The city produces vast quantities of products (merchandise),
piles them high everywhere, and threatens the very future of
human society with this flood. [8] Look at the packs of
automobiles crowding the roads. Look at the great quantities of
agricultural chemicals in use. Look at the mountains of medicine
and food additives being shoved down our throats. It is the same
for the worthless cigarettes produced in mountainous quantities;
for the oceans of alcohol meant to help city people forget that
there is no longer any meaning in their lives; for the heaps of
records and tapes, which, like sonic narcotics, produce noise and
dementia; for the weekly magazines and comic books that overflow
with idiotic stories and pictures -- one could go on without
limit. It would not be an overstatement to say that all
merchandise produced by the city is the same. And just as I
mentioned before with jet planes and aerosols, they produce
pollution not only when they are used, but, as outlined in
section five, become pollution themselves after use, thus causing
the utmost trouble for people in other places. No matter what
product, it cannot stand up to use indefinitely; sooner or later
it becomes trash and the city must dispose of it somehow (these
days we see many products that were made purposely to last only a
short time). [9] Everywhere we look we see discarded junk like
televisions, washing machines, and automobiles (strangely enough,
these were supposed to be the very symbols of prosperity) -- does
it not make one feel the desolation foretelling the end of an
age? When a tiger dies it leaves its hide, but when city
merchandise dies, it leaves more evil. [10]