The Politics Of
Consumption
Adam Wasserman
First Edition, June 2006
Copyright 2006 by Adam Wasserman
All rights reserved
Smashwords Edition
Part I
In a large, fortified building on the outskirts of one of their most prestigious cities, the three most important personages of Oceania would come together and make their decisions. Yes, that's right, three. It was a rather dull building, or so it would appear from the outside, the color of concrete and the occasional darkened window. As far as anyone could tell it was a single complex, although it was huge, massive, and sprawled chaotically across the cement lot on which it was perched. The entire place was surrounded by menacing electrified fencing and there were gateposts manned by creatures that appeared to be human, although it was difficult to say for sure. They all wore thick dark clothing and helmets and sunglasses and did not speak unless it was to roughly bark an order. The consumers of Oceania were hardly permitted a glimpse of this building, although occasionally they saw pictures of it in the news, and always in the far distance.
Inside the bowels of this building, buried far below the ground-level and protected by the most recent advancements in computer, mechanical, and material science, there was a large empty chamber. Empty? Well, almost. At its very center there was a simple metallic table, round, and three chairs parked unceremoniously about it. The chairs were all plainly similar, very sturdy, and probably of the same material as the table. There was light, too, that came from illuminated panes on the ceiling, and there were large air vents craftily disguised here and there in the walls.
No one was allowed in the room except the three men who used it. Very few people even knew it existed. But it did. Deep down in the earth so as to afford the greatest protection from air or biological attack, this was where the Gang of Three would meet - sometimes daily - to hammer out the policies by which Oceania, its government and its daily life, would be driven.
It had, of course, always been like this. In countries and nations and states all across the world, since as long as there have been buildings to house them, there were like rooms with a like table and chairs. The number of the players in the Gang had not been and was not always the same, but if they were present their particular characters and natures were more or less similar. There was the Politician, the Holy Man, and - a more or less recent addition - there was the Capitalist.
The Politician was the oldest of the three, having his roots in the days when people had not yet found it necessary to dwell in large, permanent settlements, but none the less found it practical and natural to choose leaders to decide for themselves on the most important military and organizational matters. But once the building had been built and the room with its table and chairs put in place, he found it convenient to bring in the Holy Man and let him in on the secret.
The Politician was a lopsided man. He had a lean, smallish body and was usually dressed in the most conservative garb of the day. The most curious thing about him was that his head was so large in comparison with the rest of his body. This was a natural and somewhat convenient development for the Politician, his head being the part of his body he devoted the most attention to. The strands of his greasy hair were always neatly and primly tucked into place, and the large surface area of his face provided the ideal setting for the constant smile that perturbed it. The Politician was almost always smiling, and if you ask me he looked absurd doing it, if only because he rarely stopped. But the people seemed to be very much attached to that perverse smile and would remonstrate him if ever it went away, so that with time the Politician learned to extend it to virtually the lobes of his ears and to use various aids and devices to enhance its effect.
Now, as I said before, the Politician found it expedient to invite the Holy Man into his chamber for consultation. For the Holy Man was found to be extremely useful in the Politician's dealings with the people, as they were called in those days, and the Politician had found that the protection of the building's walls provided ample opportunity for stockpiling the various articles of leisure and pleasure which a person can enjoy, both physical and spiritual. So from a very early time the Holy Man was more than happy to support the position of the Politician, and the two were quite happy with themselves and their room with the table and chairs.
The Holy Man was a bit more aged than the Politician, grey haired and silvery, a fact which lent him the appearance of wisdom, and a bit more stocky, too. Sometimes he had a beard and sometimes he was wont to shave, and his body had the usual proportions, but his dress was a bit too ornamental for my taste, and bulky and needlessly expensive at that. Long, heavy robes that others often had to help him around in, following after him in a train holding the ends of his garments. He was wont to wear various hats, too, of the most unusual shapes and sizes, some of which didn't fit his head too well and so slid down over his eyes if he moved suddenly. The people feared the Politician, but in general they trusted the Holy Man, which is why the Politician courted his friendship.
Now, together for a long time the Politician and the Holy Man arranged the affairs of their countries and states. At times, for some reason or another, the people grew restless and would clamor, or the Gang of Two (as it was then called) of some other land would assault their interests, and the building would be stormed and the Politician and the Holy man would be put to the test. Sometimes they were done away with, sometimes one would find himself with a new partner, and sometimes they did not allow the room to be penetrated and were able to repulse the attack, but in the end it was always a Politician and it was always a Holy Man who met in the room in the building, the room with the table and the chairs, and it was always they who were making the decisions that so much affected the lives of the people. It is true that at times they were at odds with each other. Such discord tended to arise later on in their relationship, and there was even a time when the Holy Man was no mere support for the Politician, but when he actually had the Politician subdued in the folds of his magnificent robe, so to speak, and had the final say on matters. The people found after a time they did not like this situation, however, for the Holy Man was noted to be rather excitable, and even if the people trusted him he was grumpy and not very dynamic as a person. They found the scope of his imagination limited and his mind resistant to human persuasion, and so after a time and with great effort they were able to restore the Politician to his dominant place at the table.
Later on came the Capitalist. He was never really invited. In fact, no one is quite sure how he even got there. At first he found his way beyond the fences and the gates and wandered around a bit outside, talking privately and quickly to anyone he could meet coming out, and later on he was even seen inside the building. The Capitalist was not a very good talker, like the Politician, nor was he in any way attractive, and he did not really believe in anything in particular and so could not inspire respect in those he met, but he did have one import thing: capital, and that means Money. The Capitalist had lots and lots of Money, and because of it he was able to acquire all the luxurious items and articles of enjoyment that the Politician and the Holy Man had already had at their disposal inside the building for years on end. So when the Politician and the Holy Man met the Capitalist in the darkened hallways, they were disappointed to see that their displays of ostentation - which they considered a special treat reserved for only their closest intimates - had no effect on the Capitalist, who snorted with contempt and bit scornfully into a hotdog.
The Capitalist was a man who dressed entirely in black and white. He wore an old-fashioned, black suit with a black bowtie and an off-white, buttondown shirt that was almost always rumpled and splattered with the remains of his latest meal. His shoes, too, were a shiny, almost unreal looking shade of night, and his pants - which should have been neatly pressed - were creased from abuse and neglect and showed alarming signs of structural weakness. On the top of his wide, balding head there was a black bowler hat, like they used to wear long ago when photography was only recently no longer a technology to wonder at. Invariably, the hat was too small for his head. A few strands of sickly looking, brownish-grey hair protruded from under it, amazed and desperately thankful to see the light of day. These were, in fact, the only signs of humanity to be seen about him, aside from the pasty white skin of his bloated face and his pudgy hands which couldn't quite close properly, and his beady eyes, constantly blinking and flicking quickly and incessantly from this point to that, in search of more wealth or his next meal. The coat that he wore was made of a dark velvety material and had a long tail that came just to his ankles. The tail actually consisted of two parts, two long extensions of material that descended from the nape of his back and tapered off by his heels. Yes, he was a man dressed in black and white and yes, silver buttons - and did I forget to mention the thick gold chains that hung from his neck? No, those were not black or white, of course not, and the Capitalist was often to be seen fingering them. In those days he had on at least three or four gold chains, some thicker than others, and at least one large golden ring on the index finger of each hand. He believed the presence of the rings made it more impressive when he pointed at something he wanted. The Capitalist was often to be seen eating. In fact, if he wasn't fingering his chains he was either smoking a cigar or holding a bag of French fries drenched in mayonnaise, or fried chicken, or a greasy hamburger, or all three in some wonderful orgy of delight that only could have appealed to this man, such as he was. The Capitalist was to be seen licking his fingers, or wiping his hands on his pants. He wasn't too keen on hygiene, he loathed bathing, and many a person who shook his hand came away a bit disconcerted about what they imagined they felt on his fingers. But few people ever said anything to him about it; he was usually in a position where he had something that they wanted, and they didn't want to jeopardize their already fragile position as supplicants. It would have to be considered the height of diplomacy to have said that the Capitalist was fat, or even that he was an insult to the beauty of the human body. His stomach was like a fifty-pound bag of cement that hung suspended from breasts as large as an amply endowed woman's, if an elderly one. Several chins protruded from the mass of gold under his face, trying desperately to escape their imprisonment between one of his necks and his jaw. When he walked it was slowly and anyway he appeared more to wobble than stroll along like any other descent human being. He never went up stairs and always took the elevator, even if it was far out of the way and only to go down a single floor. The Capitalist was always sweating, that is true, and his pockets were stuffed with handkerchiefs which, between puffs from his cigar or while he was chewing, he was constantly in search of to wipe the drips of urine-smelling liquid off his brow. All in all, the Capitalist was a thoroughly disgusting man, plagued with bad breath and rotting teeth, and people who didn't know him or had no interest in what he had to offer (in those days, there were still some of those around), if they happened to see him on the street, would quickly hurry by, or if they had children with them, they would shield their innocent eyes and with a sharp intake of breath turn back the way they had come.
Now, even if many people tried to get as quickly away from the Capitalist as possible when they saw him coming, he somehow managed to make his arrival at the building behind the gates and the guards more and more welcome. Once the Politician came close enough to listen to what he had to say, he would come more often. You see, the Politician had much wealth stored up in that building, but the Capitalist made it plain and clear right from the beginning that no matter how much wealth a person had, it was never enough and could always be amply augmented. The Capitalist was willing to help with this eternal problem. And after a time, the Politician was only more than happy to cooperate with what the Capitalist had in mind. For the Capitalist knew what his negotiating position was, although he was always very careful never to state it outright. He needed the Politician to pass laws that were favorable to his enterprises, and that would enable him to hoard more and more wealth in his own private accounts, so that he could by more estates, more boys and more women, more rings, more gold chains, more cars, more influence - more of everything, in fact, that Money can buy, which even in those days was pretty much everything. The Capitalist, too, needed the Politician because the Politician controlled the police and the army, and the people, especially when they did not want to cooperate with the Capitalist, often had be coerced by this means.
The Holy Man, on the other hand, was - much to the surprise of the Capitalist - not so quickly to be won over. In fact, he put up quite a resistance to the spreading influence of the Capitalist both inside and outside the building with the gates and the guards. Late at night the Politician and the Holy Man could be heard to be arguing violently, and one or the other would inevitably storm away in a rage. Other people weren't entirely sure what was going on, but they were vaguely aware of a disconcerting feeling that the long standing alliance between the Holy Man and the Politician - the alliance which had led humanity pretty much since they had emerged from the wild and built themselves cities which had to be defended - was under the most severe strain, a most dangerous strain indeed. Alone in their room with the table and the chairs, the Politician frankly told the Holy Man that even the gods couldn't stop the steady march of progress, that they could either profit by the change and move forward along with everyone else or instead be left behind in the dusty bins they call temples, entirely overlooked and forgotten. There are all sorts of elaborations that could be made on the point, which I will shortly explore with you, but what it all boiled down to is that even though in the past the Holy Man was known to confuse his own exploitation of the people with the necessities of duty, if someone else were to exploit them he could come up with tens of pretty sounding arguments as to why it was a terrible thing.
Where to begin? Perhaps I ought first to tell you about what it was like for the people before the Capitalist hauled them into the cities and installed them in cattle stalls and set task masters over them. I have neglected to tell you about the people before, telling you instead about their masters, because I didn't expect that you will believe me, and I imagine you still won't. You will think me overly romantic or simply full of shit, which is understandable considering how far estranged the workers of today are from their nature and the Universe that fostered it. But, yes, the people once existed as such. They were not machines, they were animals, raised by the earth and with senses and reason and instincts that were especially attuned to the various groanings and murmurings of the world around them, so that even if they couldn't explain it they were invigorated by it. Yes, and the people were once the fertile springboard from which the privileged minority drew its numbers, the same privileged minority whose interests the Politician used to serve, and like him the Holy Man, too.
At any rate - and whether you believe me or not - before the Capitalist lured the people into his stench-ridden lair, the people lived as peasants and tradesmen in the country or in smaller, more manageable towns that were easily escaped. Their lives in those days were by no means pleasant. They lived in huts and crumbling houses, with cracks in the walls and holes in the roofs and in constant fear of reprisals from soldiers. Long hours they worked with their bare hands, it is true, but it was useful work, work the fruit of which they could understand and respect. Some were fishermen who went out in boats at dawn and returned after nightfall. Still others molded metal into useful tools like horseshoes and, of course, swords and the like. But most of them were simple peasants, and worked the farms, raising vegetables and cattle and poultry and weaving cloth. The animals they raised and killed, but they did not raise them simply in order to kill them, for some small use after which they would throw the vast remainder of the body to collect flies somewhere unseen. No, that would be cruel indeed. In those days the people honored the beasts, some of which could perform useful work, and which even after death could satisfy a variety of wants, so that almost nothing was left to waste.