While In Accord With Ambition, Focus is Misplaced

The only way to effectuate the type of systemic change sought is by evolving the political system. This does not occur by trying to change behavior, rather finding ways people will be predisposed to self-modify their own behavior. The cultural distractions you noted are self-modified behaviors, albeit absurd.

My medium publication, A Passion to Evolve, has numerous articles related to evolving systems, complexity, and sociopolitical change in particular. The best article for connecting ALL the dots you have identifies is my, Macroscopic Evolutionary Paradigm.

Fyi, my M.A. is in Alternative Futures Research and Ph.D. is in how systems evolve.

Doc Huston