort himself with the knowledge he is being ethical. It is his duty to work hard. This has been the primary economic situation for just about all of pre-industrial history. As Russell states, “The conception of duty, speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own” (26). The peasants toil, and the warrior and priest classes leisure.
Here’s the rub: a civilization actually NEEDS a certain amount of leisure to advance itself. As Russell states, Athenian slave owners used their time in a way which would not have been possible without slaves. It opened up time for philosophy, the arts, and debate, all at the expense of a toiling, suffering working class. But certainly this state of affairs is not desirable. What to do?
Answer: “By the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world” (27). Because of modern technology, we are able to produce more by working less, so why don’t we work less? The answer to that is above: our pre-industrial attitudes about work persist. We MUST work because it is our duty to our nation and our government. To add to Russell’s explanation one might add we work to continue the consumption cycle that we have unwittingly entered into. Our desires immediately fill any kind of surplus state that is opened up when we make more money. We make more money; we expand, stretching ourselves like some monstrous balloon.
Russell proposes: “If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment—assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organization” (28-29). “Moving matter about” just isn’t the point to our lives, argues Russell. It is unjust that so few should idle while so many toil. It is also less productive, paradoxically.
If we worked less, we would become more active. Russell states that the reason we are so passive in our leisurely pursuits is that we are so drained and active during our work. If we worked less, we could be more active in our leisure pursuits, pursuing all forms of leisure which make a civilization civilized; after all, it was the leisure class which “cultivated the arts and discovered the sciences; it wrote the books, invented the philosophies, and refined social relations. Even the liberation of the oppressed has usually been inaugurated [by the leisure class]” (33).
Above all, an individual could be more happy and joyful, leading interesting, fulfilling lives instead of dreary, depressing ones.
To put it simply: To be idle is to have the freedom to work hard at what makes us most human.
Works Cited
Russell, Bertrand. “In Praise of Idleness.” Why Work? London: Aldgate Press, 1983.
25-32.
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