I have already tackled the mathematics of publicly funded major league sports stadiums and proven that the tax payer should not contribute one cent—because all these public funds are pretty much pocketed by the owners who are now adept at lining the pockets of politicians and blackmailing one group of taxpayers against a different group of tax payers—whilst all the making a mockery out of the sport in their ceaseless efforts to squeeze every ounce of profit out of the game. But guest writer Karl would like to look at this issue from a different perspective, focusing on the broader issues of materialism and social fabric, i.e., real values, as opposed to the invented values promulgated by pseudo-Christians that we have to suffer on a daily basis to the exclusion of serious meaningful discussion. See Karl’s Book on Amazon
Patrick Andendall
It looks like professional football is willing to spend $2.66 billion for a new football stadium in Inglewood CA., even though Los Angeles County has two stadiums close at hand. I did not do the research, but my local paper says it would be the most expensive sports venue ever built. All I know, that is a lot of money that the broken down people and homes around Inglewood will not experience. Once again, the poor will be shunned as the meaningless scurvy the wealthy wants them to be. Projects of this magnitude actually increase society’s stress, by inflating entertainment spending rather than fixing our social problems.
The middle class will buy their tickets, the wealthy will sit in their private suites, others will toss peanuts for a buck, and all will watch grown men applying brain damage to each other. The whole circus of watchers and peddlers encourage brain damage, just by driving past the indignity that starts a mere block away. Down those next blocks, many humans will starve and die every night a professional football game is played. The billionaire club has struck again with another, hey; let’s entertain ourselves, rather than spending money on the drastically serious humanitarian needs.
These current facilities are so well designed now, that they are their own atmosphere of corporate enterprise that does not mingle with the poor of a city. They are the self-enclosed Disneyland of shopping. Capitalism pitches the biggest lie of, this improves the neighborhood, it will produce long-term jobs, and it will bring stores and shopping and supply local businesses with a better cash flow. The cash flow is true for the city coffers by way of sales tax, but not true for the local citizens. How could it possibly benefit the locals when, the new stores are not owned by newbie business men and women born in Inglewood? Those fancy new shops are owned by someone else in Westwood, Santa Monica, Pasadena, or perhaps as far away as San Francisco. And sadly, most will be corporate owned goliaths.
The locals will be paid a minimum wage and the older businesses of Inglewood will have to compete with the shinny new stores. Local family retail and restaurants aren’t getting a portion of that $2.66 billion to fix their dilapidated store fronts. So naturally, a shopper will choose a nice new building over a decrepit one, and a small family business goes out of business. It’s the Wal-Mart syndrome disguised as a sports facility.
This is not development, as much as, just shoving the barely surviving aside. A billionaire has created a play zone for people with money, to come in and have fun, and few will venture outside the sports complex because the surrounding streets are scary. Again, so much for the locals making money. Can the city take their extra tax money and fix up the neighborhood? History proves many cities have tried, but the needs are so great in the blighted areas, that the small revenues of tax are never enough to address everything, like $2.66 billion could.
$2.66 billion can do a lot better sideways, down the streets of Inglewood, rather than straight up into the air. Big deal, we reduced blight for one big square block of civilization, when we could have spread that money down many blocks and fixed up the broken shacks of the poor. We could call it compassionate building, with new insulating windows and solar rooftops to cut the poor’s living expenses, and at the same time improving Earth’s ecosystem. Here’s a wild, out-of-the-box idea that corporations say they love so much. How about taking the extra step of giving the businesses of being a gang, a polite slice of money that relieves their concerns of drug dealing and extortion to the neighborhood? Now they can invest in new businesses and with a mentor program. And the ultimate compassionate build; throw in some really nice solar kit homes for the homeless who watch it all. That money could have gone ten blocks deep and altered homelessness for a large section of LA. But the billionaire Ram’s owner, Stan Kroenke, did not see this vision of a Hail Mary that would slightly block off the deterioration of humanity. He saw luxury suites for him and his wealthy friends and full-on party mode for all participants.
How could anyone interpret this as modern development, when it is exactly extra materialism for us to play with? This entertainment project is not the modern development humans require. It is the creation of a personal edifice to leave Stan’s mark on history, under the lie of construction jobs. The project thoroughly diverts us from the real construction that advances civilization.
My heart broke for the destitute entrapped by the leaders of Brazil. Preceding the world cup soccer matches of 2014, the poor were simply standing by, watching the rich build new soccer palaces to entertain themselves, and went as far as building a $270 million soccer stadium in the obscure city Manaus that rests in the middle of the Amazon jungle. Only four games were played at the stadium in the middle of nowhere, and all experts agree, the facility will fall into disrepair as many Olympic venues have. What a waste of money, pure and simple. And that is what the Inglewood project is all about – the incorrect spending of money. The Rams could have played football comfortably in the Rose Bowl or the Coliseum. But no, some billionaire owner wanted the best at the expense of the cold and hungry. The cold and hungry will curl up farther down the street and watch this mammoth construction reach for an incorrect sky.
Is this how repugnant man has become? We would rather waste heaps of money on nothing that really matters while other humans starve? Yes, this is completely true. Humans love to entertain themselves, so that we may smile and laugh while others can’t even crack a smile due to malnutrition. How can this be human anymore, when we act like mindless biological machines that enjoy looking past the human heartache of sleeping on cold concrete? A real human heart or even commonsense intelligence, doesn’t offer the pity of peanuts; it offers complete resolution to all homelessness.
Per year, depending on which survey is used – as if that really matters with such large numbers – Americans spend roughly $20 billion on movies, $17 billion on video games, $30 billion on professional sports, $34 billion on casino gambling, and $14 billion on performing art tickets. Those are just a few of the avenues regarding our spending habits.
America is a 18 trillion-dollar economy and the figure I found dis-believable, is that we spend approximately $10.7 trillion on shopping. I thought the figure was an absurd ratio to the $18 trillion number, until I realized it might be highly accurate because everywhere I drive, it’s one shopping center after another. Regardless if the mentalfloss.com number of $10.7 trillion is perfectly accurate, the economy of materialism is so large and grand, it can easily put a roof over everyone’s head.
Perhaps we should end all forms of entertainment until we clean up the human mess of poverty, first. Or perhaps the freewill spending on movies, sports, concerts, and all nonessential shopping should carry a new 5% statewide sales tax on each dollar spent. And that money goes toward helping the homeless with compassionate blocks of society, constructed especially for the depraved. Kit homes with food and heat, and roaming doctors with medicine. The whole lot can be a side pocket taken directly from our insane spending, which tends to the cold and hungry by the state of California. The extra tax money could easily fund a new agency, but, with one catch. We must find topnotch managers who can properly manage full care to the state’s homeless. Better yet, contract the money out to the private sector and force corporations into the production of goods and services that are free to the poor. Every giant corporation could have a nonprofit side that is naturally better managed than government, and ultimately will do the best job since the realm dwarfs all government.
A state-level, unfiltered compassionate endeavor with corporations that care about advancing civilization, could induce a corruption free atmosphere that bypasses the local corruption, who make these absurd deals that push humans with shopping carts full of old blankets down the street. Civilization requires governments and corporations uniting to a compassionate construction movement, and highly necessary in a state that produces $2.2 trillion in good and services, where none of it is designed to completely eliminate homelessness. Then maybe we can go for a nice walk after a football game, instead of hurrying to the car so we don’t get mugged. See why the Inglewood sports complex is framed so big?
This is truly a dire condition of modern life. The cold and hungry must feel really sad inside, when looking out at the busy world and no one cares. A world in which some cities are passing laws against homelessness. Yeah, that is tax money well spent from entertainment and shopping. Now can one see the tax irony of a city plan infected by the corporate mentality of acting like one? It’s extremely heartbreaking when city government aids in the pushing of humans aside. It’s much easier for a negative corporation to push around the smaller city governments, and time for reform.
Cannot our mutual commonsense agree that we must divert some of the money that is entertaining us, into the caring of the poor? This would produce a genuine smile on your face, compared to the placebo smile of owning 100 pairs of shoes. I know it does for me, but I don’t have enough money to feed everyone. However, adding all our combined money up, we definitely have enough to feed and house everyone. So what if they don’t have jobs. They deserve to be treated like humans first. It’s the compassionate thing to do and a gesture of an advancing culture. You know what else it does? It fends off the de-evolution of civilization to a certain degree, and may even ignite the virtuous path to a resourced-based economy.
Is this a rant or a request for humans to open their eyes and fight the materialism that will eventually kill the planet? Only your eyes can make that call. I suggest you take a hard look at what surrounds you. That Western lifestyle of incorrect materialism through industrialization, cannot expand within our nation and as a world platform without serious harm to the planet. It completely distorts our mental ability to grow humanity, and instills the economic blinders to the approaching catastrophe. It’s literally an insane lifestyle.
And I’m a hypocrite. I really, really enjoyed, Tom Brady’s almost comeback against Denver.
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