When I grew up, every meal time my old man would bring up materialism. He had it on the brain just life some people these days have carbon emissions or old growth forests on the brain. He seemed to think that materialism or rather to be grammatically correct anti-materialism simply meant frugal living. However he was generally a something of a recluse. My mum also generally believed in anti-materialism .Although she was a bit more gregarious being far more involved with church activities. She was however highly influence by the ideas of Sylvester Graham who thought that a man should not get married until he was 30. I try not to despise Sylvester Graham too much as he grew up in poverty without any love and as an agricultural laborer he also lived in poverty. I don’t know how he ever got ordained. Although he attended Amherst College he did not graduate. He had difficulty getting on with the other students. In short he was the antithesis of what Allen Ginsberg was on about. If they had lived at the same time period they would have been completely at loggerheads with each other. I am not sure if Allen Ginsberg coined the term materialism but he certainly popularized it. Am I right in thinking that he was on about the, above the basic necessities, the most important things in life are meaningful human relationships. So does anyone else think that my parents missed the point of what Allen Ginsberg was on about?
