Recently came across a post on universal basic income (UBI) from a channel I follow on social media. The page puts out good content in the critiques of capitalism vein, with a good balance of highlighting injustices and corruption on the one hand, and positive, “this is how we could live” posts on the other.
So, there I am on my daily house-arrest scroll, and I come across this post. First thing, it’s positive, Club Tropicana drinks are free, positive. UBI is the answer; it’s the way out of this mess and not just as a temporary tub of hand sanitiser in our new coronavirus paradigm, but as genuine panacea. UBI, by the grace of some divine benevolence, if we only see the light, could be our saviour.
OK, I exaggerate, but you get the point. This channel loves UBI. And that’s what I don’t get.
See, to me, UBI is such a contradiction of most of the content this channel disseminates. Their message is: we live in a corrupt capitalist system, facilitated by corrupt, mouthpiece-for-corporate-interest governments that infantilise and pacify the population, and create narratives that separate people. A fair point of view. But, in the next breath, they’re championing UBI, effectively encouraging us to take passive handouts from this very same system, somehow expecting the corporate cynicism, greed, and manipulation they so brilliantly expose, to not demand its pound of flesh.
Really? Is this a real argument?
From the ubiquitous corporate disempowerment machine, that in its many guises sells us crap our lives don’t need, food and medicines our bodies don’t want, and information our minds can’t fully process, I get it. It’s a beautiful cynical monkey-trap, holding people in ever more dependency and need. You put your hand in for the free fruit, you hold the fruit, but you never get your hand back.
From corporate sharks, yes. But from this channel?
It’s like ferociously railing against the local drug lords, demanding their removal because you’re hooked on their expensive crack and its decimating effects on your community, and then saying, “It’s all good, baby!” when they start giving it away for free.
Look, I’m not even saying UBI is per se a bad idea. Maybe there’s a case for it being the way we do things in the future, albeit a future that’s difficult to see right now. But that’s the point, things would have to change radically for UBI to be stripped of its potential use as seduction and entrapment.
To accept UBI as an honest policy of the current status quo is, for me, trusting sympathy from the devil.
Commentaires