by Kara Machowski
Here we are, most of us are on month two of lockdown/self-quarantine, and you’re either continuing to stay home while being shunned by the far right or you’re venturing out into the public or reopening your business and are being criticized by the far left. The diversity is splattered all over social media while our leading CDC physician, Dr. Anthony Fauci, is being falsely accused of party preference and business owners are being called all sorts of names for reopening while they’re suffering to put food on the table, let alone keep their business afloat. All of this is happening while an actual pandemic is sweeping across the entire planet killing hundreds of thousands, and we seem to be forgetting who the true enemies are. Americans are being pitted against one another in a wicked hunger games match. All people who are in need and are afraid are fighting one another while the capital continues life, unharmed. Citizens have every right to be angry or afraid, or both. We’re scared for our loved ones, we’re sick of the idea of running out of cash or deciding which bill has to get paid and which can wait so that our kids don’t go hungry. Starving and broke, Americans are waiting in miles long lines for food handouts for hours only to be turned away because of shortages. Most patriots have yet to receive a stimulus check, an amount that is a slap in the face as many have been without income for over two months, but we’ll take it, because we’re not getting any more help. Naturally we’re angry and frightened. But while we’re scared, broke, sick, starving, depressed, angry, all of our politicians sit comfortably in their same two to three figure cars, three to four figure homes, and continue to get paid, and will continue to get paid. They're going make it out of this pandemic as the upper echelon of class as our economy shifts so that middle class families become lower-class and could lead to the abolition of the middle class. Upper-middle become upper-class as they continue to get paid, will eventually receive raises because lower employees were furloughed and few are even getting promotions or will at the end of the tunnel. Lower-middle class and lower-class who aren’t essential workers are the ones who are suffering the most.
Many essential workers are even having their wages cut as companies writhe to remain open. Retail jobs, restaurant employees, personal assistants, teachers, small business owners, are all loosing their incomes. Families that make less than $40,000 a year make up the majority of the recently unemployed Americans. Even the few whose businesses are reopening are struggling because patrons are too nervous to shop and many still can’t or are too afraid to return to work. This is the reality that many in the business world are resilient to admit. Larger businesses are being saved during the pandemic through banks, the government and even the ones who are filing for bankruptcy will most likely stay in business while their debt is wiped clean and employees loose money owed. AMC theaters is nearing bankruptcy while movie theaters remain closed, and there are whispers that CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, is considering purchasing the AMC, which would give them a stronghold in the movie industry. This is what's happening while we’re all fighting one another, mega-corporations like Amazon are becoming so powerful that they are basically indestructible at this point, something that no business should be able to be. At the same time, Amazon employees are complaining of working in high-risk environments for little compensation, while their CEO remains one of the richest persons in the world, even after his net-worth was slashed in half through his recent divorce.
What will happen is that small mom & pop shops will be forced to close, restaurant owners will be forced to close doors and perhaps go on to manage a restaurant of a national chain or larger city chain. Many companies like AMC, Nordstrom, and even smaller shops and small restaurants will be saved by bigger corporations. One day Amazon will consider pocketing skyrocketing restaurant companies, a business model that has begun to control many city restaurants.
Restaurant groups typically are run by a few restaurant owners or entrepreneurs, and will open up 5-10 restaurants in a major city and have become popular in smaller cities now. They're seemingly separate restaurants as they offer differing menus but guarantee the same restaurant and food quality. Megacorporations will eventually come along and purchase business groups like this and eventually all that we will have is major corporations running our purchasing and economy in a communist-like manor where the markets is controlled by just a few companies, sometimes only two. We have to stop megacorporations from becoming so powerful that they are indestructible and control our entire economy, but the question is how?
The government set aside hundreds of millions of dollars in relief and aid to the Navajo Nation, but they've yet to see any of that money. Navajo nations are greatly impacted by the virus, many live in tight-knit communities which gave room for the virus to spread rapidly and now they're suffering because of lack of PPE, medical supplies and physicians. They most likely won't see the aid, at least not when they needed it the most. Doctors Without Boarders (Médecins Sans Frontières) were deployed to the Navajo Nation, a non-governmental, French origin organization that normally supplies poverty stricken countries with proper medical supplies and workers. MSF typically aid countries like Nigeria, Mexico, Iraq and the Democratic Republic of Congo, but Navajo Nation needs the help as they've yet to receive any from the American Government, even after President Trumps meeting with the Navajo Nation in Arizona the first week of May.
So while we’re sitting here, fighting one another on social media, arguing with loved ones who have opposing views, we ignore the true enemy, our government and mega-corporations. We continue to take is up, the well, you know what, from these companies and our governments, the people who WE gave power to, the very people whose power WE control, and whose future WE control. Yet, we stand by as they control us, our futures, pigeonhole us in dead-end jobs that decay us while they reap all the benefits. Yes, the government was slow to react, but we didn’t call for a reaction, we stood by until the country was already infested with Covid, living our normal lives, thinking that we were impervious.
I'm not imploring you to stand at your state capitol, armed, requesting for businesses to reopen. We should be requesting more relief, more assistance and more reassurance. We were promised a stimulus check, many haven't seen one. We were promised that our country will reopen when it's ready to, we still aren't ready. But Americans are suffering and those who never ask for a handout are refusing to and will work to put food on the table, but that's because they have to.
Canadians were given a relief of $2,000 a month for four months of country lockdown, a total of $8,000 for that time, an amount of money that few Americans have ever had in their bank account. Some Americans make the argument that the country can't afford to give that type of relief and keep the economy afloat, and they're right. But this should be a testament to how little our economic stability is. We have control over the government and yet we allow them to spend trillions of dollars waging wars, stuffing pockets of governmental employees, friends and arms dealers, and not just the terrorist type. While of course the government has to take action, needs to learn a lesson about how to better handle something like this in the future, let this be a lesson to us. We need to pay attention more, we need to really put our vote into action, and not just for a president of our choosing, but our entire government. Things need to change, but WE control the government, it’s up to US to be that change. Just like Hunger Games, we can replace the enemy, but with whom are we replacing them with? What change are we going to enforce them make? At the end of the day, the government is a reflection of the society and when it isn’t, that’s when the society needs to take back its power and redesign the government, it’s our responsibility. This is your calling, instead of fighting one another in a modern day Hunger Games like empowerment, turn your anger to the capital, to mega-corporations.
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