The Longest Journey Begins…

So.  Let’s talk about “The American Dream”. Ours is a land where all men are created equal, a land with a government of, by, and for the people. A land of opportunity where everyone will have the freedom to dissent in their opinions openly and without fear of reprisal. The only land where just anyone at all can become PRESIDENT!  Just think of it!  No matter who they are (or even where they were born?) the electorate of America can put them in charge. How’s that for freedom for the huddled masses, eh?

Of course this also means that just anyone at all will automatically have the specialized knowledge of such highly complex issues as international finance, foreign policy, military intelligence, corporate and civil law, ecology, medicine, agriculture, national and local banking etc., etc. to make informed decisions. Whew! Not only that but they will have an entire four years to cure every perceived ill not only in this country but in the rest of the world as well. We certainly are the ‘land of opportunity!’

And of course all the rest of our elected law makers are voted into office using the same strict criteria for fitness for public office that we apply to all our presidents, that is–just anyone at all can do this.

The basic tenets of the American Dream I have in bold letters above were actually taught to me in grade and high school. Taught me by teachers, if you can believe it, people who went to college for at least four years. And they were so proud to do it. And what is more, it is continuing to be so taught to this very day. Even as a very young American I had enough native good sense to be amazed at the obtuseness of my teachers on these particular subjects and I was by no means alone. Every last bit of the anti-establishment mentality that came into its flower power heyday in the sixties was seeded by the type of injudicious  rantings you see above.

When you tell a group of growing youngsters that just any old body can be a senator, or a congressman, or best of all–The President!,  this will not be perceived by them as a great freedom of opportunity. Children have no such life experience as to make this association. What they will think is — ‘can’t be much of a job if just any one can do it.’  I know this was the impression my classmates and I were given. We had some lively discussions when the teacher wasn’t around. And I still see this reaction in a good portion of students today. As I said in my first blog, I don’t think young people are stupid.  They do not suffer this type of thing gladly. It brands the most important of our public offices with a minimum wage job mentality and all american school children are taught to despise minimum wage jobs and the substandard shmucks who perform them.  ‘Anyone can grow up to be president’ is equal to ‘do you want to flip burgers the rest of your life?’ This is the attitude we convey to our young people by not choosing our words more carefully. The American Dream is being slowly poisoned by uninspired semantics.

We have heard a lot of rhetoric about the declining quality of education these past few years. And just as much about resuscitating the American family and its’ values in order to keep the American Dream alive and healthy. Education and the American Dream are solidly linked together in our minds. Most of this rhetoric has come from the conservative right in our political system. These are the same people who for several generations now have regurgitated the kind of kant that produced much of our malaise in the first place. So now it is time not for dreams, but for a reality check. Our current crop of young people are providing us with one by dropping out of our schools because dreaming is an adult pass time. Growing children are not interested in dreams, they want to know what is real and useful in the world around them.  It is our job as a society to teach them these things. They will form their own dreams when they’re ready to do so. The American Dream is being systematically poisoned by succeeding generations of conservative but self-centered adults.

It is not true that just anyone can be president. Or a senator. Or a representative. We need to stop selling this fallacy to our future voting population— it makes them bilious when they grow up. Being elected a leader by your peers is a great honor and only certain personality types will be able to lead well and with grace. It also requires more than just an average type of education and better than average brains. Not just anyone can do this. We need to start teaching this in our school systems. It will provide some backbone to the American Dream if our children are taught to recognize and honor real leadership qualities. It will be a valid litmus test for our “values” as a whole if they as individuals have enough self-respect and self-confidence to do so.

By indoctrinating our young people with political hyperbole, by devaluing the many in preference to the publicly chosen few, and by focusing all accolades on these few we have not created a population of stable, intelligent citizens. We have by our own lack of perception destroyed the self-esteem of the average children who will constitute the bulk of our working population. Until we moderate the ranting of imbeciles in pursuit of the Great Expectations of the American Dream, until we begin to give ample respect to the average citizen in our scholastic rhetoric, we will never do such simple things as balance our national budget or wipe out the deficit. It is vital that we stop giving our children the idea that life not lived on the mountain tops of personal wealth or public acclaim is not worth while. That a moderate income is something to be despised. That simple everyday things are to be continually passed over in the expectation that something more exalted lays in the future.

It is more than high time that we stop abusing our children with totally unrealistic Great Expectations that the greatest majority of them will never, never  realize. They will still be good people, good Americans, and good parents if they never do get to be president. Or a movie star, or a neurosurgeon, or a rock star. Or have a six figure or over yearly income. If we don’t start reversing this ideological rubbish that came out of the slums  of Old Europe in our public schools where it is taught, we will not survive for another two generations.

We have a great deal more ground to cover on the subject of
dreams so the next post will be entitled—–

Dream On.

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