Bread And Circuses

Something's been bothering me lately. Okay, a LOT of things bother me, but one thing in particular has caught my attention. It's the way that modern careerism and corporate group-think is affecting our Republic.
   Let me 'splain. Any democratic form of government requires its citizens to participate. Actively. That means people should go to city council meetings, they should go to zoning board meetings and school board meetings. They need to know what's going on in their neighborhoods, their cities, their states, and in the nation. And they should vote.
   But let me ask you this: when was the last time you did any of that? If you answered 'just last week, Don,' I can almost guarantee that you do not hold a full-time job. You're retired, or a part-time worker, or a stay-at-home Mom or Dad. Or unemployed.
   Working a 9-to-5 job has over the last decade become working an 8-to-5 or an 8-to-6 or longer. And then there's the commute, people are willing - for some reason - to drive an hour or more to work somewhere they really would rather not be in the first place. We're spending over half our day Monday through Friday working, getting to work, or coming back from work. After that we have to make time for our families, and then all the stuff that needs doing anyway like the laundry or cooking or cleaning.
   After all the busy work that we do just to get by, are any of us inclined to trek to City Hall to listen to a zoning committee? After a very long day of corporate monkey-spank do we really want to hear about library funding or sewer improvements?
   Being good corporate drones is making us bad citizens. We're neglecting the things that make this country the incredible place it is, in favor of yet another TPS report or PowerPoint presentation.
   I don't know if this is by accident or by design. A corporation is just a legal fiction, after all, a piece of paper on file somewhere in Delaware. But corporations are run by human beings, some very poor human beings usually, and I wouldn't put it past them to have planned this all along. Get people hooked on corporate welfare, get them running the treadmill of the paycheck economy, and then slowly subvert the system from within, knowing that people are too tired and distracted to pay attention. All that is necessary for evil to succeed is that good men stand by and do nothing, after all. And what better 'nothing' to do than fail to participate in a participatory democracy?
   Maybe it's my impending old-man-ness showing, but this has to stop. We have to stand up and take charge of our work day. Just say no to another day working late, just tell them the report won't be ready on Friday because you have to go help keep America great. Let's see those weasels argue with that.