>It's also worth noting that life doesn't seem to get substantially easier if you decide to be a corporate stooge -- that social contract is broken so badly tha

>It's also worth noting that life doesn't seem to get substantially easier if you decide to be a corporate stooge -- that social contract is broken so badly that I think it's misleading to imply it's the secret to stability. Yes. Furthermore, let's think about why someone would want to be "special". Forget about middle school teachers preaching self esteem. Just look around at how you get ahead in this society. It's not by keeping your head down and doing your job. You do it by building special unique skills, by self promotion, by standing out from the herd. Take the tech industry for example. No one wants to hire an average programmer who does his job. Everyone wants a "rockstar" who's going to bring up the level of the team. Look at the companies and individuals that are successful: they are "disruptive" "innovative" "changing the world". Definitely not "ordinary". This country, and the tech industry in particular worships the extraordinary and disdains the ordinary. So its a bit hypocritical to turn around and ridicule people who aspire to the goals that society has very clearly laid out.