The European immigrants were already knowingly part of the great experiment: a capitalist nation from its birth. All of the colonies had economic goals, even those pilgrims [2] we're taught were being purely religious.
In general, the rise in consumerism [3] started a generation or two before Stewart's existed, so I wouldn't blame them for that. And American consumerism as we know it today is usually traced to the end of WWII. [4] It was due to rapid industrialization and a bunch of managers trained [5] for the war effort combined with the G.I. Bill creating a better educated populace. It wasn't long until the invention of the teenager [6] and it was all downhill [7] from there.
I remember visiting south east Asia at a time when my cousin was working there.
There were three distinct socioeconomic classes in evidence:
- the poorest shopped in open-air markets, where the local language was spoken
- the middle class shopped in air-conditioned malls, where english was spoken
- the richest "shopped" by having their driver take their cook to the open-air markets
Upon my return to the States, I started to notice the same phenomenon; it had just been disguised by the fact that there were no language changes involved.
My hoodlum friend took me to the Suffolk Downs race track during football season. There was no horse racing; the place was used as a legal betting place.
There were three levels. On the bottom were nasty desks and booths under harsh fluorescent lights. Lines at betting windows. Semi-pathetic characters in soiled pants and hoodies working on their bets, then standing on line at those windows. Now up the stairs to the second level. Here was a well appointed cafeteria with cushioned seats. Kind of like a Denny’s or a large mall restaurant. Here, the denizens were older and better fed
Now the hoodlum was a member of the “Club.” This was on the top, with a panoramic view of the race track finish line. Here was wood paneling, a full bar, and lots of tables with comfortable chairs. Everyone seemed to know everyone. The walls were covered with TV’s showing every active race track in the U.S., and the degenerate gamblers here would bet them. Galilean relativity was in evidence. As the horses approached the finish line at some track somewhere, a patron would yell: Where’s the wire? Where’s the wire? In the horses frame of reference, the wire was coming to them, and the horses desperately groped to reach the moving wire first. Three levels, just like that market.
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[ 0.29 ms ] story [ 33.2 ms ] threadHad Bostonians not been consumers, they wouldn't have had the Boston Tea Party.
everyone everywhere consumes, but when the very habit of doing os becomes part of the social activity, it's a very different animal indeed.
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/a-brief-history-of-consum... https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/11/how-hum... https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/tupperw... ,,etc
No, that was the purpose of Indian schools. [1]
The European immigrants were already knowingly part of the great experiment: a capitalist nation from its birth. All of the colonies had economic goals, even those pilgrims [2] we're taught were being purely religious.
In general, the rise in consumerism [3] started a generation or two before Stewart's existed, so I wouldn't blame them for that. And American consumerism as we know it today is usually traced to the end of WWII. [4] It was due to rapid industrialization and a bunch of managers trained [5] for the war effort combined with the G.I. Bill creating a better educated populace. It wasn't long until the invention of the teenager [6] and it was all downhill [7] from there.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_boarding_schoo...
[2] https://plymrock.org/the-economics-of-the-pilgrims/
[3] https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/the-rise...
[4] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/tupperw...
[5] See Drucker: https://www.drucker.institute/perspective/about-peter-drucke... Also Deming: https://deming.org for how industrialization helped the US war effort, leading to the post-war Toyota Way (and today's Lean software).
[6] https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2018/02/brief-history-te...
[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ski_Party
(looks like that was indeed part of it, but they were also driven out by economic and political considerations. The cost of living was too high, and political turmoil seemed imminent: https://www.history.com/news/why-pilgrims-came-to-america-ma... )
You can be both, and we are.
There were three distinct socioeconomic classes in evidence:
- the poorest shopped in open-air markets, where the local language was spoken
- the middle class shopped in air-conditioned malls, where english was spoken
- the richest "shopped" by having their driver take their cook to the open-air markets
Upon my return to the States, I started to notice the same phenomenon; it had just been disguised by the fact that there were no language changes involved.
The minimum payrate is much higher, not to mention a tangle of labor laws and exposure to legal liability.
There were three levels. On the bottom were nasty desks and booths under harsh fluorescent lights. Lines at betting windows. Semi-pathetic characters in soiled pants and hoodies working on their bets, then standing on line at those windows. Now up the stairs to the second level. Here was a well appointed cafeteria with cushioned seats. Kind of like a Denny’s or a large mall restaurant. Here, the denizens were older and better fed
Now the hoodlum was a member of the “Club.” This was on the top, with a panoramic view of the race track finish line. Here was wood paneling, a full bar, and lots of tables with comfortable chairs. Everyone seemed to know everyone. The walls were covered with TV’s showing every active race track in the U.S., and the degenerate gamblers here would bet them. Galilean relativity was in evidence. As the horses approached the finish line at some track somewhere, a patron would yell: Where’s the wire? Where’s the wire? In the horses frame of reference, the wire was coming to them, and the horses desperately groped to reach the moving wire first. Three levels, just like that market.