Cherish materiality: oh, dear materiality

Hello, classmates. A couple of days ago I saw this image, and it immediately reminded me of The Beat Generation. The reason for that is that as covered in class, The Beats reacted against materialism and advertisement from the 1950s on. This is clearly seen in the message contained in this image, where it is stated that in our world, "things are being loved and people are being used." 

I would like to connect this idea with a poem by Allen Ginsberg called "Death to Van Gogh's Ear." In this poem, to me at least Allen clearly expresses himself against materiality, especifically against making money through it: "eggs should be eaten or given to their mothers." Here, what Allen is clearly saying is that we should only take eggs away from their mothers to eat them, not sell them. 

He seems to be saying we humans live in a world where some of us prefer material objects to a life: "Elephants of mercy murdered for the sake of an Elizabethan birdcage." I once read that the only one who really needs fox skin is the fox, not us, and that's true. But some of us, or perhaps most of us, do not seem to understand that. 

I think it is in the making of money that the connection between this poem and the idea expressed in the image lies, for in order to make money workers are needed, workers who sacrifice a lot of time to make money in order to survive. Thus, they are being used, and what is worst, sometimes even such workers who work long hours, some of them almost like slaves, fall in what Henry David Thoreau called a prejudice: we work very hard to buy things we don't really need to live. Thoreau  through Walden (1854) had already expressed this idea that most of the things we work for are not really necessary for our survival, which is why at a point in this book it is said that "It is never too late to give up our prejudices." 

As you can see, Thoreau's idea was then complemented by Allen Ginsberg of the Beat Generation in the sense that both fought against materiality. And this idea is also complemented by the idea expressed in the image included in this entry--that we live in a world where "things are being loved and people are being used"--and it is in the following quote from Ginsberg's "Death to Van Gogh's Ear" that the connection between all these ideas lies: "Money! Money! Money! shrieking mad money of illusion!, Money made of nothing,/starvation, suicide! Money of failure! Money of death!" 

As you can see in that quote, money is an illusion made of sacrifice, either from nature or from humankind: to make money natural resources are needed, animals are killed, human labor is needed; and sometimes, some countries invade other countries to get such natural resources, or even labor force (see slavery). All for what? for an illusion because money to me, as well as it seems to be to Ginsberg, is "vast paper of illusion." The reason for that is that money has value because we humans ascribed value to it. Perhaps if most of us or all of us were less selfish, perhaps we wouldn't need money to purchase fundamental things such as food and water, which is what we really need to survive. All the rest, except a house and clothes for winter (obviously in the case of clothes it would be ok to manufacture them so as not to kill animals, or perhaps we could use the skin of animals that have just died) could be, is unnecessary, at least from the point of view of the preservation of our species. 

Unfortunately, the way the world is organized makes us be dependent on material things. For instance, we as students know that we can't study without Internet connection: our teachers send materials through it, they let us know via e-mail or the virtual classroom whether a class  has been canceled, whether we are on strike, whether we have homework, whether the test dates have been modified, etc. They even make us do research through it, so at least as university students today it is unthinkable to study without internet connection. I honestly don't think we can get a degree in any field of study without Internet connection and a computer today. But still, as I said before, from the point of view of biological survival we don't need any of these. 

So what do you classmates think? Do you think we live in a world where "things are being loved and people are being used"? Do you think it should be otherwise as it is stated in the image above? Do you agree with my reasons provided above to believe we do live in a world where many prefer materiality to a life? Do you think money is an illusion? I look forward to your answers.