Thanks again to the California globe for running this piece. You can visit the website at: https://californiaglobe.com/
And thanks to the Heartland Institute for also running this piece on a sister site which you can visit here: https://stoppingsocialism.com/
With abundance, anything is possible; with scarcity nothing is certain.
And what the world is facing right now is an abundance of scarcity.
From climate change edicts to purposefully limiting housing supplies to cordoning off the public square from the free exchange of ideas to food shortages and/or diet modifications to the limiting of energy availability to personal health strictures and to the very ability to make the best choices for oneself, the currently fashionable scarcity makes one thing abundantly clear: global society is becoming more confined, more caged in, more restricted.
And that’s the point. And what the world is seeing now – in real time and at warp speed – is an intentional modification of what it means to be a discrete individual in a larger society.
Abundance is the opposite of scarcity and it comes not only with comfort and a sense of certainty and well-being, but also with the ability to take risks, to make choices, to try – or think - something new in the knowledge that one’s basic, core needs are being met.
To use a poker analogy, if you’re up for the night you can take a flyer on the chance of getting that inside straight and really cashing in and if your card doesn’t come up it’s no big deal.
In other words, abundance allows for choices, for risk, for innovation, for the rise of the new.
Scarcity does not.
A person in a constant state of anxiety about being able to meet their basic needs is simply not capable of taking such a risk for fearing of losing whatever they happen to have left, therefore limiting their options to “sure things:”
Like an addict, they obsess over their next fix, to fulfill their most compelling need and cannot look beyond to a future that could involve other options. And when that need is met they are happy and grateful and calm…until, and only until, the next time.
Mere survival becomes the point of day-to-day life and one will never challenge those people and organizations that just barely keep you from falling over the edge; in fact you become grateful, you become compliant, you never wonder, and you become willing to imprison yourself to ensure your continued existence.
Hence the impossibility of the idea being touted by the World Economic Forum and its masterclass minions - https://www.forbes.com/sites/worldeconomicforum/2016/11/10/shopping-i-cant-really-remember-what-that-is-or-how-differently-well-live-in-2030/?sh=6179a2b17350 and https://sociable.co/web/wef-director-youll-own-nothing-be-happy-disinformation-campaign/ - that you will own nothing and “be happy.”
This current sense of scarcity is not being caused, as it has transitorily occurred in the past, by random calamity but by an intentional effort to control global society and the eight billion individuals who comprise it.
On purpose, global oligarchs are using the iron fist in the velvet glove that is the social economy or the caring class or the civil society or the third sector – whatever you want to call it – to pursue their end goal of limiting the individual in all facets of life.
(The social economy, etc. is typically defined as that amorphous blob of “charities,” non-governmental organizations, think tanks, foundations, new philanthropies, ESG, DEI, private social service agencies, inter-governmental agencies, etc. that have warm and fuzzy names but are dedicated to providing the infrastructure for the global elite to run the world; the WEF itself estimates that 10% of the economy in Europe already falls into this nebulous nightmare of nascent nullification.)
The control – and rationing - of basic resources and rights is at the heart of effort to domesticate the entire human race. And to ensure that control through constant surveillance, either voluntarily (Siri, Alexa, etc.) or compulsory (street cameras.)
For a concrete example of this process in action, one needs to look no further afield than California. The Golden State, as it has been far too often as of late, can be seen as a harbinger of the horrors to come.
High housing costs? Check. Unreliable and expensive energy? Check. Limits on free speech? Check ( https://californiaglobe.com/articles/doctors-without-voices/ ) Neo-feudal oligarchical rule? Check. Massive investments in the social economy? Check. Constricting employment and business opportunities? Check. Canyonesque wealth gaps? Check. Public shaming of perceived retrogrades? Check. Forced political re-education? Check. Overarching and increasingly centralized government power? Check. Destruction of public spaces? Check. Occasional random government largesse? Check. One-party rule? Check. Purposeful neglect of public infrastructure and services to change behaviors? Check.
What all these factors come together to do is to create dependence, limit options, and literally force people to stay in their homes (self-imposed lockdowns make a certain sense if one has to step over human excrement on the sidewalk.)
And this public limiting becomes a private tunnel vision which spirals into a loss of self-worth, a destruction in one’s confidence, and a despairing “just leave me alone and I’ll do what you say” approach to life.
And the subjugation is complete.
Only by refusing to accept imposed scarcity can society once again govern itself as a collection of individuals voluntarily bound together by empathy, respect, and a common vision that allows people as much freedom to fail – and succeed – as possible.
For a further look at the issue, I would strongly recommend Joel Kotkin’s “The Coming of Neo-Feudalism,” which can be found here: https://joelkotkin.com/the-coming-of-neo-feudalism/