for Americans..what do you have to complain about

[beingnobody]

..that you perceive as so severe that you think violence is the solution?

If you are so fortunate as to live in the United States, no matter how poor you may perceive yourself to be, you live a life of comfort and luxury compared to about 75% the occupants of this planet.

Other than the fact a lot of people spend way too much time on the internet and TV allowing people to get rich manipulating emotions I don't understand why there is so much anger and hatred for people who have nothing to do with your own life.

There is nothing going on in America that is in any way physically threatening to me,..or ANYONE else in this country, no matter what someone who gets rich manipulating people's emotions tries to convince you to believe.

 

[TheRealCallie]

How about all the homeless in America? Are they fortunate too? How about the people who struggle to feed their children because they can't afford the high prices? If you think it's as black and white as all that, you should do more research.

Do you live in America? If not, you shouldn't talk about what you don't know.

 

[beingnobody]

I was jo

How about all the homeless in America? Are they fortunate too? How about the people who struggle to feed their children because they can't afford the high prices? If you think it's as black and white as all that, you should do more research.

Do you live in America? If not, you shouldn't talk about what you don't know.

I was born in America and other than time in military spent overseas have lived here all my 65 years seeing and experiencing things you may never know. I've been homeless, survived two strokes, survived stage IV throat cancer, was married for twenty years. Maybe you don't know as much about the world and life as you think. You are less skillful at communication than I can sometimes be, but you are obviously young, relatively inexperienced, and full of your little self, so I will forgive your youthful, privileged arrogance. I have been there. Humility would benefit you greatly.

 

[polyp]

Cantankerous old man trying to coast off his age in internet arguments.
Wonder how you ended up on a site for lonely people.....

 

[TheSkaFish]

Going to have to disagree with the idea that poverty in America is comfort and luxury. You can be very uncomfortable in America...too cold, too hot, hungry, just to name a few. And if prices get bad enough, all of that stuff absolutely can become physically threatening.

I don't agree that it does much good to compare yourself to people doing worse. It's the old "kids in Africa" thing. Sure, it is terrible that there are kids starving in Africa. But that doesn't really do anything about, say, being unable to pay my bills in America. It doesn't mean my problems aren't real. They're just different. Other people's pain doesn't negate one's own pain. Unless the pain isn't really pain at all but is just silly, like being mad you drive a used sports car instead of a new one. Or that you can only have one house instead of two.

Maybe violence isn't the answer, but there are definitely valid criticisms of America that are reasonable to talk about. There are definitely deep structural problems that have only been getting worse. I'm not really old, but old enough to distinctly remember things being better than they are now. I would say the time I grew up, the '90s, was much better than today as far as standards of living go. We didn't have all this technology, but the dollar went further, and all the technology in the world doesn't do you any good if you can't afford it. It was easier to be middle-class. And it didn't seem like we were always living under some kind of crisis. Even 10 years ago, while it wasn't great economically, was still better than today. The thing about the hatred for people that "have nothing to do with your life", is actually that they do have something to do with it. By destroying the middle class, they do hurt our quality of life. Trickle-down economics doesn't work, they don't reinvest the money, they just hoard it. The whole thing was a scam. It's time to try something else.

My personal opinion is that if politicians, or whoever, really want to get serious about decreasing crime and violence, they have to go to the source - why do people think this is the best course of action? Why are they this angry? And I feel like ultimately the source is the decreasing middle class. If you make it easier to be "OK", then people will be less mad. They'll feel like they have too much to lose by breaking the law, and they won't feel as alienated and not cared about. Basically if people feel they have a real chance to make things better it will keep them going. But if you take that hope away, as we've been doing, eventually they don't care anymore.

 

[TheRealCallie]

I was jo

I was born in America and other than time in military spent overseas have lived here all my 65 years seeing and experiencing things you may never know. I've been homeless, survived two strokes, survived stage IV throat cancer, was married for twenty years. Maybe you don't know as much about the world and life as you think. You are less skillful at communication than I can sometimes be, but you are obviously young, relatively inexperienced, and full of your little self, so I will forgive your youthful, privileged arrogance. I have been there. Humility would benefit you greatly.

Do you know what "I don't understand"? How someone can sit there and post something like this and have the nerve to say I am the one who is full of myself and arrogant.

 

[Memyself]

I think point was missed where he said what makes Americans so angry to think violence is the answer. Homeless are not taking the streets nor attacking the government. Do poor have the means to travel to DC, or hoard guns? Do poor call elected officials with death threats? Is this a poor or homeless person

 

[TheRealCallie]

I think point was missed where he said what makes Americans so angry to think violence is the answer. Homeless are not taking the streets nor attacking the government. Do poor have the means to travel to DC, or hoard guns? Do poor call elected officials with death threats? Is this a poor or homeless person

No one is disputing the violence because we all know it's there. The problem people have with his post is that he is assuming every person in the US regardless of circumstance or anything else has luxury and comfort and I'm sorry, but that's ********. Not everyone has luxury and comfort in this country and it's ignorant to think they do. Also, I'm not so sure about the validity of that 75% comment.

 

[Memyself]

No one is disputing the violence because we all know it's there. The problem people have with his post is that he is assuming every person in the US regardless of circumstance or anything else has luxury and comfort and I'm sorry, but that's ********. Not everyone has luxury and comfort in this country and it's ignorant to think they do. Also, I'm not so sure about the validity of that 75% comment.

correct me if I am wrong, but key words in his post are anger and violence being the answer, which are not addressed in replies.

 

[TheRealCallie]

correct me if I am wrong, but key words in his post are anger and violence being the answer, which are not addressed in replies.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the original post is basically implying that all Americans do this. If you are so focused on the negative, that's all you are going to see. As I said, no one is disputing that there are people out there that do this, so that is why SOME people aren't addressing it. However, to say it is not addressed at all is also wrong because Ska addressed it, but instead of pointing that out or commenting to that, you felt the need to argue with me.

It doesn't matter what the keywords are in a post when someone is claiming something that is not only wrong, but also offensive and insulting.

 

[Memyself]

Correct me if I am wrong, but the original post is basically implying that all Americans do this. If you are so focused on the negative, that's all you are going to see. As I said, no one is disputing that there are people out there that do this, so that is why SOME people aren't addressing it. However, to say it is not addressed at all is also wrong because Ska addressed it, but instead of pointing that out or commenting to that, you felt the need to argue with me.

It doesn't matter what the keywords are in a post when someone is claiming something that is not only wrong, but also offensive and insulting.

I was arguing with you, just pointed out how all of you derailed his post, and then it turned personal. And he is right, being poor in America is not the same as being poor in majority of the world. This is why they are at the Southern border, choosing to be hated and mistreated for a chance to be poor here.

 

[SirPanda]

lol, the misinterpretation of what OP Said is astounding. Comparitively yeah Living in America is cushy af compared to other countries. Even if you're homeless in America. And yeah I live in America. In the homeless State Capital of Commifornia. Who's policies have made it worse. The people in charge of "solving" homelessness are just robbing tax payers and creating absolutely no solutions. Just collecting a large paycheck to not solve a problem they were hired to solve. Because in doing so they remove their over paid cushy job.

The anger stems from the destruction of the middle class. Ofc nothing is black and white. And countless books literally have been written on this subject and all of American societies ills. But all the maintstream media short form sound bites don't allow nuanced discussion. It just foments discourse at a childish level and creates this tribalist divide.

 

[user 139760]

...don't you Yanks complain about EVERYTHING?

I'm down with it, though. Only thing left on Earth that's free. For now...

 

[TheSkaFish]

Comparitively yeah Living in America is cushy af compared to other countries. Even if you're homeless in America.

I don't agree. I feel like America is like...a lot of mini-countries, inside one country. If you're dialed in to the system, have a good paying job and all that, then you live in what most people consider America to be. You live in the first world version of America. But if you're homeless or living in a poor neighborhood, you live in a completely different version of America, one that much more closely resembles a third-world country. You're just as much left to fend for yourself, left to deal with violence and the brutality of the elements. The fact that you live in a country which has first-world services, doesn't do you any good because if you're poor, you can't access them. So I don't think there is that much of a difference. It sucks to be poor, no matter where you are. Maybe I haven't been homeless myself, but I've seen the documentaries on YouTube about homelessness and crime, and it's terrible. There's no way that those living conditions can be called luxurious. The fact that people are allowed to live in that degree of squalor, in what's supposedly the greatest country on Earth, is shameful.

That's also the issue though - the whole idea that there is a comparison, and that the existence of the absolute worst case scenario negates all other scenarios, is a fallacy - it's called the fallacy of relative privation. That's the proper name for the "kids in Africa" argument.

 

[polyp]

Somebody born in Switzerland is even more lucky. Maybe I'll take a boat there and just never leave?

 

[Sarah G]

Somebody born in Switzerland is even more lucky. Maybe I'll take a boat there and just never leave?

And Denmark, they literally get paid to study at university. Plus it's hygge

 

[user 135671]

Or Oman no taxes and they'll give you the money to buy your first home.

 

[royalewithcheese]

Cantankerous old man trying to coast off his age in internet arguments.
Wonder how you ended up on a site for lonely people.....

I don’t see YOU popping champagne bottles with friends. Why are YOU here?

 

[polyp]

I don’t see YOU popping champagne bottles with friends. Why are YOU here?

I can't connect to other people on a deeper level, so I try to fill that void in various ways.

Op's a guy who WAS married and is apparently very "skillful at communication".

 

[Memyself]

Op's a guy who WAS married and is apparently very "skillful at communication".

Now you are just being ridiculous