The Treatment Program of Absurdity: 2

Habitat for Humanity

Because of his court order, Luke had to do 500 hours of community service. O wanted to do some community service to both redeem himself, and have some activities that would enable me to transfer to Yale.
On Saturday August 27th, 2011, We shared a cab to go to Grove Street, where we volunteered for Habitat for Humanity. On that day, there were 4 other juveniles who had been court ordered to community service, as a punishment for truancy. Shortly after the director introduced himself, he gave out assignments. The house was almost finished, so all that was needed was to paint the house, and to sweep out the dust.
I was assigned to painting, but asked the director for another assignment, due to the fact that he didn’t want to get my Nike pants ruined. The director complied; and all of the four juveniles gave me a look of disgust, while Luke hit his head. Myself and Luke ended up sweeping, while the delinquents were assigned to painting, since the director wanted to monitor all four of them together.
At the end of the day, Luke and I left in a jolly mood, and we both stopped at McDonalds on the way home. While at McDonalds, I exclaimed, “The director told me a family needs to make $55,000 to be eligible for a house. That is more than most people make, so shouldn’t these houses go to those who struggle?” Luke turned to me and said, “Harry, get your ass out of your sheltered bubble.” I told what I’d seen to Dr. Linkins, and Dr. Linkins made a speech to him:

Harry, the media doesn’t tell people about the s***ty world that we live in. There are political gains. The media doesn’t talk about how 300,000 children are annually forced into prostitution, SNAP doesn’t stop people from dying from hunger and how 20 people in major cities have to cram themselves into apartments.
You are supposed to say that we live in a country where everyone has a cell phone. We are moving to a point now where every adult in an affluent community has a smartphone; every adult in a middle class community; but when 70% of New York City residents spend the majority of their income on rent, it makes you wonder how one could afford a cell phone. There is one simple reason for all of this: People don’t give a f*** about the poor and suffering, so they try to act like things aren’t that bad, so they can get away with dismissing it. Charities mostly cater to people who are middle-class, just because the rich want to keep the middle-class happy, so they will vote for the politicians that they like.
The corporate media also likes to make people feel like lavishing lifestyles are normal, so they will sacrifice everything to buy luxury goods. People are sensitive about how tight money is, so they will go as far as to buy fake high-end products, such as knock-off Nike shirts, just to make themselves seem rich; and if the knock-offs cost more than the Woolworth’s shirts, people will forgo their electricity to pay for it. Because the media depicts high-end luxuries as being “normal”, people will do what they need to do to appear “normal”.
Historically, most parents have been horrible to their children. They coerce them into sports at a young age, and they neglect giving them a childhood; and when kids merely don’t do well in school, parents threaten to disown them. Now, people are now so sensitive about the subject that you are now supposed to say every parent does what is best for their children.I see it as a way of silencing children and teenagers, and get them to conform to when parents never let them have any fun, and bully them into sports an academics, but that’s just me
What I like about you, Harry, is that you don’t have the douche bag persona that most boys your age have. Most people endure so much misery and very little happiness from the time they are children, but they never talk about it, and the sensitivity keeps the media form talking about it. Life isn’t just too miserable to think about, but it is too depressing, so people need interesting stories to keep them going. The life of a CEO of a major corporation: from the age of three, work very hard academically, with practically no fun time, until accepted into Choate; do nothing but work, with only enough time to sleep for about 4 hours a night, until accepted into Princeton; do nothing but work, with only enough time to sleep for 2 hours a night, until accepted into Georgetown Business School; and upon graduating, spending 20 hours a week working for about 30 years, where you might finally have time for a girlfriend; and after 30 years of having merely enough to live in an affluent community, so your kids get to go to a good public school, you will finally make enough to live well. YAY! With how boring life is, people need to make images for themselves. Like an NFL player might make himself seem like he has an amazing life, when in reality, because he has had to spend all of his time playing football to become a pro, he doesn’t know how to dribble a basketball or how to play “Pac-Man”.
When I was in Peru, I took a train from Cusco to Macchu Pichu; and on the way, I saw poverty more riveting than anything the media depicts. It is like I said: people will do anything to make an image. A millionaire is more likely to spend his money on a mansion, and only decorate the rooms people will be in, than he is to spend it on a nice condo, and own luxuries that will benefit him.
At first, what I thought he said was just and attack on the GOP, but I realized that what he said applied to liberals as well. I spoke with people who came form college-educated households, who grew up on food stamps. I saw an article in The Wall Street Journal about how people who live in public housing in Brooklyn sometimes make about 200k annually. I later spoke to Senator Fly, who told me that Medicaid and Medicare are designed to get to the people who are well-educated enough to vote for demagogues, and those who don’t make enough end up often dying from bad healthcare. I sat and reflected on what both she and Tommy told me about the society we live in.
I began to reflect on the fact that maybe it is hard to know who is shallow and who is sympathetic. There was then a part of me who began to reflect on the fact that maybe it was what I said that mattered to people more than what went on in my head.