Stupid Americans

While some bloggers wonder why the American populace isn't carrying pitchforks and torches down to Wall Street to protest, I'm amazed they think Americans capable of such a thing.

Chances are, if you buy stuff, you've gotten screwed, recently, and probably frequently.

• Bought an appliance (it died or had parts stop working within 5 years). Screwed.
• Flew coach on an airplane (you're made to give up hours of your life, get squished into teeny weeny seats, accomodate some hellish bureaucracy, and possibly never get where you're going). Screwed.
• Ate packaged food from a grocery store (your atmosphere was polluted, resources used up, and workers just like you were exposed to toxic chemicals and/or dangerous factory conditions). Screwed.

But who do we get mad at?

Not the corporations using planned obsolescence or inhuman conditions to guarantee the bottom line. Not the governments which fail to regulate or limit corporate "rights" to profits at the long-term expense of the populace. But individuals.

That's right, in America, there is no "we," there is only "I." And individuals, perceived to be making individual choices over which they are fully in control.

Didn't want to die? Shouldn't have gotten sick then. It's your own fault.

I haven't flown on a commercial airline in over five years now, because the experience has gotten so unpleasant. I'm a normal-sized woman, even a bit short, and I was squished, as the airlines moved seats closer and closer together. I was frustrated, waiting on the tarmac for 2+ hours with no food and no bathroom breaks and no information as to wtf was going on.

I opted out. Because I could.

Others have chosen to get angry, not at the airlines creating these conditions, but at fellow passengers who seem to be "getting away" with something they, themselves, are not allowed: taking up space.

If you want to see how stupid Americans are, read the comments under this post about an obese man on a flight. And remember, this post is on the very liberal Huffington Post.