metraboy online: may 4, 2000

Okay, so I lied.

�

Well, not completely. You see, the new site is actually coming around. But I haven't' done any more of it yet, and i probably won't for a while. School has got me pulling my hair out.

However, today i just really, really needed to post because...well, because I couldn't leave what I had to say this time alone. I couldn't just say, "nah...i don't ant to post until i get the site revamped" because this was too important to leave alone.

It is really weird that my mom has the address for this and so will know that I think out this stuff, but oh well. It's important.

What follows is an email and then my response to it that I just sent out to the tenors. They are an important group so I figure that it is okay that they hear all of this.

No. That's not it at all.

I care about them a LOT, so it is important that they read what I wrote. That's more like it.

Some may say that i have violated the sanctity of email by posting this. I think that the stuff behind it warrants that violation. And anyway I took out names besides my own.

So here you go. As t.v. show (was it the A-team?) once said, the names have been changed but the problems are real.

All too real.

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The Email:

Where I come from, you always have a choice as to where you want to work. Some people make the choice at an early age, not allowing themselves as much flexibility down the road, and others make the choice later, creating more flexibility. I don't care what anyone says, it is all a matter of how much effort you put into something. If you're blue and want to have a more white collar job, then you can do it. It is all a matter of effort. Some people are going to have to try harder than others because this is not an ideal world, but the opportunity is still there. I believe this without a doubt, and I feel like you are setting white vs. blue up like we live in some sort of caste system. That just isn't the case.

My response:

If you really wholeheartedly believe that then you are a lot more naive (and a lot more conservative) than I ever thought before.

White vs. blue collar as a caste system? Absolutely.

The American Dream as a reality? Absolutely not.

You hit a nerve, so brace yourself....

Sometimes people do not show "effort" to better their station because they are socialized to think that there is no better way. Tell the kid whose brother is a drug dealer to go work his way up the ladder at McD's for a fraction of the income. Right. Tell the person who has come from a line of tradesmen (bricklayers, electricians, what have you) that he shouldn't do that and he should go do something else instead. Maybe. Yell my mom, who was a housewife until my dad left, has has her psyche ripped to shreds by two failed marriages, and doesn't believe that she's smart enough to do anything but clean houses that she should go to school to better their station in life. I tried that and it doesn't work.

The American Dream, "work hard and you'll be successful" is a crock of shit. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Have I worked hard to get where I am? Hell no. I've been blessed with the intelligence to get here. But even in the poorest school district in the state I'll be making four times what my mom makes every year. In fact, if I work at the library for less than 6/hour, I'll probably make more than she does every week. Does she deserve that? No. Does she work a hell of a lot harder than I do? Without a doubt. Can she better herself? No. She feels stuck, trapped, isolated, alienated. And she's not the only one.

There are whole segments of our society that feel this way. There's a whole bunch of reasons (consumer society, the fact that when you have no money you tend to blow the money you do have, etc.) that this happens, but I truly, absolutely do not believe that everyone can improve their station in life. The money you make is more luck than skill.

To believe that the American Dream of "we can all work hard, we all begin with a clean slate, we all have the opportunity" is to deny years of labor disputes, racism, sexism, ageism, and other oppressive factors in our society.

Maybe to a white guy from [detail deleted to protect the original author] it seems that way.

To an education liberal from rural Marengo who has seen the other side, the American Dream is a bunch of shit.

jim

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So there you have it. I'd like to invite you all to email me to tell me how you feel about this.

Or even sign the guestbook. That'd be rad.

I'll try to get the new design up soon enough.

Until then, I remain....

metraboy

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metraboy online
last updated may 4, 2000

"They say crime doesn't pay
But I bet you that it pays
Better than minimum wage"

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