When I was a child around 2000-2003, I lived overseas for a couple of years where, instead of receiving the same tv options as a child state-side, we received an 'overseas' package mostly consisting of old Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon shows from the early to mid 90's and a few newer shows that were airing at the time.

During this era, Nickelodeon had a whole slew of game shows with child contestants, one of which was titled Figure It Out. The game worked like this: a contestant would have a phrase or sentence describing their talent or creation displayed on a board with blank spaces indicating each word. The panelists, a reoccurring group of child stars, usually cast members from All That, would ask yes or no questions to the contestant, trying to suss out the phrase. If one of the questions contained a word that was on the board, it would be revealed. This went on for three rounds and if the full phrase was never guessed, panelists would receive a prize, after which, even if the contestant didn't win, they would showcase their talent or creation.

Most of the talents or creations were extremely bizarre such as 'won a pickle juice drinking contest' or 'growing rat tail since birth' or nonsense inventions such as 'fishbowl water dish for cats' or 'talking toilet.'

But one of them stood out and I have thought about it every once and a while since I saw it. It was 'a double lid peanut butter jar,' meaning that it was a cylinder with a lid on either end, making it more convenient and easier to remove the peanut butter. (In hindsight, this kid is obviously not the only person to think of this, and perhaps not even the first, so saying they were the one who 'invented' it is a stretch, but it's a tv show for kids not the patent office, so who cares.)

I remember thinking as a kid, 'this one makes sense, this should be in stores.' But, as these were re-runs, I was also acutely aware that it was not in stores. I had never seen it, I had never heard anyone talking about it, it wasn't something that companies then went on to make. And I wondered why this never happened--someone invented something so obviously useful we should have seen it. There was no reason why this shouldn't have been implemented.

This then made me realize that "Adults" or companies or governments, or any systems of power are not interested in making things more convenient for people. They are not interested in making things easier, no matter how small change. They would rather live with the inconveniences already in place than extrude any effort to make things slightly better.

Perhaps the justification is because these changes are so small, and to mundane things that don't vastly improve the lives of people, they do not matter.

But it also makes me wonder, in how many small ways is life that much more difficult. How many people have discovered or 'invented' better ways or better objects that we won't see because someone, somewhere didn't think it was worth the effort to implement.


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