Benign Sedition

I had planned to write a piece this morning inspired by an article about the hope of Spring, subversive agriculture and non-violent resistance to authority. In the shower I meticulously crafted the narrative: weaving the concepts from James C. Scott's "The Art of Not Being Governed"and Toby Hemenway's "Liberation Permaculture" together in concert with the soft spots in the armor of technocracy. I'd throw in examples of COIN failures across the world and finish up by bringing both the strident activists of the Left and Right together by shredding ideologies and unify their primary motivations (loosely, to make the world a better place) in the values they share rather than separate them by how they differ.

It was not to be.

Before I jump off into what might be taken as an anti-technological rant, let's clear things up. Firstly, I am not opposed to technology. However, I am also not a true believer of the technological quasi-religion that seems to have taken hold of American culture during my lifetime. I understand why it has become what it is. If you put yourself into the shoes of the 19th century everyman things like tractors, phone lines, train travel, electricity and the democratization of the internal combustion engine would be extremely useful and very seductive because of their eminent practicality in day to day life. The mid-century was quite dazzling. Supersonic jets, atomic energy, rockets to the moon, computers, etc. Were these things really useful to the average person? Certainly not, but they we're sexy. They told us a story of the "FUTURE!!!"  Whether or not you really wanted to colonize other planets or have a laser gun you be a fool not to be wrapped up in the ecstatic fever sweeping through the masses, fueled by the scientific manipulation of the human mind otherwise known as marketing. We weren't sure how it worked or how it was going to benefit us in any sort of practical way but, by God, we were for it.

Fast forward to the early 1980's of my early childhood. Flying cars? No. Colonies on Mars? Nope. Free Energy, world peace, the end of poverty, teleportation... did we even have a better train network than we did in the late 1940's? Fuck no. We had Space Camp, video games and all sorts of other consumer goods that were dressed up in the trappings of Futureness, but nothing tangible other than, arguably, jet travel being within reach of the man on the street. Luckily the marketing machine was still going stronger than ever:

If you were 7 years old, as I was, in 1984 when the above Grumman X-29 flew for the first time you were, like, convinced you were living in the future. Between this, the Space Shuttle and the SR-71 Blackbird the fact that we were not living in floating houses like the Jetson's apparently did not matter. What I now find hilarious about the X-29 is that forward swept wing jet fighters were being developed by the Nazi's in 1944 and the SR-71 took it's first flight in the mid-1960's. In other words, they were the past but we were still willing to buy that "most glorious future place of the Fatherland" was still coming, apparently.

I have a very particular memory of the late 1980's(or was in the very early 1990's?) which was watching Future porn TV shows reminiscent of "That's Incredible!" where goofy houses of the future, flying boats and all sorts of James Bond type novelty vehicles were trotted out to amaze the plebs while they watched it on television sets that were little different than those of the 1970's.

Accelerating in the background was the Information Revolution, which had begun during the Nixon administration to allow global financial stuff to happen 24/7, and by the late 1990's the internet was the new Futurism. Sure, web 1.0 was mostly populated by badly html'd Pearl Jam fan sites and message boards full of neck beards but that didn't mean that we couldn't speculate wildly on it and crater the US economy.

All the way along: What was the utility of most of the future hype bullshit that was marketed at us? The space movies, zippy looking jet planes and other assorted stories we were told about technology? Peer into the lives of the average American and you'll find that they are still living in a crappy house/apartment/trailer but now there is a large flat screen squatting in the middle of the living room where the 19" Zenith used to be and that everyone has a computer phone. Oh and their cars get 10 miles a gallon better mileage but if they break they can't work on them.

What would the guy at the beginning of this narrative of the age of technology have to say about this state of affairs? Not much positive I would bet.

You seeing what I'm getting at here? Maybe not, but I will proceed nonetheless.

Now, in the year 2017, the X-29 loving 7 year-old me would have thought we would for sure be living in the future promised by 2001: A Space Odyssey and yet, here we are.

 And this is why I will, likely, never write the article I intended. Because, on the way to my office to write I decided to pop in my headphones, listen to a podcast and dick around on my phonecomputer. My tight nest of thoughts scattered. My ambition sublimated. My will soothed by the false perception of doing something important.

This brings me to my real point: appropriate use of technology and the slippery area between work and play.

15 years ago you knew if you were relaxing/wasting time because you were plopped in front of a TV or reading People magazine. Nowadays you can check your work email on the bus and the next thing you know you have wasted the better part of an hour yelling at dumb people on Facebook. You will not get this time back. This is not an improvement.

Yes, there are infinite ways of being productive on a smartphone, but ask yourself the question I asked myself this morning: "How much time do I spend fulfilling the promise of the internet as the New Library of Alexandria versus how much time to I spend distracting myself, punding on the latest news, hate reading social media and looking for stuff I don't need on eBay?" Not just this but also: "What could I have done with the time that has just slipped away from me today?"

Now let's ask the larger question "How much human productivity was lost today by these means?" comScore says 198 million people own smart phones in the US as of 2016. Let's say that 2/3rds of those smartphone owners spend on average 1 hour a day dicking around. Both of those numbers seem fairly conservative but what the heck. 130 million hours of human production have been lost. Today. Considering that a human has 120,000 hours of dedicated work in their lifetime according to how we do things in the Western world that is 1000 lives worth of lost production in one day.

I would like to put this out there for you to consider: If technology does not improve your life and the lives of others, it is making them worse.

Wasting 1000 lives worth of work in one day does not seem like it is making things better. 

Stop dicking around. 

Start doing something meaningful.

Like making your own Hot Sauce?

Eggs, rice and beans, quesadillas and so many more things are just made better with a little bit of hot sauce sprinkled on top. Hot sauce is great because it is cheap and it doesn't really go bad, but is it as good as it should be? That depends. I use plain old cheap store brand hot sauce to adjust the seasoning on things like soups, stews and beans. This because I want acid and heat, not chile flavor. However, sometimes you do want the flavor. Sometimes you want to give a meaningful gift to your uncle or your dad. Sometimes you need to make your own hot sauce.

Recipe

1 cup White Vinegar
4 Habanero chiles, minced very fine
Salt

Optional

Garlic
Fish Sauce
Fermented Shrimp

Do

Combine minced chiles, vinegar and salt (and garlic or fish sauce or fermented shrimp or whatever) to taste in a glass jar. shake and refrigerate for 2-3 weeks, shaking when you think about it. Once the flavors have married bottle it up in recycled beer bottle or whatever and top with a cork. Old hot sauce bottle work surprisingly no well for this sort of thing because of their narrow necks.