Something is very wrong here...

[whocares]

To me what I'm about to post about is a definite "social issue", so I'm hoping this is the right section of this website to post what I'm about to discuss in.

I'm going to start with a very specific situation and use it to illustrate the overall larger problem.

Ok, here it goes. I graduate from college this past May and I was lucky enough to receive an offer to Intern in Washington, DC for the summer. I had no money to live in Washington, DC so I put up an ad on Craigslist offering to work for free room and board. Long story short, I met a family in the Arlington, Virginia area that let me live with them while I worked part time at my internship in DC. It was an amazing experience. Definitely the best 3 months of my life.

NOW for what my post is about. I wanted to stay in Washington, DC badly. I wanted to work for the government in or around the National mall area, i.e. close to the white house, Washington monument, Capitol Building, etc. I was offered a full time internship with a congressman from my home state of Indiana, BUT it was totally unpaid.

a 40 hour per week, unpaid internship in one of the countries most expensive cities. Who could afford that? I'll tell you who, rich kids. And that is what the point of my post is about. I was SO VERY CLOSE to making my dream a reality. I was so close to interning for a congressman on CAPITOL ******* HILL. In the end I turned it down because it was unpaid. I'm sure some other kid took the offer, but I'm curious as to how they afforded it.

Now for the bigger problem. In this country, the fun life is reserved for the rich and privileged. This would be fine if it wasn't for the fact that the rich and privileged do enjoy rubbing our noise in it. Take a look at anyone in the Congress or Senate. A bunch of rich motherfuckers who get a hard on or wet pussy because they're senators or congressman. Maybe I could have been one too if I had the money to get my foot in the door.

Same thing on TV. we have all these tv shows with these young, mid 20's people who live in these big pent houses in downtown NYC or LA. Who on earth could afford to do that in real life? Again, the rich and the privileged. Certainly not us who have to deal with the reality of life and a horrendous job market.

My point is that our society celebrates these amazing lifestyles even though 90% of the people in this country have no way to achieve such a standard of living. Look on the front page of magazines and the prime time sitcoms on TV. Look at the **** commercials we have to watch. All examples of a lifestyle most of us have no means of obtaining.

Is it any wonder people are losing their honeysuckle in this country? Shooting after Shooting. And guess what the Senate is doing? They're taking breaks during the day to watch the movie "Lincoln" on Capitol Hill as the ever impending fiscal cliff looms.

I've just had it with our culture celebrating these extravagant lifestyles as if they're the norm when the reality of the situation is anything but.

THOUGHTS?

 

[Will8285]

I'm conflicted as to how to respond. I come from a privileged family, not ones like you're talking about, I'm not flying around in private jets, but I could have taken the internship and my family would have paid my way. Before you judge I spent five years as a United States Marine. My first tour in Afghanistan was 12 months, my next one was just 6. Do you know that the teens on the teen mom show make more than me, even in Afghanistan with combat pay? It's a little upsetting, I must admit. Do you that on top of a congressmans pay, they get COLA? And benefits of any military personnel for losing a limb in combat, are a small fraction to a congressmans retirement benefits.
But, you and I can run for congress, we can invent an app and become millionaires, if you pick the right stocks, you can be the next warren buffet. I won't deny that you got screwed out of a good opportunity, but don't forget, in some countries, there are no opportunities. No matter how hard you work, or how smart you are, you will never be more successful than your parents, and your children will never be more successful than you. I don't agree with a lot of things in the US, but I can tell you first hand, there's a reason people risk their lives to cross our borders. If you don't like the way things are going in our country, you are free to leave. This also is a luxury not afforded to every country. The conflict in Myanmar has led Bangladesh to close their borderes to refugees of the 60+ year civil war. So while I do agree with you that changes need to be made, at least we are able to make changes.

 

[AFrozenSoul]

:/ Well I do not really see a problem of celebrating the good life. It gives humans what they need. It gives them someone to strive to be. It also gives them someone to hate. I will admit that those people gloating about their life is kind of annoying. However, who does not want to gloat about how awesome something is. It is like all the parents on this forum gloating about the fact that they have proof they had sex. Of course they like to talk about kids and their kids lives and all that honeysuckle. Oh yeah and the fact that they have the official badge of adulthood because they have a child. It does not matter how young they are. It does not matter that they deal drugs, strip or prostitute themselves to afford the kid. They have a kid and they are awesome.

Here is another truth. If the regular peasant life was so wonderful, why would we need to have entertainment? I mean why would we need to find external stimulus to fill in the gaps? The truth of the matter is we want to see others being happy and living the life we cannot live. Whether the fact that we choose not to live that life or cannot live that life is irrelevant. Then again, maybe I am coming from a different perspective. I am treated like a rich spoiled piece of crap because I have one job, and have income to spare. I have learned to not hate others just because they have the life I want. Because I am the envy of so many people who are on food stamps, on welfare, on... other government charity programs.

Now onto your internship. Have you ever heard the phrase Paying your Dues? What about people who pay their own way through college. You know college is a full-time commitment. I went to a small division 2 school. The school did everything in its power to get students. In-state tuition, was only $3000 for a full semester. Generally speaking, with food and books. You could squeak by only paying $6000 a year for school. A lot of those kids held a regular full-time job on top of their full-time school. So I have to wonder how your situation is any different? How come you could not take the internship and work a night/weekend job to pay the rent? Yeah DC is expensive, but the whole point of working an internship like the one you described is to get the experience. Once you have the experience, you can likely get a job as a lobbyist at any major company. You could get any number of government jobs. Plus you have contacts in high places. Who is to say that you could not work as an intern during the day and then be a stock guy, bartender, waiter, or something like that at night? You know I bet if you asked them they could refer you to plenty of places that interns get paying jobs at.

Really I have to wonder if the issue above is really an issue. Or if a more relevant issue is the fact that people like you run around spreading hatred for the rich. With such a small part of the population being rich. There are just as many rich people who are inheriting the riches as there are people who actually earned them. What about those people who actually earned their wealth? Do they not have a right to brag about how they pulled themselves up from the dirt and into the sky? Maybe not a right, but are they not allowed to be proud of their achievements? What about the kids who were born into money, but get neglected by their families and are left to fend for themselves? Do they not suffer just because they have money? Do they just not want someone to take notice of the destruction they are reaping on themselves? Just because someone is rich and living this lavish lifestyle does not mean they are happy. No matter what, hell I know, by most people my age's standards I am rich. My roommate constantly reminds me of how I have more money than him. If I talk about something, anything that involves extra money people roll their eyes at me. Even if that amount is only like $15 more. I am openly mocked because I complain about the difficulty of working at home. Yet here I am sitting around waiting for my cat to die so I can kill myself. Funny how the world works right?

 

[kamya]

Here's how they afford it. DEBT. Or they are rich kids like you say.

 

[whocares]

Thanks for the responses. You're right, this is a great country and THOSE whom have worked hard to build their wealth do have a right to be proud of themselves. I guess the point of my post was just that I am very disappointed I lost such an amazing opportunity, but I just couldn't afford to do it. These unpaid internships are bullshit.

 

[ThisSideOfTheRainbow]

I have spent alot of my life studying human behavior and sociology, and well as geopolitics and philosophy, and our history. So I can give you a convoluted answer at best, but it will have to do.

Society is only going to continue to get worse, as the gap between the rich and poor grows. 99% of the human race lives off of one third of wealth and resource on this planet, while the one percent consumes the other two thirds.

Think about that. To draw an equivalent, think about a fat rich man eating a steak, and the rest of society getting to lick the juice off the plate when he's done. And that means 7 billion people sharing the juice.

The most frustrating part is it doesn't have to be this way. But it has been created this way, by design. The design goes back hundreds of years, and the ultimate part of the design is not for the super rich to acquire more wealth, but for the super rich to direct society in the way they want.

Look at the legislation being passed in the United States. Look at international legislation, such as Agenda 21. These documents are calling for population control and the eradication (death) of the impoverished classes. Some documents being put forth on national and international levels even call for microchipping the population, and tracking their every move. This of course after they eliminate the "useless feeders" as they call them.

Sound like conspiracy? Some may think, but read the actual documents in the Library of Congress, or straight from the United Nation's website. The truth is hidden in plain view.

Do you know that right now, RIGHT NOW we could all be enjoying a plush lifestyle? The technology for free energy has been available for decades. Zero point energy, perpetual motion, anti-gravity. We could have a commodity based economy instead of a debtor's based one. But such things are not in the interest of our OWNERS. Tesla's free energy devices of 100 years ago were shelved by JP Morgan. What good is free energy to a banking system that plans on getting rich, consolidating resource and property off a petroleum based system? The banks wanted a petroleum based economy and electrical grid for the same reason the Roman's built the roads and the aqueducts. He who controls the infrastructure controls the society. A very simple rule that no one is paying attention to, except the OWNERS. And the OWNERS own the infrastructure. They own the banks, the corporations, the politicians are in their back pockets through lobbying, they own all the mainstream media, and they control most of the teaching curriculum taught in most schools and universities. So basically, they control thought.

I don't expect you to believe a thing i say. Do the research for yourself. Read the government documents, and cross reference everything you read.

But understand the forging of a caste system is not a new idea and is in fact the NORM through history.The rich have always been a select few, and poverty among the populous a normal occurrence. It is getting worse now for several reasons. Massive population growth, technocratic philosophy, especially amongst the rich, for example, the simplicity now of bank fraud or election fraud through the use of computers, and of course international corporation conglomeration, for example, the merging of media corporations and other institutions, such as private banks or social institutions, such as merging of national security agencies.

I could go on and on, but most of this stuff is really depressing to say the least. But the people of the planet need to be aware of the details on how our global society is run, and that it is run by only a small handful of very corrupt men.

[youtube]6oBo8CJxatQ[/youtube]

 

[Solitudinal]

Great post and I understand your anger. Luckily here in the UK we're presented with a lot more opportunities even if we're not rolling in cash. Politics is still a closed club... but you get in by being an absolute ******* rather than being rich.