WHAT’S THE POINT?
This year we again went to Utah to do the family Christmas thing. It is always a strong reminder of what the middle of America is like, and how very different our life in this hamlet of happiness called Santa Monica truly is. We live in a rich society and we shouldn’t forget it.
My partner and I make the road trip to Utah each year by car. We do so for several reasons — the time spent together is a great opportunity for us to be alone and talk about all the things that we don’t normally have time for in our hectic, crazy days. We bring along our little dog who creates great joy and spontaneity and he forces us to make stops along the way.
The drive also lets us see the country up close and personal. Each year we see the growth of the mega marts and their infiltration on society. As the miles pass, the deaths of the small companies and “mom and pop” shops become more striking.
Each year the truck stops become more and more alike — they all have the same corporate fast food eateries, the same tacky cassette tapes for sale, and a boarded up diner that used to be named something like “Dinah’s” or “Mom’s” but now is just a shell.
Once we enter Utah, there are four Wal-Mart Supercenters in the distance of 200 miles, and near each one is a Kohl’s, Home Depot, Costco and a Super-K. Fully one-third of the cars on the road are Tahoes, Suburbans, F250s and Expeditions. There are kids with kids everywhere. It is commonplace for 19-year-olds to have a family of two or three and all that goes along with it.
This is the land of consumption. We are a nation of buyers and users, controlled by the media that tells us what to buy, where to buy it and how to save a bundle doing it. Our country is fast becoming the Brave New World, 1984, Brazil world of doublespeak, mixed messages, and abdication of our personal responsibility to the need for “more.”
As the president continues his “war on terror” by spying on people, even if they are not Americans, and claims to give us security at the price of our privacy, I look around and see that we are becoming a nation of zombies who are kept numb and dumb. We are fat, and distracted with our latest and greatest new plastic toy, fresh from the factory in China.
I was in a line with my sister-in-law in a Toys-R-Us and all the parents were surrounding us with their shopping carts full of Barbies and Legos. As societal outcasts in this land of conformity and consumption, we stood out as an odd couple. I’m a gay man, and she a multi-racial African American looking woman. We were surrounded by people who think there is only one right way to live your life, and we don’t fit that picture.
We were the odd ones, not only in our make up, but also in that we were laughing and joking. I saw none of that in the people around us. We were the happiest people I saw. There were no smiles, no sense of joy in the giving. Just obligation in the buying.
I see it everywhere. In the grocery stores there are stacks and stacks of everything. In this land of plenty we are inundated with advertising, marketing, opportunity for eating, learning, creating. And what have we done with it?
We have become a fat and disconnected country of discontent. We have more than any other country has ever had in the history of man, and we have created obesity, malaise, ignorance and apathy.
There is a striking difference between our country at this time, and other countries in their times of plenty. China 1,000 years ago had plenty, and they created art, jewelry, sculptures, architectural masterpieces, poetry and fiction.
India, too, had plenty, and they created poetry, art, architecture, philosophy and song.
Europe explored the world, and brought government systems, distribution channels, and a form of peace as they conquered other lands.
What have we done? We have explored space, deep sea, technology, medicine and worlds of thought. We have writers who are willing to say what they think, and philanthropists who are striving to do good in a world of disaster. We have created a society that can cure disease, feed itself and others, provide safe living conditions for its members and protect itself.
Like other countries before us, we step forward on the backs of the masses. Others did it with slavery, and serfdom, we do ours with the creation of the underclass. Luckily our underclass has it better than any other underclass.
As in a good family, we will stand together against the world, yet still fight amongst ourselves over the basics of what each person should have in this country. What rights we will grant and to whom.
It becomes clearer to me each year, when I leave our bastion of bourgeois life, to the core of what keeps this country going, how very lucky I am to be here. How lucky we all are. We live in a city that provides for us, that allows us to grow and explore, and doesn’t dictate to us how should live our life.
In this country of plenty, we have material possessions and food beyond our needs. We have a large portion of the country that is apathetic, drugged with their fast food and latest novelty, spending their days in their SUVs scared of the outside world.
It is a stark reminder of how feeding the body is the easy part. It is the feeding of the soul that we need. For us, in this happy little burg, we have writers, artists, thinkers, anarchists, activists and rebels. We have a very rich society in our little burg. And we should not forget that, even as we fight amongst ourselves. (David Pisarra is a business development lawyer in the Santa Monica firm of Pisarra & Grist. He or (310) 664- 9969.)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 27, 2005. Read the original PDF.