True story. When I was working at the supermarket - this was back around 1978 - the manager used to sometimes come into the breakroom and check receipts for whoever was eating something from the supermarket. One time, a kid was munching on a bag of M&Ms and the manager asked him for his receipt. When he couldn't produce one, the manager grabbed him by the earlobe in front of the whole bunch of us and led him out of the breakroom and out of the store, never to return again. Meanwhile, all the rest of us are white as ghosts, frantically checking our pockets to make sure we had our receipts. Those were different days. These days, the kid would have sued the manager and won a large settlement.
Why not call this the Great 21st Debate?
An economic and cultural upheaval on a par with the industrial revolution and its aftermath and brought on by the digital telecommunications revolution.
And/Or
Worldwide capitalism and the selling out of America’s moral and institutional hegemony and our birthright as US citizens.
More difficult yet are the lives of those who do not have the luxury of broadband and a safe home and neighborhood where crack addicts and social discards are not a problem. What we need is a more moral economy rather than a cultural economy based on the Marx, Gramerci, etc.
There is no need to refer to Greek mythology or attempts at gaining an upper hand in debate by the use of classical Greek figures largely invented by the human mind during its attempts to grapple with reality or at the real dawn of human history or to ask which Greek figure tried to tame the sea. . Sadly for Agamemnon and others this is no longer taught at most Ivy League institutions or liberal arts schools.
We have been failed by those same institutions in their graduate MBA programs whose purpose is to take those of more fortunate by dint of circumstance, heredity and just plane chance and make an enlightened society. Instead we have a Postmodern, passively nihilistic society caught up in celebrity worship and marketing to the lowest common denominator. Just turn on the damned TV.
As a current resident of North Carolina and near a Research Triangle Park (small Silicon valley) and a former resident of Pittsburgh Penna., I wish to think that I have some credibility to offer. As a boomer, may I also add that I am very dissapointed by the self-indulgent selling out and opting in of many of my generational counterparts?
In addition to castigating the Ivory Towers turning out weak capitalists and social nihilists, what of our elected officials? I’m giving Bush a pass right now as he has bigger fish to fry, but I know we have a weak Governor and since when do states by themselves abdicate economic responsibilities? I don’t want GWB saying jobs but rather careers and good stable employment.
There are a lot of good people on FR discussing this issue and make no mistake about it, technology is propelling us to unforeseen places. Sad thing is that we need to take responsibility as human beings to look out for other human beings. Darwin believed in natural selection yet believed mankind could transcend these forces. The project of started by the Enlightenment has been stymied by nihilistic Capitalism and as practiced so expertly by those of the Postmodern Liberal Intelligentsia whose vision of the future is that of Bladerunner or the Matrix.