Big Paper

America, I don’t understand how this place hasn’t devoured itself by all its greed and power hungry people in power. The American Way of Life has become so tiring and predictable over the years. What is really interesting is how commercial everything here is. They (media) still strive to make America seem so united and democratic and equal when it’s so far from. America in simplest terms is basically run by rich, greedy power hungry people who work the hell out of the poor people in this world. Honestly, America is run by money.

Individually, American’s have their own way of living, and they quite commonly think that they are so different from every other American, but that’s where they are wrong. In a way, we all have pretty typical lives. We go to school, we go home, we stuff our faces while watching senseless shows, we wake up and get educated some more, they eventually help the ever-loving flow of capitalism by working for the rich. So we all basically have the same lives with MAYBE one or two exceptions. It seems like all of America value’s the same things and that in a way makes us dismal.

When interviewing Americans, one has to be almost insistent about it. We asked people in the street what they thought the AWOL (American Way of Life) was. It took most people by surprise because its not a very normal question to be asked by a swarm of teenagers. Some replied “Well, uh to go to school, get a job, get married and have some kids”. That’s the life of many many Americans (see what I mean…typical). We would nod and quickly blurt out “Do you think you live a typical AWOL?” The person would smile and say “No I think I live a little out of the ordinary”. We’d ask how and they would give some long explanation about how they got their job or how they lost their job. Something, that quite honestly sounded quite typical. Our last question was the one I desperately wanted answered “So, what do you think the most important aspect of AWOL is?” The expected answer was schooling or family, but that’s not what we got. “Money”. Almost every person we had interviewed said that money was the most important thing. It really shows how capitalism has really infected the lives of all American’s.

How much power do we really have here in America? I mean, everything is kind of already decided, we only get to vote once every 4 years, we have to work, we have to go to school and we have to pay taxes. That doesn’t sound like “we the people”. America is just a front to hide what really goes on in this commonly mistaken “great nation”. If the people don’t like who is in office, yea we can do something but that would be along rigorous process in which many people would probably give up. In order to make a stand here you need to be rich, in office or have a badge. Yes, our fellow police officers aren’t rich, they aren’t in office but that have those shiny things and a badge that make us listen to them. But the problem with people who have authority is that sooner or later they abuse their power. If a police officer on any given day decides that he wants to commit a crime just for the hell of it he can, and get away with it. Because honestly, who you gonna believe? The lovely cops that we have all been filtered to love or the beat up civilian. Exactly.

The constitution, the lovely foundation of out beautiful nation. I would bet that most people don’t know what the constitution really says. This document, on the surface gives the Legislative, Executive and Judicial Branches power. It balances and distributes the power of the government equally throughout all the branches. There is a delicate system that keeps each branch from gaining too much power. It is said that the constitution was written “in favor of the people”. But I would disagree. The foundation of this country was in the fate of a few rich white guys who probably all had slaves. That says a lot about our country, a bunch of old RICH white guys making the laws according to them and no one else.

It seemed for a long time that everything was about rich Caucasian people, well it still is but with a twist. Now that we have a black president everything is gonna change…right? Now why would anyone question this godsend? Well it’s been established that 99.9% of Americans hat bush and blame him for all this bad s**t. But Mr. Obama just happened to be working with Bush. Bush even helped to raise more money for Obama’s inauguration “President George W. Bush on Tuesday declared an emergency in the District of Columbia that will let the nation's capital tap deeper into federal coffers for Barack Obama's inauguration.”(pwtenny.newsvine.com). Hmm…Makes you wonder. So many people are so proud that now we have an African American representing America now. For a while I was under the haze of the man who is going to make history. But then I realized a whole lot of s**t. Obama is not 100% black. He’s only ½ Black and half White. But media or his many supporters don’t realize that, and if they do they always ignore it. It makes me feel like; yes even though his skin color is black he really isn’t fully black. Many people think that up until now we have evaded another white president but…not really. Obama is talking about feeding more money back into the economy, but they spend millions of dollars on his inauguration “Money Spent: $488,334,933” (projects.washingtonpost.com). When I mentioned it to my family they replied “Oh, we’ll get it back”. But will we?

Speaking of spending money, back to our economy. In the simplest terms capitalism is basically the business of making money and spending money. That’s all American’s are really good for. There is a simple website that very accurately depicts America (sad isn’t it?). EBAY! Yes this lovely website lets you buy and sell all the crap you could ever want or need in 3 lifetimes. The catch to buying is you have to bid on what you want and obviously if you want it you have to win. You and however many people also want what you want have to continually try to undercut each other until time is up. Sounds fun doesn’t it?. Well my ultimate source of income (mother) was not to pleased about the whole idea of bidding good money on useless junk, not only that but the small fact that you and another stranger are virtually fighting until the (cue in the dramatic voice) death. So we had a falling out, I explained that we had to do it for school but she wasn’t going for it. So I simulated an E-bay auction for myself and watched how people like vultures, virtually fought for ultimately useless crap. Wow, imagine corporate America.

Gobble gobble, Oh the start of the holidays. American’s eat it up…literally. This is the holiday where you and your family get together and stuff you faces. Its like heaven to America, no school, no work just food and TV. It’s sad that it’s just another way to make money. People rush to the deli and the supermarket to buy shopping carts full of food. They spend hundreds of dollars flying in family members and they spend money renting movies to watch when the family arrives and let’s not forget that con Edison bill that gets run up from all the lights being on and all the TVs in every room on day and night. And what’s genius about Thanksgiving is that Corporate America is making money and the poor workers aren’t. Because the rich capitalists don’t spend time with family they keep their fat asses in their leather chairs making sure the stock market doesn’t crash. They make their money from the poor people spending quality time and not to mention quality cash on family time, the plot is evil but oh-so genius.

Ho-Ho-Ho Merry Cashmas...Wait that’s not right. To the rich capitalists it is. Let’s see, Jonas Brothers Cd: $13, Obama T-shirt: $7.50, The feeling the rich capitalists get from the constant cash flow all through December: Priceless. This holiday is for spending money. I mean the kids want toys and really that puts parents between a rock and a hard place. The sweet look on a child’s face is adorable on X-mas morning is adorable, I wonder about the sweet look on the faces of the members of the board for Toys R Us when they make millions of dollars for an entire month. No one realizes this but we spend all this money on stuff that we won’t use and we only make ourselves poorer in the process! Does no one get this? They probably do but its just out way of life and we wont apologize for it . I wonder how we all complain about how the rich get richer and the poor get much poorer when in reality by spending our money we are only helping them. Every single holiday is made to spend money:

 Valentines Day – Lovers spend big bucks on chocolates and roses
 Easter – Peeps, Chocolate covered eggs not to mention the $15 egg coloring kit
 Thanksgiving – More money for food!
 Christmas – More money on gifts
 New Years – More money spent at bars and useless 20.. glasses and hats
 Halloween – More money spent on costumes
 4th of July – More money spent on Fire crackers (whoop)
 Black Friday – Cheap crap for only a few hours.
 And lets not forget B-days – The Amt of $ you spend depends on your age

It may be that American’s don’t know how not to spend money. Take Buy Nothing Day for example. What the hell is that? I had never heard of such a day in my life until I was shown a short video of people promoting the idea of not buying anything on Black Friday instead of buying of everything. I completely understand what they mean by saving your money and I understand where they are coming from. But still I couldn’t resist a sale. People get crazy when money is involved and even crazier when there is a chance to save money. There was a guy who got killed on this day, trampled by a crowd of people trying to make it into the store before all the good useless crap was taken by other crazy sleep deprived money saving people.

Marx! The guy who was completely against capitalism. He was all for a socialist society and believed that the workers should have more benefits than the non-workers. Capitalism to him was evil and was not needed. He realized that without workers, ultimately Capitalism would fall. Workers out number bosses and all workers hate the idea of making some rich white guy more money than he needs but no one will do anything about it…Yet (End Scene—Cue Inspirational scenery and music) And –Cut!



Sources:


http://pwtenny.newsvine.com/_news/2009/01/14/2309376-bush-declares-emergency-for-inauguration?threadId=469848

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/2008-presidential-candidates/finance/candidates/barack-obama/

http://library.thinkquest.org/18802/usholi.htm