Free Agent Society

Loyalty, commitment, and devotion are nearly dead concepts in our free agent society. In our fast food, red box movie, drive through, E-Z pass, attention deficit, consumer society it is a wonder that anything lasts.

Athletes don't stay with one team for their whole careers anymore. Neither do most ordinary citizens stay with one job for that matter. If you buy something and you don't like it, you can take it back.

Marriage has also followed that model. People so look forward to finding someone to share their lives with for better or worse, then when the worse part happens as it inevitably will, they simply choose to take it back.

A friend and I recently debated whether the word committment can be used to describe a temporary pledge. He used the words, "I am committed for now" to describe his stance on his romantic relationship and those words rang hollow in my ears.

Have we become a civilization of fads and trends? What is an important issue today becomes old hack tomorrow. Are our commitments now dictated to us by the number of rotations a story gets on the news cycle?

A young boy gets murdered in a racially motivated shooting and everyone wears T-shirts and hoodies in support and solidarity until CNN stops reporting on the case. National support for new gun control laws reaches 60 plus percent in the wake of an atrocious school shooting, but falls 10 percent with the passage of just one month.

Truth is now temporary. Faith is flexible. We have alternative life principles and morals. We are all becoming fair-weather fans and fashionistas in a world where even the climate is changing.