from Alain de Botton’s “Status Anxiety”
When Franklin D Roosevelt was asked which book he could give to Nikolia Khruschev and the Soviets to exemplify the advantages of Western capitalist society he pointed bluntly to the Sears catalogue.
Such is the pinnacle of achievement of our civilization.
The paradox of progress is that a sharp decline in depravation has created a sense of depravation amongst ordinary folk. Now class and position no longer provide the security of non-achievement we are exposed to the reality that our “lot” is precisely our own doing. The country knave, the leather-worker, the serf and the weaver now awaken to the reality that their timeless existence is threatened by the idea that their neighbor and guild-brother now may be upgrading to an X5.
Lack of income, achievement and wealth are the flames that torture the average worker, fanned by the hidden hand of advertisers.
The flipside of meritocracy is status anxiety.
Posted via web from grahamdbrown’s posterous
