(36). Letter From An African Psychiatrist: 12th Reason For Staying In South Africa.
Be the change you desire.
Dear friends,
A year ago, I wrote an essay (available on jonathandmoch.substack.com, link bottom of page) about my 11 reasons why I am staying in South Africa. The letter went viral, and I hear reports that it stirred much debate at dinner tables and in bedrooms. My favourite interaction with a reader: a friend met me on the street one morning - “Doc, I agree with you 100%, but…”
Twelve months on and my reasons are holding well, if not stronger. For example, we are blessed with the best weather in the world: other countries, especially those where South Africans emigrate have faced ‘worst-in-history’ floods, hurricanes, droughts, and heatwaves, over the past year.
I am now adding a 12th reason for staying: the start and march of the 3rd World War in the northern hemisphere. Who would have thought, a year ago, that Russia would invade Ukraine, destroying properties, murdering, raping and pillaging? Millions of refugees have left their ancestral homes, families torn apart, traumatised for the rest of their lives. Russia (because of its historical genes) will not stop with the Ukraine, and surrounding countries (Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, …) are at significant threat. Who knows how the West (read NATO) will respond?
Secondly, China is flexing its military muscles as it now threatens Taiwan. The United States is weakening as a global economic power, tiring as the planetary policeman, and is trapped in a painful incorrigible civil war within itself (compare Fox News to CNN headlines). It’s moral compass is fractured. Don’t think world wars as only bunkers, killing fields, machine guns, extermination camps: the new world war includes weaponising gas supplies, food distribution, water hoarding, information flow, financial scamming, money laundering, economic sanctions, all at scale, and hacking massive data systems (cyberwarfare). And much, much more.
Thirdly: Wars are generally stupid and costly. No one really wins. The result is probably the worst of all scenarios: rapidly rising runaway inflation. Already, the cost of living is becoming increasing more expensive. Basic food prices, think bread, is rising, so is petroleum, so is gas, so is…. There is no way that increasing wages, without a parallel increase in productivity, can narrow the gap between income and expenses. A wage spiral is inevitable. And goods and services will be more expensive as the salary bill is built into manufacturing and retail prices. This depressing arc leads to increasing lending interest rates, a global recession, decrease in tax collection, layoffs and unemployment.
Arguably, global inflation, the rising cost of living, is more virulent, more devastating, than COVID could ever be.
In summary, there is a rapidly changing world order as China is itching to become the next global power, and the USA declines at multiple levels. Europe is at war, again. There is the real threat of massive civil disorder as people become hungry and angry. Inflation and the rising cost of living will dominate our discussions. Beware of emigrating into a socio-economic hornets nest.
My view geopolitically is that at the bottom of Africa we will feel the breeze of the far north but not the gale. Hold onto your precious jobs, hold onto your important relationships, hold onto your cherished values, and hard won political freedoms; and if entrepreneurial seek out opportunities to create jobs, helping others lower their burden of cost of living.
Open your eyes. Find meaning. Be the change you want.
Dr Jonathan D Moch.Contrarian Psychiatrist
Further Reading. Ray Dalio
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Hi Jonathan.
Your letter no 36 was absolutely outstanding. What a good message you gave about staying in our home and country.
https://digital.olivesoftware.com/olive/odn/ftuk/default.aspx#_