This might be the most controversial thing I have written out of 2,295 pieces.

And honestly?

The boardrooms might just be the biggestbl nurturers and providers of all time. They give exactly what people asks for. Keep doing the “good” work. Maybe one day they’ll realise it, but for now yoj’re doing exactly what they want.

I think I have been looking at this completely backwards.

Because I am standing in Wood Green looking around at the sheer amount of consumption happening around me.

Shop after shop.

People buying.

People carrying massive bags.

People eating.

People drinking.

People consuming.

People spending money constantly.

And suddenly I have had to ask myself a question I really did not want to ask:

Are companies actually taking advantage of people?

Because what I keep seeing does not necessarily look like exploitation.

It looks like participation.

Companies are providing.

People are buying.

Companies create something.

People choose it.

Companies put it on the shelves.

People pick it up.

Companies offer convenience.

People demand convenience.

Companies offer distraction.

People pay for distraction.

And then we turn around and blame the companies for the society we are continuously financing.

At what point do we have to be honest about the other side of this?

Because supply follows demand.

And demand is not an abstract concept.

Demand is human beings.

Us.

The people making the purchases.

The people clicking the buttons.

The people renewing the subscriptions.

The people eating the food.

The people buying the clothes.

The people consuming the entertainment.

The people rewarding companies financially while simultaneously complaining about the world those companies help create.

And that is where this gets deeply uncomfortable.

Because what if companies aren’t forcing us?

What if we are willingly participating?

What if people are not being dragged into this system?

What if people are repeatedly choosing it?

Every single day?

Then perhaps the question cannot only be:

“Why are companies doing this to us?”

Perhaps we also need to ask:

“Why are we continually asking them to?”

Because I cannot honestly stand here and say that companies are taking advantage of everyone when millions of people are willingly giving them their money, their attention, their time and their energy.

They are responding to demand.

And yes, companies can manipulate demand.

Yes, companies can influence behaviour.

Yes, companies can create unhealthy environments and profit from human weaknesses.

But there is another uncomfortable truth sitting underneath all of that:

A market becomes powerful because people participate in it.

And people participate in it because, at some level, they are choosing it.

So what happens when people claim they want better food, but continue buying the worst food?

What happens when people say they hate corporate culture but continuously reward corporations?

What happens when people say they want quality but repeatedly choose the cheapest thing?

What happens when people say they want meaningful lives but spend hours consuming distractions?

What happens when people say they want change but refuse to change their own behaviour?

What exactly are companies supposed to do?

Stop providing what people buy?

Stop making money from what people willingly purchase?

Stop responding to demand because society says it would prefer a different reality while continuing to behave exactly the same way?

This is where I genuinely have had to reconsider my own thinking.

Because I have spent so much time looking at systems and asking what should change.

What should governments do?

What should businesses owe humanity?

What should Parliament change?

What should institutions be responsible for?

And now I am looking at humanity itself and thinking:

What are you actually asking for?

Because your behaviour is answering that question already.

And your behaviour is louder than your words.

People say they want better.

Then they buy the same thing.

They say they want change.

Then they reward what already exists.

They say they hate the system.

Then they participate in it without question.

They say they want something meaningful.

Then they spend their energy on consumption.

And perhaps this is the part nobody wants to hear:

Companies may not be taking advantage of us nearly as much as we allow them to.

Because if nobody says no, nobody resists, nobody questions, nobody educates themselves, nobody changes their standards, nobody demands something better and nobody is willing to stop participating—

then what exactly is the company exploiting?

A weakness?

Perhaps.

But also a choice.

And that changes the conversation completely.

Because you cannot spend your entire life demanding that everyone else become better while refusing to examine what you are personally rewarding.

You cannot complain about the quality of society while continuously purchasing it.

You cannot complain about corporations while making corporations richer.

You cannot complain about Parliament while never challenging your own behaviour.

You cannot complain about exploitation while willingly participating in the conditions that make exploitation profitable.

At some point, self-responsibility has to enter the conversation.

And this is why I am so disheartened.

Because I keep looking for people who genuinely want something different.

Not people who can describe what is wrong.

There are enough of those.

I mean people who are actually willing to do something differently.

And I keep finding complaints.

“This doesn’t work.”

“They don’t care.”

“This system is broken.”

“Companies are terrible.”

“Government is useless.”

“People are asleep.”

Fine.

Then what are you doing about it?

Because empty criticism changes absolutely nothing.

And I am beginning to realise that perhaps this is the real problem.

Not that people do not know something is wrong.

They do.

Not that people cannot see the problems.

They can.

Not that people cannot imagine better.

Some clearly can.

It is that most people are not willing to inconvenience themselves sufficiently to create it.

They want better without disruption.

They want change without sacrifice.

They want justice without responsibility.

They want better standards without changing their own standards.

They want a different world without having to become different participants in it.

And then they wonder why nothing changes.

Honestly?

What the fuck do you do with that?

Because I am one person.

I cannot drag humanity towards a future it does not collectively want.

I cannot force people to care.

I cannot force people to question.

I cannot force people to educate themselves.

I cannot force people to open their eyes.

I cannot force people to choose differently.

And perhaps that is the most disheartening realisation of all.

Maybe the problem is not that nobody knows.

Maybe the problem is that people know enough and still choose the same thing.

That is a completely different problem.

And it means I have to question my own assumptions.

Because perhaps companies are not the great villains I have spent so much time trying to expose.

Perhaps they are, in large part, incredibly effective providers.

They see demand.

They supply it.

They see what people buy.

They produce more of it.

They see what people reward.

They optimise it.

And as long as people continue saying yes with their money, their attention and their behaviour—

why would the market hear a no?

So maybe the question is no longer:

“Why aren’t companies changing?”

Maybe the question is:

“Why aren’t people changing what they reward?”

Because ultimately, businesses can provide almost anything.

Governments can legislate almost anything.

Parliaments can redesign almost anything.

Systems can be rebuilt.

But none of it means much if the people inside those systems keep choosing the same reality.

And perhaps that is the piece I have been missing.

I have been trying to expose the world.

Maybe the world has already exposed itself.

The choices are everywhere.

The purchases are everywhere.

The habits are everywhere.

The priorities are everywhere.

The contradictions are everywhere.

People are telling us exactly what they want.

Not through their speeches.

Through their behaviour.

And behaviour speaks much louder.

So I am left with one question.

Not for companies.

Not for Parliament.

Not for governments.

Not for institutions.

For humanity.

If you genuinely don’t like the world you keep complaining about—

why the hell do you keep paying for it?

….

And then there’s the moment where we must write this piece, because this is probably the most controversial piece out of 2,295 pieces that I’ve written. I think this is the most controversial, but also the most empowering— well, not empowering, sorry, disheartening. Because when you look at how companies are, because even when you look at places like this, right? There are so many shops. The amount of shops that there is around here, like, and people are just buying and buying and buying every day, constant. Like bags, like massive bags, or just buying and buying and buying, and I can understand why. I mean, like it’s the only way that you can distract yourself from the shit that’s happening around you, I guess, is just comfort yourself with buying, consumption, like of all kinds. And it is just— like it just gets you to understand, like are companies, and the biggest question, and this should be the title as well, is: are companies actually taking advantage of others? Because if people are willingly just abiding and willingly consuming, willingly giving their energies, willingly giving everything for no goddamn humanitarian reason, are companies really taking advantage or not? Because it doesn’t look like companies are really taking advantage. They’re only providing to the demand, because everything works in supply and demand. People are actively choosing everything that’s wrong in the world and just abiding by it, actively, constantly, daily. It’s sickening. It’s genuinely sickening, and at this point I don’t even know. Like, I can’t say. I genuinely cannot say in good consciousness that companies are taking advantage of anyone. So I understand why companies don’t feel even responsible for anything. They’re really not taking advantage. They’re providing. They’re the greatest providers ever existed probably on Earth, because people are willingly asking for it. Like, genuinely. Like, just look around. People are asking to be taken advantage. And I know that this will sound very bad, but that’s the reality of things. Because if no one really says no, if no one really stands up, if no one fights the cause, if no one challenges things that are so openly to be challenged, like if no one really wants to educate themselves, if no one really wants to open the heart, if no one really wants to see shit for what it is, you gotta ask yourself. Companies are not taking advantage whatsoever. They’re quite plain-leveled. They’re quite fair, actually. They’re all very fair. From my own perspective, they’re not, right? But I’m observing life. I’m observing humanity just perishing in front of itself, and I’m one person trying to fix it all. It’s genuinely impossible. I can’t fix this. I genuinely can’t. Like I would love to, but I can’t. I genuinely cannot. Like, I don’t know. Companies are not taking advantage of anyone here. Like people are just willingly playing the part. Like they are just willingly playing the part. That is the clearest message of all, and it should be focused on that. Because if no one is willing to put up the fight to safeguard themselves, to have some self-respect, to have better standards of living, to have a better life, to have better of anything, like you really got to ask yourself the question: are we really being taken advantage? Absolutely not. Should companies be liable for anything? Absolutely not. Should parliaments be challenged? Absolutely not. The parliament is providing exactly for the people that house it. I’ve gone about this all wrong. I’ve genuinely gone about this all wrong. Like people don’t actually care. People don’t want better. People don’t want anything that’s different from how things are right now. They say that they do, but they don’t. Their behavior speak louder than their words. They genuinely don’t. So what do you do? Like, what the fuck do you do? I have no idea what to do with myself. I am in the wrong world. I am genuinely in the wrong world. Like I want to say that I am in the right world and one day someone is going to wake up and something is gonna happen and everyone is gonna start looking and questioning their own life and their own realities and everything that they’ve accepted to be. But I am such at a loss of words that I am losing the hope. Like every day I get reminded as to why hope is lost. It’s because people give away the hope. They don’t want hope. They don’t want it. Like they genuinely do not want it. They do not want anything that’s good. They don’t want anything that’s better. They don’t want any sort of salvation. They don’t want nothing to be disrupted. They love it the way that things are. However mentally ill that sounds, because for someone to be okay and liking the way that things are, it’s quite— honestly, it’s appalling, right? But that’s how they like it. I am in the wrong world. Like for real, for real. Like they just like it like this. Like they wouldn’t change anything if they had the power, because they do and they don’t. You know? Like people actually love it the way things are. They enjoy it. They see comfort in it. I don’t have words to describe this. Like the only word that comes up right now is disgust. That is the only word that comes up. Utterly disgusted. And I genuinely feel like, I don’t know. I don’t know what to feel, what to think, what to be in this world. I don’t know what to be in this world, because this world has nothing for me at this current moment in time. It has absolutely nothing for me. No one wants to listen. No one wants to think. No one wants to question. No one wants to look at things happening in front of them. No, everyone wants to look away. Everyone wants to just like crack on. I mean, what the fuck do I do? Like it doesn’t matter how much we expose. It doesn’t matter how much we say. It doesn’t matter how much truth we show. Like it’s just, it doesn’t really matter. That’s the reality of things. It just does not matter anymore. I mean, to be fair, I honestly don’t even think it ever mattered. But it certainly does not matter whatsoever at this current moment in time. Like whatsoever. Like it just does not matter. I don’t know what to do with myself. Because associating with this, it’s like terrible, bro. It makes me look bad. Like if I go back on myself, it just makes me look bad. And it’s not that I don’t care. It’s not that I care about how people perceive me. I care about how I perceive myself. Like I would make myself look so bad to myself. Like I just— I don’t. I can’t contextualize this. Like it’s just so— it’s so— it’s so mentally ill. Like I cannot contextualize this. Like I want to laugh because I don’t want to cry. It makes no sense. And I keep attracting people that are just like, This is shit and that doesn’t work and this is terrible and oh, they don’t care and all of this. And, like, it’s just empty words on top of empty words on top of empty words. Like, there’s nothing meaningful in everything that they say. Like, and nothing makes sense. Yesterday I had a conversation with someone, and in that, in, like, they kept, apart from the fact they kept on cycling, like, around, saying the same thing. They couldn’t even make sense of the things that they were saying. Like they were saying something, but it made no sense to what they were actually saying. Like, they were saying that in order to have a relationship with God, you have to learn the book. As if the person that wrote the book had, or needed the book to write the book. No, they didn’t. They had a personal relationship with God and they documented it. Any book, anything that exists, there was someone that saw it before. There was ever a book. Like, it absolutely makes no freaking sense whatsoever. And there’s so many conversations, but everyone is just, like, so self-absorbed they can’t even hear or comprehend you trying to make sense of what they say. Like, it’s like having a conversation with a light pole. Like, they cannot understand you trying to make sense of what they say. Like, it just, it doesn’t make sense. They don’t make sense to themselves, and they don’t make sense to nothing, like, that life is. They just don’t make sense. How have we got to this point? I have absolutely no idea. No one is mentally stable. No one is emotionally stable. I think in the last half an hour I saw, like, 20 people, obviously unstable. That’s not to count all those that look stable but clearly aren’t. Like, it makes no sense. My existence makes no sense in this world. I don’t make— I’m starting to not make sense to myself. I’m like, why am I here? Like, genuinely, like this makes no sense whatsoever.