Ridiculous Opinions #206
It was busy in Black Spire outpost the other morning, because we knew that we had work to do. You see, I was recruited to help plan the rebellion a couple of weeks ago, because the First Order is a bunch of buttheads.
You may know the First Order. They are a group of very rich, white people who control the economy of the galaxy. Their ultimate goal is to maintain the status quo and they live in utter and complete fear of losing that control because of the natural order of change in the universe. Thus, they use their power to repress those who disagree with them. They have all the credits and thus they live lifestyles that are far and away beyond the scope of those that cannot afford that lifestyle. They are intolerant of other species within the universe. They repress those that are disloyal to them, and maintain their loyalty solely to a leader that is petulant, short-sighted and ignorant of the world around him. We all live in fear of this leader having supreme power because of what he will do with it.
So, that was the job I was tasked with: helping to plan our counter-strike against a repressive system that was tasked with keeping down the people. For you see, those that have power will forever hold onto that power if they are left unchecked and thus we should always hold their feet to the fire in order to keep them in line. There are several ways to do this.
One way to do it is to hold them accountable for the massive profits that they receive from the hard work of others. For example, we all enjoy watching holographic entertainment in a variety of areas. We enjoy it so much that we think it’s a right. But most people don’t think about the hard-working species that write those shows. Somehow, most people think that these shows are created out of thin air.
And of course, the First Order doesn’t care about the people who write those shows. Their job is to maximize profits for shareholders and thus they look to cut costs in every area they can, forcing the writers of these holographic shows to take less money, while the First Order takes more money for themselves.
Plus, the First Order streams their shows to millions and in the process of creating those streams, they broke a system that worked very well and earned profits for all involved. In their attempt to gain complete control, they tried hard to repress the creators of those shows, taking away residual profits from reruns of these holographic shows and masking the number of viewers in order to maintain their control of the cash flow; again, all to appease the shareholders.
Part of the planned rebellion is a general strike, which the writers have engaged in. Most people would think that writers have cushy lives and that they should be happy that they get paid to write entertainment, but the truth is that writers work just as hard as everyone else and only a small fraction of them make enough to actually support themselves as writers. If the writers of these holographic shows don’t fight this battle, then their ability to sustain themselves in an industry that everyone enjoys will be lost.
Now, other industries have joined in with those striking writers. The actors in these holographic shows have also gone on strike. There are rumors of other potential strikes as well. There are strikes planned from those who deliver packages across the universe. There are unions that are planned for the people who serve us blue milk at fancy blue milk locations. There are unions being planned for gigantic First Order corporations that allow us to order anything on the intergalactic internet.
These things are necessary.
Baktar Glutneck once wrote, “The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.” This is a true statement. We must constantly be on guard for our freedoms and fight against intolerance and corporate greed. We cannot rest on our laurels and sit back to say, “Well, this doesn’t affect me…” If it doesn’t have an effect on you now, it most certainly will in the future.
We take a lot of things for granted in this universe and we are most certainly intolerant of things that impede on our regular lives. But strikes and labor action are designed to make you uncomfortable so that you awake to the injustices that surround you.
Corporate greed will continue to grow, because the curse of capitalism is that everything that one achieves is never enough. You can never have enough credits. You can never have enough satellites. You can never have enough power. And the more you have of each of these things, the more you want of them.
We must continue to fight against those that repress us, especially when it comes to the First Order and their desire to maximize profits at the expense of the average citizens of the universe. If we do not, then we run the risk of losing everything we have and becoming slaves to the people in power.
And you will never be one of those people in power. They don’t want you there. They just want you to think that you can be there.
So, fight against them. Join us in the rebellion.
