Steam Rolling Globally

There are so many things in life that make us think that we actually have a choice. We are forced to accept whatever terms or bullshit someone wants because there really is no other option. We, as humans, allow people, companies, and groups to steam roll our goals, desires, and freedom. I’m sure some of you right now are thinking “freedom? That’s a bit much”, but no, it’s not too much. It’s the truth. We give up so much of ourselves for so little in return. Why are the metaphorical scales of trade and commerce not more even?

Terms of Service… one that we are all victims of. You have to sign away your rights and personal information to get an iPhone or a Samsung, and you don’t have any say in the matter. You either get the phone and accept the outlandish, and quite frankly unreadable, terms and conditions, or you don’t get the phone. You may think that you have a choice, but you really don’t. These phones have everything that you may need (apps, music, maps) or maybe you can’t live without those blue message bubbles. You can’t say, “yes I’d like the phone, but please don’t sell my information”. Yet so many of the services that we live and rely on daily take advantage of our lives to increase their sales and profits.

Another huge perpetrator in this fight is Facebook (don’t care if they changed names). Facebook is notoriously malicious in some of their terms of service. When you post a picture on Facebook, you no longer own that image… Facebook does. How in the world did we allow a company to take ownership of the dear memories of our past? Somewhere along the line, businesses stopped caring for the people and prioritized profits. Of course as a company, you think that’s great, but it is all people (including the perpetrators) that fall victim to their schemes.

I am young so my horizon here is small, so I did a little research looking up statistics. Companies used to put more money into its people, more cooping, and even paying for their employees schooling so that they could promote internally and retain that employees value. Now, hardly any companies will offer things like that; it almost seems like they go out of their way to explicitly hire from outside so that they can get around having to invest in their employees.

How about we look at this same concept from a different perspective. American union workers as a percentage of population has fallen 9% since 1985, down to 10% in 2019. Unions were designed to employ more people and to teach the tools of the trade. This stands in contrast to the continuously increasing physical labor force. You would think that as population and labor force grew, so would unions, if they were protecting its members. It seems that companies and even government continue to swallow individuals up to fuel immediate monetary gains for the top 1%.

Our shifts and goals as groups (political, business, etc) affect all people, no matter where they stand in social hierarchy. I don’t know if this particular problem will ever be solved or if we will continue using people up like batteries and tossing them away. I think that it will take huge pushes from the upper echelons of society to remember we are all humans and trying to get by in this world. I guess there’s only 2 questions left. Do you think that the companies and groups will ever regain a sliver of their human souls? If not, is there any way that you can take advantage or at least be in strong standing facing this human eating machine?