<p>I have an idea: to get more people to come to my post, i shall make the thread longer, thus making people enter my post, believing that there is some interesting conversation within that is accumulating many pages. To lengthen my post, i shall start with my analysis of greed, which i wrote junior year:</p>
<p>Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. The point is, ladies and gentleman, is that greed -- for lack of a better word -- is good.
- Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas)</p>
<pre><code> This famous speech, given by a stock broker in the 1987 movie Wall Street, shocked a generation of Americans through its frank portrayal of an ancient sin as a beneficial reinforcement of the modern world. Despite its obvious existence in capitalistic life in the 1980s, greed kept its age-old reputation and continues to hold a terrible stigma. One of the original Seven Deadly Sins, greed is considered to be the perversion of human happiness, a sort of corrupted state of motivation. Greed is something to be blamed for, a shameful offshoot of mankinds selfishness that will supposedly bring about its own destruction, its own terrible death. However, greed does not destroy. Rather, it is the innate vitality of the human being, the subtle longing that defines the ups and downs that make up life. Without greed, there is no passion, no desire, and a world without want is as lifeless as the Earth was on its first day of creation. Greed allows humans to go higher, to reach out from the dirt and touch the sky, fearless and vivacious and full of life. Greed, in effect, is not only good but in fact the very essence of life itself.
Greed is, in its simplest form, a desire. The OED defines greed as an inordinate or insatiate longing, esp. for wealth, avaricious or covetous desire; to have an eager longing for. It originates from the Scottish word gredus, meaning hunger. In the darker era of earlier cultures, when the chief objective was survival, hunger was the only sort of greed available, since the lack of food prevented any further wants. Indeed, greed, or gredus, was the only way to survive, for to eat food required a desire for food, which in turn provided the actions needed to obtain it. In these primal days, greed was a necessity to provide for life.
Once our societies advanced enough so food was no longer the only common concern, but already provided for, our hunger began to be expressed in other ways. Our hunger for wealth, for art, for entertainment created a whole new world and way of life. Civilizations started to think outside of survival and started to think deeply about mans purpose in the world. The sciences and arts expanded, universities were formed to teach the ignorant about the new ideas that were spreading everywhere. Throughout the world there was a hunger, a hunger to learn and to teach, to expand power, to cultivate great fortunes. It is through this hunger that civilization grew out of starvation and into grand cities full of ideas and people as diverse as the colors in a master artists portrait. Literature reflected this transition of greed from its primitive beginnings to its new, complex role in a changing society. Shakespeares Romeo and Juliet delved into the intricacies of lust, and Machiavellis The Prince established a new government outlook based on the human tendency toward greed. Throughout these years, greed remained as much a tool of survival as it had been when the people were banded in tribes, desperately seeking sustenance. Even after food was well provided for, it gave everyone a reason to live, a reason to look beyond daily survival and to reach farther than they ever had before. In this way, greed continued to be a necessity in its ability to hold people to life, to keep everyone afraid of death through promise of more to come.
Thus we have mapped out the history of greed in the world. But now we must examine the more personal nature of greed to see how those early men came to extend beyond their boundaries to seek better lives and fortunes and set out to create these new societies. Greed is anticipation, it is appetite, which, as Laurie Lee claimed in her essay of the same name, was the keenness of living. Greed is the abyss within each and every one of us that demands more, and it is this piece of empty space where we find life. Nothing is done in the world without greed. It pushes us forward, always asking for something, stopping us from being content. Consider the very origins of our existence. Our beginnings were set in motion through pure, savage lust, the most biologically basic forms of greed. The world of nature marches to the rhythm of sex, providing the survivalist mentality that allows a diversity of life to flourish. Our modern world of business and finances is no different than that of natures. We still fight to survive, and greed empowers us to that struggle. The fancy sports car of the CEO serves the same purpose as that of the lavish feathers of the male peacock- genetic survival.
In response, many point out what they believe to be the inherent problem with greed- the suppression of contentment. But contentment is nowhere near happiness, much less liveliness. For it is those that have a hunger within them that guides them, that empowers them to do and think and dream. A long time ago in Earths past, a fish crawled out of the content mud that made it, slapping its fins for the first time against dry land, gasping for air as its gills flapped wildly. And what made the fish crawl out of its safe ecosystem? Greed for more food, greed for escape from the overcrowded waters it was leaving behind, greed for discovery, and most importantly, greed for difference. Thus men have crawled out of their own mud through and have reached higher, even under the most intolerable circumstances, because of the innate greed that powers their actions.
One of the saddest sights to ever witness is a person without greed, a person who has become lacking completely in any sort of desire, listless and incapable of life. In literature, the characters of two of the idle rich in F. Scott Fitzgeralds The Great Gatsby exemplify the death that follows a dearth of greed. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made
In place of greed, Tom and Daisy have become cruel puppet masters of those who surround them, playing with other peoples lives to make up for the lack of desire in their own. Indeed, anyone who falls into a state of contentment will, as humans tend to, grow bored, and find ways to stimulate themselves, sometimes harming themselves and others. This is a false pleasure; it is often hedonistic and lacks guidance and good judgment. Greed, however, pleasures through its rewards, and encourages motivation and self-discipline. Nothing in this world can be received without action, and greed powers that action. Thus a test of pure human motivation is set throughout the world; those who have the sternest will are the ones who reap the greatest benefits. Alexander the Great of Macedonia, who conquered vast territories and ruled the Mediterranean world with an iron fist, has become a hero among kings, a legend whom other rulers have tried to model themselves. His ambitions were equal to none; he had the vivacity, the sublime fire that burns in all great leaders eyes. He had greed. The luxuries of his life never satisfied him- he had the desire to conquer the world, to bring the known universe to its knees, and his innate greed allowed him to accomplish the impossible. True, he was never truly happy, but to become great, complacency escapes you. Contentment will get you nowhere; those with greed become legends.
In essence, greed is both life and the ability to guide life through the struggles it naturally provides. Greed, in fact, protects against meaningless hedonism and instead endorses personal improvement. The spark within each being of life that sets us apart from the rocks and mud we stand upon is desire, that foe of contentment that promises more and gives us the ability to act. We owe our lives to greed, and we owe what we accomplish in our lives to greed. Greed is not merely good-- it is everything we have.
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