Vegans, Mylie Cyrus and British Petroleum

The chatter on Facebook this afternoon was about Mylie Cyrus and sex. Specifically using an underage girl as a sex object to market her brand. Of course this is as cynical as it is effective. The human beast is wired to respond to the high hormone level in the young females of the species. They become sexually attractive by virtue of their body chemistry, and in turn enjoy the attention they get by being available to males. In previous generations mothers actively discouraged their daughters from advertising their availability by controlling their clothing choices. Now we find the clothing choices are marketed as 'empowering' even in prepubescent children.

Empowering means flaunting this basic sexual reaction between males and females in females that are not ready emotionally or intellectually to make choices that protect them from the cynically predatory male sexual response.

Who benefits from this empowerment? Not the little girls who are targets for every sexually frustrated male in their vicinity, including adults who should know better. Not the sexually frustrated male, especially at his 18+ yr peak. A three year delta at eighteen is a jail term but at 21 it's getting lucky.

So the majority of marketing is targeted at people with the highest hormone levels, the least maturity and the most sensitive egos. And the corporate marketing executives use sex to increase their sales, and incidentally driving the cultural norms implying that the rules don't apply to the observer.

And the corporations will tell you that they are just reflecting societal norms, not making the norms. Which is a lot like how BP is addressing the Gulf Coast. One lady (a clean up team leader) was fired for telling her team to excavate for sludge buried by the tidal sands. She was told the job was just cosmetic.

I heard in the Crystal Restaurant in downtown Watertown NY that BP is leasing the charter boats that have been losing business due to the oil spill. Are they using these vessels to mitigate the oil problem? Of course. They want to prevent the news media from discovering the true extent of the disaster they (BP) created.

Of course with BP the truth is this is just business. They want to control the perceptions of how bad the problem is. It's all about marketing the brand. They can't be the green energy brand name when they've caused one of the biggest ecological disasters since the Exxon Valdeez. (Exxon has never lived that down and it's no where near as bad as the BP Deepwater fiasco.

So what's this got to do with Mylie Cyrus and Vegans?

Corporate greed uses human nature, whether sex, or security or greed, to meet its objectives. The vegans unfortunately, are trying to do something lofty by not eating animals under the presumption that will prevent the death of the animal. However since the majority of food animals are raised specifically for diner their lives will not be spared if we skip a hamburger. Should we as a race cease eating meat the animals would have to be disposed of just so their waste wouldn't continue to damage the ozone layer.

We shouldn't let corporate greed dictate our morals. In fact we should insist that corporations behave in a moral manner. After centuries of using oppressive control techniques to protect our daughters a free society can't abide lies, chastity belts and the law treating females as property. But we need to be open about human nature and what the unpleasant truths are about human sexuality as well as the more pleasant aspects. A blunt and open discussion with our youth would be more effective than all the platitudes and fear campaigns and jean advertisements.

We can't change human nature but we can understand it, accept it and work with to build a better society.

No Fear

The catch phrase titling this post is a fallacy. Fear is the cornerstone of our ability to learn, whether used by our parents as in fear of physical or emotional punishment, or by the law (remember breaking any law has a punishment, and punishment is to be feared) or political activity.

Control comes from directing fear.

Power comes from Control.

If you want to know who's in power look at who's directing your fear.

I spoke with a friend yesterday who strongly believes that the Constitution has been usurped in Washington. He believes that the real power in this country lies with the Haliburton's and the Merril Lynch's.

I think he might be right to a certain degree. Corporate media and corporate sponsored sponsored media is responsible for dumbing down the discourse in America to fear bites. What should we fear today? They tell us, and then tell us we have to act on this fear.... Everything from the complexity of our cable bills (a corporate deception used to raise profits) to our president (take any sound bite from Fox News).

Fear leads to panic and panic thinking is usually reactive and predictable. Any soldier will tell you that to panic the enemy is to win the battle. Lesson here? The fear and panic mongers think of the people as the enemy.

I want us, the people of this country to exercise control. I'm afraid of the corporate power because it is insidious and above the reach of the law. At least it appears that way. I don't want to be afraid of these non persons. I would like to tear down the facade that hides the men and women behind the curtain. Managers of corporations should be personally liable. Corporations should not be protected. They are not people. They have no rights. Especially not the right to make a profit.

I think that we can change the climate of fear by stripping Corporate America of its unnatural rights. And if the multinational corporations don't want to play here then I think we need to go back to self sufficiency.

Corporate Innovation

One of the Facebook characters stated that Corporations are the source of all innovation and job creation.

After I finished choking I tried to explain succinctly and politely that corporations are responsible for stifling innovation and shipping jobs over seas where they don't have to pay workers a living wage.

The sad part was the joker attacked the president and then declined further discussion under the label of inappropriate venue.

Well this is an appropriate venue and I offer up my thoughts with the understanding anyone may respond as long as they are polite. Facts will be checked and bullshit called.

My particular point is that corporations were created to hide owners and concentrate wealth. They were not created, nor do they, innovate or create jobs. Most corporations consolidate actual production jobs (production as opposed to overhead or non-production labor) to minimize their direct costs. Overhead can be amortized over quantity but direct costs accrue proportionately with production, because they add value (ie create wealth).

Here are real facts on innovation.

Nikola Tesla, an immigrant from Serbia, invented the modern electrical distribution system, fluorescent lights and radio. These are true facts. Look up the patents. He was paid 25,000 by Westinghouse for the patents on the generators, transformers, switches, and distribution system he designed and then he built the first generation plant at Niagara Falls.

George Westinghouse provided cash. And made BILLIONS. Without Nikola Tesla's genius we'd have no power grid, no aluminum manufacturing operations, no airlines, spaceflight, and pretty much anything that requires large quantities of electrical energy. (Semi conductors....) And we might have more air pollution because of inefficient coal usage.

One example.

PCs are another. IBM had no interest in small computers until Apple founders Jobs and Wozniak started selling computers to persons. Then they decided to peddle to their corporate market. IBM and Microsoft, as corporate partners, stifled the growth of the personal computer for years. Windows was/is a poor copy of Apple's OS. Innovation stifled. Oh and Apple as a corporation doesn't want anyone to play with their toys... another stifler.

So where are the examples of corporate innovation? Well when I worked for Scott Fetzer in the early 80's we manufactured electric motors in Watertown NY. The workers in the factory were mostly women (because they worked for less) and the management wanted to cut direct costs so they opened a plant in Mexico where instead of $8 an hour they paid the workers $8 a day. Instead of using high end manufacturing techniques and training the workforce to operate robotic equipment they just found people they could hire for less money to do things the old way.

Innovation.

Those are the facts. Corporations don't want to create wealth for individuals. They want to create wealth for themselves, with no moral compunctions otherwise. Corporations need to be regulated and tightly controlled because they have no human values. They only consider profit and that doesn't support human society. We saw how they manipulated the economy when no one was watching them. They bled the economy until it nearly collapsed.

I could go on but I really am tired. It would be nice if we the people, conservative and otherwise, could have a civilized and intelligent discussion. We might find that the real villains are the ones trying to tell us what a good job they're doing fixing the mess they made.