DGp, one's history and personal experiences certainly do shape their opinions and philosophy. (Not to mention education and lack thereof.) But I'll still never be able to reconcile those that expect/demand equal OUTCOMES without regard to ability, drive, personal responsibility, effort, etc.
I grew up fairly "poor", but in a loving family that understood the difference between want and need. We didn't have much, but we had "enough", the result of my Father's 75 hour (low paid) hard work weeks, year after year, at a beef packing plant.
He died when us kids were teenagers (without ever getting to enjoy the fruits of his hard work - retirement), at which point we all got jobs, including my formerly stay at home Mother.
I worked full time at a beef packing plant all through college. (Not the same one my Dad had worked at.) There, I watched literally dozens of guys hired and quit over my four years there. I'm talking about dozens of guys just in our own little department of 15 or 20. The work was "too hard". Sometimes they'd last a week. Sometimes they'd disappear after lunch break on the first day.
That certainly hardened my attitude towards the "can't find a job" unemployed.
I paid for college as I went, graduated with money in the bank. Never bought anything until I had saved enough to pay "cash" for it. And therefore grew up perplexed about the "got to have it all now" crowd.
I'll never forget, about thirty years ago while I was still a "young" man about ten years into my post-college career - watching the recent college grads come into the company, immediately buying houses, new cars (one for him, one for the wife), and complaining about needing bigger salaries, and not being able to attain this or that. This one old crusty guy (about 55 or so at that time) finally had enough of listening to that and commented on how his generation (and that of those kids' parents) had worked DECADES to get the same material possessions those kids already had at age 23 or 25 (as they complained about not yet having enough.)
Perspective.
We've got a whole country full of millions of folks now that expect to have everything they want without having to work for it. And we've coddled it for so long that I don't believe we can break the cycle.
It ain't going to end pretty.
Regards,
D&O Man
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