…in the face of everything I see, fighting for my job will do what? Stem the tide for another five minutes? I will humbly stand corrected if I am wrong, but what am I supposed to fight for? A kinder, gentler capitalism?
Sorry, it doesn't compute.
………..
Seen from 10,000 feet, where the shape of things below is visible in all directions, the facts you present are irrefutable.
Perhaps the economists, who always rush in at such moments to remind us that the US has the world’s largest economy (100 ka-jillion dollars a year!), will dispute your prediction of the total disappearance of the middle class and the US’ not-far-off loss of productive capacity but aside from that, most folks with any understanding of how capital works must nod yes.
Still, the mind and heart have certain habits yes?
I’m thinking now of the early 1980s and the American autoworkers who un-lovingly applied sledgehammers to Japanese cars in public displays of anger. Surely those men knew they couldn’t smash their way to the past, when American cars were king and the American autoworker a culture hero.
Yet their frustration at the impending loss of a way of life compelled some of them to wreck what seemed to be the symbol of their undoing.
So now we have the info-tech workers calling for Congressional action, protesting, starting websites and writing tales of woe. They’re also trying to preserve a way of life. It is natural. Indeed, accepting feelings of resignation before you’ve even tried to confront the problem would be a sign of ennui. We must try, then fail before we understand the larger reality.
So no, it won’t stop the drama of unraveling or transformation capitalism is performing across the globe but the effort to stem the tide is not entirely without value.
Newly awakened people will emerge from the wreckage of that project.
Meanwhile, from amongst the tech workers being created around the globe, a hacker cadre of anarchists – like the fine children who brought “I Love You” to your Inbox, will be born spreading disruption like sunflowers.
Something dies. Something is born.
DRM
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