Machines and jobs When I see the new automated trash pick up system on Tuesday morning, I cannot help but wonder, how many jobs did these machines replace? Yes, I have heard the people released from crew duty were found
Machines and jobs
When I see the new automated trash pick up system on Tuesday morning, I cannot help but wonder, how many jobs did these machines replace?
Yes, I have heard the people released from crew duty were found positions within the county. I suppose this makes everything okay, insofar as no one lost their livelihood despite this new mechanized technology making their old jobs obsolete.
But I ask myself, ‘The new positions the old crews filled, who would have filled them had this new system had never been?’ I for one would have greatly appreciated being awarded one of those positions, as I and many other potential consumers whom have applied for years with the county need work badly.
Perhaps the cost of these new machines and their upkeep would have paid for those positions we potential consumers might have secured for our families. There is something here that confused me.
A modern trash truck cannot buy food, clothes, gifts or insurance, or pay taxes. I cannot begin to understand why a government would promote such an expenditure over a human being.
Perhaps all devices and technologies that replace consumers’ jobs are not so good. Perhaps all businesses should realize the only group that can cure their business ills is the viable consumer and not the machines that takes their places.
I suggest all businesses put profit on the back burner and make a concerted effort to hire as many people as they possibly can if they want to overcome this very sad, sad era.
Christopher Schaefer, Kapa‘a
The beat goes on
There was a time, way back when, that there were occasional summaries of what seemed to be news featured at movie theaters entitled, Time Marches On. It supplemented the daily newspapers across the nation, magazines like Life, Look, and Time, radio broadcasts (locally and otherwise), and certainly televised evening newscasts which have become 24-7 stations blurting out the agonies and ecstasies of happenstance at colossal magnitudes.
Then, there is the inevitability of change, which naturally comes with progress, advancement, new technology, shifting attitudes, etc.
The resistance to change fans the flames of debate and discussion which seem to go on forever. And finally, there is adjustment, leading to full-blown discussions pitting traditions and values against being innovative and radically different.
New ideologies may be as disarmingly blatant and offensive as the latest fashion, craze or fad. But, it is ‘necessary to keep up with the times,’ we keep reminding ourselves.
By putting these three concepts together, one after the other, ‘Time Marches On, Change, and Adjustment,’ it is plain and simple to see that they occur naturally, require our time and attention, and demand our abilities to coordinate our collaborative efforts and resourcefulness to seek solutions and/or compromises in dealing with such matters.
So, when you shake your head in disdain about the songs they sing today, remember how long ago it was when “Aba-da-ba Honeymoon” was once a delightful ditty!
Like it or not, the beat goes on.
Jose Bulatao Jr , Kekaha
To smart meter haters
What are the chances that at any given point of the day, I might find you holding an electromagnetic wave-generating device next to your head, beaming electromagnetic radiation directly into your brain?
My guess is that the chances are extremely high, since these things have become so ubiquitous that people think you are strange if you don’t have one. Even children are carrying these things from an early age.
I’m convinced many of you would have one of these devices implanted into your head if the technology “advanced” to such a point.
So, this doesn’t bother you, but the idea of having a meter outside your home, which you would almost certainly never stand next to for long periods unless you were some kind of freak, scares the living daylights out of you?
In the immortal words of Ricky Ricardo, “Lucy, you got some ‘splainin’ to do!”
Michael Mann, Lihu‘e
One with the universe
Good news! We are already one with the universe, and it ain’t perfect, thank God.
Perfect is stasis, and stasis is death. Luckily the universe is a clashing raucous dynamic event, not perfect. Send no money, join no cult to find it, you are there!
Keep the cash for your ego, which is an important and valuable survival tool. Life is no game. It is intense, personal, and ego-driven. Ego and individuality are the reason slavery and suppression, cults and group-think are bad ideas because they suppress the individual from seeking personal advantage, and seeking personal advantage drives innovation.
The best society is one that finds a balance between extremes, curbs the excesses of poverty and extreme wealth, and remembers that the driver for our best work is personal gain.
The concept that we all need to be one mind bound in universal love is not some immutable universal truth, and it is silly, really. We are intensely dependent on each other for survival.
We are made to compete with each other, and also within our communities and countries. We negotiate and push each other, pick each other up and continue. Our love is personal, intense, and particular.
Our ego defines who we are as individuals. The person who helps another is driven by a personal self love for who he or she is, not some vague notion of oneness with the universe, about which you have no choice at all.
Kurt Rutter, Kapa‘a
