Success & Money

We are immersed in Success--mostly that of others--and I wonder if it's good for us.

On a daily basis the accomplishments of perfect strangers are shoved down our throats. Every media available depicts the fame, fortune and bad-taste-bling of people most of us would not invite over for dinner, and at probably no other time in history has this sense of m'as tu vu (French for 'look at me') been as prevalent as it is today. It's odd. A friend says it's not so much a question of envy as of head-shaking disgust with what is seen as going way over the top, repeatedly.

A good example are the MacMansions that have taken over my neighborhood. These houses have nothing of the singular or stylish to them. They are cookie-cutter homes and not built as well as my Korean War-era GI Bill special. They have no yards, but all have three- or four-car garages. One gets the impression that they were put together to last 10 to 15 years, and will certainly never be a part of anyone's inheritance. According to another acquaintance in the building trade, the coming thing in such homes will be minimally sized kitchenettes, since an entire generation of people now refuses to cook anything more meaningful than popcorn. They occupy space, are sold for four times their building costs to people who often can’t afford them. I was in one recently. There was no furniture in the living room save an old sofa and a state of the art home entertainment system. Classy…

High end cars are much the same. Talk to anyone with a knowledge of exotics such as Ferraris and Lamborghinis--once the possessions of the very upper class--and they will tell you that the newer cars can't hold a candle to the ones fabricated even 20 years ago. Recent models are shoddily built and designed to be traded in at incredibly diminished values within a year or two. Basically, these once proud marques have become m'as tu vu cars.

Thirty years ago, the word 'bourgeois' intimated everything people detested about a consumer-oriented society, and a musical on Broadway had a song titled "F*ck the Bourgeoisie." Today it seems as if there really is no upper class to speak of and the bourgeoisie now comes in several tiers: lower lower, lower-middle, upper-middle and so on, until we reach high ostentatious.

I wonder what this does, subliminally, to our collective egos? Of course there have always been the haves, the have-less and the have-nots and certainly in the land of Horatio Alger, the wealth of others remains a benchmark one could hope to attain. But with the advances of stupid money--that is to say riches that defy good sense given to nouveaux riches who lack any dregs of elegance—and runaway credit, we've come to foster examples of wealth that no longer has any social relevance. Urban kids are willing to kill for team jackets and the latest Adidas. Everyone deserves--no, needs--a Mercedes. Bankruptcy proceedings are followed by a rush of financial offers for credit since the bankrupt now have a clean slate.

Basically, money no longer has the relevance it once had. It has become a cheap commodity, and that perception is going to be a hard one to change, if indeed it can be changed. Money without real value--now that's one hell of a concept!