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The Epidemic of Aimlessness in America
What are you doing?
The question seems innocuous enough at first glance. The ominous reality, however, is that it embodies a rapidly unraveling fray in the fabric of society. For far too many people, that question lacks a satisfying answer. The cogs of capitalism churn and drive us forward whether we’re inclined to go or not. What are you doing? Well… I suppose I’m just trying to survive when you get right down to it. Trying not to get carried off in the undertow of the economic tsunami we call freedom and progress.
Attempts to pin down the meaning of life are ageless. It’s a question we’ve been asking ourselves since before history remembers — one, in my opinion — that will never be answered. But that’s a little uncomfortable for most of us, isn’t it? The lack of any preordained purpose, the drifting nature of our existence. And so we’ve built for ourselves a machine that assigns tasks to all members of society and handed the controls over to disembodied demagogues we call corporations.
At no time in history have so many people so feverishly pursued nothing. We work more hours for a smaller share of the income the edifice of American prosperity generates. We put more and more of our meager earnings into the gaping mouth of the beast we call the healthcare system while it laughs as we die younger and more indebted than our…
