Slavery is a State of Mind

Today in the U.S. there is equality which did not really exist when I grew up between all races and classes. But just as there became more freedom and equality between all races and classes in the U.S. something else was also changing, The Capacity for one person to support others.

For example, in the 1950s and 1960s  One man without even a high school diploma could easily support himself and about 5 others. This is no longer true just with a single 40 hour a week job. However, it has been a slow slide into where we are today.

I first noticed the change in everyday people about 1980. Before then people (of all races and sexes) did not seem to slip back into experiencing themselves in a subservient way. But after 1980 I began to notice this, to me, horrific slip back into servitude as a mental attitude of the average American.

When I grew up in Seattle and Southern California there was still a great deal of attitude that the average person always had. It went something like this:

"I am Captain of my own ship and master of my own destiny, so get out of my way!"
This was the western pioneer spirit and one found it everywhere and people needed to get out of the way of people like this wherever they lived because they were going to create the life they wished or die trying. And God help you if you got in their way.

But something has been lost between then and now. Maybe its lower wages or the death of many unions during the Reagan administration. Maybe its stagnant wages or too much college and not enough real life experiences. Too much theory and not enough real life lived to the fullest. Maybe it's all these things and more. Whatever the real reason I worry that the average American is slipping once more toward thinking like a slave to his company or his nation and losing the powerful independence that self sufficiency and a "Do or die!" attitude that has always been what has been the greatest thing about being an American.

Slavery is a state of mind.

But so is freedom