We’re All Parasites
In biology class I remember the categories of creature lifestyles: predatory carnivore, carrion carnivore, herbivore, omnivore. Some creatures engage in mutuality or symbiosis, and then there are the parasites. Humans are parasites.
Technically we’d be called omnivores, but the way we exploit the planet and behave toward one another, it’s clear we fit more neatly into the parasite category. We tear at the Earth, killing all creatures great and small and sift through the rubble to extract the resources precious to our lust for manufactured goods like computers and whatnot. There is no dispute about our imbalanced relationship with our host. Clearly this parasitic behavior toward our spherical home offers Mother Earth nothing of value in return, unless you count the floating Pacific garbage patch a form of repayment. Look at a satellite photo of any city and notice how it resembles a malignant tumor on an otherwise lush green skin.
But the parasitic behavior we exhibit toward one another is apparently less noticeable. Objectively assessing our activities with any thoroughness reveals itself to be a misanthropic enterprise, and no one wants to do that. Denial is the only option.
We all must make a living. And we don’t necessarily get the job we want. We must make compromises. So, if you dreamed of being an artist, you may resort to computer design and drafting for an engineering company. Or if you always felt you were a writer, your novel may get put on hold as you earn your paycheck writing copy for a marketing company. You don’t get to choose the products your company sells, which are likely to be considerably environmentally unfriendly. You’re there for the paycheck. You have debts. School loans to pay off, auto payments, rent, like everyone else. You’re an indentured servant.
So your life is a fudge. The idealism of university dissolves in the daily grind of making a living. For you to thrive, your company must thrive, and they do that by pushing products the public largely doesn’t need. We don’t even want the crap, but we are cultivated to want these brand-new products through advertising and the relentless pressure to keep up. You may call it progress. I call it parasitism.
I’m an old fart and can still remember the freedom we had before everyone was welded to their cell phones. Everyone needs one now, it’s no longer a question of wanting one. You can’t survive without it, as all the street pay phones have been ripped out. It’s funny that it’s called a smart phone because it makes you unable to think for yourself and the phone is the least used function on the contraption.
I doubt many readers made it this far. To say cell phones are destructive is as blasphemous as being an atheist was a couple hundred years ago. Uncomfortable truths are unwelcomed in a world where convenience is king.
No matter. If anyone had the stomach to read my words I’d be an uber parasite, earning lots of money on Medium peddling feel-good tripe.
