hopelesshappiness.com

I understand before I even start that this is almost assuredly an exercise in futility – but I just – can’t – help – myself.

I can no longer hide it. And I can no longer hide from it. No matter how much it hurts, most times now I just lean into it, welcome it, embrace it. It is better to recognize it for what it is – a betrayal – than it is to hide its truth behind a mythical American Dream. It is better to look ahead at its trajectory, than to try and hide myself behind privilege that may or may not exist.

To unnecessarily act in one’s self-interest knowing it is at the expense of another is a trespass against all of humanity. Not that we act as if we care.

It does not have to be a zero-sum game, but because it often is, because that is what we have been taught, it is of course the wealthy and powerful consistently and constantly taking from those less-privileged. Must we first somehow reverse the flow of this zero-sum game so each of us can see it from all sides, before we can quit it entirely?

Below is an example close to home.

My employer is a large state university. I am employed in the medical school in a student support position. According to public records released in January, this past Fall I received a 3% pay increase. The dean of the medical school received a 4% increase. One might look and think that the increases are comparable, but if I would have received the dean’s dollars, my increase would have been 75.6%. The dean went from making 18.9 times more than me to making 19.1 times more, which again sounds close but again if I would have received the dean’s dollars (and he in turn mine) the dean would have went from making 18.9 times more than me to making 10.8 times more than me. The issue of course is the growing income gap. To entertain the thought that the dean is 19 times more deserving or more capable or more entitled than I am would require a different conversation; a conversation about available opportunities and available to whom and who makes the rules and bias and bureaucracy and convention and certainty and division. That is not this conversation.

Another way of seeing this conversation is that as said, instead of 3% I would have received 75% and on the other side, instead of 4% the dean would have received 0.15%. I suspect that the dean of the medical school would have been insulted by an offer of 0.15% yet I am expected to attach a different meaning to the same dollars. This example is one-to-one. More relevantly, looking at all pay for more than 23,000 employees in this same frame, if we would have reversed the dollar flow between the top 10% and the bottom 10%, instead of 6.65 times more, the gap would have narrowed significantly to where the top 10% would be making 4.1 times more than the bottom 10%. It is likely not necessary for one’s well-being (in the case of the dean) to pull in $910,000 instead of $875,000, nor is it likely a matter of life and death if the top 10% averaged $209,406.13 or $193,681.12. However, the difference (in the case of the bottom 10%) between $31,524.85 and $47,265.65 could hugely impact an individual’s or household’s well-being. It is worth repeating: a 59% increase for the bottom 10% would change lives. But instead of taking care of each other, the wealth gap widens, and the inequality is further entrenched, and the zero-sum game plays on with no dollar-flow-reversals and no rule changes. It is a trespass against humanity and (apparently) humanity should be grateful.

If we applied this thought exercise reversing the dollar flow between each pair of mirrored deciles, here is what would happen:

• For tier 1 (top and bottom 10%) instead of respective averages of $209,406.13 and $31,524.85 and the more affluent sector making 6.65 times as much, the respective averages would be $193,681.12 and $47,256.65 and the upper half would be making 4.10 times as much.
• For tier 2 (11-20% and 81-90%) instead of respective averages of $105,754.16 and $38,592.13 and the more affluent sector making 2.74 times as much, the respective averages would be $99,741.30 and $44,604.99 and the upper half would be making 2.24 times as much.
• For tier 3 (21-30% and 71-80%) instead of respective averages of $84,679.51 and $44,395.10 and the more affluent sector making 1.91 times as much, the respective averages would be $80,749.08 and $48,327.23 and the upper half would be making 1.67 times as much.
• For tier 4 (31-40% and 61-70%) instead of respective averages of $72,129.23 and $51,702.56 and the more affluent sector making 1.39 times as much, the respective averages would be $70,291.70 and $53,539.29 and the upper half would be making 1.31 times as much.
• For tier 5 (41-50% and 51-60%) instead of respective averages of $64,445.48 and $58,268.89 and the more affluent sector making 1.11 times as much, the respective averages would be $63,698.53 and $59,015.84 and the upper half would be making 1.08 times as much.

Equity! What a concept!

And if you’re paying attention, you will have noticed that this dollar flow reversal has allowed the bottom 10% to (barely) leapfrog the second decile from the bottom thus (in a sense) eliminating the bottom 10%. Wouldn’t that be something? And yes, there will be some in that second decile from the bottom who would want to complain about their paltry 20% increase compared to the 60% captured by the former bottom 10%. But they only need be reminded of two things: 1) that this process will work more in their favor next year when they are in the bottom 10%, and more importantly 2) To unnecessarily act in one’s self-interest knowing it is at the expense of another is a trespass against all of humanity.

Not that we act as if we care.

It is upside-down and distorted, yet gives an impression of depth and dimension.

It is a lie bought and sold again and again and again, increasing in cost with each successive sale yet paradoxically, proportionately decreasing in value.

At its best it is magical, alluring, captivating – a siren's song.

At its worst it is disturbing, ominous, sinister – a malevolent propriety.

It is a comfortable excuse; it appeals to my sense of order and it makes me feel less ignorant, yet it leads me astray.

It is an enterprising depiction of what is (simultaneously) there and not there; an invention, an illusion, a myth.

It is full of light and dark and hope and trust and imagination and danger and vulnerability.

It is an urgency incidental to itself, and a warning humbled and hesitant. We have chosen to follow the urgency; the warning goes unheeded.

It is a house of cards built inside a cast iron vault.

It is (only a little) closer to reality at 90 degrees and then (a bit more) at 180 degrees.

When you look beneath it – there is nothing there.

When you reach underneath – it slips through your fingers, cold and wet; unctuous, unfathomable.

It is a tool used to substantiate,  justify and maintain.

It is a covering, a garment used to conceal, amuse and distract – one size fits all.

It facilitates, expedites, promotes, simplifies, enables.

It is absurdity masquerading as wisdom. It is impulse pretending virtue. It is artifice playacting sincerity. It is death posing as potential.

It is a mirrored membrane reflecting a misremembered past as present as future.

It is an imperious suggestion of misinformed righteousness.

It is a preference for answers over questions, constraint over consideration, presumption over doubt, loud over obvious.

It is decisive, judgmental, unflinching, unforgiving.

It is a landscape, a pointillist perspective, a watercolor, a canvas stretched, a kaleidoscopic diffusion of promiscuous observation.

It is blissful reconciliation.

I came across this suggestion in the book “Blood Memory” written by Dayton Duncan and Ken Burns: “We're supposed to make decisions that go seven generations beyond...” -Marcia Pablo, Native American.

I came across this statement in the work of fiction “The Son” written by Phillip Meyer: “…it was all pointless, we might as well have never crawled from the swamps, we were no more able to understand our own ignorance than a fish, staring up from a pool, can fathom its own.”

I said the following last week: “How do you tell someone who makes more money than you, is more powerful than you, and who believes they are smarter than you, that they are stupid; or even just ignorant.”

They don’t want to hear it; any of it. It is obvious that “they” are Wealth and Power. It is less obvious that “they” also includes comfort, and that compliance is often confused with comfort, and I think we do this purposely to justify our inaction and to feel better about our collective lack of progress. My momentary, confused comfort is not going to help my great-great-great-great-great grandchildren. And because I am not wealthy, it is unlikely I will even be of much help to my grandchildren. And if the objective is really seven generations beyond, it is also unlikely that the wealthy will be of much help to their direct descendants seven generations beyond, much less mine. And the goal is not (should not be) limited to direct descendants, but should convey to all future generations. Yet for our momentary, confused purposes, we are wealthy, we are powerful, we are comfortable, we are compliant.

We could choose to live creatively, through the eyes of an artist; but instead we choose to live unflinchingly, through the eyes of a banker.

In the 2018 film “At Eternity’s Gate” Willem DaFoe as Vincent van Gogh said, “…a grain of madness is the best of art.”

We live in a Factual Fiction, built on false and questionable assertions, guided by intentional fiction, and ruled by a vocal majority. We should (and I believe we could) live in the pursuit of Beauty-Truth-Wisdom-Justice, built on substantiated, tangible fact, guided by expert opinion, and ruled by an actual majority. But we like Factual Fiction. It gives one something to live for, a sense of control, purpose, meaning, something to talk about. We don’t like the pursuit of Beauty-Truth-Wisdom-Justice not only because its Ideal is unattainable, but mostly because its pursuit is discouraged, unrewarded, and often punished.

A Factual Fiction from a false or questionable premise may come from the following (often entangled, mixed, melded for strength and support):

• Uninformed Conjecture.
• Hearsay.
• Anecdotal Evidence.
• Political Rhetoric.
• Fear.
• Belief.
• Doctrine.
• Tradition.
• Entitled Privilege.

As a human individual I am compelled to create a number of factual fictions to engage with others and to function in my day-to-day existence. In this process though, I should also recognize that these fictions are necessities residing outside of my essence that strives for Beauty-Truth-Wisdom-Justice. But as a capitalist culture, as a country, we have been forced to internalize Factual Fiction thus blotting out / smothering our essential reality. And we don’t appear to understand that by doing so we have lost our ability to collectively improve, make things better, do Good.

As a capitalist culture, as a country, we have replaced essence with substance; we have turned ourselves so much outside-in we can no longer feel what matters.

In a Factual Fiction unfounded judgements are required to justify its intrinsic injustice. This is relevant in two ways:

1. choosing one Factual Fiction over another, and
2. avoiding / ignoring substantiated, tangible fact and expert opinion.

Both relevancies allow one to remain loyal to their chosen Factual Fiction and to perpetuate the divisiveness necessary to maintain the underlying Intentional Fiction, widen gaps, and strengthen the vocal majority.

How do you tell someone who makes more money than you, is more powerful than you, and who believes they are smarter than you, that they are stupid; or even just ignorant. When I first wrote the preceding sentence I thought I would have to temper it. But no. Collectively we are stupid and individually too many of us have allowed this collective stupidity to turn us outside-in; to choose to live this really, really, really, really stupid Factual Fiction that is our capitalist culture – our country.

This week, in a discussion about money, someone said to me , “I don’t understand your mindset.” Perhaps that is because my thoughts don’t stem from the false premises and false promises of a capitalist culture.

And now this week I am once again reading about heedless, needless gun violence that this time erupted in my home state. I am not proud to be a Missourian. The lack of any effort by the state of Missouri, by the United States of America, to curb the proliferation of such easily attainable weapons is a head-shaking, heartbreaking stupidity; a Factual Fiction substantiated and strengthened by a capitalist culture. Once again there will be an uproar, political rhetoric, fear countered by tradition, and once again nothing will happen. We will remain mired in our collective stupidity.

Paragraphs above feel a bit disjointed this week, but then so do I.