The clarion bells of reason were drown out when the bread and circus's appeared as freebies for all who wanted them. And, the 'show' continues. So many people want all the free stuff that they can get their hands on, but are not willing to even give a fart in return; it's mine - I am entitled to it, so give it to me! But nothing in life is free - somebody has to pay for it. Years ago a wrote a piece based on this previous fact , and it was in great detail (I hammered away at a lot of BS). A young professional who had read the piece asked me what was its' purpose. My response (and the total monograph) dealt with what I thought was the needed corrections in our social fabric. His response was that you cannot complain about something without offering solutions. That's true, but I had the solutions in my work and I pointed them out to him. Rather abruptly I was told that those solutions would not work in our world today. At that point I had to wonder if the man really read my work or just focused on the title. To me, the solutions would work, no question. So, I had to ask him why he thought that way. His response was a blather of bull pucky.
My solutions involved sacrifices. Not sacrifices that involved giving up a job or selling off property, or even cutting off an appendage (that would be really gross), or living like people did hundreds of years ago. Nothing as drastic as that. My solution involved a sacrifice, a change of a person's current mindset and world view; to give those up in exchange for something better. Too much of our social fabric, I told the young man, focused on the possession and the obtaining of things. This is the basis of the idea that .... the one who has the most toys at death wins. That, I said, needed to change. His response was that I was out of touch with the modern world. My counter argument went back to my monograph.
I replied that the virtues listed in my work, courage, discipline and truth, honor, fidelity, and self-reliance, hospitality, industriousness, and perseverance needed to be embraced by all. It was, I told him, a positive moral and ethical solution that would correct many our our current social short comings. He then laughed at me and not only repeated his previous comments that I was out of touch, but added that I must be mentally ill.
Well, if I am mentally ill for trying to embrace these nine virtues and make them work in my life, so be it; the other path is just not worth it. By the way, did I mention that that young professional was a lawyer?
copyright @2012 Terry Unger
