A comfortable life used to be the American Dream. Not being a financial mogul. Not fighting for the top spot on the food chain. Working to get your share of the pie with the whip cream on top. Grabbing enough food to fill your plate, but leaving plenty on the table for others. Let’s do that again.
The People are still like that. Regular, everyday people. It's the propaganda of the sociopathic CEOs who are trying to hypernormalize their behavior by gaslighting folks into believing psychotic greed is good. The American Dream is still just a house and food on the table.
We can't go back to that under capitalism number gotta go up no matter the cost to humanity and life on earth, to do it, number gotta go down, and 'number go up' can't be the driving force of civilisation anymore
I don't have much, but what I do have I'm willing to share.
If only it were that simple.
WE HAVE A HUGE CLEAN UP ON AISLE "THE PEOPLE'S WHITE HOUSE" BEFORE THIS CAN TURN THE PAGE
Extreme wealth must first be controlled!!
Seriously! Because someone making $50k a year suddenly making $60k is a big deal. Someone with $10 billion suddenly having $11 billion doesn’t change their life one bit, other than making them want 12, 15, 20, 30… No amount of money is enough for the greedy.
👍💙🙏💙👍
Even if I was a mogul, I would be living and giving. But I'm not so...
The American Dream was always a lie told to cover up various forms of slavery and genocide
American greed seems to have taken the forefront, while kindness has become a rare gem. When did this shift happen?
Reagan. The 80's the movie "Wall Street," when all the scum-sucking racquetball playing yuppies that do hostile takeovers of companies & gut people's pensions & smirk at the plight of the poor & downtrodden became the new zeigeist for success. 😠🤬
That's also when lots of jobs went offshore. And the ones that tried to stay here couldn't compete. What that means is the management wouldn't be able sell goods at the same price point & siphon off enough for themselves to justify paying a living wage to their employees. It's greed to the max.
Amerians wanted CHEAP GOODS... WHY RE USE WHEN YOU CAN GET NEW,CHEAP CRAP FROM CHINA..Agood part of this thing has to be owned by AMERICAN SOCIETY. I never bought into that stuff. Still operate on my basic European sense of conserving. Americans are so wasteful
That's very true. I'm very frugal though.
And now the rich are so rich that they would be gods and decide the life & death of others.
Money has lost the value It’s grotesque to have people making billions and so many barely make ends meet and work very hard All out of proportion You earn it ,you deserve it But it’s out of synch
They don't 'make' it, they take it.
Maybe 🤔 to many take Nothing changes in life wealth is power and Rules the 🌎
The dream now is to survive the Orange Cancer
YES
I'm glad you said this. I am NOT raining on your parade, but the American Dream wasn't always within everyone's reach. Let's include everybody this time. #LetGreedDie GOP: Grow One Pair. Give each other the strength to be heroes instead of, yes, zeroes. Crawl out from under that rock, into light.
Wasn't it the marriage, kids, house, white picket fence, doggy & kitty? Oh well, let's all work for the oligarch company store guys, sounds fantastic!
I've never desired to be filthy rich. Just pay my bills and have enough left over to splurge on travel
I concur.
Nothing wrong with that. I have had the same wish
If your time ain't been nothing but money I start to feel really bad for you honey Maybe honey put your money where your mouth's been running If your time ain't been nothing but money I want out of this machine It doesn't feel like freedom This ain't my American dream.. youtu.be/lyFoaqMaNWo?...
Love this!!
Absolutely. Start with removing the oligarchs, share the money they grifted away over everyone that needs it. Also not being a US citizen, get rid of tipping and pay decent wages. Tipping is only there so bosses don’t have pay fair wages. That is another taboo subject in the US.
Most people just want to live, love, and learn.
Last 30yrs USA fed steady diet of faux reality TV, WWE & UFC fight. We’re weaned on trash, taught abhorrent behavior, empathy is weakness. Churches are home to tax dodging grifters. US brainwashed into believing late stage capitalism is the same as a free civil society & democracy, which it is not.
This was the case for white people right? The trauma we are experiencing now is due to the fact that America never never dealt with her cruelty towards minorities with justice and truth. What you refer to here was the lie that you lived quite comfortably in. Let's not do thay again?
My black family had our version of the American dream First! Education -join the military to get it or find a way to get to college 2nd) get a good job with benefits so you could buy a house 3rd) Have enough to help family members achieve what you achieved Then CELEBRATE OUR SUCCESS🤩 It used to work
It worked for a segment of the AA community. I suppose in that context there are some who are quite satisfied. This ignores the tragic tale of homelessness, police brutality, mass incarcerations, and every form of terror that the majority endured as you lived the dream. This is satisfying to you?
Community used to work for ALL OF US. Why did you have to insult me because my example didn’t work for you Nobody has a perfect life, but our ancestors survived the most horrific brutality to give us a chance. TRYING to achieve is better than wallowing in misery Does being angry & obnoxious work 4U
democrats would have to stop catering to republicans for us to get this
I remember when the American Dream was not even entirely about financial or economic considerations but included living in a peaceful, civil, law abiding, moral community. But I guess these days it's all about the money, so presumably quite similar to the Russian Dream, the Chinese Dream, etc.
No it was never that. It was about how easy it was to move from Poverty into a growing, thriving, robust Middle Class that was the envy of the world. Your complacency about that is how we became the 26th in Quality of Life instead
My complacency about that? I accept that was an element of the American Dream. Most of our ancestors in the old days, unlike now I think, came here dirt poor, dreamed of a reasonable "middle class" life. I'm just saying it was once not only that. Not "Fascism is fine, as long as I get mine."
But you're confidence in declaring what the American Dream has always been, all about economics and only that, compared to my own recollections of how people talked about it years ago, reminded me the American Dream is a subjective affair that for many may have evolved over time. It's not one thing.
Lots of people do not get it. It grew out of the Poverty of the Great Depression...when we DIDNT have a Middle Class at all to speak of ...but out of THAT we became the highest Quality of Life on the planet and invented the Modern Middle Class....thats what I know
I suppose what many think is the American Dream predates the Great Depression, but certainly people who lived through the Great Depression likely had a different view of economics and politics that those who did not. Wasn't a time for market utopianism, surely.
No it does not. There was no hope of leaving poverty before the Great Depression ...we were essentially a Caste system.
So you propose early 20th century immigrants were not pursuing their vision of an American Dream? I mean, I don't meant to be rude, but I just don't understand why we're going on about this. Making a mountain from a mole hill comes to mind. Can you stop, or must we part ways over this issue?
It wasnt "an element".....it was THE literal American Dream. Thats what FDR, Truman and LBJ created.....but it was seeing poverty in the South that convinced FDR
I understand you think so, but I contend for other people in the old days, and for me, even today, the American Dream entails more than just economic outcomes. Your view has the American Dream consistent with fascism. I disagree with that take. Maybe we can agree to disagree?
"Pepridge Farms remembers"
Yes, yes, yes!
Eat the rich, and we can. But it'll never happen so long as they still breathe.
The crux of the matter. The American pie has always been plenty big enough. The problem has always been how the pie is cut up. We need to cut fair slices for all Americans. #TaxTheRich #EatTheRich
Inflation is more money going into the system. Deflation is money being taken out of the system. Without either, it's just the same money in the system. If all the money ends up in rich people's bank accounts, how do other people get money? Either print more. Tax the rich. Or they don't.
create credit and have subscription slavery.
Amen!
No, must have entire pie, plus everyone else’s pies, they can have a bit of whipped cream, okay they get spoon bowl, that’s it, no pie
There has always been enough for everyone but rich, greedy people don't want to share & need workers. Money is made & distributed, not by rules, by corrupt people in power.
That's the dream given to you by people taking the portion you left on the table.
Yes here too, Australia. And it sounds like it’s the same in Canada. What to do eh?
You should add NHS-style free healthcare to that, too.
Let’s do !!!!!
Won’t happen under trump
Won't happen so long as corporate money is considered "speech."
If only Trump would be impeached!
I’m in!!!
A split-level house in the burbs you bought for 30K, a living wage, health insurance that doesn't disappear when you try to use it, good schools that taught you history & science, & separation of church & state. It wasn't perfect. There was Vietnam, etc...but compared to now- it was bloody Utopia!😂
We got to grow up in a golden haze
We will never be there again. We are forever changed. That reality is devastating.
It is! 😭
It happens to all empires. Greed and complacency eventually brings them down. Look across the Pacific to the current China/Russia/India/North Korea pact. Trump has failed in his reverse Kissinger ploy and at the same time alienated the USA's allies who are now reducing buying US goods and arms.
That is the America I chose as my country. 65 years later ! I feel I was jibbed
You were subsidized by the poverty of the world, you were never what you thought
Not really, more like being one of the few modern nations left mostly unscathed from WW2. However the poverty of the world is what opened the opportunity to move manufacturing abroad in the 80s, and that was exploitative. Although ultimately beneficial for many.
When was that ever a thing? I’m 42 and there has never been a day in my life where that fantasy was true in America. Don’t get me wrong, I want that, but it’s impossible while capitalism exists. Those two ideas are completely incompatible and always have been
It’s telling that “comfortable” feels radical now. To live with security, to have a fair wage, to rest without guilt—that used to be the baseline. The fact that it’s been reframed as naive or unrealistic says a lot about who benefits from keeping the bar so high.
And always willing to add one more person
I’m with you.
The Mega-rich people have figured something out that we working class folk will not understand: with enough money, you become untouchable. Do crime, abuse children, break laws, violate social norms, all these are possible with massive wealth. Cash is the world's best insulation.
🎯
Solo un Poder Divino puede deshacer de tu mente cualquier limitación.
For Black folk, the dream has been a different America...
Make America Socialist Again
Greed and lack of empathy are signs of lower evolution IMO.
Yes but sadly maga Republicans don't agree
Keeping my EU passport and staying on the east side of the Atlantic . Doesn’t look very dreamy on the other side
Everything nowadays seems so very emphatic. Push push push for the dollar for the next job level up. I was there for a while, 3 jobs taking care of siblings and kids. Retired now and can breathe sometimes though our govt can make me furious.
I grew up in 1970s America and have read massive amounts of US lit and cultural history, getting fuck you money rich has always been the American dream
I have a nice house, a couple of old but fine cars, and a great wife. I don't need more than that.
I bought in. Still waiting on my slice. Got a whiff of it in the early 90's... yay, but a memory now. 😆
It will be difficult to flip the narrative pushed by the "Christian" right for decades that there is a "finite" amount to be had, and those "deserving" of the dwindling resources must wrestle it from the hands of the "lesser" ones. Too many have been brainwashed already.
Absofuckinglutely. !!!
The headlong rush to align our lives with the pace of technology was a blind error. The dream has many flaws, but vacating our humanity for instant 24/7 gratification is a big one.
We need to move away from every man for himself and work back to United We Stand.
Great but good luck.
I would "simply" like to make it from the First day to the LAST day of each month without worrying that I am $5.00 short again this month !! Not asking for a lot !! Each month, SOMETHING goes UP in cost, and I am told that inflation really isn't as bad as my WALLET is saying it is !! 😵💫
More is never enough for some. If it was constructive of a decent future supporting people AND planet I wouldn't mind, but it's all destructive
Have to stop the grift first. bsky.app/profile/endc...
Too many of your brethren saw too many Black and Brown people getting a slice of the pie too, so they voted to throw the whole thing in the trash.
BUT WHAT ABOUT MY MONEY!!!!!!!!!!
We got too close…. We must be happy as serfs, slaves, and the poor to serve the ruling class. 😢😢😢
That dream of which you speak required socialism.
Plenty of it. And everyone appreciated the benefits to themselves and didn’t mind if others were helped, too.
Agreed
Then Republicans started dismantling all the progress from FDR era. Here we are
Get rid of the oligarchs....get their money & religion out of politics and let Congress nominate and confirm Judiciary picks....not the executive office...also strengthen your laws....no felons / arrested people in office unless fully pardoned. Etc etc.
Get rid of the GOP and it's on!
Being comfortable for me is overrated. I want to make as much money as possible, because I can. And then give it to people who cannot work or earn money to live like kids, disabled people, the elderly
Good thought...yet...the richer they get..the less they share...
Like a United States again!
☠️Now the American 'dream' has been reduced to SURVIVAL FFS!👹
Until the rich are fairly taxed, the dream is gone
www.youtube.com/shorts/pnWEI...
Most of us are already there. But those crazy ones with all the money….
You don’t get to go back. None of us do. Courage.
Exactly. But young people now think the american dream is being rich, successful. That's not it at all. It's what you said^
PLEASE
OR, let’s tax the fck out of the billionaires for about 50 years to pay them back for fucking us raw. Then, maybe, we’ll let those heartless motherfuckers keep living instead of cutting their feet off at the neck, like they truly deserve.
colorful description lol
Billionaires are the 8th plague.
Unreal
The wisdom of the Original people stated, take what you need and no more, leave something for others
You described EXACTLY what I'm currently fighting for myself 🫡😤
We can’t do that until we put robust safeguards in place to protect against the greed virus. After a billions dollars your effective tax rate should be 99.9 percent.
Flat tax on gross revenue/income above a certain $, no deductions allowed above that level.. They use deductions to funnel money into PACs and Think Tanks.
You’re right. Greed is at the root of our problems, & people abandoned our system awhile ago to join the Elite looters. They wanted their often oversized share, fair or not. No matter the cost to other lives. A few of them regret public education… dehumanizing an educated “hoi polloi” is harder
No system was abandoned, this is just what capitalism is and how it always works
The Black, brown, gay, lesbian, trans, disabled, Indigenous, and women looking at this post like 🧐
Those days are long gone! Today everyone wants to start off with the opinion, don’t want to pay ANY dues and think they all deserve to be rich
My dad worked as a union telephone installer, and my mom stayed home, took care of us kids, and helped our local seniors. They put us thru Catholic school and had a cottage on the Cape. Today they wouldn't be able to even own one home.
"Keeping up with the Joneses" escalated to "outdoing the Joneses...at all costs"
Elon musk is on track to be the first trillionaire. This bs has to be addressed
It must be stopped...
agreed
Was it ever that, really? History tends to disagree.
youtu.be/wmOLTLInR3Q?...
Yeah, no. That was just the sanitized propaganda version. The reality has always been about exploitation, it's just that most people got to be insulated enough from the actual mechanics of that exploitation that they could pretend it didn't exist. The only thing different now is that you notice it.
Also, being able to use a public restroom without risking prison would be cool.
Sorry Kathi, you never had a plate in this scenario. On the plus side in a few decades we'll allow transgender individuals to be part of public life without comment and we'll believe we've solved transphobia while you're still risking violence over going to the bathroom.
I am autistic so I am a little confused by what you mean with this message. What do you mean by plate in this scenario?
No worries! I was referring to Indy's analogy of the American Dream used to mean filling your plate but leaving enough for others. The issue I have is that in US history many people were denied plates. Trans people are the latest. Let me know if I can clear it up further for you!
As for the second part I'm referring to how some people believed racism was a thing of the past when Obama got elected despite black and brown people still facing discrimination, oppression and violence in their lives.
Thank you I understand. I appreciate you taking time to explain.
Never a problem Kathi, stay safe, stay strong.
Well done!
I was having similar thoughts but wouldn’t have said it as well.
🎯
That time has passed. "Hustle culture" is a get rich ethos that doesn't allow satisfaction without over the top luxury and wealth. Or it's appearance.
That was only true on television anyway for a certain segment of the population.
I feel like that’s unrealistic. Having some money after bills but still needing to be a little on your toes feels more reasonable.
I blame lifestyles of the rich and famous as well as Cribs on mtv.
It's always been like this JPMORGAN John Rockefeller The Vanderbilts Carnage The Roman's You get the picture. It goes back to the beginning of time There will always be someone stepping on those with less
And they use divide and conquer tactics
Wake up! That dream is over.
#sanity over #greed
We’ve really never been told the truth about Trumps health, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was given advice from his doctor to get his house in order. Might just be what he’s been doing for the past few months.
What..by building a BALLROOM? Maybe it will be his MAUSOLEUM.
Donald Trump stole the American dream.
He's a symptom. It was stolen long before him. Reagan was the beginning of the end.
You just need one person to act greedy in order for that system to break. Traditionally, that's where public shaming "no tall grass" plays a pro-social role -- think the japanese, jewish, dutch, etc.
Yes that sounds like paradise.
They want the Golden Era of the 50’s back? Bring back the 70-90 income tax on the 1%
If I had a dollar for every time I've made this argument to some dumb nostalgia-struck loser, I'd be IN the 1% by now.
