REYNDERS, THE TREE THAT HIDES THE FOREST?

« For the love of wealth is the root of all evil.⁽¹⁾

What was said in August 2014, when Didier Reynders was already trying to take the high road by being appointed to Europe, is still as true today:  » Whether Didier Reynders stays at the federal level or joins Jean-Claude Juncker’s team, it doesn’t matter, Jean-Claude Fontinoy will certainly remain in the circle of his close advisors . It is true that  » Jean-Claude Fontinoy has an arm as long as the Danube « , the journalist noted without being indignant, classifying the article in the  » People  » section.

Some will take offense at what is happening in the political spheres, seeing individual « excesses » that should be corrected. However, all this has nothing to do with the realm of the accident, which would occur as a kind of epiphenomenon of capitalism. Excessiveness is written in the DNA of productivism and it is funny to read in some comments of our interview with Nicolas Ullens⁽²⁾:« when I read « antiproductivist journal for a decent society », I don’t feel like anything « . If this is also the sign of our modernity — not being able to recognize that someone whose vision of the world and of the ways to change it we do not share, can write or say something with which we can agree -, the refusal to see is part of the will, unconscious or not, to remain in the comfort of criticism that does not commit to anything. This one is then offered as a decontextualized statement, where it would be enough for the representatives to  » get their act together  » and take into account the public thing: « please, get your act together », to allow us to continue…

Of course, everything must be done to prevent Didier Reynders from evolving and reaching the heights of the untouchable, but with an identical system the work will always remain endless, because after having removed one by one the political mafiosi — as far as it is possible while they all stand together -, the political organization will reproduce the same type of individual. It is obviously not a question of saying that vice is only determined by a socio-economic system and that the one who benefits from it is only a poor consenting victim. Those who are only there to defend their own interests, that is to say the great majority of politicians, are useless to the common good, because by a form of trickle down they only commit decisions that originate from a will to share the cake between insiders. In this system, the voice of the voter must not be heard between elections for anything that goes against the private interest: the latter are only blank signatures that will allow Moreau, Mayeur, Reynders… to continue their business.

Logically, it is always a matter of pretending the opposite of what one does, of not doing what one says and not saying what one does. Nuclear power, the 5G network or other deployments of electromagnetic waves, connected objects, mega malls, wars, the purchase of new fighter jets, « pacts of excellence » and other « piloting » of the school by private consultancy boxes. »⁽³⁾commercial advertising, industrial agriculture, the invasion of the automobile, public-private partnerships … Anything undertaken would always be for the common good. However, in a society where growth takes precedence over everything else, the lure of gain is the norm and most of what is done is for this sole purpose. Anything that doesn’t pay off must be eliminated or taken over by the private sector.

This society has therefore created a type of man who has conformed to this ideology and has often made excessiveness a way of life. But  » money is like sea water, the more you drink, the more you thirst « , said Schopenhauer. If this adage applies to the « governors », it is equally valid for the « governed ». The higher the individual climbs, the more thirsty he will be, and logically he will claim his 458,000 euros in allowances when he leaves Parliament, or will receive more than 900,000 euros a year for being the head of Proximus. Everything is to the point,  » In the current system, the rich are just as unhappy as the poor. The poor would like to become a millionaire, and the millionaire would like to become a multimillionaire « ⁽⁴⁾.

If the criminals did not wait to act until a system based on accumulation and the need to produce and consume more and more was established, it must be recognized that the latter has made it possible to make these mafia practices structural and globalized, and has therefore offered them the capacity to spread out in all directions, the apathy and silence of the masses also coming from a form of acceptance of the fundamental principles of the rules of the game.

So there will always be a conformist mass, which happily takes advantage of our iniquitous system, to denounce the robber barons, but which will not want to draw the conclusions for itself. Venal politicians must be removed from decision-making spheres, of course. But after, or during this stampede, everything will have to be changed, to make this world a bearable one, where we will no longer waste our lives earning it, by consuming the earth that welcomes us. And that is something quite different from the condemnation of an individual, even if it is necessary.

Alexandre Penasse