Winning the Lottery
My fantasies are not like other people’s.
Don’t worry, this isn’t about that sort of fantasy. There is more than enough cringe going around on the internet right now (Yes, I’m looking at you Elon and Mark!) without me subjecting you to my middle aged sexual proclivities. No, what I’m getting at is the old, “What would you do if you won the lottery?” conversation. It came up again yesterday in the staffroom at the school where I earn a living.
My colleagues are all lovely. I’d even go as far as saying many of them slip into the friend basket in my mind, but we are very different people. Bedsides the conversations about weird reality TV like “Married at First Sight” (MAFS is the de rigueur acronym, apparently) and “Traitors” our ideas on what to do with a lottery win diverge wildly.
Mostly the plans for sudden wealth involved long holidays, cruises, flash cars and the like. (Or learning to drive first then getting a flash car!) Then there were the paying off of parents and relatives debts, even giving money to friends and talk of remaining anonymous to allow friendships to survive. An anecdote about a friend at another school who had won some money and paid off her mortgage but felt she had to keep the fact from her colleagues for fear of it undermining their relationship.
Nothing particularly far out here. What caught me off guard a little was not that I had very different ideas of what I would do with wealth, but the fact that I couldn’t quite articulate these ideas succinctly to my colleagues. It was a Friday, it had been a long week, but still, how hard is it to say that those aren’t the things I dream of, I dream of these other things over here?
For the record, I’d clear debts of those close to me, of course, but beyond that I’d want the money going to secure Aberdeen Social Centre it’s own premises and then I’d help it, and the radical book shop I’d open in the granite city, to be forums for plotting ways of saving the world. Seed fund a local housing coop that’s trying to get off the ground. Use the wealth to ensure I can have enough to be a full time activist, but sharing it around so others have more time to do what matters.
I suppose partly I just found it hard to say these things because what I want isn’t things. There are no objects I crave. I have all I really need. What I crave is time, social space and resources for activism. Part of me found it hard to put this into words perhaps without sounding preachy and pretentious.
Maybe this is a function of age, I was the oldest person in the room. The time I would free up for myself would come from not working as much, or at all, in my current job. (That I do have in common with my colleagues!) But my escapist fantasies are not about cocktails by the pool on a cruise liner, they are about changing the world, or having the time and resources to help others change the world.
The broader point is that I want to escape from the typical fantasies of late capitalism. I don’t dream on more or shinier stuff. I dream of time to work, plot and play with my comrades and friends. I dream of the space and resources to do that. The idea that more objects is what we should strive for just leaves me cold. Maybe that’s terribly privileged of me, to have enough, but there’s something here about the dreams capitalism rams down our throats in its adverts and in shows like MAFS. This idea of striving and hustle culture that’s so ubiquitous grates with me. It feels like a mental prison. Which makes me think of a thing one of my favourite authors wrote:
“The moneylenders, the know-nothings, the authoritarians have us all in prison; if we value the freedom of the mind and soul, if we’re partisans of liberty, then it’s our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can.”
Ursula K le Guin in The Language of the Night (1979)
This is where my dreams lie. If I win the lottery then it’s my duty to escape, yes, but we don’t escape by diving deeper into the system that enslaves us in the first place. We go the other way and we take as many people with us as we can.
I remember a long time ago when i was young…’things’ were in short supply
But a very dear friend remarked ..well you only need one cup and one plate!!
Don’t you?
Still makes sense..and it comes to mind often as i swither which cup to have my tea in..i choose a china one of course with flowers on it
An excellent article. I agree entirely.
Thank you for this, Douglas.
I, too, have found myself recently entertaining fantasies of an unepected windfall, and have wondered what I’d actually do with the winnings. You’ve articulated it well, and my thoughts have been similar — what could I do in support of making the World a better place? Because of the work I’ve been involved with over the past two decades, I already have a shortlist of projects to fund and activists to support. But I also agree, I’d work less and devote more time to the projects and pursuits that give me joy, and would extend that luxury to my loved ones. But also, try to create jobs for people to promote a healthier environment, which had a good work/life balance built-in.
I know I will most likely work until I leave this World, but I am trying to find a way to make it more about my passions rather than drudgery and making somone else wealthy.
Things? There are some creature comforts. I like good teas, for example, and a decent set to enjoy them in. I like books, and chess, and musical instruments, but all these things are a means to an end — yes, it’s wonderful to have them, but they are all tools of connection, things that weave Community, however small. And that is what I would use my winnings on — fostering and rebuilding Community.
I love the phrase, “tools of connection.”
And totally agree, community is crucial.
Great article Douglas.thanks The quote from Ursula K. Le Guin spot o n. I will never forget reading “The Word For World Is Forest” it must be fifty odd years ago Her books are as important now as ever in our battle against Climate Change and the rise of the Far Right. Community and dreams matter.
Thank you all for your kind words. I don’t write as often as I’d like and I value the encouragement.
If any of you are curious about Aberdeen Social Centre, you can check out the project here:
https://aberdeensocialcentre.org/
It would be good if people wanted what they have got.
Maybe it is more of a metaphor but do you actually play the lottery – an arch capitalist notion if ever there was one? Is the lottery or the idea of being given a huge amount of money on a purely arbitrary basis not deeply problematic in the first place?
I think the whole idea highly dubious no matter what you decide is good use for the money. Criminals talk of ‘easy money’, money that tends to get burned quickly as it is in a sense, guilty money, not earned but stolen. How different is the lottery?
The other thing to say is people can spend a lot of money ‘playing’ the lottery over many years (and in doing so fund all sorts of worthy things) so maybe they think they can spend any winning money on themselves and family with a clear conscience (and lest face it, this article is suggesting they are being selfish when they do).
Hey Niemand,
The original title I’d suggested for the article was, “Escape.” Editorial changed it. 🙂
So yeah, more of a metaphor on how we would live our lives if free from the grind of late capitalism.
Agree that gambling is a scourge on society. I’ve seen too many folk get into trouble chasing the win.
Oh, and this isn’t a comment about folk feeling free to spend money on what they want, it’s more a comment on the manufactured desires promoted by advertisers and entertainment.
Plastic consumerism is bad, doesn’t lead to happiness, community just might.
Thanks for the reply Doug and I understand better now and agree.
Personally I feel quite ambivalent, even compromised by the lottery as I have never bought a ticket in my life but have benefitted from projects funded by lottery money, i.e. by people who do buy a ticket in some forlorn hope they will win, but almost never do.
I share your vision Doug.
To be rather than to have as Eric Fromm wrote.
Was it Erich Fromm who suggested that we ask ourselves “Do I own this thing, or does it own me?”
A very pertinent question for much of the “stuff” in our lives.
Every so often I read an article and think ‘I wish I’d written that, as it encapsulates exactly what I think but don’t necessarily have the gift to convey’. This is one of those articles. Thank you.
When I retired, I began doing voluntary work, which, largely allowed me to be outdoors much of the time. I picked up litter, cut back vegetation to clear overgrown paths, i planted saplings, I planted wildflowers. I met other people who did the same. We went cycling or walking. Passers-by usually thanked us or stopped for a blether. We watched birds on the river and canal. We created spaces where people could walk, sit, feel safe, relax.
Sometimes, we were joined by groups from various companies who allowed employees days off to do socially useful things. And how much they enjoyed it, because they felt they were engaged in something useful. This is not to say that their paid work was not satisfying because most clearly enjotyed what they did for a living. But this was different – they were doing something not for remuneration, but, for the common good. It made them feel happy. It improved their self respect. It made them feel part of a cooperative, non exploitative society.
I knew several who changed their working hours so that they could spend time doing these things.
Although, as I said, many enjoyed their paid employment, there are many who don’t, whose pay levels are low and whose working conditions are exploitative. Increasingly, I think their should be a maximum working week, with at least two consecutive days on no work and that, in addition to being paid a genuine living wage, we should all get a social wage from the government.
I think it would lead to a happier, more caring society.