(Also published at The Agonist)
As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world - that is the myth of the atomic age - as in being able to remake ourselves.
-Mohandas Gandhi
When I was a child, I listened to people from my grandparents’ generation tell stories about their experiences during the Great Depression. It all seemed so distant, so theoretical, so fantastically horrific that I could never imagine a circumstance where I would see such a time in my own life. Today, as I look around me, I realize that not only is that time here (albeit in a different form), it’s becoming the way of the world for this generation. I never thought I would ever have my own “How I survived the Great Recession” story, but here I am, and there are millions of Americans in far worse circumstances and with far more horrific stories.
What disturbs me is that these stories are becoming the norm- people losing their livelihoods, families losing their homes- and there’s a school of thought that holds that the unemployed and dispossessed have exactly what they deserve. Perhaps if they weren’t so lazy and shiftless, they’d be able to provide for themselves and their families. Yet within a world where that are more than four job seekers for every available job, how can people reasonably be held to be at fault for being unemployed? If the jobs aren’t there, and they’re clearly not, the problem isn’t with the individual. It’s systemic…and those we’ve charged with fixing the system are too busy playing political games and providing for their own future to take care of business.
What’s become clear to me as I observe what’s happening in the world around me is that we’ve become a meaner, more divided, and far less compassionate people. As our economy headed south, so did our ability and willingness to recognize that we’re stronger together than we are separately. In a time when increasing numbers of American need help just to survive, Republicans in Congress are attempting to kill all manner of funding for social programs designed to assist the poor, the sick, and the unemployed. Not only is the Social Contrat fraying at the edges, it’s being torn into tiny pieces.
“Survival of the fittest” may work well in the animal kingdom, but I can’t help but thinking that here in America we should be stepping up and helping each other instead of pulling back and forcing millions upon millions to fend for themselves. We’re losing our sense of community, our connectedness, and I fear that the future we face may be colder, meaner, and far less compassionate than what’s come before.
WE DESERVE BETTER.
