HERE'S a thought for holiday shoppers: Where on the economic spectrum are society's happiest people? Sophie Tucker, the nightclub entertainer, used to say: "I've been rich and I've been poor. Believe me, rich is better." Ailments of materialism
afflict manyShe seemed to be on to something. But a lot of people now are challenging her. Even better may be peace with one's self and family and community involvements. Solid communities used to be more prevalent than they are today. Solid families, too.
We are the worse for it. Can we get back to them?
America is the world leader in the rush to materialism, also called wealth. More people have more things today than we even dreamed of when I was growing up in the 1920s and 1930s. The world comes into even humble homes through TV. Travel to faraway places is within reach of tens of millions. Christmas trees will be deep among glittery packages.
We live much longer thanks to public health and modern medicine even though we fatten ourselves in unhealthy ways and abuse our bodies more than ever with cigarettes, drugs and alcohol. Products cater to our every convenience, creating "needs" we once never dreamed of having.
But we have more crimes and more family break-ups. Our homes and our neighborhoods are less secure.
"Affluenza" is the name of a public television show first broadcast nationwide in September and reshown here last Saturday. It diagnosed our rush to materialism as a serious social disease. Among its symptoms: Work hours too long. Credit cards too many. Pressures too great. Personal life a hectic mess.
"Affluenza" described mostly old stuff we all know. But its genius lay in using actors in white medical jackets to tell us that rushing too hard for material things truly is an illness. It is a social illness that has its consequences in headaches, fatigue, nervous breakdowns, family breakups, crime.
Its message of "just say no" is not apt to carry far. A wealthy elite can turn their backs on the rat races of Wall Street and opt for "voluntary simplicity" in rustic places on their investment income and pensions -- until they tire of it.
But it wouldn't hurt a bit for the rest of society to cut up a few credit cards, or to scale back our lives to give more time to family and community. Some tycoons of the past made their way up by saving 10 cents of every dollar they earned. I'm told I'm nuts when I suggest that could be a good rule today. Taxes, rents, food and other demands are simply too great. That's why we have so many more families with both parents working...or only one parent...and the loss of attention to children, family and friends that goes with it.
What material "needs" could we skip to give more hours to our children, more hours to the community and even save a bit? I'm old enough to be able to talk about this pretty abstractly. Those who live it don't see it as easy. But wouldn't it be a good trade-off even if not easy?
After all, most Americans lived for years and the poor of the world still do without the things those of us with affluenza call necessities. Aren't the real necessities strong families, strong schools, strong communities, strong social structures?
SO far I have stayed away from strong values. But their loss may be at the root of much of the rest. Too many of our academics and intelligentsia have shown contempt for these. Liberalism too often has meant libertine-ism -- seeking physical gratification above living responsible lives. We keep churches out of public schools but we need to let more value training back in.
Political correctness has led us to espouse victimization theories, blame all our shortcomings on others, some in the far away past. We thus avoid taking responsibility on ourselves for what we are and what we do.
The cure for affluenza, in fact, may be a return to values and thus to lives more involved with family, community and churches, even at some material sacrifice.