2008 Woodie Awards
Addiction: conscious culture shift needed
Jake Cox
Issue date: 4/23/08 Section: Opinion
By nature, I seem to enjoy exploring the depths of my consciousness while contemplating seemingly infinite and timeless mysteries such as the evolution and resulting nature of humanity, the various paths of cultural development, and the ongoing behavior of humanity facing its own demise in an increasingly devastated and corrupt world. Last week, I was listening to my neurophysiology professor speak about addiction when I made an interesting connection. It seems that addiction as a model might explain a great deal about the mysteries I often ponder.
Addiction is defined as "the condition of being habitually or compulsively occupied with or involved in something." Physiologically, addiction results from the brain becoming physiologically accustomed to any number of pleasurable stimuli. The never-ending stimuli that our brains interpret result in our perception and understanding of the world. It makes sense to assert that we naturally gravitate towards pleasurable stimuli and tend to form behavioral habits that produce such stimuli.
As our culture and society has evolved, our pool of pleasurable stimuli to which we may become addicted has grown in epic proportions as the emergence of industrialized civilization has effectively created a worldview known as consumerism, the equating of personal worth and happiness with material possessions and consumption. Our basic needs as human beings, which are derived from the Earth through our connection to nature, its cycle of life, our families, our communities, and, ultimately, ourselves, are now being met through an acquired species-wide addiction to secondary sources of satisfaction created by consumerism.
Our addiction to the fruits of consumerism has been a powerful and extremely profitable tool of manipulation in the rise of the American Empire. Wealthy bankers and corporations, orchestrating an impressive puppet show starring our American politicians, are the driving forces behind the emergence of the American Empire. It has exploited the planet's resources for mass consumption, consequently enslaving its citizens as we strive and struggle to satisfy our material addictions in an effort to find meaning, purpose, and identity amongst the pain and emptiness lingering throughout our disenchanted American culture.
Addiction is defined as "the condition of being habitually or compulsively occupied with or involved in something." Physiologically, addiction results from the brain becoming physiologically accustomed to any number of pleasurable stimuli. The never-ending stimuli that our brains interpret result in our perception and understanding of the world. It makes sense to assert that we naturally gravitate towards pleasurable stimuli and tend to form behavioral habits that produce such stimuli.
As our culture and society has evolved, our pool of pleasurable stimuli to which we may become addicted has grown in epic proportions as the emergence of industrialized civilization has effectively created a worldview known as consumerism, the equating of personal worth and happiness with material possessions and consumption. Our basic needs as human beings, which are derived from the Earth through our connection to nature, its cycle of life, our families, our communities, and, ultimately, ourselves, are now being met through an acquired species-wide addiction to secondary sources of satisfaction created by consumerism.
Our addiction to the fruits of consumerism has been a powerful and extremely profitable tool of manipulation in the rise of the American Empire. Wealthy bankers and corporations, orchestrating an impressive puppet show starring our American politicians, are the driving forces behind the emergence of the American Empire. It has exploited the planet's resources for mass consumption, consequently enslaving its citizens as we strive and struggle to satisfy our material addictions in an effort to find meaning, purpose, and identity amongst the pain and emptiness lingering throughout our disenchanted American culture.
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