I am on the Caltrain heading back down to Sunnyvale. It is 12:11 AM on Thursday now. I came up to the city to see the last showing of the documentary ‘The Corporation.’ The premise of the film is to psychologically profile the entity of the corporation as though it was a person, as that is the status of the corporation as it stands in the eyes of the law. It can do everything that a live flesh and blood person can do: buy and sell property, open accounts, buy and sell goods, lend and receive money, and on and on. Using a standard questionnaire from the DSM-IV [a psychologist’s clinical definition manual] we see that the behavior of corporations fits that of a psychopath. A pretty brutal assessment for corporate America, no? I don’t recall ‘psychopath’ as being a clinically defined mental diagnosis, but I am giving the benefit of the doubt.
The film was shocking, as it was designed to be. It was also enlightening, I learned things about the history of some American corporations that I had never heard. It was at the same time a sad reflection of the society we’ve let develop, with corporate interests at seeming to be driving factor in many of the major decisions of the nation. It was also a call to arms to make a difference. People from coast to coast should see this movie. People from coast to coast should care more about their government to learn how the decisions that they make affect them. People should be more aware of their place in the biosphere, of their place in the world. People should just reflect on the sheer amount of garbage that they produce weekly.
People should do a lot of things, but will they? Will you, will I? What have I done for my world and everyone in it? What have you done for the world?