Friday, November 21, 2008
Markets in free fall, bad news on bad news?
The stock markets keep falling even as experts wanted to say that we already hit the bottom. So is it the end of the world?
No, it's the beginning of a new one.
You can consider my previous rant about why I hate capitalism, which I patriotically and presciently posted on the 4th of July before the market blowouts of September. Or just consider this:
The world wide recession is a time to be hopeful, because it's a time for the realignment of values. Just because markets and market driven consumption are down, does that mean that human needs are any less? No, they're greater than ever, as world hunger and environmental degredation and local wars make people suffer. So then maybe, it means that the abilities to work and produce are diminished? No, factories and resources and labor and skills didn't just disappear. In fact people want their jobs more than ever now, and the capacities for production were at their highest levels in history to feed the demands of an overheated global economy.
So what is in recession, what has deflated and collapsed? That which has failed and failed us all, is a system of incentivizing work for the pursuit of money rather than the value of services as truly needed. We got warehouses bursting with half-assed toxic crap looking for buyers, instead of sustainable products, nutritious food, and fair housing. So it's about time a system like that collapsed, because it was killing everything on this planet. People were encouraged to do anything no matter how poisonous, take any shortcuts no matter how inhumane, as long as it made cash. Death and destruction were chalked up to progress, collateral damage that market forces could sort out later. The worst side of humanity was running amok, and we can rejoice that it stopped before we were all dead.
Now is the time for a new entrepreneurism to flourish. Think outside the box that says if it doesn't make money, don't do it, you'll die. Trust in a greater system, call it goodness or God or Gaia or whatever you like. There's a reason why everyone is where they are, with the needs and the talents and resources they have. Can you imagine that needs are not burdens but gifts? That's right, the needy are assets, golden opportunities, and not because they represent markets to be exploited, but because we are changed to serve them. Individually and collectively, we become smarter, wiser, stronger, more loving and kind - in short, more on the side of God - the more we attend to the neediest among us. "Give to the poor and you'll have treasure in heaven" is not old self-abandoning altruism, but new market strategy for the sustainable economy. Investing in the right motives and methods today will yield endless bounty in the world without end.
Talk about busting the old paradigm. In the old way of doing things, the less open needs you had, the more you were invulnerable and strong and positioned to accumulate wealth and power. People with too many needs were hopeless, useless, let them fade away Darwinian style. In the new way of doing things, needs are to be treasured, for in denial of them we were drifting and prone to big ego scams. Needs are compasses, pointing us and motivating us in the direction of new friends and opportunities. And most important to imagine is the guarantee that every need, from personal to global, will be fulfilled in good time when we just take our cues from honest living, step by faithful step. The patience and courage required go beyond scientific awe for nature, since even nature can be cruel. But it is the spiritual promise that can be seen in the best of natural harmonies, symbioses, and synergies.
As if we had a choice of faiths? In the old godless system, money never guaranteed anything. Some of the most twisted and insecure people in the world had more money than they knew how to spend, it did nothing for them, they could only fiddle while Rome burned. Predicating the exchange of goods and services on money alone made poor people starve, rich people crazy, and "average" people miserable as they crammed themselves into the Procrustean beds of the jobs that had paychecks attached. Talents and needs, happiness and health, security and future, all took a backseat to the pursuit of money, from where to get it fastest to the hottest latest shit it could buy.
What can you really do, what do you really need, who are you really positioned to help and be helped by? As people are forced to answer those questions in the worldwide recession, yes certainly, the sales of SUVs and trinkets and super-size me portions of crap are plunging. Thank God.
I'd say we hit bottom already, because there's nowhere to go but up. The down market isn't telling the real story, because it never has. Bailouts, deficit spending, debt forgiveness, charity and more, these will make us richer not poorer now, if our priorities are at long last redefined in the process. Retool ourselves along with the economy, consume frugally and give generously, be honest about where we were headed and where we need to go, and we'll at long last become the human beings with instrinsic, not market, value for all.
No, it's the beginning of a new one.
You can consider my previous rant about why I hate capitalism, which I patriotically and presciently posted on the 4th of July before the market blowouts of September. Or just consider this:
The world wide recession is a time to be hopeful, because it's a time for the realignment of values. Just because markets and market driven consumption are down, does that mean that human needs are any less? No, they're greater than ever, as world hunger and environmental degredation and local wars make people suffer. So then maybe, it means that the abilities to work and produce are diminished? No, factories and resources and labor and skills didn't just disappear. In fact people want their jobs more than ever now, and the capacities for production were at their highest levels in history to feed the demands of an overheated global economy.
So what is in recession, what has deflated and collapsed? That which has failed and failed us all, is a system of incentivizing work for the pursuit of money rather than the value of services as truly needed. We got warehouses bursting with half-assed toxic crap looking for buyers, instead of sustainable products, nutritious food, and fair housing. So it's about time a system like that collapsed, because it was killing everything on this planet. People were encouraged to do anything no matter how poisonous, take any shortcuts no matter how inhumane, as long as it made cash. Death and destruction were chalked up to progress, collateral damage that market forces could sort out later. The worst side of humanity was running amok, and we can rejoice that it stopped before we were all dead.
Now is the time for a new entrepreneurism to flourish. Think outside the box that says if it doesn't make money, don't do it, you'll die. Trust in a greater system, call it goodness or God or Gaia or whatever you like. There's a reason why everyone is where they are, with the needs and the talents and resources they have. Can you imagine that needs are not burdens but gifts? That's right, the needy are assets, golden opportunities, and not because they represent markets to be exploited, but because we are changed to serve them. Individually and collectively, we become smarter, wiser, stronger, more loving and kind - in short, more on the side of God - the more we attend to the neediest among us. "Give to the poor and you'll have treasure in heaven" is not old self-abandoning altruism, but new market strategy for the sustainable economy. Investing in the right motives and methods today will yield endless bounty in the world without end.
Talk about busting the old paradigm. In the old way of doing things, the less open needs you had, the more you were invulnerable and strong and positioned to accumulate wealth and power. People with too many needs were hopeless, useless, let them fade away Darwinian style. In the new way of doing things, needs are to be treasured, for in denial of them we were drifting and prone to big ego scams. Needs are compasses, pointing us and motivating us in the direction of new friends and opportunities. And most important to imagine is the guarantee that every need, from personal to global, will be fulfilled in good time when we just take our cues from honest living, step by faithful step. The patience and courage required go beyond scientific awe for nature, since even nature can be cruel. But it is the spiritual promise that can be seen in the best of natural harmonies, symbioses, and synergies.
As if we had a choice of faiths? In the old godless system, money never guaranteed anything. Some of the most twisted and insecure people in the world had more money than they knew how to spend, it did nothing for them, they could only fiddle while Rome burned. Predicating the exchange of goods and services on money alone made poor people starve, rich people crazy, and "average" people miserable as they crammed themselves into the Procrustean beds of the jobs that had paychecks attached. Talents and needs, happiness and health, security and future, all took a backseat to the pursuit of money, from where to get it fastest to the hottest latest shit it could buy.
What can you really do, what do you really need, who are you really positioned to help and be helped by? As people are forced to answer those questions in the worldwide recession, yes certainly, the sales of SUVs and trinkets and super-size me portions of crap are plunging. Thank God.
I'd say we hit bottom already, because there's nowhere to go but up. The down market isn't telling the real story, because it never has. Bailouts, deficit spending, debt forgiveness, charity and more, these will make us richer not poorer now, if our priorities are at long last redefined in the process. Retool ourselves along with the economy, consume frugally and give generously, be honest about where we were headed and where we need to go, and we'll at long last become the human beings with instrinsic, not market, value for all.
