The Soul sucking world of corporate suburbia

reply to post by weedwhacker


And what about the jobs.

Once you got your house further out away from the city, were you able to get a job way out there, or were you forced to continue commuting.

I know plenty of people who have bought homes further and further away, but they still wind up having to commute to work.

As I pointed out earlier, fifty years ago, you could get jobs that paid good money out away from the urban centers. There were many factories across the midwest that paid good money. Here in CA, the jobs outside of the big cities all pay far lower wages, when the reality is there is no physical reason for most of the high paying jobs to be centrally located.

I would add that most of the jobs in California came from government contracts, mainly military contracts under Reagan. It wast he government money that created the technology centers, that lead to the computer revolution. Government money created these congested suburban centers. and most of the people like me, came to them because they were one of the few areas in the country were you could make decent money. I admit, I was drawn by the technology as well, but why are there any of these tech companies paying decent money up in places like Ukiah?

This is where I see the conspiracy. The story told is that people moved out of the cities, but a lot of people moved into these suburban areas from the small towns where decent paying jobs were available at one time.

reply to post by poet1b


People are always bad mouthing "the government".

Who the same hell do you folks think now own and operate our government?

Our large corporations, that is who. Corporate America is the mistress, wife and mother of our government. We are nothing more than slaves to do their bidding.

The opening post deserves 1000 stars for laying out the gut wrenching way our lives have been manipulated into.

I have been working 12-14 hour days and through lunch to spoon feed the people in india that will soon take over my job.

There were five of us to do the actual work. Now we are down to three of us that do "the work" and three managers to manage three people that don't even need these managers.

Our work load is astronomical, and our CEO hasn't a clue to what the real workers do - not a clue.

Like the story about the emperor and his new clothes, a king surrounded by yes men, is totally clueless he is naked.

CEO'S (Often the corporate henchmen / owners) make millions while the people that actually do the work and make the "company" profit earn squat.

No where in the rest of the world (yet) is the salary variance between the head and the bottom people so wide as in the good old USA

I haven't had a raise in three years, yet my company is now averaging two to three "acquisitions" a month, like a giant amoeba, unthinking, uncaring just a entity that continues to eat anything that comes near it

At least for now, I have a job and some warning so I can hurry and try to pay off my house I still have seven years to pay the bank 6% interest (that's six times the actual price/which is robbery but that's another post we won't get into banking and our dishonest money system here).

For the most part, people have become compliant sheep.

We need to take back Washington. How? Haven't a clue. Personally we are to become a corporate owned world soon.

Soul sucking, you bet.

Most people I have watched will do anything, including sell their own soul just "to stay in the game".

That is the way it is designed. Everyone watches and monitors everyone else, hoping to curry favor with the dumb clucks that pass as low to mid level managers.

Kissing the very hand that will eventually chop their head off.

The mighty elite are getting richer, while the average "slave" is so tired, so emotionally drained that they have no stamina left to see or speak out against the greedy pigs that are cutting 3/4 of the pie for themselves and leaving 1/4 for the rest of us to fight over like hungry dogs at the kings table, fighting each other for the few scraps that land on the floor, while the king watches on smiling in amusement.

If the dogs were smart, they would BAND TOGETHER, jump upon the king, tear his mucking throat out and share the banquet on the table just inches away. But the dogs are being kept to busy and too stupid. (Get the picture) If you are not worth millions, you are one of the dogs.

Why do you think the family unit is disintegrating? The kids are left to take care of themselves while mom and dad have to work just to put food on the table and a roof over their head.

Why do you think divorce is now approaching 50% could it be that people no longer have the emotional stamina or time to work on "relationships".

Why do you think people drink and do drugs? Self medication perhaps to cushion themselves from the 8-7 work day corporate world they have to join, if they're lucky and can find a job still on American soil.

The biggest lobbyists in Washington are our large corporations. They "donate" vast sums of money to place their puppets into office that wheel and deal bailouts, favors and money deals.

Corporate America owns our media, our minds, souls and almost everything inbetween.

Every aspect of our lives.

Research who the top 50 companies are that have profit from our War in Iraq, over the dead bodies of our youth and the people of the middle east.

All in the false name of "terrorists" - 911 was a false flag, orchestrated to manipulate people into a war that is costing us trillions we will never be able to repay.

Owning a home, now a joke for most American's. I have one but at approaching 60, husband is 65 we still have seven years to pay it off and if we are lucky.

No health care, no jobs (on American Soil) - America will soon become a third world country.

Our military and police are corporate pawns, their not even aware of this fact. They do the bidding and fight the corporate elite's fight.

I don't see many movies, but Hardwired is a really excellent movie that shows what a strangle hold over us corporations will eventually have.

Excellent opening post, starred and flagged.

"I don't want a nation of thinkers. I want a nation of workers." John D. Rockefeller

The Rockefeller's founded the National Education Association.

www.theforbiddenknowledge.com...

*******************************

[edit on 12-3-2010 by ofhumandescent]

reply to post by poet1b


THE SOUL SUCKING WORLD OF CORPORATE SUBURBIA!!!

Welcome to Democratic Communism.

reply to post by KRISKALI777


No, it's called a Corporate Dictatorship.

Totally agree with OP, except the "no choice" part. We DO have a choice.
We have accepted hook, line and sinker that for our lives to be meaningful we must have a lot of stuff. In order to get stuff you work 60 hours a week, commute two hours a day, go into debt ect; In the meantime your children are neglected, your health is affected, and our communities are filled with strangers too busy getting more stuff to be a neighbor.

And of course, our endless quest to get more stuff plays right into the corporations hands, we work for them ( and are pathetically grateful to them) to afford the crap and then we buy it from them!

It is a conspiracy.

The vast majority of people are too busy paying off mortgages, expensive new cars, and flat screen TVS to question what is going on in DC ( or Berlin or London...ect). They have us just where they want us, too busy spending our lives trying to keep up with what the media ( conspirator 1) says we must have in order to be fulfilled. Too busy working 60 hours a week ( conspirator 2) for corporations who then sell us the stuff, and finally too busy to do anything about the appalling governments ( conspirator 3) we have chosen by inaction to lead us into our increasingly dismal looking future.

There is no one to blame but ourselves.

OP, for 5 years I built those rat mazes you seem to love to abhor.

A lot of people do not realize that the design of the communities are about 85% designed by the government.

Architects design the layout per excepted design structures and than the government looks over the designs. Any adjustments the government wants, the government gets, or the place does not get built.

Also, during the construction, any adjustments the government wants to throw at the developer, the developer has to do.

Now, for the costs. The developers pick up the tab for all road improvements necessary-there goes that fallacy that the tax dollars pay for road improvements near ANY new construction sites. The developer pays for ALL utility improvements. Once the improvements are complete, the utility companies take ownership of the improvements. There goes the fallacy the utility company or gov pays for utility improvements on new construction.

Now, who ends up paying for all of this? You do, I do, everyone that rents or purchases the properties.

I have been thinking about that a lot lately. Why is the government trying to pass this Cap and Trade thing? There is something buried in that bill that many do not realize. In it, it requires all states to adopt California Building Codes. Also, it requires older homes, prior to sale, to meet the newer codes. Which would make selling an older place unrealistic.

I feel this move is two fold. To implement the improvements of the infrastructure without the government or utility companies from having to pay for the improvements and to spur business growth due to all the new regs nationwide. There is even one section of that legislation that would require all towns and cities to hire on new inspectors to implement the newer green/efficiency regs. Look into that bill, it is an expansion of government beyond comparison. Also, we have heard of the upgrade to the newer smart grid. That is also part of it. Forcing us to pay for the upgrade where the gov and utilities have to pay nothing, yet get all of the profits.

All of this is just making me sick. I fled the urban sprawl 1.5 years ago. I use to hate having to find my way through the maze. Plus, they were instituting those checkpoints where I was at. The last straw was when it took me 4 hours to drive 3 miles home one night. I hit 2 different checkpoints and by the time I hit that 2nd checkpoint, I was ready to rip off some heads.

I wish back then I would have known to ask such things as I would now. Like, am I being detained? What right do you have to implement this checkpoint?

I hear your frustration.

The endisnighe.

reply to post by ofhumandescent


Oh.......K
If you say so

I was thinking about this today. Suburbia is the problem!

That is, the postwar American idea of suburbia.

reply to post by poet1b


From Ascent of Humanity

A vast change has overtaken suburbia in the past two generations. The archetypal suburb was first and foremost because that's where people moved to raise families. Lawns and parks and lots of other families with children defined the suburb as a children's paradise. In the cultural mythos of the American Dream, childhood proceeds along the lines of the Little Rascals or Dennis the Menace or the Berenstain Bears: long days playing outside with other children, building clubhouses and forts, jumping rope and playing hopscotch, catching frogs and turtles, biking all over the place . . . pickup games of baseball and tag . . . tea parties with the other girls . . . sledding and snowball fights. Children were seldom at home. They were at a neighbor's house, or over at the playground, or the vacant lot, or down by the pond. It didn't matter as long as they were back for dinner. Until recently, play was outdoors, public, and free of charge.

Where are the children now? This is the question I asked myself one winter Saturday as I walked through the empty suburban streets and past the deserted playgrounds of my home town. Finally I saw a tiny figure dressed in a pink snowsuit, a little girl standing at the edge of her yard, waist deep in the snow. She dipped her mitten into the snow for a taste. Four hundred families in this neighborhood, most of them with children, and only a single five-year-old outdoors on a Saturday afternoon. And I cannot imagine her staying there very long, alone in the snow, the stillness broken only by the passing cars and that odd-looking lone pedestrian. Her life happens indoors.

reply to post by ofhumandescent


Good post and nice links, Yeah, that is what I am seeing.

I live in Silicon Valley, at the southern end of the San Francisco Bay, where all the major computer companies are located. 15 years ago our economy was booming, housing prices were reasonable, and there was a strong demand for jobs which was increasing salaries and wages. The internet, based on technology developed by a European scientist (who has made nothing from the core code he wrote for the internet) and a college kid from Illinois. Anyone who could write good code was making good money. People were working their lives away hoping to strike it rich in a start up, and many did, but most, especially at the end of the boom, wound up getting the plug pulled and all the money they worked so hard to create disappeared.

While this was going on, corporations began bringing in software engineers from around the globe on H1 visa programs, who worked for the corporations far cheaper than local programmers, who soon found themselves tossed out of the companies they helped create. The entire demographics of the area was completely changed as literally millions of immigrants were brought into the area. I doubt if 50% of the local population right now was born in the U.S..

Home prices skyrocketed, little or no money down was needed to buy a house, and people were being given half a million dollar plus loans which took up almost all of their income to pay. Wages and Salaries had to be maintained at a certain level for people to be able to live in the area, which jacked up the cost of salaries and wages. R&D began moving out of the area. Now what we have going on predominately, is large numbers of immigrants managing overseas developers. At some point in time, upper management is going to ship project management overseas. Then who is going to pay all of these huge loans?

The writing is on the wall.

These immigrants, they have become my friends and family. If they came here a couple of decades ago, they are doing fine, their children, however, for the most part, are struggling. Those who came here in the last decade or so are deeply in debt, wondering how long they are going to be able to hang onto their jobs. Personally I think they got scammed.

We have all gotten scammed. Lots of forty and fifty somethings with grade school kids, spoiled by life not sure what to do next.

Me, I'm just taking a pause in the calm before the storm. Most wealth is tied up in the market, which is a house of cards propped up by government borrowing. Things are going to get interesting.

Suburbia was built for consumption for a disposable economy. It is my idea that it was designed for this purpose. Everything you do here costs money. There are so many barriers against pedestrians and bicyclists, that you are essentially forced to drive everywhere. Open space is limited. Neighbors don't hang out together, people are scattered. They simply don't have time, with everyone working and driving all the time. The money is not going out to local businesses, it is all going back into the system.

The thing is, this disposable society we currently live in is not sustainable. When wages are salaries are pushed down and costs rise, people don't have money to consume. Without consumers, economies don't function.

The only real solution is social evolution. Work less, consume less, enjoy life more. With our current production capabilities, we should all be working 20 hour weeks, and we would probably be even more productive. I think most of the effort people put into their jobs goes towards politics, and useless battles over nonsense.

reply to post by pai mei


We do play dates. Their kids come to our house or we go to their house, or we all load up our vehicles and drive somewhere to do something. Of course we have busy schedules that have to be managed, and the kids are always under adult supervision. It is like kids in suburbia are always in lock up.

I grew up in a large town in the midwest. We could run the neighborhoods because they weren't surrounded by eight lane roads with cars zooming by at 40-50 MPH. There were woods and fields to play in. People had decent sized yards. People knew each other, or had a good idea of who lived in the neighborhood.

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by pai mei

 

I grew up in a large town in the midwest. We could run the neighborhoods because they weren't surrounded by eight lane roads with cars zooming by at 40-50 MPH. There were woods and fields to play in. People had decent sized yards. People knew each other, or had a good idea of who lived in the neighborhood.

Agree, and more. More than 'play in'. We had adventures! The fields, the bush, the neighbourhood were both friendly (safe) and adventurous. Its in your blood and your genes to do stupid things when you're young, show off a bit, experience some danger.

Today, there's drugs, the cops at the mall (how far can we push them?), and out of control parties.

There's no more fun or adventure. I feel sorry for todays kids. I take mine to the bush whenever possible, and encourage them to push themselves into situations that get that the adrenaline going. Never life threatening but fun. Or just plain hard work. Climbing mountains - because they're there. Because I can!

Back to good old days eh?

reply to post by poet1b


Urban sprawl certainly has put a damper on the types of outdoor activity that kids can enjoy these days. And it is comfortable to look back to when we were children and see them as the "good old days" but this is the cyber age and "play" has changed. The definition of "friendship" has changed. The personal computer, the iphone and technology ingeneral has changed the culture; it actually is a brave new world and it makes us old farts uncomfortable.

IMO the most dramatic change in America/world came when "planned obsolescence" became the corporate mantra and craftsmanship, solid design and longevity were cast aside for increased profit.

Is this current change in consciencness to the cyber age good for the culture in general? Probably no worse than the creation of the "throw away" society where we require landfills and recycle stations instead of repairmen.

Our kids in the future will reminisce about the good old days when you actually had to use wires to get electricity to charge up stuff; If we make it that far.



[edit on 13-3-2010 by whaaa]

reply to post by endisnighe


Thanks for your excellent post, I missed this earlier.

That figures that all of this is being dictated by the government, and most likely for the corporate lobbyists. I think the way cities are currently planned follows an agenda. Things didn't just happen this way, we have been intentionally corralled by the PTB.

I had thought the utilities were paid for by the city, thanks for clearing that up.

What a complete rip off that utility companies are given ownership of the utilities that the developers build. That is outright theft as far as I am concerned. Personally, I don't think private corporations should own utilities. They should all belong to the public, and private companies should then pay to use things like the power lines and communication lines.

One thing I have learned about city building inspectors is that they get by doing what ever they want, and are often more into playing games than doing their jobs. It has been my observation that cities are usually the worst violators of rights. Many local authorities in these suburban cities act much more like dictators of pubic policy than civil servants.

I'm not against laws protecting our environment, but I have never thought that the cap and trade bill concept was worth squat. It does sound like one huge power grab. Like everything else our government has done of late, it will only wind up benefiting giant corporations at the expense of the middle class and small businesses.

People should be aware of what a scam this Cap and Trade legislation is. This has been attempted before, and it is nothing but a huge scam.

Here is a link that explains it pretty well.

www.vimeo.com...

Basically, there would be a huge numbers of ways that companies can create phony offset permits in which they pretend to do something to reduce carbon output, and get real money for dong something that would have increased carbon output.

Here is another point that I think should be made.

Jefferson pictured us as a nation of gentlemen farmers.

I think we could be that type of nation in a modern world, where with computer automation, small business owners would be able to achieve massive accomplishments.

The agricultural product of Hemp could give farmers and local manufacturers major independence from corporations, especially with current computer technology, were small factory towns could be turned into independent small manufacturing centers dominated by small businesses. This would cut out the corporate domination.

Could elimination of these small factory towns been a major goals for the last half a century of more?

Here is an article on secret government activity, and how these things have been made to happen.

www.serendipity.li...