No Muchness like Suchness

“What I want, I haven’t got. What I need is all around me.”
Dave Mathews from his song “Warehouse”

When we were children our delight was ignited by the simplest things. Joy was our natural state. We were empathetic. If others were happy we laughed out loud. If others suffered it saddened us. We didn’t repress our emotions, nor did we cling to them. We were simple, vulnerable and beautiful. Rows of ducklings bobbing on the waves of wonder. We were It. No worries, No agendas. No identity crises. We were aliveness and that was enough.

But we were also born into a world of hucksterism. into an economy based on hype, a world where promoters of every stripe sing their jingles and puff their slogans, where gurus chant their chants, and televangelists perform their prayers and sell their prayer cloths, and politicos make their reluctant but resolute declarations of war in hopes of drumming up a few more guilders for their corporate sponsors.

And if business interests exaggerate the importance of their product, and make the patsies lose their shirts or their lives, well, get a grip, that’s just life in the big city. You gotta crack a few eggs if you want to make an omelet. An’, sure, perhaps a few more of your eggs got cracked than mine, but, hey, look, that’s just the way the cookie crumbles And granted I may have gotten to eat almost all the omelet myself (Here, I saved you some toast.), but still, it’s nobody’s fault. Hey, Ken Lay didn’t know, alright? It’s all about market forces anyway. Darwin did it.

In other words we live in a world in which the dominant inhabitants have an extraordinary capacity to justify anything to others and to themselves. This makes them capable of anything. (Because their amazing ability to swallow their own guff renders them incapable of knowing just what the hell they wrought at any given time.)

And so, sadly, those sweet little ducklings we spoke of earlier, the children of the world, are the first and freshest game in their crosshairs because the very young are among the easiest to twist into the desired shape, like little pipe cleaners. Hey, it is not insidious. It’s business. American as apple pie. Just remember, as the makers of Barbie accessories and the tobacco companies have always said, “Program ‘em early and you got ‘em for life.”

Show them cartoons full of action (read; violence) in a way that confuses where the program ends and the ad for the action figure begins. Depict peer-aged children having ecstatic fun with the amazing robot that flies and knocks down walls on the show. Maybe the toy can do that too. Hey, Mommy, I want that! And, as easy as shootin' fish in a barrel, the “the nag factor” has been “installed”.

Twenty years later when the grown kid’s watching a TV program that’s still little more than a half-hour ad— home makeover, car makeover, face makeover— it's no longer enough to simply be “aliveness” any more. Aliveness has long ago become unbearable without a latest animated movie hero figurine from the local Mac Donald’s, or the $100 Nike’s or liposuction as seen on “The Swan”. Unconditional happiness is robbed from us by the hucksters of the world so they can sell it back to us wrapped in crinkly cellophane. Only their scale model replica of happiness is far from unconditional. Read the limited warranty.

If I were the devil and I didn’t have the personal power to destroy God’s little masterpiece, the Earth, what would my Plan B be? I’d get mankind to destroy the accursed little planet for me. But how would I get man to destroy himself along with his world, all for my amusement? I’d make him stupid and needy knowing how volatile that combination of neuroses can be.

If I were the devil, I’d have power hungry men directing billions of dollars and man-hours toward the purpose of fogging men’s minds. Suppressing any news or perceptions that might counter the ad blitz for Moore & Moore and More! International. Fogging men’s minds would be essential because as Richard Heinberg, the author of The Party’s Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Society said, “Reality is bad for business.” I’d teach that neediness makes the world go round.

I’d disguise stupidity as virtue, thoughtfulness as cowardly, and might as self-evidence of righteousness. I’d get control of the airwaves and beam, Paris Hilton, Jerry Springer, Bill O’Reilly and Entertainment Tonight out there 24/7, wall-to-wall, coast-to-coast, sun up to midnight to prove my point.

Fog their minds so they think the pursuit of bling-bling is the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness as opposed to its antithesis— slavery through induced obsession disorder. Get them to think that worth is measured not by the things you create but by what you consume. Get nations to think that if they want prosperity they have to breed greed round the world. Advocate global rule by market forces. Inflate half-truths to the preponderance of natural laws. Like that monstrous unwritten law that says that real Americans are supposed to live as large as possible.

Creature comforts (as opposed to the comfort of creatures) has become our prime directive as was expressed so forcefully by President George H. W. Bush when he told the ’92 Earth Summit in Brazil flat out, “The American way of life is not up for negotiation.” Ah, the American Lifestyle. Hallowed be thy name. As our magnificent traffic jam of Cadillac Escalades heads like a serpentine pageant into the orange haze of all the tomorrows to come, we sing a tear-streaked anthem to lies, libertines, and the pursuit of sappiness.

So how do we come off it? Stop letting our destiny be defined by a few big shots with weak ideas and wizened hearts? First we need to pursue our happiness someplace besides the aisles of Abercrombie and Fitch. Want possessions? How about trying to take possession of the most priceless commodities of all— our senses. Once we do that, we’ll be able to take stock of what we really have. We have to take possession of the gift of sight, sound, touch, taste, smell and then we can have a chance at the universe those capacities can get us in touch with— and when you have the Cosmos, you don’t need Beanie Babies. Stop trading treasure for trinkets. The world is already your oyster. Slurp up those Omega 3s and spit out the pearl (before you choke on it)! (Next time— "Suchness II")