- 07 Dec 2012 12:26
#14123949
The issue was put to me as a matter of "hydraulic civilization" [Maurer, History Explained]. The Mesopotamians developed a society reliant on irrigation. Even though the benefits of irrigation are clear the infrastructure can be a burden, it necessitates bureaucracy and continual labor. So I don't even have to go as far as to talk about imported resources or property and labor as it benefits a minority. Even in the case that it benefits everyone - even in the case that a population has already expanded to the point of requiring the infrastructural elements to sustain itself - even in the case that the labor has not compounded and continually become more difficult every generation of living people has to want this and want to work at this, and when they don't the food supply collapses. The interesting thing from my perspective is that this actually happens. Probably for a number of reasons including warfare, mismanagement, cultural malaise, what have you.
We live in a presumption about how much we want. We have duties instead of initiatives. You can't even own land in the modern world without paying something continually. You can't have the money to do that without some kind of employment (past or present), and generally you can't be employed unless you can get around in a car. It's not just the effort people object to but the preordained quality of it. The wonderful system without which cities would die, and let me remind you of the general animosities between rural and urban cultures. Rome, as a detailed example, eventually stole and distributed land among loyalists, bullied Egypt and so on to survive. And when the "dream that was Rome" came to look like a lie that was pure bullshit the whole thing turned into scrap for anyone to break down and cart off.
We live in a massively "hydraulic" civilization. We are born into a sort of slavery. We are dependent. We cannot take a break. When the burden fails to compensate - when oil runs out - when partisan grudges mean we can't cooperate like we used to the whole thing needs to be scaled back or tyranny becomes the answer.
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The idea that self-sufficiency would naturally lead to militarism is silly. Canadians would be a bigger threat in that case. The fact is we're talking about ways of life and the natures of contentment and escalation (ambition). Civilization can go fuck itself as far as I'm concerned. Even if that means a massive die-off. If its MY ambition to help generate and sustain it then I will do that work gladly. If not well, I may look fondly on New Yorkers and work the ground for their surplus, or simply hearing what they have to say, and want to do, recognize that not only do they play stupid games with ridiculous amounts of money but they are not quiet about the cultural and political animosity they have toward rural people. So I may not, and I may not be the only one.
Honestly, if it's just a habit and a hassle fuck it. I'd rather live in a tree.
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Wild geese flying over a lake don't intend to cast a reflection
and the water has no mind to retain their image