Hello Love!
If you missed it, please go and read PART ONE of this post.
Now on to today!
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We Live In A Virtual Reality
In our world today, goods, services and all other consumable items are sold to us based on what they REPRESENT.
Since the turn of the century, those who own the means of production, those who DEPEND upon ‘our’ labor to produce the goods and then depend on our paychecks to sell the goods, have been selling us their wares based on what they MEAN about us.
We’re not just eating to sustain our bodies, dressing to stay warm, living in homes to stay out of the elements. We’re not just working to have money to pay for electricity and some leisure time. We’re not socializing just to have companions for companions sake.
Rather we’ve all been born into a system where what you wear, what you look like, the job you have and most of what you do in a day is a part of a greater SYSTEM - it’s all a part of where you FIT into SOCIETY and where you fit in society determines the level of access, power, privilege and safety you’re going to have.
Our system is pay to play.
We’re also CONSTANTLY being sold the idea that the wealthier you are, the BETTER your life is.
The better YOU are as a person.
We have so deeply tied wealth with respectability and value, that we all agree to continue to participate in a system where those who have the most hoard for themselves, leaving those who have the least to literally suffer needlessly. It’s now just common place that people of lower means are going to be treated differently by society - and this treatment literally has NOTHING to do with their personality, their aptitude, their courage, their way of being - it’s all down to money. Can you pay to play? If not, you’re a tool to be exploited to make the wealthy wealthier.
Because that’s how wealth was generated in the first place, and how wealth has always been generated. Wealth was created via the exploitation of the working class - ie. paying them LOWER wages than the actual VALUE they produced in terms of creating goods and services - while artificially increasing the prices of said goods and services - because people will pay what they need to pay in order to have what they need to live - so that there was a surplus of wealth that could then be hoarded by those who owned the means of production.
Amazon and their cruel working conditions isn’t a new thing. It’s THE system, not an offshoot of it.
It’s an indisputable fact that in our current time, we have enough to provide a decent standard of life for every citizen living in a ‘Westernized’ country. We have enough understanding, infrastructure, technology and capacity to distribute that we could easily house all our homeless, take care of our ill and elderly, support those who don’t have the capacity to work ‘high level jobs’ and to give everyone - regardless of the job they work - a livable wage. We have enough that we could be supporting developing nations in their quest to lift their citizens out of poverty through help with medicine, infrastructure, education and other technologies.
We COULD easily create an equitable society where no one needs to get left behind.
But we don’t. We don’t even come CLOSE to this ideal in many nations.
Rather we have those who own the means of production (who, at this point, own because they INHERITED what they have, or because they were deeply invested in by parents/society and given LOTS of opportunity to succeed in the system, not because they earned it through simple hard work and dedication) and those who are invested in the companies that provide for us our food, shelter, power, transportation, medicine, education and entertainment, hoarding EXTREME wealth, those who sit in high level management positions and those who are used as ‘monkey’s’ to keep the system turning hoarding loads of wealth, and essentially everyone else scrambling to keep their heads above water or failing to do so.
We have a system where those who were BORN into positions of access and privilege stay there, and everyone else continues to work and live as though ‘getting to those top tiers’ is a possibility for everyone, and as though being in those top tiers is a sign of inherent goodness.
We have a system where we’re all convinced that this is how the system should be - and the only ‘problem’ is the position we occupy within the system. We’re not considering that perhaps it’s the SYSTEM that’s messed up.
We also have a system where it’s objectively true that the higher on the wealth scale you find yourself, the more you’re going to have access to things that soothe our existential dread - healthcare, clean food and water, community and safety, the more you’re going to have access to those things that allow you to continue leveling up like access, education and opportunity and the more you’re going to have LUXURY - the ability to enjoy yourself and your life because you have a life that goes beyond safety.
So we continue to live in a way that allows for those at the top to hoard, and that keeps us feeling like we too could be like them, and that being like them is something to strive for.
Why?
Because we’ve been convinced.
We’re being TOLD that our system is one based on merit, hard work, determination and ‘doing good.’ We’re told that anyone who puts their mind to it can achieve a level of ‘success’ - and by success what we REALLY mean is again, access to those things that not only sustain our lives, but that bring luxury and pleasure to our lives as well.
We’re being told that to be in these positions of access, wealth and power is a GOOD THING. We’re being told that these positions of power and wealth SHOULD exist - that there should be people who have as much as these people have, who wield as much power as these people wield.
Some of us believe that if we suffer, if we don’t have what we need, it’s purely because we aren’t trying hard enough. We believe WE are failing on some level, and we keep buying into the narrative that society is ‘fair’ and that the cream is simply rising to the top.
Others look around and see that our system is messed up. They see the pain, they see the corruption at these high levels that is trickling down to destroy our ecosystems, that are destroying and taking advantage of large groups of people, that are deliberately disenfranchised groups of people in order that they can be exploited and used for even more profit - and we’re upset that the ‘people in power’ are just the ‘wrong people.’ There’s an awareness that society should be another way, but the onus is being placed on those at the top being ‘better’.
It appears that very few (acknowledging that the number is steadily increasing) are seeing that it is the system ITSELF that is corrupted and needs to be changed.
Influencers Are Capitalizing On Toxic Capitalism - Not Breaking Us Out Of It
Very few are seeing this because again, we all have that existential dread and fear that makes us vulnerable to the promises of our capitalist society.
We all have the same human vulnerabilities that leave us powerless in many ways against those who control the means of production.
We all have the same need to feel safe via inclusion in a group - to feel like we’re going to be helped and protected if we’re in need and to feel like we belong.
We all have the same desire to permanently escape suffering - and we’re constantly being sold the idea that WEALTH will do this.
We’re constantly being sold the idea that to have excess is to have safety, community, access to that which eases suffering and access to that which provides pleasure.
We have so many people who are in positions of truly having not enough, that to fight against the system is essentially futile. They don’t have the time, energy or resources to ask those with such immense power to be kinder.
We then have many, many people who DO have enough - but still don’t FEEL like they have enough. Our culture is INCREDIBLY skilled at creating manufactured insecurity via ever changing trends, ever changing ideas of what is a ‘good’ way to look, act, speak, work, dress and so on, and it’s so good at preying on our very human, existential fears as a way of selling us more things and keeping us trapped in the rat race even when we COULD start to be part of creating a different and better system.
We all feel insecure, and we can all feel that our systems aren’t actually set up to support us.
But we’ve all been groomed to believe that our lives are a result of our work ethic, our effort, our choices and that if we want something different or better, that it’s up to US to change ourselves in order to create that better or different.
We’ve been groomed to believe that anyone who’s struggling is struggling due to some inherent lack in their character or flaw in their makeup.
We’ve been groomed to believe that any level of fear, insecurity, genuine lack or pain in our lives is something we can ‘fix’ if we just find the right product or service to remedy our problem. If we can just do enough work to earn enough money to afford said product or service.
In our capitalist society, the answer to ALL problems is MORE CAPITALISM. More producing, more consuming. To be a better producer or to be consuming the right things.
There’s very little, if any awareness around social support systems, systemic inequality, problems that can’t be solved by working more or consuming something.
We’ve all been convinced that perfect love, security, fulfillment and safety exists, that it exists through finding the ‘right’ way of producing (you know, finding your purpose/value/super power) and through being able to consume the right things.
This formula is the same for the high powered lawyer who’s trying to make themselves look successful by having all the latest name brand items as it is for the crunchy granola hippy who’s selling fermentation e-books from their shack in the middle of the jungle in Thailand.
We’re programmed to believe that love = security.
We’re programmed to believe that love = doing the right things so that you have access to the right things.
We’re programmed to believe that if we’re living our purpose we will have enough wealth to consume whatever we need to consume in order to feel FREE from all the things that scare humans the most - health issues, money issues, relationship issues and a general sense of impending doom over the fact that we aren’t in total control.
We continue to be groomed to believe the above, and with this our economy continues to sell us goods and services on the basis of their capacity to give us freedom from pain and suffering.
This is where the Influencer economy fits in.
Influencers earn their way onto our special media feeds via curating an image of living an ideal lifestyle.
They have ideal bodies, ideal relationships, live in ideal locations, have ideal diets - and the variety of what’s ‘ideal’ is literally endless.
There are influencers for every aesthetic, for every ‘rebellion’ from ‘normal’ culture, for every subgroup of people that are out there.
These influencers represent something very insidious.
The influencer economy runs on the fact that these people present a very curated existence to us.
These people always represent our most aspirational selves.
They represent who we hope to become, if we just do all the right producing and consuming.
They represent something that celebrities could never represent - an ATTAINABLE aspirational self.
(Almost) gone are the days where we believed we could be/look like actual celebrities. We now, for the most part, have an understanding that celebrities live a life that’s totally out of reach for most people. Their bodies, their relationships, their style - it’s all possible for THEM because, well, they’re incredibly wealthy. They have access to places and spaces we don’t. They have time we don’t have. They have support we don’t have.
We’re finally getting wise to the idea that we’re likely never going to have an ass like J-Lo or abs like Kelly. We’re not really lusting after the relationships of our stars because for the most part, we get to see all the divorces, cheating and scandals that are happening. We don’t really think we can have homes and kids and lawns like them.
But the influencer who’s got those plump gluts and that shiny glow of ‘perfect’ health? Who still has some cellulite but is a good 15 pounds lighter than the average woman? Who loves her imperfect partner and shows her sometimes messy bedroom?
We COULD TOTALLY be HER.
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Alright, one more break and we will finish this up next week!
<3
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