Occupy Awakening the Masses 7-12-2012
Channel: trogar1971
Date: 2012-07-12

Something I realized many years ago when a nagging emptiness, inside me, caused me to start questioning, "I was once willing to give my life as a member of the armed forces...for this?" All around me, I saw good people suffering, good people busting their asses in pursuit of the great American dream, but despite their best attempts, that same dream eluded them. I saw good people. I saw moral people. They were, and still are, credible, hardworking, honest people.

If the great American dream truly still existed, then surely and truly, these noble people should be far better off than they were, but they were, and still are, not better off. How could that be? How could what all my elders taught me, what my teachers suggested, what TV portrayed, and still portrays, not only in shows but commercials too, could people work hard, follow the rules and still fall so far short of that dream supposedly attainable by all? I wrestled and grappled with the thoughts. I wondered around a walking wounded, half asleep citizen for years trying to figure it out. I thought and I thought, a niggling suspicion and splinter just beneath the surface continued eluding me.

I remembered a childhood where neighbors knew one another, talked to one another, and shared with one another. I remembered a childhood where a single parent working in a middle class family was able to support the entire family. I remembered a childhood where house and vehicle doors were left unlocked and open. A flashback to present and I saw neighbors whom didn't know one another, a time where it was almost impossible to support a family on a single income, and a society driven by fear locking everything up. I see a society where media fear mongering and their divide and conquer mentality have us all not only disconnected from our own government, but also from one another. They have us divided by political party lines, sexuality, religion, educational levels, classes, and other things, and we constantly fall for it.

As a child, I saw prosperity where jobs seemed plentiful. As an adult, I see people all around me struggling to make ends meet and searching frantically for jobs at a time where the rich are at their wealthiest peaks yet jobs are next to impossible for some to find. Fast forward to today and they are impossible to find for many. At 18, fresh out of high school, I was willing to enlist in the military and possibly go to the Persian Gulf to die for this country and all it stood for. However, when I see what it stands for now, the rich gutting our economy, the sheer evil that permeates our nation in greed, the corruption of our political officials, the social irresponsibility of mega corporations, a government's refusal to bring any to justice, and I can't help but conclude I'd not today make the same choice. I was willing to die to help keep the great American dream intact for all of us. Where is that American dream today?

The more I tried opening my eyes the more my patriotism and pain of reality forced them back closed. As each reality took root, forcing my eyes open like someone shoving toothpicks under my eyelids, the pain of recognition forcibly broke the toothpicks rendering even more pain through the process. "Do we have a corrupt government?" was one of my first questions. No, that couldn't be, I was a member of the military, and government is to be trusted. They'd never do anything to harm those they serve and they're in office to serve us. After all, this is what society and our educational system conditioned us to believe. Surely, this can't be true, and I'm unpatriotic for thinking in such ways. School indoctrination and military conditioning clouded my understanding. The years drug on. I watched. I remembered. I waited, and eventually a pattern developed that forced my eyes ever so slightly open. We did indeed have a corrupt government.