the good life.... a modern tale....

[Peter Kropotkin]

Speculations about what is the ''good life'' has been going on since
the Ancient Greeks... One would assume that since Plato and Aristotle
wrote about it, that Socrates also engaged with what was the ''good life?"

The Greek consensus, seems to be the ''good life'' was one in contemplation
of the universe.... thinking about what it means to be human.....
and what it was they/human beings, were to do day to day...
the Kantian questions as it were.... ''What am I to do?" "What can I believe in?"
''What can I know?"

The Middle Ages carried on the Greek ideal with their ''faith''
and their contemplation of god... the entire point of going to heaven
is to spend eternity in contemplation of god..... The ancient Greeks
would have approved of this.....

But times and attitudes change, and beginning with the Rennaissance,
the idea of a ''good life'' began to change... but one has to be careful
about what really happens.... the fact is that up to the 19th century,
the number of people who were literate or ''intellectuals" was extremely
small..... when we talk about the Rennaissance, we are talking about a
small number of people who began it and nurtured it... maybe, 5000 people
at best, engaged in the Rennaissance, and even up to the Enlightenment,
it engaged a very small number of people... so, when we talk about
such intellectual movements such as the Rennaissance, or the Enlightenment,
we are dealing with a couple of thousand people..... at most....

so, in any talk about the ''good life'' we are dealing with a very small number
of people who engaged in this type of talk... so, in beginning in the 16
century and going until the first world war, the ideal man was the
''Gentleman'' and the ''good life'' centered around this ideal of
the ''Gentlemen''... A nobleman of course, who could do everything
pretty well.... played music, danced, fenced, who was just at home
on the battlefield as he was in the court or the bedroom...
Part of this ideal was that the Gentleman didn't work, having
a job was beneath him..... and he made fun of those who actually
did the work that keep the state/society going..... the businessman
or what we would call an ''Entrepreneur'' was not the ideal... it was not
the ''good life''' and it was not what any kid who was growing up at the
time would have aspired to become..... to make money, to
be a businessman, was one step, a major step below being a ''Gentleman''
The ''good life'' was not to make money...

Our modern ears are shocked to hear such hearsay, but it's true...
making money was considered to be crass and lowlife...and that was true
for 500 years... or mostly until the First World War.... Read about the lives
of the Victorians, no one aspired to be a businessman.... or make wealth....
the ''good life'' was something else..... to be an Artist, or to be a writer,
that was a goal that was much more desired for....

and what is the ''good life'' in modern day America?
to make money, to have a house or really a house and
a country home, multiple cars, the white picket fence
fantasy land of the American dream....

the American Dream, or the ''good life'' centers around having enough
money to buy the ''good life''..... and that is the point of the ''good life''
today... it is about money and what the money can buy.....

and it certainly isn't about the Greek ideal of contemplation of
values or the eternal questions.... the Kantian questions....
the Modern tale of the American dream isn't about what one is,
but about what one can buy..... are you a good person, a moral
person, an honest person... no one cares... that isn't what matters....
the ''good life'' today isn't about those values, the ''good life'' today is
about the trinkets of existence, wealth, fame, titles, material possessions,
and power.....

so, ask yourself, ''What is the good life?"

and what modern tale will you spin?

Kropotkin

[Peter Kropotkin]

let us try this thought experiment.....

let us run out the capitalistic experience....
everyone gets their ''due''..... all the goods and services
that we can buy, we buy.... the capitalism goal of providing
everybody with all the goods available, becomes reality......
we are sated with cars, houses, couches, TV sets..... all the comforts
of our modern life available to everyone, at any time, any place.....

and now what? is that the end of history? turn out the lights and go home,
because history has been fulfilled? There is nothing left to accomplish or
achieve... we have bought everything already...... there is nothing left to buy.....

take the dream of capitalism and carry it out to everyone... everywhere.....
what is left for us to do? According to capitalism, we have reached the final
destination and there is nothing left to accomplish.... every single person on
planet earth has all the goods they ever need.... Now what?
according to the capitalists, we have reached heaven on earth.....

take the trinkets of existence and give them to everyone, everywhere...
and what is left? Frankly, not much.....
the dream of capitalism carried to its logical conclusion leaves
us with nothing, nothing at all.... just worthless junk and nothing to
move us into the future....no dreams to live out because within
capitalism lies the entire vision of what it means to be human, right?

no matter what you think, feel, believe, or hope for, capitalism answer is
just buy something new... it will make you feel better... and that is all that
will comes from the capitalistic dream..... all our dreams and hopes, loves
and desires come down to buying something..... the final state of emptiness
of modern life comes to fruition.... we have replaced our hopes and dreams
with a new couch..... or a new TV set..... hurrah, hurrah, for us....
we have a houseful of toys and trinkets that will only get thrown out
in a few years and we are left with, what exactly?

that deep, dark emptiness of your heart and soul today, imagine that
for everyone, everywhere... because we have sold our souls for a trinket
or two.....finding love in that new BMW... not quite the same as finding
love with another soul, but hay, in our modern age, love is love... even
if it is with a couch or a new TV set.... finding love with a real live human being,
that is messy and can be bought with a kiss.... and how much money
can one make off of one kiss? NO, sell the dream, the fantasy of love,
it will make someone more money that way..... and isn't that the American dream?
to make money?

Kropotkin

[Peter Kropotkin]

But this is a pretty optimistic vision of capitalism future...
the reality will not be so pretty....

as a smaller and smaller group of people gain a larger and larger
share of the world's wealth, it will create vast difficulties with people.....
as I am competing with millions of others for a smaller and smaller
share of the overall wealth, my share will get smaller and smaller......
simply math show us this.... as fewer people get a greater share of the wealth,
there is less money to go around, and as there are more and more people,
that amount of money becomes less and less..... as it is, we are fighting over
pennies right now.... just wait a few more years....

the second problem with capitalism is the problem of resources.....
to create greater and greater wealth for the few, more and more
resources are being used up..... the future won't be some sort of
paradise, it will be wars of resources.... where countries fight each other
for valuable resources... water will be paramount among the resources
being fought over.... including water, land that can be harvested will
also get fought over...

another resource that be fought over is food...... as we cause the
extinction of animal species, that in turn cause other species to
become extinct which cascades into the death of an entire area....
this is also true of forests and minerals and fruits and metals.....
8 billion people will deplete valuable resources quicker than 5 billion
and 10 billion will deplete resources quicker than 8 billion...
again, this is simple math.... nothing very complicated here....

what are we to do when we begin to run out of necessary
resources? this is the fate of capitalism.... Because capitalism only
cares about making profits, it doesn't care about the resources necessary
to maintain life..... remember in capitalism, people are a means to an end,
people's only value is to create profits...

as far as I can tell, there is no happy ending within capitalism....
run out the future with capitalism and every time, it ends badly,
there is no happy ending within capitalism..... that is because
its very nature is greed and selfish actions/behavior....
capitalism itself say this, that greed and selfish behavior drives
capitalism.....that in some, unknown fashion, that private vices
creates a public good..... no, private vices only creates public
vices...nothing more..... I can't see any scenario where capitalism
ends positively and with us in better shape than we are today......

Kropotkin

[Peter Kropotkin]

given what I have said, are you, personally, living the ''good life""
is the ''good life'' a possibility that you have, or is it already out
of reach?

If spending 40 plus years of your life being a ''drone'' in your life,
and working for others, and never being free of the capitalistic life,
if that is your ''good life''.... congrats, you are already or will be on
your ''good life''... if you aspire to something higher/more than being
a slave in the capitalist's society, I wish you luck....

the ''good life''' can only happen if you make it happen....otherwise,
you will be sucked into capitalism and be a slave forever....
your call, or is it?

Kropotkin

[Harbal]

given what I have said, are you, personally, living the ''good life""
is the ''good life'' a possibility that you have, or is it already out
of reach?

If spending 40 plus years of your life being a ''drone'' in your life,
and working for others, and never being free of the capitalistic life,
if that is your ''good life''.... congrats, you are already or will be on
your ''good life''... if you aspire to something higher/more than being
a slave in the capitalist's society, I wish you luck....

the ''good life''' can only happen if you make it happen....

Yet you don't seem to have made it happen, Kropotkin; you spend a considerable amount of time complaining about having to work for a living.

[Peter Kropotkin]

given what I have said, are you, personally, living the ''good life""
is the ''good life'' a possibility that you have, or is it already out
of reach?

If spending 40 plus years of your life being a ''drone'' in your life,
and working for others, and never being free of the capitalistic life,
if that is your ''good life''.... congrats, you are already or will be on
your ''good life''... if you aspire to something higher/more than being
a slave in the capitalist's society, I wish you luck....

the ''good life''' can only happen if you make it happen....

Yet you don't seem to have made it happen, Kropotkin; you spend a considerable amount of time complaining about having to work for a living.

K: I have and will continue to use my life as a test case for what I say.....
I use my life as an example....the possibilities and choices I have made,
I use them to help guide others into making their own choices and
possibilities....

I believe in life as an example... and our beliefs also as a ''way of life''....
I made these choices and I have suffered greatly from these choices...
perhaps you would be wise to listen to what I have foolishly chosen
and avoid that fate for these reasons.... life as an example....
I hold myself as a test subject...... life for me isn't about
theoretical values or beliefs... Life is about what we do
and the practical consequences of those choices....

Kropotkin

[Harbal]

Yet you don't seem to have made it happen, Kropotkin; you spend a considerable amount of time complaining about having to work for a living.

K: I have and will continue to use my life as a test case for what I say.....
I use my life as an example....

I'm sure most of us already know how much having to work for a living sucks, so we hardly need you to confirm that. Unless you know of a satisfactory alternative, I don't think you have anything useful to tell us.

the possibilities and choices I have made, I use them to help guide others into making their own choices and

But we each think it will be somehow different in our own case, and by the time we find out it isn't so, it is quite often too late to do much about it.

I made these choices and I have suffered greatly from these choices...

Well I suggest you reconcile yourself to it, because complaining about it won't help you.

perhaps you would be wise to listen to what I have foolishly chosen and avoid that fate

Not really, Kropotkin, I'm ahead of you. I've already been through it and come out the other end.

Life is about what we do and the practical consequences of those choices....

Yes, you are right, and I seem to remember once finding a very similar little piece of wisdom in a Christmas cracker; we don't have fortune cookies so much in my country.

[Peter Kropotkin]

anyway, part of the ''good life'' lies in our culture....
Here in America, I cannot speak about anywhere else, I can only
speak about what I know.... here in America, culture is cookie cutter
stuff....there hasn't been anything even vaguely original in years....
in any medium of culture..... which is basically the ARTS.....

Movies are retreads of retreads....but in doing so,
it tells us some important stuff.... that in movies, one of
the two predominant ART forms today.... Music is the other....
that movies are made today to make money... that is their function...
not to be creative, god forbid something is actually creative,
no, the point of movies is to make money.... which leads us
directly to the ''quality'' of movies today.... they are big budget
monstrosities.... think the MCU universe.... which has nothing to
say outside of the violence it promotes.... take away the violence,
and what is left of an MCU movie? Two and half, three hour movies
would be about 8 minutes long.... maybe....at its heart,

the MCU universe is about good and evil, old-time morality plays,
and it doesn't even do that very well..... what does it mean to be
good? or what does it mean to be evil? Watching the MCU universe
one would have no idea what the answer is.... for everything is
arbitrary...... the only character that has any sort of arc is Loki....
and Loki has basically gone to being a TV show...

Let us remove, take away superhero's movies... what other genre has
even attempted to work out morality? Or has attempted to
define culture? or attempted to be culturally significant?

Which leads us to a question, what is the value of culture?
Why even bother engaging in culture in the first place?
What is the use of culture in a society today?

I hold that the use of culture is an attempt to work out
social, legal, moral problems by giving us the possibilities
that might occur in say, literature.... now this sounds vague, but
it isn't....

Let us take a specific book that is culturally relevant...
it is a classic read.... Tolstoy's ''Anna Karenina''... a classic book of
adultery.... but it is clearly more than that... but for now, let us
see this in terms of ''What am I to do?" as a possibility....

the point, one of anyway, is that we see what one possibility of
infidelity is, is what happens to Anna.... she is shunned by society....
and finally kills herself.... and literature asks, ''what would you do
in this situation?" and therein lies the point of literature, culture....
it engages us in the possibilities of actions... we might commit
adultery, but this is a test case of that action... literature and culture
asks us, what possibilities exists for us in this situation? We can see
one possibility of committing adultery is what happened to Anna...
and other books, movies, plays can offer us other possibilities to
what happens if we were to commit adultery... maybe live happily
ever after.... but literature, culture, is about exploring possibilities
that exists for us... committing murder for example, ''Crime and Punishment''
for example, gives us an example of what might happen if we commit murder...
it shows us one possibility that might happen if we commit murder....
literature, culture can show us actions and what might happen if
were to act upon certain possibilities... that is the value of the ARTS,
and literature/culture..... to explore possibilities for us without
us actually trying those possibilities....
so, instead of me committing an actual murder, I test run the action
within literature, culture.... and I see by the text case offer by
the literature, culture, that the action, murder for example, is not
a very good idea....nor is adultery ... and therein lies the value of
literature/culture..... it serves as an example for us....
we can live vicariously through literature/culture....and the very
real wounds of life are avoided....

the more successful acts of literature and culture, are ones where
we can freely work out, vicariously, what would happen if we were to
commit this action.. be it murder or adultery or cheating on our taxes....

Now let us return to the MCU universe.... we can pretend to be
a superhero... we can identify with a certain superhero, Cap America,
for example, or the Hulk, but at no point are we ever going to be a
superhero.... so given this, I ask, what is the point of engaging in
the MCU universe if we cannot ever, be a superhero? Just good old
fashion entertainment? Perhaps....or perhaps we should be asking more
of our culture, our literature, the ARTS....

for within culture, literature, ART, it is asking the same question with
different answers, what does it mean to be human?
and offering us answers as to ''What are we to do?" ''What can we know?"
''What should we believe in?" and for culture, ARTS to be effective,
it must engage in the large questions of ''what does it mean to be human?''

and we see the real point of culture, literature, ART... to show
us what it means to be human.....and what are our possibilities
within that literature, ART, culture?
What is possible? that is the value of ART, literature, culture...
and it might give us answers as to the question,
''What is the good life?" by showing us possible answers to
what is the ''good life''

Kropotkin

[Peter Kropotkin]

let us take another problem..... the problem of the goal....

what is the goal? when we act, as if in cutting taxes or building up
the military, there needs to be a final goal? something that we are
aiming for....... but what if there is not a goal involved in our actions?
then everything, EVERYTHING we do is ''ad hoc'', of the moment.....
and how are we going to get anything done if we don't have some sort
of goal to reach for?

in this failure to think about goals is what, in part, the failure of capitalism....
there is not final goal... just getting more of the same, wealth,
material possessions, fame, power, and titles.... there is no end game in the
pursuit of these trinkets of existence..... just more of the same......
and that is why capitalism is a failure.... communism at least has
the creation of the worker state as its final act before the end of history...
it, communism is of course wrong, but at least it had a goal......

So, let us apply the goal to other isms and ideologies....
Democracy... what is the final goal in democracy? One might say,
whatever we want, but that is no answer....

I would suggest that the final goal of democracy, although I admit it is
unstated, is that within democracy, we are attempting to achieve the goal
of people having a voice in their lives... socially, legally, politically,
economically... where people have a say in what happens in their lives....
which is justice.... where people are being treated equally...
and we see that justice is the goal in several aspects of our lives....
we try and that is the goal of democracy, where the majority have
a say in the way things work.....being treated equally.....
in the political sense... equality in politics...
and in Marxism, which is a political system, not an economic system....
and one has to be clear on that... that we attempt to be equal politically...

and we see that in the actual operation of justice... the legal system....
where, once again, equality is the goal of the legal system....
for equality to exists within the justice system, it has to be blind,
as the statue shows us..... and until the justice system is actually
blind, in which everyone is treated equally, there cannot be justice
in the justice system...

and within the economic systems, we have capitalism in which injustice is done,
where equality has no place... that is capitalism... it is, by its very nature,
unequal, practicing injustice.... economically....... the lie within capitalism
is that the leadership, the management is there because they have earned it,
they are the ones who have talent and ability.... business claim to practice
meritocracy... in which talent and those with ability rise to the top...
but let us look at the reality.... it is rare that the most talented person
in the shop, in that store, is actually the manager.... I have found that
the most inept, incompetent workers in the store are the ones who get
get promoted, sometimes into management... think about your own
experiences within a business or a job... did the most talented, the one
with the ability get the job or become the manager? I doubt it....
the store manager is not the one with the talent, or competence,
but is the one who will follow upper management policies..
the store manager is the one who is managing based on their bonuses...
every managing action is based on whether or not, it gets them closer
to getting their bonus.... that is not good management....
and that is the one who becomes a store manager....
one who will obey upper management to a T.... without
questions..... and is that good leadership? following orders without
question, no matter what those orders are?

the idea that capitalism supports the idea of meritocracy is a lie.....
a lie shown by the quality or lack thereof, of the actual managers
it promotes..... and I find it hard to believe, very hard, that upper management,
the executive suite is any different.... those who are good at their job, truly
good at their job, they don't get promoted... they are too good at their job to
get promoted.... it is the ones who are second level talent, abilities that
get promotions..... for they are more expendable than the ones who have
actual ability or talent..... the business world is run by people with second
rate talent/ability.... that is the executive suite... second rate talent and
abilities.....and how does this fact, help us understand the myth, the lie
of meritocracy within business......

so, given all of this, what is the final goal? what are we trying to achieve
with capitalism? What are we trying to achieve with democracy?
what are we trying to achieve with wannabe dictators like IQ45?
WHAT IS THE GOAL? ..... what are we working for?

Kropotkin

[Peter Kropotkin]

one of the things that culture/ART does pretty well,
is to give us the possibilities facing us.....
for example, in both ''Crime and punishment'' and ''Anna Kerina''
we are shown examples of murder and adultery, and we can see,
step by step, the implications and possibilities of both.....

ART and culture, can show us examples of what it means to be human...
within ART and culture, we can see what happens if we love the wrong
person or what would happen if we were blind to the love of another....
ART and culture set up for us, examples of actions taken or in some cases,
not taken.... if we act this way, this might happen and if we act that way,
this might happen.......we can use ART and Culture as a ''way of life''
in which we can see possibilities acted out for us....

but part of the problem with ART and culture today, is that they
are no longer something separate.... ART and culture are an industry
today.... whose purpose is to make money.... not to inform us of
what it means to be human.....not to lay out what our possibilities are.....
think of an older movie, ''Fatal Attraction'' it is a ''way of life'' movie...
in which we can see the effects of adultery on other people's life....
it explores what is possible while committing adultery....
and after watching that movie, one can see the dangers
and problems with something that is inherently glamerous.....
there is an element of excitement and thrill in the act of
infidelity....

(note, I personally have never committed adultery with
my wife, but I get the thrill and that excitement that can come from
the act of adultery... the possibility of getting caught is alluring, it
is dangerous, and it makes us feel alive... the fact is that life with
another, can be routine and frankly boring... the possibility of
escape from that routine boredom is tantalizing even if it is just one night)

but we have example after example after examples of what happens in
the act of cheating on one's spouse.... and the possibility of bad things
happening is far greater than the possibility of good things happening when
committing adultery.... and ART and culture shows us that.... that is the value
ART and culture...

but given that ART and culture are now industries, just products meant
to make money, nothing more than selling soap or a new car.... what value
does ART and culture have to us today? the process of product placement in
movies is given far more thought than any actual writing or directing a
movie.... tell me, what values or possibilities are worked out in
such films as ''The Avengers'' or within the ''MCU universe?"
What are the takeaways from superhero's movies?
what possibilities can I learn from watching such movies
as one of the ''Thor'' movies...

and why was the first one, ''Thor'' such a successful film?
In many ways, it is the best MCU movie.... but why?

Because Branagh turned it into a Shakespearean play....
He gave it a depth that virtually no other MCU movie has....
He turned it into a plot about brothers who are fighting for the throne,
in say Ancient Japan.... who is worthy to hold the crown? that is a movie/
play we have seen before.... again, in Shakespear.... remove the sci-fi
elements in this movie and we have seen it before..... or does King Lear
mean anything to you? But in what ART/CULTURE we see today,
say anything about the possibilities of existing as a human being today?

as I have noted before, human beings are beings that tell stories....
and the act of telling a story has gone on for hundreds of
thousands of years within human history..... Perhaps the first
act of being human began with a story..... perhaps.....

We climbed out the tree's and we walked... might be the very first story
ever told.... from the very first night of being human, we have been
telling stories... and that is the meaning of ART/Culture....
to tell a story..... the primary instinct of every human is to tell a story....
From whom am I, to where am I going? and if we have turned telling stories
into industries, as money making machines, we have lost a very valuable
part of telling stories..... for telling a story isn't about making money,
but in revealing who we are and what is possible for us.....
that is the true value of a story.... of ART and Culture....
to tell a story..... because that might be the most instinctual aspect
of being human.... the need to tell a story....

Kropotkin