Capitalism.

You could call me a minimalist. I'm not a huge fan of hoarding or collecting things, or taking up space. Growing up in the military, it was a game of sorts to see if you could get all your stuff into as few boxes as possible. So as i've gotten older, i carry that same awareness of gathering what i need and not too much else. This mentality has also affected my observation of others in seeing what they wear and how they "promote" themselves tells me an impressive amount of information about what's important to them. My wife's little brother, now approaching 12, asked the question the other day, why do we dress like homeless people? Well, so when people see that i am not homeless, they know that i am not my clothes. My identity is not going to be found in my closet. So when i see the words "fall collection" or "new up-and-coming fashion!" i don't feel the typical rush most consumers do. I certainly have no made scramble to keep up with anyone, be they named Jones or not. At the red-hot risk of sounding holier-than thou, the first thing that comes to mind is, "How many slaves provide the porridge to feed our hunger for things?" At the beginning of the year, i attended Passion Conference. Good stuff. For years i was always skeptical of the Conference high, and wondering how much money was "wasted" on people going there (while i collected a yearly bill of close to 500-600 U.S. dollars a year on music purchases ALONE). But one year i sucked it up and decided to go and my whole perspective got turned upside down while standing next to chinese students. Not foreign exchange at-school-in-america chinese, but we-just-flew-in-from-shanghai Chinese. It's hard to be critical about the chord progression and drum beats when five people next to you are singing the loudest they can because nobody is going to arrest them for doing so here. Humbling, to say the least. The past two years Passion has addressed the issue of slavery in the world. 27 million people. Women, children, Men. Families. People held in captivity through aggression, violence, or intimidation of every imaginable (and some unimaginable) sorts all over the world, and the United States is right up there at the top of the global list with a high-count. 27 million people. More slaves right now than at any other point in history. Most people would read this and not think much of it. Another number. Another philanthropist project. Leave it alone, it'll fade out like all the other fads. And then the heart-rate goes UP whenever they see those words COLLECTION and FASHION and TREND. Awesome. God bless America indeed.