There's No Place Like Home....

Is there one thing is this world that you would give anything to possess?  Is there something so special to you that you would pay any price to own it if you had the chance?  Most of us would probably say no to these questions, or a least I would.  Everything has a price to some degree, and it depends on how valuable that item is to the buyer and how much it means to that certain person.  However you answered these questions, you probably put in a disclaimer for yourself, at maximum price perhaps?  Now imagine a world where everything is for sale.  Virtually anything on this earth and beyond can and will be auctioned off to the highest bidder.  This is exactly what the world is like in Salmon Rushdie’s short story “The Auction of the Ruby Slippers”.

            Yes, they in fact ARE the very same ruby slippers that you are remembering from the film The Wizard of OZ, and they are supposed to possess very great powers, but above all, they have the power to send you home!  Now you have to realize that life has changed a lot from what we are used to. Nobody feels safe anymore, and nobody really has a home, let alone remembers what it was like to be home.  This simple fact makes those slippers a VERY coveted item at the auction house.  Everyone is there, all different stations of people; movie stars, beggars, geniuses and the insane are all gathered together hoping to get a glimpse of these famous ruby slippers.  I hear that there are even witches and lions and scarecrows.  There are numerous Dorothy’s at the auction and a whole pack of Toto’s.  There are also people bidding from different parts of the world, being represented by big screens or hired men doing the biding for them.  In short, everyone is at the auction!  The Auctioneers are in charge, they decide what sells and what doesn’t and they seem to run everything.  It is only by the sound of their gavel that the auction is allowed to continue.

            Even though we are zooming in on the auction of the ruby slippers, they are not the only things that are for sale in the “Courtroom of Demand”.  Everything that you can think of is for sale to the highest bidder; people’s souls, pedigrees, people themselves, the statue of liberty, the Taj Mahal, pavement artists and Michelangelo.  Everything is up for bid. 

            This story “The Auction of the Ruby Slippers” is very relevant in today’s American “buy everything” mentality.  We, as Americans are constantly spoon-fed ideas about what we should wear and what latest electronic we should own, and we want it all! We are avid consumers and we want what everyone else wants.  I believe that this story is probably Annie Leonard’s worst nightmare because, nobody is conserving anything, and everyone wants something new.  Ms. Leonard demonstrates how we should conserve our resources in her presentation “A Story of Stuff” and people in the world of the ruby slippers are doing the exact opposite.

            In the end of the story, the slippers are won by someone on a screen, and the price is ridiculously high.  The auction is over but don’t worry, there will be some new coveted item to battle over tomorrow. The question is, is it important enough to you to pay the price?