A vision of the future...
Nov. 5th, 2003 09:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alixandrea(Inspired by a sad conversation recently with one of the drivers where I work...)
It is 100 years hence. Your children's children are grown and starting families of their own. You and your children are long since dead from cancers caused by pollutants and the by-products of human society. Your new generation will all be born with breathing difficulties, asthma, other birth defects for the same reason. Your grandchildren all work for the Umbrella Corporation, in its many and various divisions. Their clothes are the same, not through the need to wear a uniform, but because there is no longer any diversity - all the shops belong to Umbrella. All produce is cheap but everyone is still starving. This is partly because Umbrella only caters to the highest demand, and the highest demand is for cheap, quick, easy to make food - ready meals and fast food with their poor nutritional value are the order of the day. But it is also for a deeper, more sinister reason. The people are poor _because_ the produce is as cheap as they have demanded. The cheaper they want it, the cheaper Umbrella tries to buy it in. The poorer the populace becomes, the more fear the fat cats at the top have of becoming like that, and the more cream they skim off the top, thus making the demand for cheap produce even greater. Farmers, industries, creators (those not already swallowed by Umbrella of course) in our own country cannot compete with those of countries with weaker currency (ie. all those not in the USA or Eurasian conglomerates.) The producers of these other countries are also starving, forced to work in tiny sweatshops, long hours for less than a living wage, even in their own poor homelands. Our producers sell their produce at a loss just to get _something_ back. The government pours money into the producers to keep some illusion of a successful industry going, but the money has to come from somewhere. All the public services have been sold off to Umbrella, which has squeezed them for every drop of worth, until they are dry and dessicated. the government has absolute power over the groups supposed to bring Umbrella into line - after all, Umbrella pays the top ministers millions of Euros every year to do as it wishes. So the public services all fall into decay.
Your progeny have followed your lead in becoming doctors and medical professionals. Some fare better than many in their earning powers, but are still facing job cuts as the health service continues to be crippled. Some have already fallen prey, and are on what little job support is offered. Heaven forbid any of them should get the sack from one quarter of Umbrella's industry, they would find it very hard to get a job in any other area of The Company. Most of the patients your family see are suffering birth defects, poisoning, cancers, malnutrition.
Across the rest of the world, little green spaces remain. Some tightly managed 'parks' exist, to give the Proletariat a sense of freedom and space, but most of these are confined to small corners of the super cities. Many of our current wild spaces have been given up to rubbish tips and water purification units. Your Great Grandchildren will never see 'wild' animals outside the zoo, few exist now except for in these rare places. Elephants, Pandas, Tigers, alongside many many other species, are now extinct. There are no more rainforests - save for those kept to farm crops such as coffee, bananas and cola nuts. Most have been burnt to grow crops to feed the hoards of animals eaten in fast food restaurants across the globe.
Fuel is growing scarce, but Umbrella and the two main world Governments don't want to frighten the Proles, so they simply hike the prices of petrol, diesel, gas and coal. People cannot afford to heat their homes as the electricity and gas companies (splinters of Umbrella of course) start to feel the pinch and push up their own prices. Many people die of hypothermia in the winter time, and the surgeons among your family are kept busy treating those suffering from it. Many have limbs amputated.
War is rife across the world - some countries are trying to rise up against the 'tyranny of the West', others are having war waged on them by the US and/or Eurasia, as they try to get at resources running out in the places they have already conquered.
All this because you don't care what happens to the world. All because you want everything you desire to be available to you - all the same - right at your doorstep, cheap and easy. As long as you get your fix, you're alright? I feel so so sorry for your progeny...
It is 100 years hence. Your children's children are grown and starting families of their own. You and your children are long since dead from cancers caused by pollutants and the by-products of human society. Your new generation will all be born with breathing difficulties, asthma, other birth defects for the same reason. Your grandchildren all work for the Umbrella Corporation, in its many and various divisions. Their clothes are the same, not through the need to wear a uniform, but because there is no longer any diversity - all the shops belong to Umbrella. All produce is cheap but everyone is still starving. This is partly because Umbrella only caters to the highest demand, and the highest demand is for cheap, quick, easy to make food - ready meals and fast food with their poor nutritional value are the order of the day. But it is also for a deeper, more sinister reason. The people are poor _because_ the produce is as cheap as they have demanded. The cheaper they want it, the cheaper Umbrella tries to buy it in. The poorer the populace becomes, the more fear the fat cats at the top have of becoming like that, and the more cream they skim off the top, thus making the demand for cheap produce even greater. Farmers, industries, creators (those not already swallowed by Umbrella of course) in our own country cannot compete with those of countries with weaker currency (ie. all those not in the USA or Eurasian conglomerates.) The producers of these other countries are also starving, forced to work in tiny sweatshops, long hours for less than a living wage, even in their own poor homelands. Our producers sell their produce at a loss just to get _something_ back. The government pours money into the producers to keep some illusion of a successful industry going, but the money has to come from somewhere. All the public services have been sold off to Umbrella, which has squeezed them for every drop of worth, until they are dry and dessicated. the government has absolute power over the groups supposed to bring Umbrella into line - after all, Umbrella pays the top ministers millions of Euros every year to do as it wishes. So the public services all fall into decay.
Your progeny have followed your lead in becoming doctors and medical professionals. Some fare better than many in their earning powers, but are still facing job cuts as the health service continues to be crippled. Some have already fallen prey, and are on what little job support is offered. Heaven forbid any of them should get the sack from one quarter of Umbrella's industry, they would find it very hard to get a job in any other area of The Company. Most of the patients your family see are suffering birth defects, poisoning, cancers, malnutrition.
Across the rest of the world, little green spaces remain. Some tightly managed 'parks' exist, to give the Proletariat a sense of freedom and space, but most of these are confined to small corners of the super cities. Many of our current wild spaces have been given up to rubbish tips and water purification units. Your Great Grandchildren will never see 'wild' animals outside the zoo, few exist now except for in these rare places. Elephants, Pandas, Tigers, alongside many many other species, are now extinct. There are no more rainforests - save for those kept to farm crops such as coffee, bananas and cola nuts. Most have been burnt to grow crops to feed the hoards of animals eaten in fast food restaurants across the globe.
Fuel is growing scarce, but Umbrella and the two main world Governments don't want to frighten the Proles, so they simply hike the prices of petrol, diesel, gas and coal. People cannot afford to heat their homes as the electricity and gas companies (splinters of Umbrella of course) start to feel the pinch and push up their own prices. Many people die of hypothermia in the winter time, and the surgeons among your family are kept busy treating those suffering from it. Many have limbs amputated.
War is rife across the world - some countries are trying to rise up against the 'tyranny of the West', others are having war waged on them by the US and/or Eurasia, as they try to get at resources running out in the places they have already conquered.
All this because you don't care what happens to the world. All because you want everything you desire to be available to you - all the same - right at your doorstep, cheap and easy. As long as you get your fix, you're alright? I feel so so sorry for your progeny...
