They call us the "un" generation. We are uninterested, unconcerned, uncaring, unmoved, unresponsive, untouched and unimpressionable . We are apathetic. We are noncommittal. We are selfish and self-indulgent. We got our values all wrong. We know very little.
I see where this criticism comes from and I try my best to hold on to any evidence to the contrary. Sometimes though, you just can't avoid the truth when it's banging on your door.
The other day I was coming home from job-hunting, sitting on the bus, reading a book, when this guy comes in. He was probably on his mid to late 20s. He starts talking to people around me, asking them whether they were registered to vote, telling them about environmental issues. I take a look at him, he has a calculus book: inside a few petitions lay. "There!" I think. Here is someone from our generation, ready and willing, going to college, probably working and still making time to be socially active! Take that!"
After he collects a few signatures, I ask him, "Why are you doing this?"
(I should have stayed with my fantasy)
"They pay me a buck a signature", he says.
" I see" I say, and think, "well, a guy must pay his way through college. This is a flexible enough job that he can do it in between classes."
"So where do you go to college?" I ask.
"College? I don't think so. I am never going back to school"
"Oh.. I just saw the Calc book and I thought...."
"Oh this? Oh no. I actually just needed a clipboard and I happened to find this book on a bench..."
"..."
Eu sei que as aparencias enganam... mas po!
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2 comments:
There was a story of a person who was motivated. Motivated enough to volunteer to be a poll worker.
Then they discovered that with a simple certification they could be an inspector of the HAVA accordances with the electronic voting machines.
This person walked to the only location available to register, only to be told 2 things.
1) A person enrolled in a higher educational curriculum cannot be a judge or inspector for polling booths.
2) This person can only become a Poll worker volunteer only after an approval of a Principal or Director from that place of higher education.
This person, spent their day with the idea of helping and volunteering and ended the day frustrated and neck deep in bureaucratic bullshit.
This person did not make a difference and in fact found disappointed in yet another system.
However the capitalist on your bus grabbed your attention...and topically, at first thought, you thought he was making a difference for the environment.
If you thought that, others thought that. And that is how a difference occurs. Apathy is synonymous for nothing is for free. And although I understand your plight and identify with it that person for profit or not made more of a difference than the volunteer did that day.
And what do rich volunteers do when they feel they cannot make a difference with the shitty systems currently in place?
They manipulate the system by paying people to collect signatures for a dollar a pop.
Capitalism is not good, but its the best we got going in this human cultivated concept of the world.
i find myself indifferent to this story
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