The Theory of Enough, Part II

Why is it that there is such a premium placed on upward mobility? On the assumption that each generation must be better off than the one before it? It seems to be a concept that we take for granted; those who fail to live up to it feel somehow cheated by life and disenfranchised. I for one will never equal my parents professional credentials or earning power, but I do not consider myself a failure. On the contrary, I see myself as having evolved. By not settling for the notion that greater wealth will make me a better person, I have discovered a more fruitful ideology: living with respect for earth and man.

When I was in University one of the most striking things I learned came from a first year Geography course. The professor told us that if we were to end world poverty the average middle-class North American would need to live on 1/7th of their current wealth. I don’t quite remember the context of this statement, nor the evidence that supported it. But I have always used it as a benchmark when assessing my society’s greed because it seemed a fair assessment, and a worthwhile challenge to me. We are far too rich, and above all, inconsiderate of the fact that our ever multiplying prosperity is dependant on the destruction of nature and the subjugation of others.

Apparently mine is not an overly popular view. Young people continue to leave this city in droves to find the affluence and excitement that Winnipeg will never provide. We are the crumbling capital of a needy province. They are taking their educated brains and skilled hands to where they can enjoy greater material happiness, even at the expense of leaving those they love behind. I wonder why so many have grown up to believe that what you have is worth more than who you are and where you come from.

The province’s politicians and business leaders are desperately trying to answer the question of how to retain our youth, especially the “knowledge workers” and the “creative class” because these groups evidently represents our future prosperity. The most logical answer to the dilemma is to alter the expectations of youth and help them come to a different understanding about what life is supposed to be for. This, however, is a near impossible task. The uninterruptible messages of celebrity and status that fuel society are filtered through the lens of a manipulated media that cannot live without advertising. Add to that implicit imperative of Financial Security, and family pressures, and you get a really difficult nut to crack.

Failing a geological and/or environmental event of catastrophic proportions, Winnipeg will never be a major metropolis. Those who seek the opulence and exhilaration of the Big City will never find it here. We are a hearty and frugal folk, practical to the core. We are artists and workers and homemakers. Our advantage is not how cheap it is to live here, but who we are as people. It is all the culture that makes up this city and it’s ethnic diversity; it’s our First Nations heritage. It is the families and friends we grew up with, the places we live and meet in. And it’s the landscape itself, the weather: sometimes violent, sometimes bitter, sometimes beautiful and other times damn buggy. It is the never ending sky.

What Winnipeg could do, if it had the will, and the guts, would be to live life on its own terms. To harmonize and adapt to nature rather than being a complacent resource wasting culture of haves and want mores. Every day there is an opportunity to help someone less fortunate, to let someone merge, to thank your god(s) for the gift of life. Winnipeg is incapable of winning the Rat Race; I for one would be eternally grateful if we could all agree to stop running in it, and spend our limited time on earth acting on things that really matter instead. Living as the first people who lived on this land did, with reverence and resolve, reflection and respect.