Author's Note: this post may offend some. If my words seem insensitive, I apologize; however, I do not apologize for my opinions, as I feel they are founded in sound logical, economical, and spiritual reasoning.
“The Roman people need fed!”
The unemployed masses all pled
“We’re too busy, don’t work us!
We must see the Circus!”
I wonder—who’s making the bread…? " -Raymond Walther (That's right. I did that)
For the past several weeks, I think, this has been trying to work its way out. It first really dawned on me as I walked from the Institute to the engineering building (approximately 1 mile, by the way). See, the thing is, I don't have the funds to pay for a parking pass that would allow me to park at the engineering building, but I don't mind; this way, I force myself to get to Institute every week, and I get a fair bit of exercise. But I digress.
During my (often several) daily walks between the engineering building and the Institute, I have a lot of time to ponder. A point of especially serious concern is usually the problems faced by our generation, and how I plan to prepare my own family to withstand them. One morning, a couple of weeks ago, it really hit me: the American Dream is our problem.
Well, that's not exactly true. I'm not really sure when I first came to understand the meaning of the American Dream, but I recall a teacher explaining it when I was in third or fourth grade: that in America, a man (or woman) can be whatever they want, have whatever they want, if they're willing to work hard enough at it. Somehow, though, I think our society was only half listening, and only caught the "In America, you can have whatever you want" part. Then, they conflated "can have" with "should have", and then further conflated that with "deserve". And thus we find ourselves today.
Most of the young men and women I meet at college seem to have the same attitude: find the easiest degree for them to obtain, and then get a job where they can pretend to be working 8 hours a day, and get paid for it. Few people that I meet seem concerned with creating actual value through their labor nearly as much as they are with making money. Take, for instance, the way that my concerns about poorly edited/poorly written contemporary literature are generally met with the argument, "But it sure made them a lot of money!" The question is, if we're all sitting around getting overpaid to do little or no work, where is the value of money at all? Someone somewhere must actually be producing things worth buying, or we wouldn't want the money to buy things with. Eventually, though, the industrious few who support the lazy many will say, "Enough!", and then it will be a real pickle, because nobody will be eating at all.
In other words, let me break this down: if you can't afford it, save your shekels, don't try to buy it on someone else's dime (and that's what you're doing when you accept "the government's money", because that money was taken from someone else's paycheck); you don't deserve a big house, a car, a yard, or anything else just for the sake of the fact that you're alive. I know families that live quite happily without owning any of those things.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping people out who need help, but I'm not for giving them everything that they think they need without requiring anything of them in return. In the words of Christ, "the laborer is worthy of his hire." (Luke 10:7, emphasis added). I think too often we're so trained by the world and by our own flesh to avoid work, that we forget the real enjoyment and fulfillment that it brings. The fact is, when we "help" others by handing out to them every little thing that they want, we deprive them of the most fundamental human right that they ought to be entitled to: self respect. So, even if it means paying out of pocket for medical expenses because government funded insurance is too expensive for people who actually try to work it out; even if it means not owning my own home for a good long time; even if it means that I make less money than some other students I know simply because I actually have a job; even if it means making a lot of my own stuff (which, by the way, is way more fun, and cooler, anyway) because I can't afford things--I'll work it out. Because, it turns out, half of the meaning of achieving the American Dream is being able to look back and say, "I did that. Maybe I am worth a darn after all."
“The Roman people need fed!”
The unemployed masses all pled
“We’re too busy, don’t work us!
We must see the Circus!”
I wonder—who’s making the bread…? " -Raymond Walther (That's right. I did that)
For the past several weeks, I think, this has been trying to work its way out. It first really dawned on me as I walked from the Institute to the engineering building (approximately 1 mile, by the way). See, the thing is, I don't have the funds to pay for a parking pass that would allow me to park at the engineering building, but I don't mind; this way, I force myself to get to Institute every week, and I get a fair bit of exercise. But I digress.
During my (often several) daily walks between the engineering building and the Institute, I have a lot of time to ponder. A point of especially serious concern is usually the problems faced by our generation, and how I plan to prepare my own family to withstand them. One morning, a couple of weeks ago, it really hit me: the American Dream is our problem.
Well, that's not exactly true. I'm not really sure when I first came to understand the meaning of the American Dream, but I recall a teacher explaining it when I was in third or fourth grade: that in America, a man (or woman) can be whatever they want, have whatever they want, if they're willing to work hard enough at it. Somehow, though, I think our society was only half listening, and only caught the "In America, you can have whatever you want" part. Then, they conflated "can have" with "should have", and then further conflated that with "deserve". And thus we find ourselves today.
Most of the young men and women I meet at college seem to have the same attitude: find the easiest degree for them to obtain, and then get a job where they can pretend to be working 8 hours a day, and get paid for it. Few people that I meet seem concerned with creating actual value through their labor nearly as much as they are with making money. Take, for instance, the way that my concerns about poorly edited/poorly written contemporary literature are generally met with the argument, "But it sure made them a lot of money!" The question is, if we're all sitting around getting overpaid to do little or no work, where is the value of money at all? Someone somewhere must actually be producing things worth buying, or we wouldn't want the money to buy things with. Eventually, though, the industrious few who support the lazy many will say, "Enough!", and then it will be a real pickle, because nobody will be eating at all.
In other words, let me break this down: if you can't afford it, save your shekels, don't try to buy it on someone else's dime (and that's what you're doing when you accept "the government's money", because that money was taken from someone else's paycheck); you don't deserve a big house, a car, a yard, or anything else just for the sake of the fact that you're alive. I know families that live quite happily without owning any of those things.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for helping people out who need help, but I'm not for giving them everything that they think they need without requiring anything of them in return. In the words of Christ, "the laborer is worthy of his hire." (Luke 10:7, emphasis added). I think too often we're so trained by the world and by our own flesh to avoid work, that we forget the real enjoyment and fulfillment that it brings. The fact is, when we "help" others by handing out to them every little thing that they want, we deprive them of the most fundamental human right that they ought to be entitled to: self respect. So, even if it means paying out of pocket for medical expenses because government funded insurance is too expensive for people who actually try to work it out; even if it means not owning my own home for a good long time; even if it means that I make less money than some other students I know simply because I actually have a job; even if it means making a lot of my own stuff (which, by the way, is way more fun, and cooler, anyway) because I can't afford things--I'll work it out. Because, it turns out, half of the meaning of achieving the American Dream is being able to look back and say, "I did that. Maybe I am worth a darn after all."
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