>The Horatio Alger myth, to use
>language designed to pull your
>chain, is no more than
>one of the most potent
>of the opiate of the
>masses.

Agreed.

>Yes, in hayday
>of early American industrialization, America
>had a fair bit of
>social mobility, but those days
>are over.

Agreed.

>By whatever
>index you look at, America
>now has the least social
>mobility of any industrialized nation.

Plus a STUPENDOUS wealth gap.

>People stay in the
>same income bracket they're born,
>they have the same level
>of education as their parents,
>they live as long as
>their parents did, etc..

Yup.

>Before you come back with
>a "well, that's just the
>way of the world" argument,
>remember that in every Western
>European country and Japan, supposedly
>bastions of evil leftist thought,
>people now overcome those obstacles
>at a much higher freqency
>than they do in the
>US. I might also
>add, whatever social mobility we've
>had in the last 40
>years has had a lot
>to do with affirmative action,
>but now that that's been
>curtailed things will probably get
>even more bleak for the
>less fortunate.

Yes.

>Look, as personal mantra I think
>this philosophy is ideal.
>Every individual should think they
>can rise above the bad
>around them and lead a
>fulfilling life. The question
>is, as a society can
>we help people do that?


Organized labor (repeat a million times).


>What's illusory is your reality.
>I think you're a good
>person, and you seem to
>be active, but it's obvious
>you've never ventured outside your
>shell (either geographically or mentally).




>Go volunteer at an
>AIDS shelter for two months
>and see if you still
>feel the same way.

Better do it soon. They'll be gone within four years.

Alek

________________________________
"Say some shit that suprise me...
My face don't change."

____________________________
LEFT side of the bedroom, fool!
What? What?