In the deep clutches of Wetiko
We live in a world where migrating out of the periphery to escape imperial plunder is a crime, but systematically plundering the periphery is considered perfectly normal and legitimate. Jason Hickel
My heart breaks at the injustice.
It is everywhere. Not just at the periphery. It is coming for those once considered middle class.
In Australia, those who have worked for decades and given their all receive a wage increase that only covers inflation while simultaneously having ten days cut from their annual holidays. This is so the private company can make more money, the owners boasting of their financial acumen—as if robbing people blind is to be applauded. Tragically, in many places, it is. The owner of this business moves into their 25 million mansion this week.
This is capitalism.
It is a machine that requires endless growth on a finite planet, scraping its profits off the backs of humans, or consuming ever more resources from our home planet.
The next step is to commodify nature. Wall Street attempted to do this in 2023, applying to establish a list of Natural Asset Companies (NACs) that would hold the rights to ecosystem services, which they valued at $5,000 trillion. Fortunately, it was rejected.
But as the people of Britain know, commodifying water ends in disaster. Just as commodifying age, health and child care.
Profits are more important than humans, than life itself.
We are indeed a very sick society, celebrating and measuring the wrong things.
The indigenous people of the Americas called this illness Wetiko.
It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted in a profoundly sick society. Krishnamurti
Photo Taken June 19th 2024
