| This is the part which resonated with myself: >
Instead one chooses a destination and walks toward it. Along the way the route is commodified. Restaurants suggested instead of found. Parks digitally delineated instead of outlined by the contours of our promenades.
> In the UK increasingly one needs a credit/debit card, or a phone capable of NFC payments, to actually pay for things. The big-brand shops have most their self-checkouts as card-only & many shops are increasingly refusing cash. (There really ought to be a law mandating that all physical stores must accept legal tender as a condition of trade - else what is the point in cash?) The parks and pavements here are increasingly blighted by bright digital advertising. Railway tickets are becoming harder to get in a non-digital form, for one example of the increasing dependence on phones. Point is, the need for a phone, and a debit/credit card to go to a cafe, to take a train, etc, does remove the spontaneity and an element of joy from the experience. Being forced to carry a google or apple tracking device, or even 'just' a VISA/Mastercard makes me feel tethered to the 'capitalist' system - as this article puts it; but whatever you call it, capitalism or technocracy, the author is right. |
No-one is forced to accept cash in the UK, not even government services, all it means if you owe someone money and you offer to pay them with “legal tender”, whilst they can refuse, they cannot sue you for not paying.
And that’s it!