THE MODERN WESTERN MALAISE & THE PROSPECT OF FOREVER WARS

Most westerners have seemingly far more important things to do with their time than contemplate anything other than subjects related to work and family, however it can’t have escaped the notice of most that negative factors are increasingly impinging themselves upon them.

It should not be necessary to delineate the negative factors talked of above. There cannot be many who remain totally blissfully ignorant of them and the fact that they are increasing. Those who live in the western world can surely gauge the degree to which factors such as disease, stress, anxiety, social pressure, financial constraints and worries, psychological pressure and other debilitating factors are increasing. And within this already exhausting mental universe western populations are now faced with the prospect of being forever at war.

The heady days of the Sixties where the prospect of a world where humanity advanced on all fronts, where leisure time was increased to allow families greater scope for quality experiences due to a shorter working week, where standards of living would rise with the help of increased incomes, a wide and deep social net and a constant array of new innovations to benefit our lives seem like mere pipe dreams these days. And perhaps they always were. These promises of a better life and more stress-free time away from work where minds are relaxed and the good life is constructed for all by a capitalist economy working for all appear as a sick joke to most now, burdened by the anxieties that now plague the precariat, those who cannot rely on a lifetime of employment.

In combination with the above, those who live and work in the still privileged West (when compared to most other regions) will now have to cope with the deprivations stemming from their leaders waging war against both Russia and China. Already the economic effects are being felt due to the blowback from economic sanctions imposed upon Russia, mainly those related to energy products from Russia, oil and natural gas. Inflation has become a major problem once again in the West due to the war it is waging. Recession looms for many, no one being totally spared and Germany appearing likely as worst hit. Deindustrialisation, already long underway in the West appears certain to be taken to its ultimate limit due to the soaring costs of the energy products it needs for western industry to sustain itself.

The western powers began their regime change wars of choice in the wake of the events of 9/11 and the desire to continue them appears undiminished and growing. The neoconservatives who rose to prominence in the USA after 9/11 continue to wield by far the greatest degree of power in Washington. In fact they appear totally unchallenged at this point. Their fellow-travellers in the United Kingdom appear just as unassailable and those in Europe currently also. These radical zealots for war will not easily be removed. Their hands grip the levers of power with a determination that cannot be assuaged by reason or appeals to any degree of common sense regarding the catastrophic effects of their firmly held dogmas. No amount of logical thought can interrupt the fixed-mindedness clearly evident in the ultra-aggressive policies pursued relentlessly by them.

This all leaves the man and woman on the street and workplaces of the western world in an invidious position. Falling standards of life, increasing stresses and strains, both physical and mental, a disintegrating social and infrastructural matrix around them and ever-increasing psychological burdens where each factor describes feeds off the other.

Our modern malaise is of course man made and in theory could be undone by those men and women who have put it in place. However, so much money is made through the engineering of society this way. The pharmacological industry profits immensely as does the military industrial complex, of the USA and UK in particular. Many feed from the modern malaise and have a vested interest in seeing it continue and heighten. War is extremely good for business as is disease. In recent years many billionaires arose from the two years of world turmoil created by the Covid outbreak. Many scheme now to profit from whatever other fears, whether imaginary or real, afflict humanity in future. It is not in their interests to present solutions, their interests lie in the increase of their bottom line profits, nothing else. The U.S. and UK governments along with those of the EU require the taxes that these factors create. It is a vicious circle that in the end affects everyone in the West one way or another.

War and the threat of war bring vast profits and increased power for the few. Yet many apparently remain ignorant in the West regarding this, still seemingly addicted to their mainstream media sources which promote the very factors that hurt them in both pocket and mental health terms. A new “pandemic” is now being predicted to generate even greater profits for those who successfully manipulate it. The casino capitalist system so beloved of the West is turning it into a wasteland of crumbling infrastructure and impoverished citizens. Meanwhile those fanatically reaping the monetary benefits of this inherit an increasingly diseased region. Their manic obsession to create even more zeros on their bank balances rules all. This is the modern western malaise amid the ever-increasing prospect for western populations of being held in the grip of a forever war.