(no subject)

[avevale_intelligencer]

For some time now I've had a bee in my bonnet about large corporations. They seem to me to have a life and a mind of their own, completely independent of the mostly decent human beings who work for them and (think they) run them, and they are demonstrably without conscience, compassion or any human quality at all: sheer greed personified. I've been calling them corporate demons.

folkmew linked to this in a comment to something almost but not quite entirely else, and it shook me. I feel like wotsisname in "They Live" when someone else puts on the unfashionable sunglasses. Somebody else sees these parasites infesting our world.

This is the second time one of this man's sermons has spoken directly to one of my main concerns, in tones which make me think he shares that concern but might know more than I do about how to address it. Worrying.

Comments

[keristor.livejournal.com]

Wow. Thanks for that link. Not that I /like/ the sermon (I was never fond of horror movies either) but it is so right. Some of those things I knew about (like the exploding gas tank), some I didn't.

(Lots of people see the parasites, but many of them only in certain areas. Like those who lambast Microsoft or the RIAA without noticing that it's not the individual corporations which are evil -- indeed, by their own lights they are 'moral' -- but the system which turned those corporations into ersatz 'people' and gave them the rights of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" without the responsibilities...)

Have Faith! Don't Despair! (or maybe "Don't Panic!"?)

[folkmew.livejournal.com]

Ed got the book her referenced. I have yet to read it. But don't despair! The thing is if enough people get pissed off and noisy about it change can happen. Truly. It seems impossible but I have faith that it can.

Instead of the mosquito biting the iron bull, think of the drops of water on the rock . Meg Christian set to music a song by Holly Near. The song is a very feminist song about rape and such but the chorus always stuck with me as truly inspiring:
CAN WE BE LIKE DROPS OF WATER FALLING ON THE STONE
SPLASHING, BREAKING DISBURSING IN AIR
WEAKER THAN THE STONE BY FAR BUT BE AWARE
THAT AS TIME GOES BY THE ROCK WILL WEAR AWAY
AND THE WATER COMES AGAIN

I tell everyone I meet why I am trying really hard not to use any corporate mcfood places anymore, why I try to shop at small local stores, why I won't use Wal-Mart, and why I do use Costco (which I've read good things about as Corporations go). BTW - Ed found out that Google apparently lists as one of their ten business principles: You can make money without doing evil.
http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/tenthings.html I like that.

Anyway - I'm not claiming to be a model non-corporate consumer yet but I'm trying and if enough of us try well... as Margaret Mead said: "Never underestimate the power of a few committed people to change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."