America's illusion of choice
Someone gives you a bunch of lemons. Do you have a choice? Yes, you can tell that person to keep them. You can throw them out. You can eat them as they are. You can turn them into lemonade juice, or lemonade if you happen to have sugar and water. No matter how hard you try, you cannot turn those lemons into peaches without some sort of barter system. That means that all of your choices will involve lemons. Is that a real choice?
Early childhood educators know that they need to limit a child’s choice. So rather than asking what the child wants for lunch, they ask whether the child wants a cheese sandwich or a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. If the child says that he or she wants a turkey sandwich, the educator will generally respond – “That’s not a choice” and name the two choices on the table.
You can get your car in any color that the manufacturer offers, but in the end, all of those cars are the same on the inside. Is being able to choose the color a choice? Or is it a choice worth making? Can a homeless person choose to not be homeless? Can a starving person in a famine choose to eat? Can someone who has been told all of his or her life that he or she is no good choose to be successful? At what point do we no longer have a choice? When must we face all of the consequences of previous choices?
Early childhood educators know that they need to limit a child’s choice. So rather than asking what the child wants for lunch, they ask whether the child wants a cheese sandwich or a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. If the child says that he or she wants a turkey sandwich, the educator will generally respond – “That’s not a choice” and name the two choices on the table.
You can get your car in any color that the manufacturer offers, but in the end, all of those cars are the same on the inside. Is being able to choose the color a choice? Or is it a choice worth making? Can a homeless person choose to not be homeless? Can a starving person in a famine choose to eat? Can someone who has been told all of his or her life that he or she is no good choose to be successful? At what point do we no longer have a choice? When must we face all of the consequences of previous choices?
Americans love to believe that choice and the ability to choose are ingrained in the American culture. People are poor because they choose to be poor. People are alone because they choose to be alone. People work in minimum wage jobs because they choose to do so.
The reality is that choice in America, like everything else, is tied to the amount of money a person makes. People who cannot afford organic foods cannot choose to eat organic. The homeless cannot choose to buy a house or rent an apartment. Those working minimum wage jobs do not have the choice of finding something that pays more. Until we realize that choice is as much a matter of circumstance as selection, we will continue to believe that people are poor because they want to be, ill because they chose to be and homeless because of their choices. That type of attitude bankrupts America morally and monetarily. |
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