We knew the word before, obviously, but in 2001 the term "terrorism" became a household word. In September of 2001, the whole nation -- the whole world -- saw the Twin Towers fell, watched as the Pentagon was hit, and listened as valiant passengers took down another plane headed to do more damage. The outcome? Fear. Americans were afraid like never before in my lifetime. So we adopted restrictive rules for traveling by air and purchased an expensive organization with expensive equipment to give us security in airports and now we feel better.
Substitute just about any major event in the past hundred years and you'll see. We are a people run by fear. We recognize the terrorists that seek to harm us, but not the ones that try to "help." Our lives are absolutely driven by fear. It was once considered crazy at best and harmful at worst for parents to shelter their children; now it's considered child abuse (criminal in some places) to let them play outside without adult supervision. Why? Fear. In 2014 the world spent 1.7 trillion dollars for military spending for defense. In North America the security industry is a $32 billion industry. From IT to credit cards, from mall cops to home security, from checking accounts to jail cells, we spend billions because we're afraid and we hope to lessen that fear. A year ago Forbes reported on 40 new billionaires just from fighting COVID-19, saying that there is a "new billionaire every 17 hours" and informing us that a record 493 people joined the World's Billionaires list in 2021. (The previous record was 290 in 2015.) Fear. Fear is the economists' dream. And we eat it up. We are a consumer society that greedily imbibes fear from our media, our government, our legal system, our commercial and industrial complex, our friends and family and neighbors -- wherever we can get it. We're afraid of school shootings even though American school children have less than a 0.001% chance of being killed in a school shooting. We are told that the world will likely end because of global warming ... which causes global cooling ... and raises sea level and causes storms and ... lots of things that aren't exactly supported by the science. They assure us that in a fairly short couple of decades our climate will be murderous, but they can't reliably tell us what the weather will be in 10 days. Why are we so driven by fear? Control. Control and economics. If they can keep you scared, they can keep you in line (quite literally at airports). And you'll willingly pay for it ... with big money.
The Bible says we are to fear God, and we tend to discount that. The Bible says otherwise "fear not." Don't fear circumstances "for I am with you" (Isa 41:10). "Do not be firghtened and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go" (Josh 1:9). "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?" (Psa 27:1). "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God" (Php 4:6-7). "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell" (Matt 10:28). We -- yes, we Christians -- have a lot of misplaced fear. We don't fear God, but we do fear all the things God promises to protect us from. And it is costing us not a little.
7 comments:
Interesting post, and I certainly agree that fear is major driver of economic trends over the last several decades.
But I don't think that this current response to fear is anything but a recent event. The colonists feared what would happen if George III continued to oppress them, and they put aside that fear and fought back. In 1941 the US put aside the justified fear of the Axis powers and puled together, sacrificed, and led the defeat of the Axis. I think that we as a society have lost our ability to put fear aside and demonstrate courage in the face of danger. I suspect that there are multiple reasons (and it's certainly not universal as you pointed out with flight 93), and that a lot of them stem from the fact that we as a society have moved beyond having our needs met and are focused on our wants.
I think there is certainly a failure of courage, probably because there is a dearth of valued principles beyond, "I want what I want and I want it now."
I think that's related to moving from a need based society, to a want based society. Or as they say, first world problems. I don't think we understand the benefits of communal sacrifice for a bigger goal than simply "I want...".
I blame that Kardashians. ;)
Yes, I was agreeing. No, I don't blame the Kardashians (I caught that you were joking). I blame the millennials. ;)
I assumed you were agreeing, and yes I was joking about the Kardashians. I'm not sure I'd blame the Milennials as much as I'd blame the Millennial's parents. (Yes, I'm probably one of them.)
Oh, now you're stepping on toes. Maybe the correct toes, but toes indeed.
If the shoe fits... Or something like that.
In all seriousness, I think that a conversation around how prosperity has harmed Gen X, Millennials, and following generations would be interesting. It seems like a big part of what was sacrificed for prosperity was when feminism decreed to mom's working ws more valuable than mom's raising their children. Obviously, there's more than just that, but it seems like a worthy discussion.
Post a Comment