More is Better,

Even More is Even Better

Ken Midkiff / TomPaine.com 26may01

Editor's Note: The Missouri Sierra Club is a grantee of The Florence Fund, the parent organization of TomPaine.com.

Ken Midkiff is director of the Sierra Club in Missouri.

Somehow, in the past few decades, the American Dream has been converted into a nightmare of greed. What was once the goal of a vigorous and self-reliant people -- to be free, independent, idealistic, and caring -- is now just an endless quest for money and all that gives the appearance of wealth.

In this worshipping of filthy lucre, we have lost our way. From enjoying the simple things -- a colorful sunset, the warmth of a barn in winter, the song of a spring warbler, sitting quietly listening to the endless babbling of a stream riffle -- we have veered wildly down the path of over-consumption and the all-consuming quest for material possession.

By now, after years of such quests, it should be recognized that the possession of things doesn't bring happiness. It only perpetuates a desire for more things. If a twenty-seven inch color TV and a state-of-the-art VCR don't satisfy, then perhaps a thirty-five inch TV with a DVD player will do it. Never mind that the programming is so much mind-numbing pap, and the videos available are just re-released B-Grade movies -- it is the bigger and better we seek.

Some would trace this obsession with physical possessions back to the Great Depression, and there is likely some truth in this. The hardships endured and the losses incurred did in fact lead to a quest for security. There was a national focus on basic physical needs -- food, clothing shelter -- that many had to do without or struggle to maintain in the 1930s.

But, while we certainly need food, clothing and shelter, the nightmare of greed has gone well beyond that, to the point that we worship and idolize those who exploit the rest of us. How else to explain the veneration accorded the CEOs of multi-national corporations who have succeeded mostly by advertising campaigns designed to make us buy things that we don't need or even want. And since these things don't satisfy our needs, they promise other things which will. Unbelievably, we continue doing what we have always done and expect the results to be different.

Unfortunately, this attitude -- that if we're lacking something of quality, we need to respond with something of quantity -- is demonstrated most vividly in our national leadership. The current President of the United States and the leader of the free world, seems to believe that those with money should be given his ear. By equating the acquisition of wealth with knowledge and wisdom, he ignores that the path he is following likely leads off a cliff.

The response to a shortage of energy -- electricity, natural gas, oil -- is not to look at how energy is being used and investigate ways to be more efficient and conservative, but rather to find ways to create more. Never mind that profligate and downright stupid over-consumption has led to this self-induced crisis in California; there is a problem so let's throw money at it.

The basis of many of our problems is a burgeoning population, leading to unprecedented demands for food, housing, and more stuff. Rather than finding ways to assist the world and this country in limiting reproduction, the response is to promote growth and development -- and population. The response to too much is to advocate the creation of more.

We are rapidly consuming the natural capital of our planet. Even those most preoccupied with the acquisition of money recognize that they should make every effort to leave the capital investments in place. But we are treating this planet as if we had a backup. Every economic system is based on the availability and use of natural resources, but every economic system is exploiting those very resources in an unsustainable manner.

We can't make more fossil fuels, nor minerals, nor land, nor clean water or healthy air. We can use what we have frugally so that our children and children's children may continue to enjoy the fruits of the earth.

Or we can continue down our path of over-consumption and acquisition, and use it all up as quickly as possible. We can be visionaries and act responsibly, or we can be mono-generational greedheads, and let future generations fend for themselves. The choice is ours. We are still a free people.