Surviving Capitalism (Not) : The Roots of White Anxiety

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Monday, July 19, 2010

The Roots of White Anxiety

from the NY Times.

In this editorial from the leading newspaper of record in the US we learn that educational institutions are being attacked by various groups who feel that they are being discriminating against. With an ever increasing concentration of economic ownership by a class whose only interest is increasing profits, we will continue to see outsourcing of jobs, greater use of technology to eliminate jobs, and increasing numbers of disposable workers especially in the West.

Thus we can expect that the class that benefits from this trend will use the old divide-and-conquer strategy against working people by encouraging greater inter-group rivalries and blame.

If one realizes that technology is a legacy created by many generations of working people, then it is easy to understand that it cannot be owned and managed by the 1%, and used for their benefit. If that labor saving technology were social property--as it should be, working people would only have to work about 20 hours a week to sustain a reasonably comfortable and sustainable lifestyle.