They keep raising prices, stating that it’s due to inflation, but then they keep having record profits.
Meanwhile, the average American can barely afford rent or food nowadays.
What are we to do? Vote? I have been but that doesn’t seem to do much since I’m just voting for a representative that makes the actual decisions.
How can you change a system you are helping to perpetuate? ( A rhetorical question)
If I were a Martin Luther King Jr or something maybe I could lead a mass movement. Unfortunately I’m just a notch above mediocre.
I think this discussion is actually an interesting one though, and they’ve been talking about it since biblical times. There’s a part of the New Testament where Jesus is preaching and a rich man comes up to him.
“Jesus, I want to follow you. What do I need to do?”
Jesus says
Sell all of your possessions, give all the money to charity and then follow me.
Essentially, disconnect entirely from the system and give up all your luxuries. The rich man cried. “It is harder for a rich man to enter heaven than a camel to fit through the eye of a needle”
We like to think we are poor but even just living in the bottom quartile in a Western country we are part of the richest people in the world. Are you willing to give up running water, electricity, electronics, a car, eating meat, etc? I’m not. I’m not going to heaven, but I’m also not losing sleep over it.
History isn’t driven by “great men,” or ideas. It’s driven by material conditions. MLK Jr. wasn’t a great man because he was born a hero, but was thrust into greatness by the material conditions. He was just a man like any other, living in an incredibly unjust system. The material conditions created the environment that led to the Civil Rights movement, it wasn’t just something a person randomly decided to start or spearhead.
I think it’s a combination of both things. He had a specific set of traits and was thrust into a specific position, like you said by the material conditions, and his combination of traits allowed him to make the best of it in such a way that he made meaningful change in the world.
But still, I think you make an important point. Really, I was trying to be facetious.