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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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How does modern culture escape ‘little boxes made of ticky tacky’?

By David McElroy · January 9, 2012

Life is full of tradeoffs. If we choose one thing that we want, we tend to be forced to give up a degree of something else we also value. Being happy isn’t a matter of getting everything we want. It’s a matter of finding the right tradeoffs — deciding what matters most.

It seems as though most modern people have chosen — perhaps unconsciously — the path of accumulating material things over emotional connections with other people. So millions of them sit in their suburban “boxes” and wonder why they’re miserable, even though they’ve achieved what they thought they wanted.

I’m thinking about this because of an old song that someone introduced me to over the weekend. (Listen to the song at the end of the article.) Malvina Reynolds was a singer/songwriter and political activist in the ’60s. I doubt I would have agreed with many of her political positions, but I found myself strongly identifying with her song, “Little Boxes,” which satirizes the antiseptic and meaningless lives that she saw people living in suburban tract homes.

I’m of two minds about people who protest against this “little plastic life.” There’s a part of me that appreciates the standard of living we’ve come to have because of the standardization and mass production of our lives. A world in which everything was custom-built individually is a world where not nearly as many people can afford nice houses and other material things.

On the other hand, there’s a huge part of me that’s repulsed by the world those things have created.

I don’t want to take away people’s ability to pursue that life. If people are foolish enough to value those “Little Boxes” and the kinds of empty lives that frequently come with them, that’s their choice. But I don’t want to be part of a world where we all look the same, act the same and raise our children the same. And I don’t think you can be part of that plastic life and still live a life with the values I believe are important.

Today’s little suburban boxes are nicer than the tract homes of the ’60s. Homebuilders know to vary the designs in a subdivision enough to give people the illusion of something that’s just for them. But the life it represents is still just as sterile to me as what Reynolds sang about. The life it leads to — the whole package deal — is the sort of life that doesn’t seem worth living. Not to me.

If that’s the life you want, I truly want you to have that choice. But if you live in a nice house with all the material things that life can offer — yet you’re still unhappy — you have to consider whether the tradeoffs you’ve made are worth it.

I know what I want. I know what I need. At the top of my list are real connections — emotional, intellectual and spiritual. I’d like loads of money and some nicer things — in a few areas — than I have now. (And we all want the illusion of security that more money brings, don’t we?) I wrote recently about how I believe I’ve undervalued the drive to accumulate wealth, and I do think that’s true. But I’ll never accumulate wealth if it means giving up the things that truly matter.

As a society, I believe we’ve collectively jumped off a cliff in pursuit of “the American Dream.” If we lose the things that matter most — real emotional and intellectual connections with others — it will be a very lousy tradeoff, no matter how good our Little Boxes look from the outside.

Our Little Boxes might be full of nice “stuff,” but they’re worth nothing if the hearts of the people inside are relatively cold and empty as a part of the deal.

Little Boxes
Malvina Reynolds

Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.
There’s a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And the people in the houses
All went to the university,
Where they were put in boxes
And they came out all the same,
And there’s doctors and lawyers,
And business executives,
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And they all play on the golf course
And drink their martinis dry,
And they all have pretty children
And the children go to school,
And the children go to summer camp
And then to the university,
Where they are put in boxes
And they come out all the same.

And the boys go into business
And marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.
There’s a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

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For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to For “throwback Thursday, let me introduce you to Sam. In 2009, I took in a young feral cat who I named for the early American revolutionary Samuel Adams. He was one of the most confident — downright arrogant, in fact — cats I’ve ever been around. He had an amazing personality and I immediately loved him. He was no more than 8 or 9 months old when he suddenly died for reasons that my vet couldn’t explain. Even though I had him only a short time, he was one of my all-time favorites. #tbt #cats #tabby #feral #birmingham #alabama
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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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