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Sound your barbaric "YAWP!"

Here we will tear into current topics. Got a beef? Email me and we'll put it up for debate.

And hey, speaking of rants, check out ANT'S RANTS! It's where I like to post MY thoughts on things.

AND don't forget that you can join the conversation in the Forum. It gets kinda controversial in there sometimes.

All in all, good stuff (in my opinion).

Now, allow me me offer you a bit of reading (look below the nuns with guns!):

This is another one from my boy Derek. He's a bit of the political philosopher. He sends out weekly topics for our consideration...Below is the second part of the essay series he started on March 30th. If you missed part one, read it here. Part two was sent out on the 11th of April. This series relates to Derek's thoughts on how hating the rich is still a growing phenomenon in American culture. Read up and drop me an e-mail at acs@paradigmshifts.iwarp.com if you have a response, or bring up your thoughts in the Forum. And be sure to check out Past Rants for previous controversies.

"Eating the Rich"
(Culture Shifts Part Two)

About part one, I hope all understood the point I was trying to make. We have in this country a deep running hatred of many things, and a developing (if not already established) hatred of success. Because of the actions of older generations we have a problem with association, seeing all that is powerful or successful as something that warrants criticism and suspicion thrown all over it.

Are these feelings we seem to share as a collective accurate? Justified? I am not sure, we have not seen the full running of the course of this current ideology. If the structures of the Western world soon break down, then we will know that we were probably wrong. But if we continue in this cultural mediocrity we will find we have been successful. Right?

Regardless, I am one of those desperate fools that still believes in hope and human potential. I have recently latched on to contemporary mentalities and ideologies, but am always searching for the new view. And if I am not searching, then I am trying to make one up.

But that is not what I really wanted to discuss today. I want to get into some theory on societal changes. I wanted to ponder about why societies develop as they do. Now, this essay will presumably run a little short and definitely be wrought with mostly questions, but it is just a lead-in to the final part of this mentally cumbersome essay.

So, where to start? Well, it always worked in college to start with some background, some precedent and mentioning of those that pondered before me. Of the few I want to consider today, I will only mention two for brevity's sake. The first is Thomas Kuhn, who I am just now discovering. He had a number of theories on shifts in global paradigms and secular ideologies. Referring mainly to shifts that occurred during the age of the Renaissance, Kuhn mentioned how we went from a more organic view to certainly a scientific, uniquely human mentality bent on discovery. From what little I know of him, he was the first to point out the origins of this modern world, at least from a philosophical point of view.

The next predecessor I would like to refer to would be Fritjof Capra. Capra, similar to Kuhn, wrote (in a phenomenal book called "The Turning Point") about how we are witnessing the end of a current paradigm that began during the Renaissance and Enlightenment periods. The Scientific method would be the most familiar product of this new worldview. Both authors seem to believe that this was the last big shift, Capra (I say this because I am yet unsure what Kuhn suggests) continues to describe the current shift we are in now.

My question to everyone is.....are we changing? Are these slight symbols of new thinking a change in our global or at least Western mentality? Do these new feelings of suspicion and resentment for the rich and successful, in a society that once strove for what we are now suspicious of, reveal a new humanity? Or can we take this a step further, or a step in a new direction, and wonder if technology has anything to do with changing ideals? Our advancements certainly have an effect on our physical lives, but do they seriously affect the mental?

What I assume would be the biggest factor in finding a shift in our culture would be our desire to stop relying on science. We have many answers solved, but more so that we just cannot figure out. It seems our old methods are getting us no where, but we still rely on them heavily.

Please think on this, and I'll be back soon with part three.