What Powers The Machine...

Hey Everyone!

As often happens, I wrote a post on Facebook a couple months ago -- in this case at the end of March, so about a month and a half ago -- but didn't have the opportunity to post it here until now. Since I'm writing this way ahead of time, I'm not sure what state the country or the pandemic will be in when it goes live, but I thought I'd share it anyway because I think it's something that people might want to consider in the future, if not right at the moment. Peace!

All those oligarchs whining about how we peasants don't want to sacrifice our lives on the altar of their stock portfolios should really study up on history. Because a sudden decrease in the availability of labor, say due to the premature deaths of a bunch of people from disease, can have sweeping consequences for a society. For instance The Plague in Europe is widely credited for shifting society from a feudalistic paradigm and initiating the changes that directly led to the Renaissance period and, later, the Enlightenment. Because there weren't enough people to do all the work, so those in power had to offer more to get the labor they needed.

Granted, the Black Death had something like between a 30% to a 75% mortality rate -- it's hard to know exactly because record keeping kind of sucked and precision diagnoses didn't really exist, at the time -- which COVID-19 does not have. But even still, it's a historical precedent that anyone profiting under the current system would do well to consider before allowing their short-sighted greed to kill the goose that's laying the golden eggs.

And the near-panic the establishment is reacting with to the prospect of much of the workforce staying home for a few weeks is something those of us who comprise that workforce should take heed of. We, The People, have power. And it's power that can't be taken from us because it's intrinsic to the service we provide society. We need only the will to wield it. Because, though our power can't be taken from us through force, without the will to bring that power to bear, we surrender our power without a fight. And that makes us no more than lambs being led to the slaughter.

#JustSaying