WEALTH AND MONEY PART XXIV: WEALTH AND ANTIWEALTH
“Humanity has the option to become successful on our planet if we reorient world production away from weaponry – – – – from killingry to livingry.” – – Buckminster Fuller
Fuller used the terms “livingry” and “killingry” to describe alternate paths in utilizing Earth’s physical resources and human intellect. “Livingry” supported life and planetary health while “killingry” was harmful to both. In keeping with the concepts of this “Wealth and Money” series, the terms “livingry” and “killingry” could also be called “wealth” and “antiwealth.”
Recalling previous articles in this series:
Wealth is the utilization of Planet Earth’s material and energy resources in support of ongoing human life, biodiversity, and operational planetary integrity. Wealth production is subject to the laws of physics and the ever growing knowledge of the enlightened, caring, human intellect.
In contradistinction:
Antiwealth is the utilization of Planet Earth’s material and energy resources in ways destructive of ongoing human life, biodiversity, and operational planetary integrity. Antiwealth is both directly destructive, as in weapons production and war, and indirectly destructive in that the physical and intellectual resources used to provide antiwealth are unavailable for use in developing wealth. Antiwealth production is subject to the laws of physics and the fear, greed and sociopathic, power driven, misguided human intellect.
The United States of America now spends half of its discretionary budget, over 600 billion dollars per year, on the production of antiwealth. Our defense (read corporate offense) department currently invests more than the next 10 largest nations combined in developing increasingly effective ways of killing people. One could argue that no single entity on Earth is doing more to jeopardize the ongoing hopes of humanity than the U.S. Department of Defense. It is antiwealth incarnate.
Taken as a whole, the world’s militaries create a self-fulfilling prophecy. Nations war because of the false perception that there “is not enough wealth to go around and someone must suffer and die.” But it is the vast physical and intellectual resources wasted in military antiwealth that now creates the inadequacy. Ideologically and reptilian-reflexively blind to our ability to make Earth work for everyone, we plant the seeds of our own destruction.
Even more alarming than military expenditures is manmade global warming. Any expansion in the production and transport of fossil fuels represents the epitome of antiwealth insanity. In this context the Standing Rock Native Americans protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline are fighting for all humanity. They are taking a stand against the world’s most dangerous antiwealth. If the billions being invested in perpetuating the destructive use of fossil fuels were instead directed toward the constructive wealth of alternative energies, life on Earth would be on a far safer trajectory.
The instances of antiwealth are replete, and in the end, most are the result of flawed economic models. A prime example is the “consumer driven economy.” No one would contest the need for the wonderful products and services that enable the citizens of wealthy nations to live healthy, rich and rewarding lives. It is what we are now capable of, and should be providing for, all humans. But requiring the endless consumption of “stuff” to create “jobs” producing “stuff” so that people can “earn a living” to go out and buy more “stuff” is a destructive, vicious circle and an antiwealth downward spiral.
We must soon come to terms with our flawed economic thinking and our archaic, moralistic concepts of what it means to “earn a living.” We must soon understand that all humans can, and must, be provided for – no matter what their ongoing personal circumstances.
We live on a spaceship. One doesn’t sacrifice their ship and fellow crew members to make a “profit.” One makes the ship work – for everyone.
“People are aware that they cannot continue in the same old way but are immobilized because they cannot imagine an alternative. We need a vision that recognizes that we are at one of the great turning points in human history when the survival of our planet and the restoration of our humanity require a great sea change in our ecological, economic, political, and spiritual values.”
-Grace Lee Boggs