By Charles Springer
It’s the Christmas season again. And the shoppers are out in droves. Yet, there are people in this very city who have no one to celebrate this or any holiday with. These are people who have been cast aside and told that because of their present situation they are not worth the time or effort to be loved or cared about. These are the very people who have been categorized and labeled for the past months for political and financial gain.
Now that the elections are over, the Bill Bauers and Tony Streets can climb back under their rocks and rest easy. These are the people who would rather see a person starve than give them a crumb from their tables and throw away the leftover food. These are the same people who helped to stifle the living wage law with lies and deceptions. These are the same type of people who would rather give big corporations tax breaks than money to the education and well-being of our children. These are some of the same types of people who are in Washington right now making decisions for the American people that are destroying the very fabric of this once great and powerful nation.
And what are “We the People” doing about this? What kind of a message are we sending to these types of people? Our very sheepishness and compliant attitudes keep them in power and give them power to take away the things that we hold dear in our lives. If you look at the United States now, and compare it to the pre-green jelly bean eating presidential times, it has gotten worse not better. We have children killing each other in the schools and on the streets. And the very fabric of the family structure, on which much of our society is based, is almost completely gone. Divorce and single parent families have now become the norm. And what are we doing about it?
Yes, there are some who speak out, but the majority of us are so use to it all that we accept this as the norm when it is not. The ones who suffer most are the children; they are the ones who are going to inherit this country and what are we giving them? A country that has no guarantees of stability in the workplace or social structure? A country that tells its citizens that profit is more important than the human beings who make those profits a reality for the employer?
It’s a wonder that our children even want to be a part of this type of country. I know many of the ones who hang out on the Promenade think this country is screwed up. And we wonder why drug abuse and sex is so high among the junior high and high school level kids these days. It’s the very values that we want them to have that society as a whole is losing. And the way the country is heading now, the degeneration of the youth is going to get worse.
There are more and more kids winding up homeless and being forced to grow up fast or die out here. We, as adults, have to become more responsible in this and start speaking out more to show the “powers that be” that We the People control the country, not some special interest group or some corporate-backed lobbyists. We the People need to take this country back from those who have no interest in the future of this democracy or the common man who MAKES the money for the corporations. We the People need to start making a difference and showing the might of the majority rule. And it starts right here in our own backyards, here in Santa Monica.
We the People should show these Rush Limbaugh clones that, as human beings, we have the power to change our society and make it better than it is. That we have the best interest of this city, county, state and country on our minds and in our hearts. We the People have to stand up for what we believe in, not for something that will benefit only the 1 percent. That 99 percent is more than 1 percent should be obvious to anyone who has half a brain. Yet 1 percent controls 99 percent in this country. Thomas Jefferson said that the Constitution should be “washed in blood” every 20 years. Well, a peaceful revolution has to happen in this country, and it all starts at home.
Charles Springer, who is homeless and lives in Santa Monica, is a regular columnist.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 16, 2002. Read the original PDF.