R U what you own?
by Miki Saxon
I wrote a guest post for Sean over at FranchisePick in which I said, “Why does our society denigrate those who work low-paying jobs, when they’re honest, hardworking, pay taxes and even manage to raise families?”
Then in an email Sean said, “I think this is a good topic and one that’s had some controversy – especially when “McJob” was added to the dictionary despite McD’s protestations.
I have personally seen many many times training situations where teens and adults were being trained in basic manners and courtesy that they never learned from home or school. We’ve got this snotty attitude instead of teaching the value of service.
My poor kids work… their friends pull up in brand new Audis they never had to work for. You value what you earn.“
A couple of decades ago I read a study that showed how a lack of ownership tied to a lack of respect for private property leading to a casual attitude to its destruction. (I can’t find a URL, so if anyone out there has it please add it to the comments.)
I don’t think this has changed, in fact, I would posit that it’s gone much further—
- employers consider renters are less stable;
- single people are subject to higher turnover;
- car age reflects negatively on the owner;
- clothes labels are indicative of intelligence;
- and dozens more.
All this goes hand-in-hand with the writings of CandidProf and related posts and the angst found in thousands of article on the subject from around the world.
Am I nuts or is there a problem here?
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Image credit: djayo CC license
July 15th, 2008 at 10:22 am
Yes! U R what you own in our consumer society. We are taught to feed our egos and invite the envy of others as to the autos we drive and the clothes we wear, the houses we live in, etc… Our charactors are less visible to others and much less time is spent on developing charactor than on developing “looks” and accumulating lots of stuff.
There is no doubt that we are taught to be consumers and to respect rich and conspicuous consumers and that consuming is good for business. But, it has always been this way –even when there were only tribes roaming the earth.
The old values have less influence in society and there are new rules in our new culture. But it is still true that those kids who work hard to buy an automobile value that automobile more than those who are given an automobile as a gift.
It is still true that kids who have to work hard for their own money have more respect for money and learn earlier in life how to handle their money, and often become rich.
It is probably true that vandalism is committed by young citizens who have no respect for the rights of others and no respect for themselves and no charactor.
If we could buy “charactor” on credit, all of our problems would be solved.