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One of the things that I have really come to understand is America is not even close to "land of the free". There is a very very narrow set of rules that you a
by NTDF9 8y ago
One of the things that I have really come to understand is America is not even close to "land of the free".
There is a very very narrow set of rules that you absolutely have to follow to even be able to live peacefully here. Be born at least middle class, go to good schools, pursue the right degrees, go to corporations, make no mistakes in life and then finally retire in a retirement home paying thousands a month.
Steer from the above path and you'll start seeing things like mistakes in IRS filings or a medical issue or a pre-existing condition or a divorce or a bankruptcy or an unmangeable debt or a gap in career.....you know, normal human problems, you are screwed.
And then there are man-made problems like jail without bail, lawsuits flying around, guns, crime.
Notice there is no place in society for teachers, small-time healthcare professionals, career in arts etc.
- captain_perl 8y agoAnd don't forget about being downvoted for listing facts!
- NTDF9 8y ago> And don't forget about being downvoted for listing facts! Yeah,its a very funny phenomenon. For some reason, Americans like to downvote anything true about their society. This is what you would expect out of communist societies.
- jstewartmobile 8y agoNot true. You'd be about halfway up in any other forum, but this is hacker news--where we're not supposed to talk politics... unless it's the kind of politics they want us to talk about--like net neutrality or antitrust or some other intersection of nerds and money.
- NTDF9 8y ago> but this is hacker news--where we're not supposed to talk politics... unless it's the kind of politics they want us to talk about But this isn't politics. This is the societal reality of the home of tech industry. There are many people around the world who are blown away by the stories of Silicon Valley. When we share stories of SV parties, VCs, lifestyle, homelessness, then why not about life and reality here? At the very least, it is informative to people who are uprooting their families and lives in other countries.
- da02 8y ago> blown away by the stories of Silicon Valley What kind of stories? Housing prices? Management horrors?
- jstewartmobile 8y agoNo disagreement there. Just sayin'.
- stevenwoo 8y agoThe book A People's History of the United States makes a pretty good argument for everything you are stating being in the mix from the very beginning from the founding fathers and the volatile economic mismatch between the haves and the have nots. Of course the author has an agenda but it makes sense from the evidence given.
- GrumpiNerd 8y agoNot really true. Lots of people recover from mistakes or decide to change paths.