‘American Dream’ just a dream

 In response to the Nov. 2 issue of Southern News entitled, “Redefining the American Dream” by Stephan Shymansky.

DAN EFIRD — Special to Southern News

It seems as though there is still this belief that the “American Dream” exists. As is pointed out, “It allows for one to hold a job, have advancement opportunity, own a home and have a certain level of independence in life.” For one thing, the idea of one being able to hold down a job and own a home is preposterous.

I know of someone who has had her job for more than 11 years and is the highest paid employee at that job; she still rents a very tiny apartment. Having a job and being able to keep it to the point of “advancement” doesn’t necessarily mean that one can automatically own a home. That “American Dream” is still way off.

Most of the time, the “American Dream” is seen as this idea that one should own a home, be married and have wonderful obedient children that everyone hopes for. But where does this dream come from? The place we have always seen this dream become a reality is on the television. Ever since, what the 1950s, there has been “the perfect family” depicted on TV. The working, but still lovable father; the stay-at-home and happy wife and the two over-reaching obedient children (most likely a boy and a girl), completely devoid of any real feelings, hiding behind their overly ecstatic, robotic smiles.

The mainstream media is exactly where this dream comes from. That is why it is called a DREAM! This never really happens. Divorce rates in this country are still around 50 percent. So people still get married and may have kids and own a home, but even that dream ends sooner or later. People fall out of “love” and get a divorce, which results in one or both partners to lose their home and/or their children. So right there in that one little statistic, the so-called “American Dream” falls completely apart.

Shymansky goes on to say that this “American Dream” has been made possible by the U.S. economy. However, it is totally put to death when he states that, “currently we are in a recession, the market is in a poor state, jobs are scarce and overall the economy is not looking up.” Yet, our economy is what has made this dream possible? In fact, if the market and job opportunities are scarce, isn’t that whole idea of having a job and owning a home still just a tad out of reach? Again it is pointed out that, “It seems that achieving the American Dream today is much more complicated than in the past.” I would say so, seeing how this “American Dream” has never been more than a dream.

The question of the day seems to be why is the idea of the “American Dream” under attack? I would have to say the answer to that question is actually quite simple. It is because some people have been so blind-sided by the media that this idea not only exists, but still happens today. It is still believed in so much around the world that people from other countries want to come here because of it– because they still believe that this “dream” can become reality which, unfortunately, it cannot.

How can something that doesn’t exist become reality? Here is some good advice: stop lying America!