I appreciate the white cells patrolling my blood stream, ready to fight infection. They have kept me alive through their willingness to sacrifice their own bodies on behalf of mine. I also appreciate the red cells, carrying oxygen to the rest of my body and nurturing the energy of daily life. Who would dream of favoring one kind of cell over another in this sacred collaboration central to life as an embodied being?
And who would favor either the “Red Man”, native to our continent, or the “White Man” who arrived a few centuries ago, in the collaborative understandings each contributes to the experiment of life on Planet Earth?
Suppose that a virus (let’s call it “World-Dominating Capitalism”), destroyed most of the red blood cells in our bodies and their place was taken by more white blood cells. With all those infection-combating white cells, we’d be pretty healthy, right? With so few red cells roaming the corridors of our blood stream (transporting oxygen to our muscles and repairing cells fallen in battle), we might have to get regular transfusions of red cells (but they could be imported from China).
With so many white men in seats of power, what are the qualities that this preponderance of one brand of being is instilling in the new world? Can we see greater respect for Earth, the Mother on whom all of us depend? Are voices raised (at the start of corporate board meetings and each new session of Congress) offering up prayers of gratitude for Gaia’s bounty? Are the harvests of the land shared with all members of the community? And does this community express respect for the gift of life and for the lives of its elders, women, and children?
Or–perchance to dream–has our society become servile to large corporations whose bottom-lines do not include the well-being of the people who depend on them for food, clothing, housing, and health care? Has our society handed the keys of the kingdom to incorporated entities that do not pay taxes and that employ members of Congress and the “Supreme” Court to carry out their agendas? Like tape worms, is the unregulated growth of “corporate personhoods” stealing the wealth and sapping the health of their host communities.
When “money is speech”, whole human communities must silently watch as homelessness replaces the fragile collaboration of neighborhoods, and language is robbed of its natural wonder.