| Consumerism | Media-marketing | Man-values | Population | Environment | Power (elite) | Terrorism |

Rocinha, biggest brazilian favela         

still a chance?    (Arpoador - Rio de Janeiro)          

Today we are facing dramatic issues, jeopardizing our planet, life, and leaving no future.

Population is a major concern: its growth has been skyrocketing in the past 50 years.
This issue alone is putting the planet at risk, at least the world we are familiar with.

Consumerism is forcing people to destroy resources, to spoil nature, to fill the planet with
waste, including nuclear scoriae.

But it is even destroying "man", his traditions, his values, his mental health, by a process of
subtle/subliminal brainwashing.

Media and marketing are conniving with corporations very effectively in this brainwashing,
first by making people feel frustrated and not "ok", and then by alluring us that we just
have to buy the latest worthless things in order to be "happy"

And the religion of dollar is the value, by which things are measured and can be obtained.
This is very keenly carried on by media and marketing, which also rely on a powerful weapon,
an instinct common to all people: "emulation". So, this perverted cycle never ends.

We are all becoming addicted to consumerism as an irresistible drug

And we are more and more conforming to the same views, same opinions, same rules
(or lack of), accepting this growing conformity/sameness of news, information and opinion
 
If somebody from another planet could observe us, he would perceive that we,
all of us, are kind of "entrapped" in a giant truck speeding up in a downhill road,
and yet no one finds time or a chance to even think about just slowing down ...
On the contrary, even worse, it's not "all of us" yet: poor countries are in a waiting list...

(see also the New Commandments, in CONSUMERISM )

A word on terrorism: not only is it the only "exogenous" issue, but it is also  a
non-conforming force, actually driving against this society.

There is dramatic link among all these topics, and the complete picture suggests we are,
at the very least, at a crossroad, and if we want to stop destructing both  man and planet,
something must be changed soon and effectively.

Enlightenment, the arrogance of extreme technology, and specialization brought us  here.
G.Bernard Shaw would have witty comments, such as:
The ignorant man knows very little of everything.  The expert person knows a bit of something.
Very expert people know much of little.    But a super-expert knows everything,   of nothing.

Some things to do, in Western countries,  include:

- allocate portion of a nation's budget to environment, studies on society, new technologies
   for "cleaning a little bit" the many disasters already done in this past century

- promote/seek a slow-down in private consumption, compensated by new type of "Services",
   new type of projects for "Research", new type of projects for "Environment"

- try and rethink the old (simplified) equation  GDP= C+I, in terms of a more comprehensive :
   GDP= C+I+ new Services+ Research+ Environment (...+ "values")
   
- appoint a kind of ethics-panel of "wise men", who could analyze our society and its implications,
   monitor media & advertising and set some ethical rules
   and study issues as population, media, corporations, violence, people frustration, planet
   destruction, lack of "values", and try and propose remedies/suggestions

- enforce a law to set minimum ethical rules for media and tv programs

- severely limit media/advertising, particularly when directed to kids/children

- severely limit/stop subsidies to industries which tend to change course of nature heavily

- promote and detax private investments/cooperations/solidarity, promoting a market
  of ethical bonds and ethical stocks: projects for environment, for research on society, on
  new "services", on new types of urbanization/transports and for poors/poor countries

- ngo and other organizations could associate in a world "joint-venture", trying and spread
   a common message in a clear and loud voice

- environment movements could realize that environment issues are just one most glaring result
  of many other issues: these should be addressed first (consequently saving environment, too)

- famous people (e.g. actors) could play a key role, also because they have access to Media ...
   (obviously, if they agree that something should be changed)

- we, all of us, could/should slow-down consumption, especially of the many useless things offered,
   being aware that we would get other more valuable/satisfactory "items" in exchange

some interesting links (see also under each topic):