Usable Insight – Please tell me I’m wrong
First seen at Huffington Post
I had a bad dream that won’t go away.
I had this realization that the United States may be essentially “screwed” (not by others, but by itself) as globalization, both socially and economically, becomes more of a reality.
In the dream I looked at the United States through the eyes of the rest of the world and this is what I saw and concluded:
- “You don’t have a work ethic among your youth or much of your young adults or even middle age adults. By this we mean that unless you are incentivized by a near term material gain or something that adds to your personal status or stature, you don’t try. And also, unless you see that what you are doing will lead to that personal, self-serving goal, you stop trying.”
- “You act entitled instead of earning what you deserve. That means that you believe that what you want should automatically come to you. You confuse a privilege (which you need to earn) with a right, that is given to you.”
- “You resist thinking and planning unless it gets you an immediate reward. You are not intellectually curious. You fight learning and instead are focused on having.”
- “We no longer need your services (which we are quickly becoming skilled at…including creativity which you think is yours alone) nor your products (as ours are increasingly becoming better in quality and reliability).”
- “What we do need, but increasingly less now than before, is your money to buy our services and products, which you will keep paying us as our services and products increase in quality and are less expensive because we are not weighed down by all your excessive labor and other costs.”
- “And we are certainly quite happy for you to use your resources both in money and in manpower to go chasing after terrorism in the world. And since we know you will go it alone, we are perfectly happy to let you do that until you can no longer afford it (which has already occurred).”
- “We are not against you, but if you steadfastly refuse to wake up and do a reality check to see that you are part of the global community and no longer ‘King of the Hill,’ the world will pass you by.”
There was much more in the dream which I thankfully can’t recall, but I think that’s enough to keep me awake for many nights to come.
Please tell me I am wrong.
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Tags: generation gap, global, world news, world politics
June 23rd, 2009 at 2:59 pm
Well done
June 23rd, 2009 at 3:38 pm
I know that many in the Huffington Post world look to Europe as a forward thinking, progressive, enlightened society versus the greedy U.S. I wouldn’t trade the habits of the US population for anyone in old Europe (new Europe is a different world). Allow me to paraphrase your first two points telling you aren’t wrong, but are part of the slam America crowd — here’s what I see in European folks:
1. “You don’t have work ethic among your youth as they cant’ get a job (20% unemployment in France) as employers won’t hire them due to onerous ‘life-time’ employment laws and the middle aged workers look to the government and not themselves for their security. I will trade being ‘incentive dependent’ versus being government dependent any decade.
2. “Yours is a ‘government’ entitlement mentality and if the government threatens to cut entitlements you stop trying and go on strike. You confuse a privilege (which you need to earn) with a right, that the government gives to you.”
June 23rd, 2009 at 3:52 pm
This is excellent…and I would add that, as always, other countries tend to know far more about us than we do about them (since they expend the time and effort to explore the concepts). It doesn’t always occur to Americans to get to know other cultures. After all, why would we, if we’re “#1″?
June 23rd, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Thank you Joel and Patrick.
I don’t even know if my perception as seen through the eyes of the world is accurate or if the perception is accurate, if that is the reality. Unfortunately to most people, perception of reality and reality are synonymous.
June 23rd, 2009 at 4:11 pm
I would tend to agree with you with one exception: those in the military.
[Actors for Sex Signals] “stressed that they have seen one worrisome similarity: a slowly worsening blasé attitude toward the entire issue of sex from both audiences. The younger people tend to think of sex as an automatic…”
“There is one benefit with the military audiences, she said. Abbot says she’s noticed the troops have “pledged their life” to a calling, that they have an institutional set of values to which they’re supposed to adhere.”
“College audiences don’t demonstrate that “higher moral calling,” she said.” [Entire article may be read here: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=63312
As long as we have a volunteer military, we will have a sector of the population that knows how to work as a team and understands the concepts of honor, courage, and commitment. Unfortunately, with the liberalization of the media and military service seen as “an option of last resort,” we in the military may find ourselves like the ancient Greeks and Romans and relegated to life outside the city gates…
June 23rd, 2009 at 4:16 pm
Excellent additon, Mary K. There are also many noble folks who give their talents and wealth in great abundance. Bill Gates and others have contributed to the advancement of medicl sciences, etc.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:08 pm
Who’s afraid of a declining work ethic and sense of individual responsibility when we have HOPE AND CHANGE!
Concerned about entitlements? Oh please! Get with the program! Everyone is entitled! From each according to his means to each according to his ability!
Don’t worry, we aren’t looking for terrorists anymore! We’ve focused the vast resources of the United States Government internally! By the way, how much money did you make last month? Hmmm? Terrorists? Whatever. We’re growing our government!!!
Everything will be so much better now!
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Its easy to criticize this Country and find reasons why it may be ‘morally bankrupt’The truth is likely more complex. We are going through a difficult period where we are better at identifying our differences than our points in common. Leadership qualities seem to have taken a ‘leave of absence’. We behave in ways which seems that we want a messiah to come and ‘make it all right’. But history has taught us that we have gone through periods like this before. The time of the American Revolution was not a ‘walk in the park’. Readings from that period point to times not all that different from today. The good news is that we have the courage to be introspective which can lead to self correction. I have great faith in the principals that this Country was founded on and wouldn’t trade them for any other body politic. We will find our way and we will continue to be a beacon of hope for the world.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:17 pm
And from my colleague Bruce Heller, PhD:
Mark:
I wish I could write and prove you wrong, but I can’t. I agree with you 100%. The U.S. seems to be in that life cycle of civilizations called “decay.”
Yet, I am hopefull that people will begin to fight their denial and begin to “take back” the U.S. and galvanize the strength of the U.S. I also believe until we fix our schools and education system this may not happen.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:23 pm
We DO have a great country where such spirited debate is allowed and encouraged.
I am happy to have my dream proved wrong.
I would like to know how America is perceived by the rest of the world. It seems to me the President Obama is indeed viewed in a very positive and hopeful light domestically and abroad — and that can only help our situation — but I don’t know that Americans as a whole are viewed the same way.
Another question I have is how critical to the way people behave is their perception of a situation? It seems to me that it would be very difficult to act or react to the world counter to your perception be it right or wrong.
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:40 pm
Pretty cool post. I just found your site and wanted to say
that I have really enjoyed reading your blog posts. Any way
I’ll be subscribing to your blog and I hope you post again soon!
June 23rd, 2009 at 5:44 pm
I think that it is important that all people and Countries have a degree of ‘self awareness’, knowing how you are perceived is important input. BUT, just like no one can live their life being OVERLY concerned about what others think of them, neither can or should this Country be overly concerned about perceptions. We have gone through a period of very bad behavior as a Country, we may have had some honorable intentions, but net/net it was perceived very badly and if we had the chance to do it again we likely wouldn’t. But what other Countries think of us is interesting but shouldn’t be perscriptive. Every person and Country needs to be guided by their sense of Duty and direction. The U.S.A. has always been an easy target of criticism from others…but only we walk in our shoes and we shouldn’t be mis-directed by others Agendas….name me another Country whose agenda is pure and not self directed…God knows it isn’t France or England…and it certainly isn’t Iran or China….lets get real people, there is a great deal of self loathing that is encouraged by the popular media…I would put our values and intentions up against any other Country.
June 23rd, 2009 at 6:19 pm
Mark
I hate to say it but this is old news.
It is all a part of the undercurrent of the moment. The real news is that we used our sense of entitlement to believe that we could load up the personal and collective credit card. Now it is coming time to pay off the card and, well sad to say, but there is nothing in our pockets other than more debts.
Pretty soon much of our creditor nations are going to figure out that there is no longer a there there in the US work ethic and entrepreneurial enthusiasm. When that happens the financial carnage of last fall will merely seem like an overture.
Sure it may seem like the world is turning against us, but really they just want to believe that they will get their money back. As it become clear that they will never recoup their losses, they are going to get some pissed. If we choose to see it as them being jealous of us and our exceptional ways, we can find lots of mediated means of expressing our self delusions. They won’t change the realities of our rapid descent into a Second world status with First world armaments.
Sorry Mark, it isn’t a nightmare.
I hate to say it but it looks like you are simply waking up.
June 23rd, 2009 at 9:07 pm
Mark: I particularly agree with your 5th point as I recall when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner late last month went to China and talked up China’s US Treasury assets as being “very safe”. This got a response of laughter from Chinese students, which in my opinion, is reflecting China’s growing skepticism of financial stability in the U.S. I think the perception of the U.S by other countries like China is staring us in the face yet, sadly, we have failed to recognize the stark realities we now face as a nation, which your dream so sadly describes.
P.S. – i personally, however, refuse to accept your dream, though.
June 23rd, 2009 at 9:48 pm
I couldn’t agree more. I have been saying this for years. Unfortunately this now occurring in older people aqs well. On my last job I hired a forty year old who had a worse work ethic than an eighteen year old working for me.
June 24th, 2009 at 8:20 am
This is an awakening for some but the vast majority are busy taking care of too many things trying to keep up with the neighbors. My wife ran into this at work when a woman of African desent with a doctoral degree won a position over an American. The American was complaining that it didn’t seem to make sense. My wife suggested that it would be easy for an American to get a teaching license (far easier than internationals, who have to pass language and SAT-type requirements despite any degrees even to teach their native language), the person just replied, “I don’t want to go back to school.” USA is attracking the best of the best from around the world. They know how to compete and do not feel entitled. Menawhile, our youth strain to feel the need to get an education.
The only way past some of these entitlement thoughts would appear to be a SHOCK. It may come from countries in which our debt lies. For goodness sake, all of the TNT for our precious explosives are made in China along with all of the electronic gadgets we’ve bred our young to become so accustomed. This should come to roost sometime but we’re too busy to be aware of what to do about it. With a shock would come a strong return to an ethic without the entitlement. This isn’t to say that there aren’t examples out there of hard workers BUT until we recognize the NEED to be better and to pass this onto our generations… I’m not hopeful… even in an Obama time
June 24th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
Irrespective of the current state of affairs it must be noted that the USA is still the most prosperous nation in the world. We are also the nation with the most personal rights and freedoms. While the “eyes” of the other nations see and judge the USA primarily on the actions of our government, even more narrowly on our government’s foreign policy, they fail to factor in the overwhelming generosity and compassion of the American people. One need only look at the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami and the over $3B public and private aid effort from the US, plus the fact that USA continues to provides for 51% of the World Food Bank to know that we are doing some amazing things in this world. When it comes to our work ethic, I think we could certainly stand to improve, but we still have among the highest per capita output. I have faith that as a nation we have the capacity, the resolve, the ingenuity and resourcefulness to make the necessary course corrections. Sure there are lots of things that need fixing and changing (especially with our government), but our strengths still vastly out-number our weaknesses, and it really doesn’t matter how other nations judge us, if we do the right things as individuals we will continue to prosper as a nation. The recent recession is just part of the course correction.
June 25th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
This is a great blog once again Mark, here is a question that I sort of framed out from your post, “If the United State’s is perceived by the rest of the world as a nation of takers, how will this impact our nation socially and economically as globalization requires increased inter-dependence with the other people in the world?”
When we say that we are being perceived by the world, I get the picture of the whole body of living persons in the rest of the world acting as an entity, and I suppose there is some truth to that with respect to group behaviour in a digital world. People watching television, news, movies, and twittering on the internet are connected more and form opinions that take into account an aggregated perception. Will globalization in the world be impacting the USA socially and economically based on media type perceptions, or based on individual relationships. I believe that the factor shaping our nations social and economic success, will be formed at the individual personal relationship level, through one-on-one human relations. In other words, individual people in the United States interacting with individual people in the rest of the world, at the micro level, forms the overall USA and World relationship. One might have said at one time for instance, that the US is a Christian Nation, but that was only because this nation was made up of Christian Families of people. Some today may say that the US is a selfish nation, but they would only being saying that because it is made up of selfish people.
You could probably go out and take a survey of all the people of the world, and It is likely that you would find that we are perceived in the news, film, and media as being composed of mostly “takers,” by the people of the rest of the world. I myself, a citizen of this nation perceive my own selfishness to a degree. At the same time, I identify with the People Pleaser described in a previous blog titled: “It’s Okay to Be a People Pleaser. Mark’s own reaction to a particularly instrusive taker, was that he became cautious, witholding and negative for over a year, and then decided to become generous again but with the following caveat emptor, ““Give to everyone once, but recognize takers and those who don’t reciprocate and never give to them a second time.” ( http://markgoulston.com/podcasts/1202.html ). I think the valuable lesson learned for myself and other People Pleaser’s like me, is that takers kill relationships, and it is best to identify and avoid them.
If this is the case, and the people of the entire world read’s Mark’s blog or receive other similar wisdom about dealing with takers, then we would expect the rest of the world’s people to either be guarded or at least cautious in their relations with the United States. How else would we expect the rest of the world would respond to the United States, if they perceive that we are for the most part, a selfish and self-serving nation of takers?
Another question is, How much should one focus on national perceptions, or even individual perceptions of oneself or one’s nation. What will we accomplish after we have expended much time and effort, primarily being concerned about how we are perceived by people or the world? What will happen if we deal with our selfishness, and then come to find out that the “World,” is against us? I don’t think we are out of the woods with regard to avoiding takers, because if we are concerned about the world, then we could be getting fooled by the biggest taker that ever was.
If we ourselves are takers, we might be serving the biggest taker that ever was. If we elect people and they pass laws that show an attitude of entitlement, a resistance to thinking and planning, then we vote for the biggest taker that ever was. We made a decision to close Guantanamo Bay, but didn’t have a plan to relocate the terrorists. Banks suffered financial meltdown as a result of corporate greed, and our reaction was to put our money into the waiting pockets of the greedy (TARP). We reacted to economic downturn by borrowing/spending money? Our spending will enslave our children in debt to other nations that do not share our founding philosophies. We hold so high the need to maintain our personal social and economic status, comfort, & lifestyle that we have made it lawful to take the life of an unborn child, no matter what the reason.
I belive that the only way we can change our perception by the world, is by changing from people that are takers, to people that are givers. I don’t believe that we as individuals can change who we are by ourselves, we don’t have the will or the power to defeat the biggest taker that ever was as he is too strong for us. There is only one person who can defeat the World’s biggest taker, and help us. He is the World’s biggest giver. He will help anyone who asks him to. Listen to what He says, “Don’t love the world’s ways. Don’t love the world’s goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity. 1 John 2:15-17 (The Message)
I should really seem stupid to some of you for saying these things, and I know that because, “The Message that points to Christ on the Cross seems like sheer silliness to those hellbent on destruction, but for those on the way of salvation it makes perfect sense. This is the way God works, and most powerfully as it turns out. It’s written, ‘ I’ll turn conventional wisdom on its head, I’ll expose so-called experts as crackpots. So where can you find someone truly wise, truly educated, truly intelligent in this day and age? Hasn’t God exposed it all as pretentious nonsense? Since the world in all its fancy wisdom never had a clue when it came to knowing God, God in his wisdom took delight in using what the world considered dumb—preaching, of all things!—to bring those who trust him into the way of salvation.’ “1 Corinthians 1:17-19 (The Message)
By World, the bible is referring not to creation like trees, clouds, & people; but the “world,” described above is the organized invisible system that is opposed to God and all people. I believe that Satan is the head of this World system, which influences our thinking and actions, and that it influences the way we respond to truth, and right living, and justice, and anything that causes us to be selfish and self serving. I should also share something my pastor said, that the World is anything that comes between us and our relationship with God and with others. If we are concerned about how we are perceived by the world and man, then we should also be concernced about how we are perceived by God. He is the one who has the power to judge us, and the power to save us. Once our relationship with Him is right, he will make our relationship with other people right.
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March 20th, 2010 at 3:48 pm
Nice post, intresting read. Keep posting and I’ll come back for some more reading! Thanks!
June 5th, 2010 at 7:32 am
Pretty insightful post. Never thought that it was this simple after all. I had spent a good deal of my time looking for someone to explain this subject clearly and you’re the only one that ever did that. Kudos to you! Keep it up