Forum Post: Time for Millennials to Take Control

Time for Millennials to Take Control (with links) http://paulglover.org/1005.html

by Paul Glover

Fifty years ago America stood alone on top of the world. Americans had most of the world’s best jobs and cars. We had the strongest money: our wages bought us the coolest toys, warmest homes and cheapest food. The minimum wage bought six gallons of gasoline. We lived longest of any people.

Today many other countries have more manufacturing jobs and stronger money for better quality goods, better education and health care, tastier food and longer lives. The federal minimum wage buys two gallons of gas.

Your grandparents-- baby boomers-- were raised in luxury by hardworking parents. During the Sixties, boomers rebelled against war, materialism, greed and environmental destruction. Then most gave up and joined the consumer parade. Good people, they wanted to enjoy life, raise kids, fly the flag and feel normal. They committed their lives to mortgages and cars, made investments, bought you hamburgers and vacations.

But their neglect to prepare a new American way of life, after the 1974 oil embargo, leaves you with fewer jobs, higher fuel prices, tougher mortgages, weak dollars, student debt, national debt, crummy cars, narrow ballot choices, poison rivers, bulging prisons, barren soils, costlier food and health care, higher taxes to pay for their old age, no Social Security or Medicare for your own future, and shorter lives. They’ve given you everything but a society and a planet.

Typically, younger generations learn from wise elders, then gradually take power. Today, however, because their elders have stripmined America, Gen X and Gen Y leaders need to rebuild their futures and their childrens’ futures. Young leaders can completely and joyfully defy nearly everything normal, to make America’s cities more beautiful, secure, creative and fair than any the world has seen. We’ll take risks, to invent new systems that serve us: green jobs, solar power, community money, nonprofit co-operative health care, energy efficient housing, urban orchards and farms, independent media. As Obama says, “Change comes not from the top down but from the bottom up.” That’s you, on the bottom, pushing forward.

Culture, law, technology, money and jobs will follow. But they won’t follow without being shoved. Corporate headquarters fly big flags, but when forced to choose between public benefit and profit they will choose profit, regardless of the damage to America or Americans.

Most of America’s institutions have become vastly anti-American, in fact, existing primarily for maximum bucks. For example, health insurers are not in business primarily to give us peace of mind. Mortgages are not issued primarily to shelter us. Commercial banks do not exist primarily to keep our money safe. Electric companies do not exist primarily to brighten our lives. Gas companies do not exist primarily to keep us warm. Grocery stores do not operate primarily to nourish us. School districts do not operate primarily to excite children about learning and prepare them to create the best communities they can imagine. Prisons do not operate primarily to deter crime or prepare people to return to society. Government does not exist primarily to balance competing interests or fairly distribute resources. The military does not exist primarily to defend America from invasion. Television shows do not broadcast primarily to entertain us. News media do not exist primarily to help us comprehend our world and become effective citizens. These institutions exist to keep themselves alive, make some people rich, and control the rest of us.

Currently, they employ millions of us to help weaken America. So Millennials can choose: live twisted to screw everybody else, live small to hide, or live big to build a healthy world. Some new college graduates will become managers of America’s continued decline. But history will honor those of you who enact radically healthy communities.

Many adults think obedience is safe, that current systems are practical, and that compromise with injustice is mature. Some adults will laugh at you. Others will welcome your leadership. Martin Luther King said it this way,"Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?'  Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?'  Vanity asks the question, 'Is it popular?'  But, conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because one's conscience tells one that it is right." Changing the world has always been a big challenge. It’s the most fun too.

Essential Rebellions

Several profound shifts are needed, to create a green and just civilization. They require courage. They give life. List at http://paulglover.org/1005.html