Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Globalization: Recipe for disaster ?

           Many have counted the recent economic troubles of the U.S. as part of the early warning signs of an empire about to crumble. It is both Historic and Scientific that anything that goes up must come down so when will it be us? Some argue that it will be soon, within this next generation, many disagree and the argument begins to be comparable to debates on the Apocalypse,
however I think it is not important to know the when, it is crucially important people begin to analyze the why. Why did Rome, Greece, Egypt, Persia, etc. fall? Many specific reasons can be applied individually to why they fell, i.e. conquering outsiders or elite infighting, 
but a common thread you will find and it is this reason we should be concerned. The exploitation of the lower classes! In the wake of Globalization this has become rampant exceeding even the levels of past empires. Many can attest to the functions of globalism: cheap products, networks of commerce between countries, trade agreement that prevent war more effectively than a treaty ever would; but if there are losers than the system is flawed and a flawed system is not and can not provide lasting prosperity to anyone including the winners.
         Just as China did not foresee that imposing the one child law combined with the patriarchal society would lead to more abortions, more infanticide, and eventually a lopsided enough population between men and women that women's status actually both improved in some cases; the world is not seeing the big picture. What is going to happen when the have nots, having being systematically conditioned to be nothing more than an ill-informed source of cheap labor and the ever consummate consumer, have nothing? Who are the haves going to sell their products to? You see there are only three options the world has in front of it after globalization:

     1) When the haves finally exploit everything from the proletariat they will re-allow debtor's prison for the have not's to work off the debts they incurred trying to remain above the poverty line as slaves.

Debt equals slavery
                      


     2) Governments Continue to create social programs or economic stimulus plans to postpone the inevitable crash after crash see options 1 or 3.                             

     3) Realizing that as corporations have blurred the lines of countries and we as humans should blur the line between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Then and only then will we as a species, as a race begin to band together toward a common goal to do not just incredible things separately but achieve the unthinkable, the undreamable.
 





It is no more natural for their to be a gap in the quality of life any human receives or has available to them as it is natural that there is a better race of human than another. The only function I truly see of globalization, on the long term scale of human existence, is the fact that it will most likely be the catalyst for the honest development not of countries or corporations but of Humanity.


Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Physical Geography's role in Mythology

  In many ancient civilizations the surrounding physical geography has played a role in the development of mythology and more specifically our creation. The interdependence on the Nile for survival for early Egyptians was crucial in their culture developing their creation story. Watching the rise and fall of the Nile from wet to dry season, from feast to famine was the basis for the understanding of water to be where all things come from. This is attention to the surrounding geography also led to the Gods residing on Olympus which is the highest mountain in Greece which was then impossible to climb. In most any mythology you will see a connection to the surroundings of the culture, the very fact that most gods and goddesses are caretakers or the cause of natural structures or occurrences lends to this. Geological evolution caused by tectonic activity and erosion is even documented in Iroquois creation myths as two brothers one good one evil in a cycle of creation and destruction.


The world around us has had such a role in inspiring our very notion of our creation and the nature of the universe. We may not claim that sea monsters live in the oceans now that we have explored them or think that gods live on mountain tops but the world around us provides just as much wonder and beauty today as it did then.