sf wrote:
>We don't have a caste system. Everyone has a chance
>to succeed here.

Some people have far larger chances than others. The child of an ivy
league alumnus has an almost guaranteed chance of admittance into such a
university as a "legacy" student, while a poor minority will have to
find an ethnically or racially based scholarship. Community college
education is often remedial and inferior. Some people live closer to
places of employment, while others need cars because they live too far
away, yet can't afford their own vehicles. No, not everyone has the same
chances, and some people get next to no chances.

>Honestly, I think those days are over in the united states (let's just
>keep this to legal citizens and not kitchen sink it). IMO: There is
>no more crime due to lack of choices. In my city, we have too many
>social outreach programs for that excuse to hold water anymore.
>People turn to crime because of their poor choices rather than through
>necessity.

No one needs to commit crimes when they can obtain what they need to
live from charitable organization. Crime is considered a psychological
necessity by people who believe they have no other alternatives. Such
people are trapped in a number of illusions, chief of which is the idea
that material possessions will make them happy. Most people don't get
arrested for mugging folks while loading groceries into their cars.

>If they chose not to be educated, they put themselves on a
>slippery slope.

The public education system does not serve every student equally. More
affluent schools can afford books for every student, have computers,
electives, tutoring services and smaller classes where vital learning
deficiencies can be addressed. Your argument is predictably simplistic:
"It's all these people's fault for making the wrong choices." The
implication is that if people make wrong choices, screw them; let them
suffer! What if our parents or God treated us that way each time we
"sinned," misbehaved or were unkind toward our fellows? Of course,
people can make wrong choices and should be allowed to feel the
consequences of those poor decisions. But, your argument assumes every
poor choice is equally informed. If I can see that a burner on my stove
is turned on and I throw my hand right on top of the flame, I can't
blame anyone for getting burned. But, if I inadvertently sit on wet
paint because I can't see the sign and don't feel the paint until it's
too late, who would blame me for making that mistake? This culture does
not prepare our young people to face real life; it prepares them to play
video games, watch unrealistic movies and act out the thug life in
hiphop jams. At least, that's what lower class kids learn to do. Upper
classes get college prep courses and career coaches before they can even
walk. They get supplemental and extracurricular ballet, marshal arts,
piano, tennis, debating and other enriching activities. When they seem
to suffer from eating disorders, no one blames them for choosing to
starve themselves or vomit whatever they eat; they're taken to
psychologists and family therapists. When all else fails, troubled rich
kids are sent to pseudo boot camps where they get their spoiled
tendencies beaten out of them by sadistic neo-military thugeroos who've
never had to be tender toward anyone. What do the poor get when mom's
too busy for affection, dad has been absent for years and elder siblings
are busy living their own lives? Not much of much.

>If they chose to join a gang, chances are high that
>they'll also do drugs and commit crimes.

Why are they joining gangs in the first place? Because they need a sense
of love and belonging; they need acceptance and praise for what they do
well. Do they get praise from their teachers who won't even look them in
their eyes or address them by name? Do they get acceptance from
neighborhood people who walk the other way when they see them on the
street?

>The people I'm talking about
>don't see a future, they live in the moment. Drugs and thugs have
>been glamorized, so they feel no shame. It's cultural and
>generational now.

Why not say it's racial too? Your entire argument has been moving in
that direction anyway. Of course, it's cultural and generational; people
do what they see others around them doing, especially if it helps them
get what they value.

>
>Conversely, there are lots of honest people who are poor and
>uneducated, who live in high crime, high poverty areas, but they also
>see a future. In many cases, they are sacrificing their "now" to make
>their children's future better.
>
>
>

Those are the people who need to be glamorized and held up as being
worthy of maximum respect. Our culture doesn't mind packaging gangster
entertainment and violent movies as long as the consequences of that
entertainment are confined to bad neighborhoods. As long as movie
producers can laugh to the bank, as long as hiphop producers can watch
their artists soar up the charts, as long as drug dealers can continue
killing people while getting rich, nothing will change. The key is to
break the system that makes exploitation of the poor, young and naive
permissible. Stop buying that gangsta thuggeroo bullshit! Stop buying
those hiphop records that degrade women. Stop buying that fast food and
liquor, even if you don't yet know what to buy in their places. Stop
watching TV even if you're bored until you find enriching alternatives.
The poor might not be able to afford much, but they can turn off their
televisions, opt not to buy junky music and crappy food. They can
organize neighborhood watch groups so that their kids can play outside
without being accosted by gangsters and drug dealers. They can barter
services for some of what they need. That's what the poor can do. But,
our job is much more challenging. We need to stop putting the poor in
cages, projects and mental boxes, and actually befriend them. When's the
last time someone like you actually had a poor person over for dinner or
went to their house and ate what they cook? When's the last time one of
you let your kids invite a poor child over for an honestly social and
non-charitive sleepover? When's the last time we offered one of those
stereotypical fat ladies help with anything, the kind of help where we'd
actually give of our time in building personal relationships rather than
writing checks? The more we emphasize the differences between us and the
poor, the wider the chasm between us grows. Chasms are not narrowed by
blaming, finger pointing or legislation; they're narrowed and
transformed through love and understanding. That's right, love and
understanding. Love and understanding might mean listening to their
music and eating their food. Love and understanding might mean letting
one of your teenagers go out on a date with someone from the "wrong side
of the tracks". Love and understanding might mean picking up a poor
friend at home before going grocery shopping or helping another to the
emergency room. Love and understanding might entail ripping a gun out of
a drunk man's hands before he kills his woman and child in a domestic
brawl. Love and understanding might mean sheltering a battered woman
while she leaves her abuser and gets back on her feet. How many of us
have done these things before pointing fingers? Before we assert that
love and kindness don't work, how many of us have genuinely tried it?

Orlando