A piece of art I created for a Living Museum exhibition at the PROGR;
“Art is the language of the revolution”.
We all know Ghandi Ji’s Quote “Be the change you want to see in the world”.
But as we are living in the age of
tell us that we need a r-evolution
without telling us that we need a r-evolution
this adaption seemed more timely.
- People all over the world do their best to earn a living and survive, only to wake up day after day to a rising cost of living while their salaries fail to increase proportionally.
Meanwhile, the number of super-rich individuals and their wealth grows disproportionately (with incomes for the top tier rising by 80% since 2020 in real terms), so that by 2024, the richest 1% of the population controlled more wealth than the “bottom” 95% of humanity.
(Funfact on the side: the fact that “unpaid Work” in German translates to “free will work”. This can serve as a good starting point for the research about how free we are in this life, where we go to work every day for the rich to get richer.) - A sexual abuser and convicted felon who continuously attacks foreign countries and minorities within the nation he resides in, who frequently abuses AI to generate absurd “heavenly father”-like images of himself, and who proclaims that he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize (—which he doesn’t get; but as the world functions in accordance with the underlying system, there is certainly another clown who quickly steps in to hand over a newly invented, pretentious peace prize as an investment in the main clown’s ego and his business relations), uses his media presence to attack the Pope for criticizing “tyrants who spend billions on wars.”
- Even though it is evident to everybody that global temperatures are rising—can you remember the days when any temperature above 30°C was considered very hot? If not, you are either too young or too ignorant—the scientific prediction that Switzerland will be disproportionately harshly affected by climate change (where a global rise of 3°C translates to a staggering 4.9°C increase, potentially leading to up to 41 tropical nights in our cities) has received far less media coverage than the trashy bromance fight from the other side of the planet or the dramatic images of the Blatten landslide (even though these very predictions define our daily future.
I wonder whether this diminishing media coverage has to do with the fact that the super-rich, who have a massively disproportionate negative impact on the climate primarily through their extreme consumption (private jets, yachts) and CO₂-intensive investments, are also the most influential players in media, economics, and politics? But then again, heavenly father knows!)
But let’s be clear about this:
the billionaires are not the problem.
They are simply playing the game.
Perhaps more cruelly than the average person could or would dare,
yet (most of the time) strictly by the rules.
And they’re doing it very, very successfully!
So yes,
if the super-rich ceased to exist, that would be great.
However, let’s not be naive: some other clowns would immediately elevate themselves from the merely rich to the super-rich to take their place.
So always remember:
Even though the super-rich are undeniably a big part of the problem, we essentially have to change the game itself, and the way we live and play it.
PS:
I write and speak of r-evolution because I believe both terms to be loaded with unhelpful stereotypes.
Revolutions are commonly associated with violent social movements leading to a state of anomie, where the most brutal individual seizes power to eliminate others [only to perish eventually, for human are not able to survive in isolation].
While this offers an interesting interpretation of todays neoliberal capitalism, it cannot truly be called revolution, since that would be merely a reaction to existing structures and narratives.
Evolution, on the other hand, is often linked to concepts like “the evolution of consciousness.”
Since most of our lives is built on the illusions of separation and permanence, I do serioulsy think that an evolution of consciousness is crucial for our survival!
However, I also see many people preaching about the evolution of human consciousness merely to distance themselves from the world, feed their egos, or sell (healing) courses and materials. This might be called spiritual bypassing, deception, or fraud, but it has little to do with the evolution of human consciousness we need right now.
Therefore, I prefer the term r-evolution.
It indicates that we need both revolution and evolution, but that, in my understanding, they will look and feel very different from how they are portrayed and understood in mainstream society today.