If you guys don't think I'm weird yet, wait til you read this. Keep an open mind. As almost always, I'm not saying we should do this. I'm just saying it's fun to think about. Oh, but I'm also not saying we SHOULDN'T do this...just to be clear. Anyway, you should probably read my note called "A Beautiful Chaos" before reading this, because I'm going to reference it in here. It's about anarchy. Anyway, this note actually is kind of the idea of anarchy. Anarchy is not quite what people think it is - it's not actually necessarily just a bunch of chaos. It's where, instead of having a government that rules over everyone and screws people over every chance it gets, there are small communities with leaders, which make up larger communities, which make up even larger communities. There's leadership and authority figures, but the system is just set up differently, so that a government can't get so big that it runs everyone's lives. Anyway, it's a fun thing to think about. I have no idea if it would ever work, but it's kind of a cool idea. Anyway, so be advised that this note kind of encompasses-ish what true anarchy would be comparable to.
So the idea is living like Native Americans...or the indigenous people of any culture. But for the purposes of this note, we'll use the Native Americans as my example. So they lived in tribes that had a generally fair leader. Everyone worked together and shared what they had. There was even sharing between tribes. And they were very peaceful. They hunted and gathered, and there was plenty of food to be found, hunted, and made. The Native Americans made things they needed, such as tools and pottery and jewelry. They didn't need money, because they traded actual items they made and found and hunted. They gave each other what they needed. They even had doctors, and everyone did things for each other, simply to be kind and helpful. The doctor didn't get paid for doing his job. Instead, people did nice things for him in return for his medical aid. Everyone looked out for each other, and greed didn't exist - at least not in the way it exists in our world. This goes back to another note I wrote. It was one of my very first notes. It's called "Is the Use Of Currency Making Us Greedy?" I do believe that currency = greed. Maybe if we didn't have such a thing and just did things for each other out of the goodness of our hearts, then society would be better. Maybe everyone should just each other's backs, give and take. For the Native Americans, there was no hierarchy to speak of. I mean, there was a leader. Every group needs a leader. But the chief wasn't a tyrant, and everyone was, more or less, equal. No one was super rich, while others starved. Everyone had equal amounts of food and other things they needed for survival. It seems like they had a pretty nice set up, if you ask me.
In contrast, we currently live in a world where the government controls everything. They are the top dogs. They take our hard-earned money and do with it what they please. They kill people (through war and capital punishment,) and they run the show in any way they want. They pull the wool over our eyes and make us think they're doing one thing, while they're doing something completely different. They disobey the law they make, and nothing can be done about it, because they make the law, and therefore, they can disobey that law if they want. Because who is going to put the president in jail for phone-tapping without a warrant? Who's going to stop a cop for speeding and give him a ticket? And the government does all kinds of crazy, horrible things behind our backs, and half the time we don't find out about it...at least not until it's too late. And there's a hierarchy. Those who know people and have connections make it to the top and have so much money, they throw it away. All the while, there are children from poor families who starve. In today's society, it's every man, woman, or child for himself. And there's nothing anyone can do about it, because if you defy the government, you'll be put away for treason. If you try to start a revolution, you'll be killed. We use currency, which makes everyone super greedy. It makes people want more and more money. No amount of money would ever be enough. And people don't help each other just to have each others' backs. They don't offer medical care, because they know they'll get something in return later. They don't offer to share the meal on their table, because they care about their neighbors and want to help them, for sake of being good people. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there where people die, because no one will help them. And it's really hard to make it to the top. If you aren't born into a rich family or have some kind of means to get an education, then you're screwed, and you'll work as a waiter your whole life, and your kids will go hungry some nights. And even when you have education, it's super hard to get a decent job with decent pay, because your government has screwed over the economy so badly that no one has a job, and even those who do don't get paid worth a crap, because the only people who have high salaries are government officials! Even when people are starving, the president takes more taxes from the poor, so that congress officials can have a pay raise and make $250 thousand a year. We live in a country where it's literally illegal to take pictures at factory farms. So not only are they feeding us a bunch of crap processed food from animals that were tortured, but they don't even allow us the knowledge of what's going in our bodies. We live in a country where animal testing is fine, torturing animals for food is normal, and poverty is not taken seriously. (I've written notes on each of these topics. They are called "Animal Tips, If You Will," "Don't Be a Vegetarian; Instead, Change the System," and "The Reality of Poverty," respectively.) We live in a society where the environment doesn't matter near as much as money and success do, so it takes a backseat. (Read my note "Environmental Tips" to see what you can do to help the environment.) We live in a country that will actually consider passing a bill that allows the government to view our social networks, take down anything from our sites that they don't like, and delete our profiles if they don't like them (CISPA bill, which thank God, did not pass.) There's so much corruption in this country, and honestly, pretty much everywhere in the world today, that the world is pretty much oozing corruption out of every orifice it has, and it's hard to imagine we can really do anything about it.
Benefits of being in the society we live in: We do have (sort of) a chance to become really successful and have lots of money. We have a chance to work the jobs we want to work. If we want to become a vet, we can work for it and (hopefully) become one. If we want to be a lawyer, we can work as hard as we can and try to become one. We have job choices (if we can make it.) And we have opportunities to become rich and successful. However, it's make it or break it in this kind of set up we have. It's really hard to make it. There's a chance we can, but it's hard, and if we don't, then we're screwed. So we could either live the way we are living and all be equal and have no chance of being super rich (but the pay off would be far greater than what we'd be giving up,) OR we could take our chances and live in a corrupt society with a corrupt government and try our darndest to become successful and rich. Take your pick. I know which one I'd pick, and I'll give you an extremely blatant hint: IT'S NOT THE SOCIETY I'M CURRENTLY LIVING IN. We either work to make money to buy what we need, or we hunt and gather for what we need and share it with everyone, and in return we get all kinds of other things we need. We either work our nails to the bone to feed our families and don't get to spend any time with them, or we spend every waking moment when the people we love. We either live in a dog-eat-dog world where there's so much competition that we fight for what we need, or we depend on each other and form great friendships with each other that ultimately keep us alive. I bet you're thinking the Native Americans weren't such savages now. I bet you're thinking they were peaceful and had the right idea.
Here's another thing that was great about the Native Americans. They loved and appreciated nature. They didn't screw over their environment and their world like we do. They thanked their animals for providing them with meat for food. You might think it's weird, but it's very respectful. They didn't build factories to omit all kinds of noxious gases into the air and kill everything, including the earth itself. The Native Americans stopped and smelled the roses. They appreciated everything and found beauty in everything. If you haven't actually paid attention to the lyrics of the song "Colors of the Wind," by Pocahontas, which is where the title of this note came from, then you should read it. The link to these lyrics are at the bottom of this note. My favorite part, I think, of the song is the very end which says "You can own the earth, still all you'll own is earth until you can paint with all the colors of the wind," which means you can own the all of the earth, but you'll only own a bunch of dirt if you don't appreciate what the earth has to offer. It really is a beautiful song.
There are a couple more songs I want you guys to take a look at. I'm sure you guys know that Greenday is a (great) band that has written many songs about corruption and the United States government. Well, their best songs are "American Idiot" and "Holiday," which are about American government corruption. Take a look at the lyrics, which can be found in the link at the bottom of this note. The lyrics to both songs are on that page. They're the first and third songs on the list. The other songs are good too, so you can totally check out those lyrics if you want too. And there's one other song I'd like to have you guys look up, and I'm pretty sure you guys haven't heard of this one. It's called "Patriotism" by Company Flow, and it is also about American government corruption. The lyrics can be found (you guessed it) in the link at the bottom of this note.
Anyway, my point in all of this is just to show you guys all the corruption in our system, and that there are alternatives. I think it's a really big thing to at least be aware of the corruption, instead of being bamboozled. And I think it's fun to think about living like the Native Americans. And I'd like to, again, point out that this is basically the idea of anarchy - except it's more like a splice between living like the Native Americans did and living like we do now. There's no government, but there are leaders and communities. Look up more about anarchism if you're interested in learning more about it, because it is a neat concept to think about, and everyone should understand what anarchism really is, rather than just assuming it's total chaos with no authority figures or leadership. Afterall, I've always thought that knowledge and awareness are power and freedom.
So here are the links to the songs I mentioned above:
Pocahontas's "Colors of the Wind": http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/classicdisney/colorsofthewind.htm
Greenday's "American Idiot" and "Holiday": http://lyrics.rockmagic.net/lyrics/green_day/american_idiot_2004.html
Company Flow's "Patriotism": http://www.elyrics.net/read/c/company-flow-lyrics/patriotism-lyrics.html
A Native American tribe peacefully spending time with each other and caring for each other.
This is just really neat.
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