We hear constantly about scarcity: the apparent lack of everything from money and time to food. It’s an attention-grabbing narrative, and one that has us locked in a collective game of musical chairs (or so it feels), according to US writer and activist Charles Eisenstein.
“When you lose a round, you aren’t merely out of the game,” he writes. “You also lose your home and must choose between food and medicine for your children. The very survival of you and your loved ones is at stake.”
Eisenstein describes the ensuing “mad rush” to sit down when the music stops, “an elbowing, shoving free-for-all in which the chairs go to the strong, fast, and lucky … Everyone is so focused on winning a higher proportion of chairs for themselves and their group that they don’t question the rules of the game and whether those might be changed.”
Sound familiar?
