One of my core philosophies is that in order for society to work properly, you need as many different types of people as possible. People who want a lot of different things and who have many different core values. Well built societies should be places where people who want different things can still grow and thrive. And I don't think we have that in the United States.
The problem in the United States is we prioritize financial success over everything else and we believe that everyone is equally able to attain it. Do you want to be a stay at home mom? A noble cause, but it will never bring about financial success so we don't need to make sure you have enough to eat. Are you a working mother trying to balance work with raising your kids? Well, you need to pick one or the other. Are you somebody who's encountered barriers based on your race or sexual orientation? We don't believe in barriers, therefore they don't exist, therefore you must be lying about your experiences. Are you disabled? Well then you'll never be successful, so we'll pretend you don't even exist.
These are the problems people always bring up when they talk about the issues America has, but the issue I've always had with the way the United States does things is that if you don't want to be successful, too bad, you still have to work just as hard as those who dream of being Bill Gates.
I could be wrong about this, but I've always thought that most people don't dream of being at the top. In Pokémon, there's a lot of strategy to playing the game, and a lot of mechanics you could use to bring out the best in your team, but most of the people who play Pokémon don't care about competitive play. They just want to raise a team of their favorites and beat the big bad. In real life, there are a lot of rules and exploits you can use to become rich, but most people don't care. They want enough money to not worry about starving and being thrown out on the streets, and a job that leaves them with enough free time to pursue other hobbies.
But in the United States, that isn't enough. The story is that everyone born in the United States has the same opportunities regardless of if their parents are the owners of the largest company in the world or the people who work the cash registers of one of that companies stores. I don't think I need to explain why that isn't true. Worse, our society is built on the idea that everyone dreams of being president, or CEO, or someone who's name is everywhere. The truth is that most of us don't want that. We want to be valued, but we don't want to be on top. But here, if you aren't on top, nobody cares about you. And if you are on top, that doesn't mean you've won. You're still expected to work hard and make even more money, to prove that you aren't satisfied with what you have in life.
Anti-Capitalism has been growing recently, but what I think people are fighting against is this feeling that Capitalism leaves us with; no matter how much you have, you can never really be happy. Are you a cashier at a grocery store? You should be working on getting a better job that makes more money. Can't find a better job you're qualified for? Well then you should work on getting a college degree. Not skilled in something like math or science? That just means you need to work extra hard. Would you honestly be happy if you're current job paid enough to live on and customers appreciated what you did? Heck no, you're not supposed to be happy doing the bare minimum. This is America, hardship is how you know you need to work harder to make it. So does that mean that if you make it, you don't need to worry anymore? Of course not. Making means you need to push yourself to the next level and work even harder because you've proven yourself to be better than those you left behind.
Not even our Billionaires are safe from this relentless push for success. It's why they flaunt their wealth so much and put so little effort into doing things that would fix our societies problem. In their eyes, they don't have any responsibility for making sure everything's okay, their responsibility is to please their shareholders. To do that, their stock prices have to go up. To keep their stock prices up, they have to lower costs as much as possible, which includes paying their employees as little as they can get away with.
What this means is we have a society that values success where almost nobody can actually be successful and where everyone has to keep trying even if they know they can't make it. Is it any wonder everyone's miserable? This means that only professions that have been deemed successful professions are ever shown as options for people in high school. That isn't a good thing. I don't think we should push everyone to be an engineer or a scientist when many would be a lot happier studying philosophy or history. I don't think it should be normal for everyone to work constantly when that's not what we want. I know we've been one of the richest nations for centuries now, but I honestly don't think it's worth what we're doing to ourselves. Societies need to have multiple paths to happiness, but it's become apparent we don't have any paths to happiness.
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