The Mayan Culture was an example of a society where the majority of the population were enslaved by systems designed to leave power in the hands of the few and subjugate the many through systems of Religion, Philosophy and Economics. It is important to analyze this because it represents a time stamp of a failed civilization that looks in a lot of ways similar to the one existing in the World today.
The Mayan People as an entire culture from Southern Mexico to Panama got up at around 2am every day. In the pitch black of night, they dressed themselves in full religious garb including feather hats, face paint and seashell chest plates to parade through the streets because they thought if they didn't, the sun wouldn't come up. Every single citizen did this every day. This religious ceremonial belief was so embed into the collective consciousness of the Mayan People, no one ever thought, "Why don't We all just sleep in? Maybe the Sun won't come up...Maybe it will. Who cares?" They never slept in.
The Mayan religious system is based all around self sacrifice through ceremony. The common person believed their only way to the afterlife was through sacrifice of everything, children, blood and hard labor. Their Kings were considered the only way to communicate their loyalty to deity and secure existence in the after life. They performed bloodletting rituals and sacrificial death was considered an honor. They believed this was necessary for the agricultural, economic and general well being of the collective whole. The Kings had a large group of priests who enforced these beliefs to maintain citizen loyalty to the Kings as a path to salvation.
The Military and Prison industrial complex require the same sacrifice from the collective whole for an embedded belief system all over the World. Every Nation State in the World has an army, secular violence or a radical groups allowed to take temporary power. Globally, We are sacrificing Our Children because of fear and a belief that war is a necessity to the corporations and nation states engaged in the death economy.
Another part of daily life for Mayans was learning the Ball Game, a bit like basketball if the basketball were a 55 lb rubber ball, the court an inverted stone pyramid with walls players must scale to score by hitting the balls through the stone hoop with their hips and players often die. The smaller Mayan cities have small ball courts set up as practice courts where they train their children from a young age to later compete in large urban arenas. Their leaders would bet on the victor of these games to settle territorial State disputes (borders) and economic conflict (trade wars). The losers served as ritual sacrifice usually ending their lives in a nearby cenotes or in a blood letting ceremony.
The Mayan People were completely subjugated to an economy rooted in the extraction, transportation and distribution of commodities. Obsidian, volcanic glass was extracted in mines worked by the population in Guatemala, transported through river systems to the ocean, then sent north to southern Mexico to be used to make the knives and daggers in sacrificial ceremonies.
In Guatemala, the economy was structured around the extraction process. People either worked in the mines or the trade shops set up to process the raw material and prepare for transport. The transporters made the most money and represented the wealthy noble families who lived in large stone houses in Tulum, where everyone else lived in thatched huts in the jungle. All the extracted Obsidian came through the port City of Tulum. From there the material was moved to Coba where transporters paid import taxes and arranged for distribution to inland Mayan Communities. The inland community economics was centered around production of this raw material into finished ceremonial items complete with local symbols and design.
Obsidian was only one commodity out of many the Mayans resourced. They mined copper, gold and many other available minerals used for alter decoration, jewelry and household items. Extracting these commodities and building giant temples for the benefit of the Kings where the struggle of daily life for the Mayan People all because they believed if they didn't they would individually be forsaken by God and not allowed into the afterlife.
In today's society the same conflict is happening on a global scale. Regional wars and trade wars are all fought over the extraction, sale and transport of the Earth's commodities. The majority of the population all around the World is subjugated to maintaining economical systems designed to benefit the few and demand sacrifice with no equal reward to the masses.
Most of the People in the World are getting physically sick from the environmental and economic conditions of the death economy and health care systems are set up to help the health care corporations profit from sick People. The food is poisoned with unnecessary chemicals and sugar or there is no food available at all for most individuals living all over the World. Corporations are profiting from the Human Condition in every country. How is this different than the practice of bloodletting? The Individual is sacrificing good health.
Every human religious system in the World promotes ceremonial ritual and economic contribution when the common denominator of every religion is the message that each individual should create a relationship with their Celestial Parents. Religion is a conversation an Individual has with whatever interpretation of God most speaks to them. Religion is a completely personal experience meant to foster a meaningful relationship between the ascending mortal and deity. Every single individual is having a varied version of this conversation in their head throughout their lives. Religion is not a strategy to control the collective conscious of mass amounts of Individuals.
Throughout history and in every Nation or Civilization economics, politics and religion have been used in ways benefiting few at the expense of the majority of the population. Robbing Individuals of access to the 3 core values of sustainability, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness has proven to have detrimental effects with no reduction of harm. No one in the World is safe while extreme poverty, loss of environmental resources and rampant war are allowed to exist as a part of the Human Condition.
As a collective Human Race, We will all eventually have to come together and create systems of Government structured to put the well being of each Individual before the needs of any institutions. Institutions will need to be designed to improve the quality of Life for every individual without discrimination. Changes will need to made on all levels, Individual, Community, Country and Global. It starts with Individuals deciding what they do and do not want in their World and making adjustments. We have to be able to visualize a better World before We can build the bridges to get there. What is Your Vision of a better World?
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