But I think that we here in North America have finally done what no others have been able to accomplish in almost a century; establish a way of life that is so ubiquitous as to deserve the title of Age. Ladies and Gentleman I would like to welcome you to the Age of Avoidance.
No age before us has proven so adept at turning a blind eye to the realities of life as we have. No matter how glaringly obvious an issue is we have perfected the ability to not see what is right in front of our faces. From our governments on down to individuals we have devised more and more ingenious methods of not dealing with our own shit.
Can you think of anything else that would explain the proliferation of New Age religions? What better thing to offer people if their lives are going down a sewer than a guarantee of peace and harmony? Come to the light and avoid the reality of what is causing you to have nervous breakdowns and to chew anti depressants like Smarties.
You can buy books on how to get your own personal Guardian Angel who will watch your back as you go through life. There are ones that will bring you abundance, and others who will help you get lucky; in fact there is probably a Guardian Angel for every aspect of your life that you're willing to dish out money to protect.
This way you can avoid dealing with any nasty personal issues you may have. Who needs to confront their demons when they have a Guardian Angel? They take care of everything for you and you can on with your blissful existence and just wait for the abundance to roll in.
Of course we all have avoidance techniques; anyone who lives in a big city has long ago learned how to not notice the folk that line the streets with their hands stuck out for spare change. If it gets too bad you can be sure that city council will create a bylaw outlawing homelessness so that anybody without a permanent address will be either thrown in jail or shipped out of town. Homeless problem, what homeless problem?
Article comments
1 - Christopher Rose
Nice work, Richard.
2 - Angeni Wyanet
Richard �" while I agree with your assessment of reality shows, (I never wasted my time) I don’t agree with much else of what you’ve said. For starters, I think your reality is viewed through a very jaundiced and somewhat prejudicial eye.
Beginning with “the most recent”; turning to New Age religion for help. How is this any different than people praying for their lives to change and sitting back and waiting for it to happen for the last 2000 years? How is this any different than people going and speaking with their priest, their minister or a rabbi?
We have long looked to some divine intervention to change things we ourselves thought we couldn’t. Or a lot of times, were afraid to attempt or just too lazy to. It was so much easier to pray to something than actually take assertive action to change things for ourselves.
‘Too much debt? I’ll just pray that something will eventually come along to clear up that debt.’ It never occurs to us to go out and aggressively seek employment or find ways of doing that. Cut up those credit cards and use some self discipline to change our lives. Nah, just pray to god that it’ll go away.
My brother in law, (once removed), is a Methodist minister. He tells his parish that ‘the lord helps those that help themselves’. In other words, do it yourself. How many people do?
Also, how is buying a personal guardian angel any different than buying a St. Christopher metal to wear or carrying a fetish of some sort to protect you? Or any other amulets or talismans to guard us from bad things? These aren’t recent habits; these are ancient practices so are they valid simply because they're time tested?
You also unfairly characterize the person being hurt by high gas prices as a polluting, gas guzzling driver when in fact, there's a much better chance it’s a young mother who has to drive her children to daycare so she can get to her job. You know the one. The mother who’s family will suffer if she doesn’t work for that second income because taxes are so high?
She needs to pay her taxes so the government is able to pay out all that money keeping the people who are free loading off the system.
This mother can’t afford a new hybrid electric vehicle, and is stuck with driving her old Saturn and hopes, dare I say prays it won’t break down before they can afford a new one. Which is getting further and further into her future because gas prices continue to rise and suck up all her wage.
As for Ages. There were worse ‘ages’ in history than the one you’ve dubbed the Age of Avoidance.
How about two great European ages -
The Age of Empires �" conquering and killing everything in your path.
The Age of Discovery �" see above
Personally, while I totally disagree with your summation, if it were so, I would still rather be known as “one who avoids” rather than one who plunders, kills, steals, infects, and annihilates entire cultures and civilizations.