Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Ionedery2's avatar

Your examples are an indication of an out of control social breakdown. Whether by design or by default it's happening. Like during covid, some consequences were intended and some weren't.

The fallout from years of indoctrination, the erosion of values in favor of relentless pursuit of wealth is upon us. The "american dream" was a pipe dream all along it seems.

The ship is foundering and steerage isn't going to cut it.

Expand full comment
Gerald's avatar

GenX here, ‘73. After 10 years in the US together starting our family (the first four of our five children), in 2014 I suggested that we move to my wife’s native Japan. This country looks rich to my American eyes - because everything’s still functional instead of dysfunctional: both the physical & institutional infrastructures are still functional, healthy. That said, certainly I do suffer homesickness every day, but the move was ultimately all about the children’s futures & us parents’ future end-of-life experience.

… 1995 was my political wake up call. We were in Nowhere Special, France, university students. Sometime after midnight my future wife came down with the first & only UTI of her life.

A young doctor arrived faster than pizza delivery, and administered a shot, and wrote a prescription. The house call cost only $10 (in 1995 USD; that’d be like $40-$50 today 😂 but still a bargain!) And the prescription cost only $6(?); the pharmacy was just around the corner - no car needed, no waiting, no insurance needed.

My political awakening began with the “evils” of socialist medicine. (That means socialist, not communist!)

‘They’ (i.e. my childhood indoctrination in “unbridled capitalism”) had been lying to us about everything, not just medicine it turns out, but e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g. 😡: employment conditions/ workers’ rights, education, housing, transportation, zoning & small business regulation, the denatured & adulterated food supply, etc., just everything, welfare, Big Pharma, etc.. As my awareness continued to grow, the list of institutional & infrastructure dysfunction just kept growing longer ‘n’ longer over the years 😡

And really, I kept looking for a way out of the US’s “middle class squeeze” ever since 1995. It was lonely talking about it back then because my fellow Americans (Boomers & GenX) didn’t see the problems.

… What a boon social media has been. At least I’m connected now to people who see the problems 👍🙂 “A problem shared is a problem halved.”

Expand full comment
1 more comment...

No posts