Yesterday afternoon I went up to my family’s for a few hours (I’m still woefully sick, by the way, but more on that in a later post), and while I was there some neighborhood teens came by playing “Bigger or Better.” For those who haven’t seen this in the wild, you split into teams, each with an initial object (something small). You then go around knocking on doors, asking for something “bigger or better” and offering to exchange it for the object you’ve got in hand. After an hour or so, whoever has the biggest and/or best object wins. (Ideally you then donate the stuff to charity or the needy or something.)
So anyway, I’d just been reading about the globalization of Bhutan in March’s National Geographic, and it struck me that a game like “Bigger or Better” is the sole domain of the rich (globally speaking). You don’t play games like that in third-world villages. You just don’t.
Why? Because the whole premise is that you have more than you need, and not just small things, but bigger and better things. And for most of America, that’s true. For the rest of the world, it isn’t. Not by a long shot.
It doesn’t feel right.
It’s not the poverty of the third world that bothers me so much, though. I mean, yes, we need to do what we can to lift them up to decent standards of living and try to exterminate disease and other things that poison quality of life. But there’s nothing wrong about working as a farmer in the rice paddies, if you enjoy it. (I think we of the middle and upper classes have convinced ourselves that luxury is the only path to happiness.)
What does bother me is the gap between us and them. More particularly, how far above our needs we live, while so much of the world lives under theirs. And how we’ve managed to delude ourselves into believing that we need what we really only want.
Affluence isn’t bad. But it takes an active effort to keep it from twisting our vision until we can’t see straight.
And now I’ll get off my anti-materialism hobbyhorse. :P
Comments
More particularly, how far above our needs we live, while so much of the world lives under theirs. And how we’ve managed to delude ourselves into believing that we need what we really only want.
Bastiat talks about this when discussing the progressiveness of man’s wants:
Ben it is interesting how you hit the nail on the head:
“Bigger or Better†is the sole domain of the rich (globally speaking).”
and then missed the nail all together on the second swing:
“You don’t play games like that in third-world villages. You just don’t.”
Perhaps you are not aware of U.S. intervention on the behalf of banana barrons begining around the 1900′s through out South and Central America. The rich not only played bigger and better in those poor countries, they played the game using theU.S. government, the U.S. Marines and the C.I.A. It is an interesting history to research.
Wait, Ben, maybe you’re on to something. What if we start a global game of “bigger or better,” with third-world countries/developing nations/emerging nations (not sure what the preferred term is these days) going door to door to larger, more economically robust countries? That could be interesting…
In the meantime, I still need to dig up that essay on economic disparity for you. It’s really interesting. A BYU econ (or maybe history) professor makes the case that the great sin of our day is not sexual permissiveness, but rather economic disparity. He explains that it’s something most of the students in his classes at BYU haven’t been trained to see as a problem–that they tend to blame those who are economically disadvantaged for their disadvantaged situation, leading to a disturbing attitude of “It’s their own fault, so why should we help them?” Yeah, so I need to find the essay for you…
Katherine, I would love to have a copy of the essay. If you could post a link I would appreciate it:)
Janet,
Unfortunately, I don’t think the essay is online. It was first printed in BYU Today (the precursor to BYU Magazine) in September, 1990. It was later printed in “Readings for Intensive Writers,”a book edited by Susan T. Laing and used in introductory writing courses at BYU. The Essay is called “Socioeconomic Inequality,” by Richard E. Johnson, professor of sociology at BYU. When I get a little more time, I’ll post a few quotes from it.
Thanks Katherine. I would appreciate it. You could also scan it and email it as an attachment. My email is janetwalgren@gmail.com.
Connor: Brilliant quote — thanks!
Janet: I don’t know that I’d say I missed the nail altogether, seeing as I was talking about teenagers going door-to-door, not about nations and governments. :) (“Bigger or Better” is not a game that teens play in, say, Afghanistan.) But moving the discussion to a global scale…
Katherine: Is an interesting idea. :) I don’t know enough about economics — either globally or even locally — to tell whether it would work, but I do like the sound of it. (And I realize now that I need to study economics. Time to dig up a copy of Wealth of Nations… ;))
As for that essay, it sounds absolutely fascinating. And it’s also absolutely not online, as far as I can tell, though it’s referenced a lot. Too bad BYU Magazine only goes back so far with putting their articles online…