I was just reading a fabulous piece of literature for my (guess what?) Intro to Lit class, and I just thought I'd share my feelings about it.

The piece was by Bambara, entitled "The Lesson." The story, more or less, discussed how unfair the dispersion of wealth in America is. She talks about how there are so many people who can barely afford to pay the rent, let alone provide things like toys for their children. Yet on the other hand, there are families that are so abundant in wealth, they can not only pay the rent, but afford several nice toys and adventures for their children.

My thoughts on this were this: I am constantly upset by the fact that hundreds of celebrities and pro-athletes get paid ludacris amounts of money, for a job that only requires a little work, and far too much vanity. And on the other hand, there are millions of people around the world who are actually educated, hard-working, talented and dedicated, and they don't get paid jack shit. This is a complete disgrace! An outrage!!! Yet society in general seems to condone it. How can we, as a society, possibly stand to let these filthy, crude, degraded/degrading, talentless, ugly celebrities be overpaid for a ridiculous service that we could most certainly live without????? Instead , shouldn't we want to distribute this extreme abundance of weath to lower-class/single-parent families, homeless people, disabled people, college students and people who REALLY need it? Makes no sense to me. And this is precisely my problem with America. We have got our priorities entirely backwards, upside down, and duct taped to a bed of nails.  I can't wait to go to Germany. They have their share of problems, too, but theirs are far more capable of being dealt with than ours.

Auf Wiedersehen.