Our economy was only ever as good as its ability to get bigger and faster. To what can we compare it? There is nothing so precarious as an elite athlete. Capitalism is the structure of elite competition. In such a structure there is a necessary majority of losers. There is the inevitable wreckage of bodies permanently sidelined and discarded by injury. Within the structure those who ‘benefit’ are those are in service of the victors or at least the competitive. This includes the direct losers (one still needs competition to be able to win), the trainers, statisticians, coaches, owners, infrastructure, merchandise, etc. They only have worth to the extent that the athlete is at the very least competitive. The lives of athletes are fully in the service of improvement, of growth. Every moment is accounted for including rest which some athletes schedule in as ‘meetings’. Coaches know this precarity and caught between their ego and the pressure of investors tend to abusive behavior as a means of controlling the athlete and their performance. The elite athlete is not conditioned to be healthy but to be improving at an appropriate rate or be discarded.

In the same way that sports like track and field are hitting hard limits of human improvement so too we have known that the global economy is hitting hard limits. We have known that while producing some ‘competitive’ economies around the world it also produces abundant losers (and a wreckage of injured bodies and torn up playing field). Indeed the common ‘spectator’ of this economy has to take on increasing debt just to watch from the sidelines. And what value the economy has brought is overwhelmingly reinvested back into the research and development of making the economy again bigger and faster as opposed to making populations healthier and safer. The surplus of the economy is used to ensure the economy makes more surplus.

This economy has experienced ‘injuries’ in the past but has been able to rehab and get back out there but it seems that in a new way we are seeing the extent to which the ‘strength’ of the economy was being propped up by drugs returning to action too soon and too aggressively. Or more fundamentally we are seeing how the economy was invested when it is forced to stop.

We desperately need less competition. Bodies are literally pilling up on the playing field (never mind the state of the field itself). We desperately need a revision of the rules of the game. Our economy was only ever as good as its ability to get bigger and faster. It was never designed to stop (or at least radically scale back) so that it could attend to the wellbeing of others. It was never designed to place the wellbeing of all at the core of its functioning and structure. Environmentalists, human rights activists, and scores of others have been saying these things for a long time but this latest injury to the economy now has everyone’s attention and attention is a powerful force. Corporations, politicians, sports and entertainment businesses willingly pay billions for our attention because with it comes our time which shapes our values from which our commitment and resources will follow. There is a direct correlation between attention and what the religious would call devotion or even worship. But what has got our attention now is not the powerful world record holder but a crippled body, abusive coaches and greedy owners. What we are seeing now is a system where companies will discard employees en masse without benefits with the wealthy scrambling to hoard and transfer wealth to their benefit. We are seeing a system that fiercely opposed to government interference and now (again) looks to the government for support.

Will we again simply inject the economy with a surge of adrenaline and smelling salts and send it back out there? Will we demand governments and other non-profit organizations take over key sectors of society so that a broad base of care will be prioritized? Pay attention. Much will be asked of us now and in the near future in terms of our belief and commitments. We will likely be asked to believe again and trust that our record breaking days are still ahead of us. But I, for one, am not willing to play this game any longer. I wish to state simply and clearly that I do not trust this economy and so I do not support Canada’s ongoing alliance with it. In as much as our government is to reflect a collective will I demand that our governments at all levels work presently and actively to bring economic interests in line with common wellbeing. I am fine with elite athletes going out trying to make it big again but this cannot be a model determining all of our fates. The economy must serve people with a focus on the vulnerable not the strong. From each according to their abilities to each according to their needs.

In the wake of COVID-19 let’s get our stories straight and starting working out a different game.