China Syndrome III:
CHINA SYNDROME III:
MAD IN AMERICA
The Tower of Babel looming at the End of
our lockstep march towards GLOBALIZATION
By: Dusty Schoch, DW Foreign Policy Editor
Prefatory Note – On the way to China, Chris Columbus discovered “India” (he thought). Long after that (like today) Americans are making a much worse mistake…by exporting American jobs and industry to India (first) on the way to China.
I made America’s exporting furniture and other industry the sore subject of two articles on the DW site (“The China Syndrome” and “China Syndrome II”)
More recently, DW Editor, Bobby Dees has sounded off his discontent with having to deal with customer service reps in India in the effort to make his radio work. (See “Outsourcing Fails This XM Radio Customer”).
The present article is my own retake on the much-wider picture of America’s present march towards industrial/economic paralysis… wherein we—even now– find even our service industries (such as the service division of good old American “General Electric”) speaking to us from….New Delhi !
What is, actually “Made in America” these days…? Only two things for sure- (1) those little foil stickers on the bottom of every thing we buy at WalMart that say “Made in China” and (2) the paper our Hong Kong-bound books are printed on – including the book with that old story of Babel’s Tower in it … that prophetic parable first uttered over 2000 years ago that today warns that if we humans keep trying to make things bigger and better (and easier), one day, our greedy and luxury-driven industrial revolution might lead us to a time and place when and where we can’t even understand what each other are saying. Are we perhaps there already?
Have you recently tried calling your “personal banker” maybe to find out what’s in your checking account ? If so, you’ve discovered that , your “personal banker” has no name. In fact, he has no blood, bone or any other signs of sharing life with you. He is, in fact . . . IF you can remember your PIN number, and IF you find the toll-free number that allows you to call your local bank’s (mine is in High Point NC) customer-service department in Tupelo (can we rename that “ cussed-service”, maybe?), and IF you can ferret your way through the punch-key code that robotic voice gives you, and IF you can recall and correctly key in the 10 sequential numbers of your account . . . a digital cyber-chip , made of silicon and silver whose quantum of cognitive quality makes Dick Cheney seem charismatic.
By the end of this experience, you will have discovered that , though your dollars and bank account may in fact be “made in America”, they are serviced elsewhere… out there in the neverland of corporate cyberspace, somewhere clearly east of Eden and in close proximity to the Tower of Babel.
A recent case in point. Sue – my very sweet and trusting step mom recently re-did her entire kitchen – filled it completely– floor to ceiling with brand new appliances – all of which were , of course “Made in America” – - fine modern machines made by trusted old-brand National industrial heroes like Whirlpool , Matag and our own , still “bringing-good-things-to-life” U.S. o f A. icon, General Electric. Of course, Sue ordered all her new stuff from our equally home-grown home supply super-store in High Point (not Home Depot, but rather the “other one”…the more locally-based, Lowe’s).
When the remodeling was done and the delivery guys (who did actually have blood and bone) came and installed her new stove , refrigerator and dishwasher (all G.E.) , Sue was beside herself , surrounded by all that new glistening reaffirmation of American innovative technology … the wherewithal and embodiment of her lovely life of industrially-engineered comfort and leisure. Surrounded and pampered by all her spanking-new American appliances , Sue wasn’t at all shaken initially when her dishwasher and refrigerator wouldn’t work, because, they failed to drain and cool (respectively or respectfully) , thinking she’d “just call down to the store and they’d come and fix things”. Memories of current “Maytag” commercials flashed on the screen of her nonchalant noggin as she dialed up her local appliance megastore.
She held her own while navigating through the computerized telephone maze which connected her finally to yet another flesh-and-blood primate. This “customer service” man , addressing the non-draining dishwasher first, said “No problem – let me connect you with the GE repair department”. Seconds later, a heavily -accented middle-eastern male voice comes on the phone and , after identifying himself and taking the dishwasher’s vital signs and symptoms from Sue, informs her as follows (in an authoritative – but soothingly-exotic version of English that brought to mind the Gandhi character Ben Kingsley played in the Made-In-England movie of the same name): “ Your dishwasher (assures Gandhi) is not broken. Merely it is most probable dysfunctional temporarily because it is not used to its environment.” Whereupon, my step mom, of course says…”What????”…And the Gandhi-guy on the other end haltingly continues…. “Just leave it to be. When the machine is adjusted to new environment… a few days only it will take …. it will swallow the water and it will be fine…Not to worry.”
Sue, thought this pronouncement (not-to-mention pronunciation) a little strange, but when an appliance is made from parts emanating from a dozen venues around the globe…why be concerned if the repairman (and his remedy) seem a little . . . exotic? And maybe those various alien parts in her dishwasher needed time to adjust to the temperature and humidity-controlled climate of her new Carolina kitchen.
So , Sue resolves to give her dishwasher time to “adjust” to its new environment, and , calling the store again, addresses the problem of her refrigerator’s refusal to refrigerate. This time the very same virtual humanoid at the mega-store she talked to about the dishwasher answered and declared that Sue was “in luck”. This was the second call on a un-cool GE fridge he’d handled that week, and he knew just how to fix things. He had personally called the repair department for General Electric… “Did I tell you they’re in India ? “ , he asked her. “In India?” , says Sue - thinking “No wonder that guy sounded strange… and took so long to answer—we were talking on satellite .” “Why is the GE repair department in India?” , she asks, naturally. “Well, it’s not really the repair department– just the customer service part of it. GE can afford to have them talk to you long distance because they work for $10 a day in India, and the union workers in the States get paid more than that an hour.”
“I see”, says Sue, “but what about the fridge?” “Oh, that one’s easy”, says the store guy. “I called and talked to the guy in New Deli myself when a customer last week had the same problem and the Indian guy just told her all she needed to do was put stuff in .” “Put stuff in?” , Sue pursues. “Yeah,” the guy continues, “The Indian fellow says that the new GE refrigerators won’t cool unless they sense that they have food inside them, and so you have to put your food in so they will decide to cool.” “Really”, quizzed an increasing incredulous North Carolinian customer named Sue, who by then couldn’t resist ruminating on the odds of an environmentally-traumatized dishwasher and an on-a-food-strike refrigerator having been delivered to her by an All-American General Electric Company on the same day.
“But don’t do what that other lady did”, continued the store guy , still relaying to Sue the New Deli guy’s remedy for her refusing refrigerator … “That lady tried to trick her refrigerator into working by filling it up with magazines… and it didn’t work.” By this time, Sue, feeling herself somewhat Alice-one-toke-over the-looking-glass-line , said, “Maybe it (the refrigerator) would prefer newspapers …. I have a lot of those”. And she wasn’t altogether kidding. Certainly the store guy wasn’t, because he responded , sincerely and artlessly , “No m’am. I’m sure that won’t work …The Indian guy said for sure the refrigerator needs food. You need to fill it with food and than call me back if the refrigerator won’t cool it.”
By now , any sane reader will think this story is being made up. That at least part of it has to be a joke. Sorry, my comfortable compatriots. The sad (if comical) story is , the story is true. Every weirdly worrisome word of it. As things turned out, my step mom, Sue, finally came out of the Indian ether and called General Electric’s corporate home office (some place…you never know where you’re actually calling these days). When the “all-American” (i.e., $18/hour) boys heard Sue’s story, they had the store send out union-card-carrying blood and bone American repairmen that very day, and within minutes, the fuse and o-ring required by the GE fridge and dish-washer were installed , and the rebellious machines were contentedly cooling and draining their food and water like GE and the Heavens had ordained.
IS IT MAYBE….BABEL?
But speaking of “ordained”: More than a comfortably few prophesies in the Good Old Book seem to be being ordained of late. Our blind, heedless greed and endless quests for affluence, leisure and dominance of our natural environment (not to mention our neighbors’) may have finally led us again to the top of that tottering tower of mythical Babel. Some how, to some degree, that filthy lucre (the Dollar) and perhaps increasing human laziness and narcissism are involved. But as far as who’s ultimately to blame (or to become responsible ) for this creepingly-ubiquitous state of American affairs is a little harder to pin down.
Maybe we can go back to that ancient Myth in Genesis (11:4-9) for clues. When mankind’s pride, heedless striving and ambition got to the point that he offended his maker, what did that Ultimate Authority (in the story) ultimately do? He made it impossible for men to continue building their structures- stopped them dead in their progressive tracks and scattered them to the four corners of the globe by …making them speak different languages…
Is that what all this . . . madness in American means? Has the ultimate cosmic authority commenced another remedial intervention in our collectively-dysfunctional lives? If so, we need to be aware: Men, speaking in “different tongues” simply can’t help each other fix things. Over the phone, the internet, through the media, or at a Middle Eastern Summit. From the terrifyingly-toppled twin towers to my step mom’s tiny refrigerator, this trend poses a chilling question: Where is this shrinking world – this swelling separateness – this so-called “globalization” taking us? I don’t think we’re likely to find the answer in calling General Electric via New Deli. I think that , eventually , we’re going to have to look inward, and maybe take a few steps backwards , in the direction of a time and place where in fact, truly good things were brought to life …by Americans, for Americans . . . in America.
At the same time we’re looking inward and possibly slowing down some, we need to be further aware, as humans, that in separateness, there is …madness; In Unity, Strength. Accordingly, compatriots, in the contrails of September’s (9/11/01) grave awakening, as we individually persevere and resume the pursuit of our comforts—from refrigerators to flights abroad—there’s a new and vastly smaller globe out there…So we need – collectively – to expand and promulgate as vastly the motto of the motherland – - E. Pluribus Unum. Including the last time we glanced at the words ensconced on that tiny ribbon of a banner, clenched in the beak of the raptor printed on our … U.S. Dollars, when’s the last time we paid any serious mind to the most profound, potent and promising standard a nation ever had the prophetic vision to give itself?
Best to all,
Dusty
2-24-07
This entry was posted in America, American Economy, Economics, Political. Bookmark the permalink. ← What’s Wrong with Barack Obama? American Fascism* →
