Things Fall Apart

In today's Post, an opinion article called "An Earth Day Pep Talk", noted that the Times headlined today an article called "Nation's Mood at Lowest Level in Two Years, Poll Shows" and stated that many countries would want to trade places with us, despite these hardships. "Life is good," it stated.

And with that, I disagree. We live in America, we are born in America, we are schooled and educated in America. We have a particular American bias. A dismal number of Americans have passports, and an even more dismal number have actually used them. In my oh-so-humble opinion, Americans don't  know what they're talking about when it comes to how the rest of the world is. We are taught from a young age (don't get me wrong, all countries put their own slant on historical events) the American perspective of how things went down and how FREE we are here. How very, very lucky we are to live in America. Sure, maybe we've got it better than places in Africa where AIDS is running rampant and there are no schools and fresh water and civilization--in our opinion, though, right? Am I the only one who's read Things Fall Apart? What we are forgetting when we make statements like "so many others would love to live in our great country" is that this is based on cultural ideas of what makes life good. 

I think a lot of people would be astounded and not too impressed by our extravagant, unsustainable, have-to-get-ahead, workaholic lifestyles where guns are attainable, people are super-sized, and our public schools are falling behind. 

So let's not try and ignore the fact that we have a set of problems here with the "it could be worse--take a look at Libya" mentality. In the past week, there were two shootings in my neighborhood--by kids. We have a huge budget crisis, unemployment issues, an unsustainable lifestyle (we use more energy than most other nations by  A LOT), and no matter what we do, year after year, we are fighting to protect people's rights. Do you know how many permits you need and fees you have to pay to be a small business owner here? Do you know how many codes and regulations we have on everything? Do you know how much money is cut each year from education programs and social services? Despite what the people who these things impact want, decisions are made, and we live them. This country is set up so only the rich survive. 

All I'm saying is, we can't just glaze over this by saying "we have it better than other countries." That is merely an opinion. If we want America to be great, we do need to look at the issues on the table. We do need to reverse the unemployment crisis and get people off the streets and into jobs. We need to improve our public schools, and we need to take note of all of our failings and debts and correct them. We need to change the way we live, so that we're more earth friendly and energy efficient. We need to live simpler, healthier lives. We need to take back our rights and make a stand against the governments decisions and funding cuts. We need to take ownership of both the good and the bad and be a responsible community member. 

The nation shouldn't be feeling depressed today, like the Times notes we are; we should be enraged and charged up by what's going on around us. Today, Earth Day, is a great day to evaluate your lifestyle and your values and make some changes. Don't take the "life is good" approach, and ignore all that is wrong; instead, look at all the faults of this country. Look and fight for a better future. How we measure up to other countries shouldn't motivate us to act(or not act, for that matter)--we should want better for ourselves, our families, our communities.


--Megan