I have only read Book two of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe. But I remembered reading the following in one of the other books in the series:
This planet has – or rather had – a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn’t the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.
Of course, the small green pieces of paper is referring to money, and money – or rather, the lack of it – definitely makes many people unhappy
But do you know how much is your money really worth?
Nothing. In reality, the pieces of paper in your hand is really worth absolutely nothing. They are ‘worth something’ because the government gahmen decreed that it’s worth something, as it is what it will accept for taxes, and the people around you only accepts it as payment for goods and services. Because of this, people believed and have confidence that these little pieces of paper is worth something, and they become much desired. In short, if there is one day everybody suddenly decide that it is not even good enough for wiping the ass, it will become worthless overnight just like the ‘Banana Notes’ (currency printed in Singapore during the Japanese Occupation) when the Japanese surrendered.
You might want to protest, and say that every single Singapore dollar in circulation is backed up with reserves, unlike the ‘Banana Notes’. In fact, the Singapore dollar is backed by billions of dollars in foreign currency – most probably in US dollars. But what really are these foreign reserves? In reality, they aren’t even pieces of paper. They are nothing more than a figure that exists in the computers somewhere. And even if that money exist as stacks of paper, it is also backed up with absolutely nothing as well.
If you don’t believe it, here’s something you should watch which will blow your mind away:
– What is Money?
– The mechanism of money creation
– Where money is ‘created’
So, if the ‘backing’ of all the money is really nothing more but thin air, then what really gives it value? Well simply, it is ‘backed’ by the fact that we find it inconceivable that all these money is really worth nothing.
In other words, we really do live in the Matrix. In our case, this Matrix is not a simulated reality created by sentient machines, but our very economic and financial system.
Instead of the machines tapping our bodies’ heat and electrical activity as an energy source, our economic and financial is nothing more than a system of modern slavery that lays claim to our labor. Sadly, this is a Matrix in which there is no Neo, no red pill to swallow and no Zion to wake up to. It’s the equivalent of a nightmare you can’t wake up from.
By the way, if you think Obama’s going to be that Neo, dream on… selling more US Treasury Bonds to raise more debt is simply giving the green light to the Federal Reserves to print more worthless pieces of green paper. That, is hardly salvation.
Let’s simply hope that the nightmarish parts of this Matrix we can’t wake up from will pass away soon… and hopefully these parts won’t return with increase frequencies.