Greed and the American Dream

Let's face it, the American dream as we know it is all but dead. It started to die many years ago. Over two-hundred years ago, this nation was founded on some basic principles: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. Our founding fathers failed to factor in one simple little truth though, People always want more than what they have. If we have freedom, we want more. If we have a free healthcare plan, we want a vision plan. If I were to give a free ice cream cone to everyone who walked in my store, most people would complain because the dish was too small.

My wife is a middle school teacher in a very under privileged area of Des Moines. Recently she took her class to a nearby Ice Cream store; she gave each of them $2.00 (of her own money) and their assignment was to purchase a treat, get a receipt and make certain that they received the proper change...a valuable life skill and pretty generous for someone on a teacher's salary. She was incensed to hear over half of her class boldly protest that $2.00 was not enough and some were rather indignant about it. To her credit, she did exactly the right thing. She took the money from those that complained and handed it to the students that were thankful. So half of the class went without ice cream and the other half got extra money. But despite the unthankful attitude of many in her class, It turned out that they learned a lesson after all..."Don't look a gift horse in the mouth!"

It doesn't matter how much you give, people will always want more. Its survival instinct to an ultimate degree I suppose. It starts like this: You are watching TV and eating Cheetos in the late evening, your wife lets the dog in and he sits and stares at you until you break down and give him a Cheeto. You sort of expect the dog to eat it and wag his tail as sort of a "thank-you" and lie down. But is this the way it goes? No. You gave the dog a Cheeto, but the dog always wants more. That stupid dog will beg for and eat as many Cheetos as it can physically hold. Even then, the dog yacks on the carpet (right beside the linoleum) and eats the vomit again. The dog's instinct tells him: "take all you can get now because you might not get anymore for a long time" so the dog begs, sniffs your crotch and whines until you give up another Cheeto (or kick him unmercifully). Pretty soon, if you don't take a stand, you're out of Cheetos, there's an orange stain on the carpet where the dog barfed. Angrilly, you put the dog out, then what does he do? He shits in your yard, all because you gave him a handout. It's the same with people, why do you think buffets are so popular?

I'm no theologian but I'm almost certain that there is a cryptic message in Revelations somewhere warning us that Buffets are somehow a sign of the impending apocalypse. Despite all this abundance, people beg for more. We talk about "saving room for pie" but none of us do, we are gluttons. Here's a human example of the dog analogy. You've got a group of homeless and broke people; out of kindness and a sense of brotherhood you build a housing project. Each homeless person gets a free room or apartment in the housing project based on need. They are given "shelter" from the proverbial storm. Eventually, people start to complain (as they grow weary of smearing feces on the walls) that it's not big enough or that it's not in the right area of town. This happens all the time. Free and low-income housing areas are often run down, dirty and crime ridden. Why? Because there's no sense of ownership in something that you didn't have to work for.

Every high school in America had that one punk kid whose dad bought him a new Z-28 and how did he treat it? He beat the hell out of it. All too often charity is thanked with a healthy "screw you". Lets take this a step further. Now these residents of the housing projects are all given homes in modest neighborhoods with fireplaces and garages. Pretty soon, you start to see people using the fireplace to burn garbage, weeds grow up around the '79 El Camino that rests on cinder blocks in the front yard with a Rottweiler chained to the axle. The sofa, the washer and the dryer somehow make their way to the porch and small maple trees begin growing in the rain gutters and the people invariably bitch and moan about the snobs on Country Club Drive. The cycle goes on infinitely. It's nobody's fault, its instinct.

Our pursuit of money is no different than a dog's pursuit of food. The more we have, the more content we think we'll be. But not only do we always want more than what we have, we want more than the other guy has too. This is an ancient truth. The Bible tells the story of a rich farmer who hires an unemployed guy to help pick the crop for 3 silver pieces a day (the going rate is 1 silver piece per day). The jobless guy gets work, the farmer has someone to bring in the crop. The next day, the same farmer offers to hire another jobless guy to help pick the crop but only offers 2 silver pieces per day to this guy (Maybe he was Hispanic). The second guy says, "Wait a minute man, you hired my buddy yesterday for 3 pieces, what's up with that?" Then the farmer says; "2 silver pieces is still higher than the going rate, but since you like to complain you don't get anything". Long story short, the second guy could have had a job (at double the average wage) but his greed screwed him. (Again, I'm no theologian - however inaccurately the parable was referenced, the lesson is the same) We always, and I do mean ALWAYS, want more. We super-size our meals, we buy 60 televisions, we trade-up our cars and houses. Our greed is killing the American dream.

Growing up, the "American Dream" to me was having a nice house with a cool (not to mention hot) wife and an awesome job. I imagined, vacations with the kids, Christmas mornings being perfect, having a swimming pool. But when my friends and I started to get our driver's licenses, things started to change. None of us had thought about working and saving for the things we thought represented our dreams. We were used to handouts from parents and credit card offers, we never dreamed that those handouts would ever end.

Those of us who did work were blowing our meager checks on beer, CD's and concert tickets. We lived (and still do) in a world of instant gratification. If we wanted it, we had to have it now. I'd like to tell you that my parents were just too busy to try and teach me responsibility; I'd like to tell you that, but it's not the truth. The fact is that they tried to teach me but I didn't listen, and I'd be willing to bet that ninety-nine out of one hundred of you ignored your parents too. We were too wrapped up in crap like Yo' MTV Raps, big hair and Whitesnake to listen to good advice.

It is human nature to want more, I once won one hundred dollars by matching 4 numbers in the lottery. It was great, I used it to pay bills but found myself angry in the passing days that it wasn't more. I rationalized that if I could have just gotten one more number, I'd have had a bunch more money. If I had two more numbers right, I'd have won the jackpot. I looked past the fact that I'd actually won one hundred dollars that I would have otherwise not had. I often find myself wondering, how many people win the jackpot and wish that it had been bigger, maybe fifty million instead of just ten million. If only it had been that two hundred and eighty million instead of this measly fifty million. These are dilemma's we'd all like to face. I still make fun of people who have won the lottery and gone on Oprah three years later, broke, divorced and suicidal. God himself reached down, and touched these people with abundance that mere mortals dream of, and they blew it! They deserve to be depressed and destitute. Look at former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson. I'm sorry champ, you are one tough son of a gun but you aren't the sharpest tack in the box. You had millions of dollars and last I heard you were living on someone's couch. What happened? How about once famous rapper MC Hammer? I hope that paying $100,000 a week to have an "entourage" was worth it...moron.

But I digress. I'm displaying that side of human nature that I'm trying to explain. We ALL want more than we have and we take pleasure in having more than our neighbors, friends and peers. We even take pleasure in watching those who have lots of money, lose it. We just can't get past human nature, or can we? Despite a growing chasm between our nation's "have's" and "have-nots", there is grass roots movement of Americans who have decided to be thankful for the blessings they have. Which type of person are you?