We Got It So Damn Good

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The other day, I came across this video in my YouTube feed. Check it out.

Now contrast the life of the typical Roma living in Luník 9 with the life of the typical American. How many American children grow up without access to electricity, indoor plumbing, and public education? How many able-bodied American adults are totally bereft of any employment opportunities? How many American communities can attest that their only designated outlet for recreation is a “soccer field” that lacks boundaries and nets and is strewn with human feces?

We got it so damn good, we got to make up phony-baloney reasons to feel resentful. Do you think the Roma fret over “privilege,” “microaggressions,” “cultural appropriation,” “body shaming,” and “misgendering”? Heck, they don’t even have bathrooms to argue about what biological genders should use what bathrooms. There’s a reason why Aladar was wearing a Route 66 t-shirt and not a Roma Lives Matter t-shirt. When you have real problems, you don’t have the mental bandwidth necessary to make sure your clothing is properly accessorized with Twitter-approved virtue signaling.

America is far from perfect, of course. But never forget this: America still has a very formidable infrastructure of roads, airports, courts, schools, libraries, hospitals, parks, museums, churches, stores, offices, factories, waterworks, power plants, sewage systems, and cell towers. Moreover, Americans have never been more live-and-let-live in the sense that no one is stopping any American from doing anything constructive with his or her life. I’ve yet to hear of a single American needing to fight through a phalanx of “mostly peaceful protestors” in order to open a Roth IRA, read a book, or do some effing push-ups. The typical American thus has everything he or she needs to make a wonderful life for him or herself.

Tomorrow, of course, is Thanksgiving, and I have a suggestion. Take a long vacation from news and social media. Those two institutions seem to be hellbent on sowing division, envy, and a kind of complacency that’s more befitting a serf than a patriot (“Save me, government! Save me!!”). And rather than subject yourself to their poison, take some time to reflect on all you have and all you can do to improve your life or someone else’s life.

If you are at all sentient, you will quickly realize that you have a bounty of opportunity that the Roma can scarcely imagine, and it would be a crime against common decency to do nothing with that bounty. Peace.