I think you're a bit harsh on homesteading here. You've picked some of your triggers and ignored your own thoughts in other stories(capitalism doesn't breed innovation, Convenience vs the planet, etc). Most of the homesteaders I've known are pretty much like everyone else in a desire to be in control of the useful and real value they create( be it bread, milk, pigs, kale or children). The world could be a lot better if we stopped making people work for less ethical entities in order to have the time and means to care for a place and live close to it. Civilization has a hook, too: "Live like you don't answer to natural laws" All of the science of facts hasn't made prophets or profiteers think twice about the competitive moral turpitude of Limited Liability Companies as inherently creating a suicidal consumer species.