Can It. Throw it away. Flush it down the falls.
This American Dream that has cramped our nation's imagination for decades will, if not discarded, strip we 99% of Americans of even the last crumbs of real freedom while the 1% uses this as a shield to hide behind their "free market" ransacking of the planet.
It is because of this dream that all the old attitudes about gender, race, sexual orientation, fundamentalism, and xenophobia have reared their ugly heads. This is because our blind adherence to this American dream has left us passive, alone, unnable to think, and unnable to question. We drown in endless accumulation of stuff, rather than face the hordes of "others" that differ in any way from the tiny circle we were raised with.
In a world where we face so many threats to our basic survival as a species, Americans are still besotted with this idea that our only goal in life is to grow up in one closed hothouse, get a job, get married, move into your own hothouse, rinse, and repeat with the next generation.
This attitude probably stemmed from the twin hardships of the Great Depression of the 1930's and the enforced rations of World War Two. Decades of want and sacrifice were so harrowing for the generations that lived through it that the desire to spare their children such constant upheaval became overwhelming.
Hence the Baby Boom generation of cookie cutter suburbs removed from downtowns, enclosed nuclear families, and a mental curtain drawn against the inconvenient realities of the outside world. The desire for a secure existence was paramount. Family values was the be all and end all of existence.
To achieve this illusion of complete security, ideal roles for little boys and girls, men and women were set up with a rigidity that could not allow even a hint of a doubt about whether they actually worked, lest this disturb the mirror smooth perfection of the household routine. Men worked and were seldom home, while women were never meant to come out of it. What could be more "truly femimine" than for half the population to sacrifice all their own dreams for this American one of all wrapped family cocoon?
The trouble with that ideal was that by fending off all human challenge in the name of this complete security, too many of my generation were left in a perpetual state of emotional childhood. The real world becomes unfamiliar, and the unfamiliar becomes frightening. For the American Dream to to remain pure, everything frightening must not be talked about or even have its existence acknowledged. Ethnic difference, sexual reality, religious origins, real economics, science and art, gender "boudaries", curiousity about Earth as a whole, ALL must not be mentioned whatsoever.
Far from banishing these fears, the inabilitry to talk about and confront them freely only makes them larger in their invisibility. Little by little those amomg us with even the tiniest personal differences in appearance, faith, or lifestyle becomes suspect and joins the list of banned subjects. Next door neighbors become competitors and must be furtively watched. Even relatives outside the nuclear cocoon are barely tolerated. Too much exposure to even their livescould infiltrate the core family bubble from within.
Yet with so much of human experience blocked out in pursuit of the American dream, existence becomes an interminable routine of mind boggling boredom. What else is there to do besides obsess over endless minutae and ease the tedium with every chemical and addictive substance around, legal or illegal? Meantime, most of the 1% and all who pander to their interests, use their cunning and underhand tactics to turn the country into a hereditary plutocracy for their families alone. Because family values means no one else's family counts.
This explains the resurgence of outright racism: the plot to deny women equal pay, equal justice, and any access to health care; the slow genocide of African American young men and boys; the seething hostility to immigrants; the attack on unions; the plot to eradicate public education; all are part of the pattern. As long as we huddle in out little cocoons and hiss at our immediate neighbors, we will stay blind to the real creping threat to the nation.
That is why we must junk the American Dream. Replace it with many different ones instead. Replace them with dreams that embrace the widest range of life. Propel yourself from our house, your neighborhood, even into totally different environments.
Could this be dangerous? Yes. There is no such thing as a secure life. Will it involve the risk of having your worldview shattered at any minute? Yes. But you will never suffer boredom again. Each shattered illusion can open up a vast new vista. We can finally live with idea that the family home is where we only begin to develop as a human, not where it has to end.
I realise this only brushes the surface. There is much I cannot cover in one essay. I attempt to explain one root cause behind the symptoms of our country's breakdown.
Because without questioning this ideal, earth will do what it has to do to amintain its own balance, with or without humans. This explains the overclass' clinging to climate change denial. If enough ordinary people understand Earth is bigger than any coccon, no matter how tight, the urge to join together and take on this challenge will gather all our energies so quickly that no amount of mere money in the world can stop the tide.
It's time to come out now.