Stretching

by AJ/Skald

In the spirit of stretching my assumptions, I embarked on regular reading of Tom Peters' blog... which is dedicated to passion, innovation, (and all that jazz)-- in the business world. At first I was pleasantly surprised to find such words thrown around by a business consultant. I allowed for the fact that I may be wrong about the business world... or at least a small slice of it.

But lately Ive grown weary of reading the site. The more I read, the more I feel that the hype is smoke and mirrors. Most commenters to the blog are working for corporations that are anything but radical or humanizing. And most posts concern bland corporate gossip.

I also find an in-built faith in advertising and marketing.... pursuits that Aldous Huxley dubbed the dark opposites of the Perennial Philosophy: for their sole concern is to increase craving... that sickness which most mystical traditions identify as the root cause of suffering.

There are a few standouts on the site. Tom Asacker is one. Trevor Gay is another. But for each one like them, the business world is filled with a thousand money grubbing bastards-- who would gladly dump toxic waste in their neighbors' water supply-- if it'd add another 1% to quarterly profits.

And there are another 5000 who dont care about anything; they just shuffle along to collect their paycheck. They never question anything, never examine the organizations they work for, never wonder if there could be a deeper purpose to life. They do what they are expected to do.

And so I have found little passion, very little innovation, and no inspiration.

My picture of the business world is bleacker than ever.



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