the list of both need types
changes with time and innovation
and alas both grow longer too .. yes both
"new necessary needs"
is not a self-confounding expression
famously keynes had "absolute " needs in mind
when he wrote the following :
"For at least another hundred years
we must pretend to ourselves and to everyone
that fair is foul and foul is fair;
for foul is useful and fair is not.
Avarice and usury and precaution
must be our gods for a little longer still"
and we can say in some sense
as he predicted in 1930
we first worlders from today's first class nations
can" imagine" a mass "sated " class
quite easily in fact
ahh if only all we needed to feel
we no longer pursue "happiness "
but have caught it
well if not happiness herself
at least a sufficient material basis for happiness
she is cornered and we have an unencumbered life time
to wrestle her to the ground
but these keynes needs these absolute needs are only half the deal
clearly " relative needs ...needs that arise thru "comparison "
of whats in your pile andwhats in mine is by construction
a pursuit without end
the groaning board of status potlatch is ever with us
Rouseau needs lets call em
the nasty spurs goading on
our tender amour propre
its not a paradox really
that these stinging relative needs
become even more important as social inequality rises
the taunts of the conspicuously superior
are ever thrown in our faces
and we can't brush it off as absurd ..not all of it
there is always an inequality that finds and cuts the under belly
these past 30 years or so
not only do we have the reality of growing inequality
our mass culture can't stop
showering us groundlings with it
golden showers in fact
and itsproduced all of it
just for you mr and mrs loser
the top dogs may swan about for each other
but the media by mounting it and broadcasting it 24/7
at all us weebles
why
its like poodles peeing on fire hydrants
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