The Divine Comedy: Week 10, Spirits Carried Along by the Battling Winds

I don't plan to dwell on each and every level of Dante's hell. The Inferno isn't my favorite part of The Divine Comedy. My favorite part is Purgatory.

Still, I'd like to mention the punishment in the second circle of hell for the sins of lust.

In Canto V Virgil and the Pilgrim leave Limbo (the first circle), pass Minos, the judge of the underworld who assigns souls to their respective punishments depending upon their sins, and enter the second circle of hell.

Here in the second circle of hell the sins of the Lustful are punished. Their punishment is to be blown around through all eternity by forceful winds:

I learned that to this place of punishment
all those who sin in lust have been condemned,
those who make reason slave to appetite;

as the wings of starlings in the winter
bear them along in wide-spread, crowded flocks,
so does that wind propel the evil spirits:

now here, then there, and up and down, it drives them
with never any hope to comfort them...

...spirits carried along by the battling winds...

Do you know what I thought of when I read that description?

Capitalism and consumerism.

Many have pointed out that late-modern capitalism produces an "economy of desire." Capitalism creates desires, inflames desires, pushes and pulls desires. Everywhere you look it's the second circle of hell. Because of our desires the winds of capitalism and consumerism blow us "now here, then there, and up and down [driving us] with never any hope to comfort."

We are craving, coveting, desiring, wanting, needing, restless, envying, dissatisfied, longing, discontented, greedy, lusting, hungry, yearning.

Welcome, everyone, to the second circle of hell.

We are spirits carried along by the battling winds