Phil Rockstroh: Regaining a Spirit of Defiance

[marmar]

from Consortium News:



Regaining a Spirit of Defiance
February 29, 2012

When kids scramble to buy the latest Nike running shoe, they’re mocked for their consumerism; yet, when Mitt Romney mentions his wife’s Cadillacs and other one-percenters tool around in their luxury autos, they’re admired for their success — a commentary on America’s crisis, writes Phil Rockstroh.

By Phil Rockstroh


The course of action taken by the present-day U.S. political class in addressing the era’s rising tide of economic hardship and ecological peril has proven as helpful as tossing an anvil to a drowning man.

The following two, axiomatic headlines reveal much about the dovetailing mindsets manifested by members of both the drowning class and the moral compass-bereft captains of the ship of state:

“Nike Foamposite Galaxy Shoe Spurs Frenzy At Malls” (Associated Press, Feb. 25, 2012)

“Mitt Romney: Wife Ann Drives ‘A Couple Of Cadillacs’” (The Washington Post, Feb. 24, 2012)

Inadvertently, Mr. Romney’s declaration, stated in his own blandly deranged way, captures the As Above/So Below nature of consumer-state psychology. By means of incessant, womb to tomb, commercial propaganda, the corporate class has promoted the idea that an individual’s identity is based solely on the sum total of his worldly possessions.

Yet, when young people, denied a decent education and stranded in circumstances where they have been deprived of a means to gain a sense of identity by acquiring the skills and the development of the talents necessary for the pursuit of their individual aspirations, have the temerity to reflect the societal values they have internalized — for example, by acting in an aggressive manner in a mindless pursuit of material items that they have been conditioned to believe will bestow a sense of self worth — then media elites and bamboozled bourgeois should not, as they can be counted on to do, react with consternation, carrying on as if these acts of desperation on the part of the young are wholly devoid of any cultural context. ..................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2012/02/29/regaining-a-spirit-of-defiance/