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SJU junior looks at Occupy Movement with “great disgust”

By Patrick Stewart-Hester | November 14th, 2011

I have been watching the recent Occupy movement with great disgust. What has happened to America? We used to be the people who did things for themselves and did not want or expect people to help them out. Now I see that all over the media, people are beating drums because there are people making loads of money. That used to be revered here. Last time I checked, was it not the idea of the “American Dream” to prosper and to have the chance to acquire a good life for your family?

Clearly, there is a generation of people who does not care about the American dream and think they are entitled to live comfortably without exerting any effort. How could this have happened to us, especially just a few generations after our Greatest Generation?

I have a few theories, but would like to focus on one that encompasses the main problem we are facing. I blame citywide sports leagues, who like to make people feel good about themselves. At some point, they decided that everyone gets a trophy instead of just the winners. This instills the idea in a child’s head that it is okay to be a loser and that no matter how bad you are at what you do, you will still get a medal and a poorly-made trophy. The same trophy, I might add, that the champions of the league get. I would love for someone to explain how that builds the drive to succeed.

Fear not, for I have a solution that will allow us to return to the good days of hard work where people had something called pride in their work and selves.

I would like to float the idea of another Red Scare, because what is more un-American than socialism? Read the book “The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution” by Bernard Bailyn if you do not believe me. He won a Pulitzer, for all you who think Krugman is all-knowing simply because he won a Nobel. The purpose of this Red Scare would be to point out all the ways that socialists are planting the seeds of entitlement and laziness in the brains of children and uneducated voters.

I believe it is fair to say that this investigation would lead straight to the White House, to the Senate Majority leader’s office and perhaps to that filmmaker Michael Moore, who hates the economic system that made him quite literally a “Fat Cat.” The end result of this would be the election of competent leaders (no more Bachmann or Pelosi types). These competent leaders would be able to finally bring back personal responsibility and real justice to government instead of holding back the best of our citizens all in the name of economic justice.



  • Kelsey (Class of 2010)

    Sigh. The Occupy Wall Street movement is actually much more in line with the American Dream than Mr. Stewart-Hester here gives them credit for. There are quite a few recent studies and graphs showing that income inequality has risen considerably in recent years. Here’s one of them: http://www.epi.org/publication/bp331-occupy-wall-street/. Here’s another: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/businessdesk/2011/09/easy-as-pie-inequality-in-down.html

    If the American Dream means that hard work is rewarded with earned wealth, then it shouldn’t be the case to see the vast majority of Americans work hard to earn less. The so-called 99% doesn’t “not care about the American dream and think they are entitled to live comfortably without exerting any effort.” Rather, they are asking for the chance to live comfortably as a result of their efforts- not to be ignored and patronized by those who will dismiss them as lazy or un-American.

    There are plenty of legitimate complaints that can be made about the Occupy protests. Dismissing their concerns as a harmful byproduct of socialism, laziness, and self-esteemia is not one of them.