Culture of Heedlessness

result, man’s full attention is now focused on these things. Consequently, the list of one’s needs and wants (and many wants came to be considered needs) became so long that it appeared to have no end. Acquiring these objects became the be-all and end-all for people. In previous ages, the satisfaction of one’s needs happened through a few simple things. However, people’s list of wants (in addition to their needs) is so long that it seems never-ending. Acquiring material objects to cater to one’s ever-increasing desires has now assumed the form of a veritable religion, the religion of consumerism. A deadly result of this is that today, almost no one wants to reflect on questions related to the very purpose of human life. The phrase ‘the higher purpose of life’ has become unfamiliar. Modern consumerism has led man to live at the level of beasts. As a result, living at a higher level of humanity has become alien for most people. For this state of affairs, man has had to pay a hefty price— and that is, his intellectual development has stopped in the true sense of the term. Now almost every person’s condition is such that if you speak with them about issues related to their profession, they will appear to be ‘experts’, but if you talk to them on any subject other than their profession, you will feel that you are talking to someone foolish. From the physical point of view, they may appear very smart, but in terms of intellectual standards, they seem to be dwarfs. Perhaps it will not be wrong to term contemporary consumerist culture as ‘beast culture’. A deadly result of