Opposite Sides of the Same Bad Coin

Remember the counter culture extremes of the '60's? Life without limits, restraints, controls or consequences. Free sex, free love, free drugs, and rock and roll with general disregard for the future. It may well have been a predictable reaction to both the 1950s with its McCarthyism as well as the technological and cultural determinism that lead to the travesty of the VietNam war. In the end, however, it was not very effective. It was a bad idea that promoted immature self-indulgence, greed and the I.Me over the We. It did not and could not work as envisioned. Perhaps because it was basically an unbalanced view of "reality".

Now, some 40 years latter, we have the business cultural extremes of the first decade of the 21st century -- last seen from 1890 - 1929. Free market capitalism without limits, restraints or controls and with the same general disregard for inconvenient consequences. It too is a bad idea that promotes immature self-indulgence, greed and the I.Me over the We. It is not working. It is showing us every day what a bad idea it is. Enron being but one example. It too is basically an unbalanced view of "reality".

Worse, the Bush team has now, with the internal logical consistency of their prior business excesses ala Cheney & Haliburton, brought this same no limits, no controls, no boundaries, no consequences dogma to our politics. This is producing yet more disasters. Iraq being chief amongst them. They will be remembered for the gift they are giving to the future.

Remember the Club of Rome Study: Limits to Growth? It was an arrow to the very heart of the business culture of no limits, restraints, controls or consequences. The very word "limits" was anathema. The Business community reacted to it, via the National Association of Manufactures et al, just the way they reacted to FDR's first Inaugural Address in 1933. FDR was reasserting the need for limits and controls after the country was put into a many year Depression by the excesses and zealotry of rampant free market capitalism without limits. This had to be countered by the NAM at any cost. So they hired Edward Bernays and hijacked the New York World's Fair of 1939 to trumpet the superiority of the Corporation. Bernays manipulated the Fair to give one message: The future would be brought to you by the almighty and benevolent corporation. And what a future they have created for us. See, for example, "An Inconvenient Truth".

For more on Bernays, The New York Worlds Fair, and much more, see the BBC series "The Century of the Self".

Abu Ghraib, torture, rendition, illegal spying, denial of science and global warming, etc are not anomalies. They are all of a piece. They are the logical approach of those who demand life, government and business without limits, restraints or controls with complete disregard for consequences. The triumph of the I and ME over all else at any cost.

The irony is the 60's extreme counter culture leaders and today's extreme business culture leaders hate each other while they embrace so many of the same values integral to a Life without limits, restraints, controls or consequences.

Is it any wonder that neither group has found a way to fix the war zone in Detroit? Much less address the impending global consequences of de-stabilizing the biosphere?

Posted by Jock Gill at June 29, 2006 11:05 AM | TrackBack