I had kind of an interesting experience yesterday. Since it’s Sunday, I figure it’s a good day to share the story of it with the world. Oh, who am I kidding? It wouldn’t matter what day of the week it is. But it does seem kind of fitting that today is “the Lord’s Day”, under the circumstances, because I am about to preach.

As I wrote in today’s travel post, Bill and I were out and about yesterday. We first went to a little town called Hofheim, and then we got kind of bored, and decided to move on to Wiesbaden. On our way to Wiesbaden, I was looking at Facebook on my phone. One of my more conservative friends shared a Republican themed post. Basically, it was about how, back in the day, a person could start with nothing as an adult and develop a career that paid enough to raise a family. Nowadays, people go to college for years, emerge with a lot of debt, and have to live in tiny apartments with roommates to be able to survive.

I don’t actually dispute what the post communicated (except for the part about the sergeant having zero qualifications). I myself have three college degrees and international work experience. I had trouble finding suitable work when I finished grad school and got married. Granted, I might have done better if I hadn’t been married to a soldier, which required us to move at the Army’s whims. If I hadn’t married Bill, I might be employed, but probably still be deep in debt. That is the truth.

Actually, the whole truth is, when we got married, we were both up to our asses in debt. But we worked together to use Bill’s salary and my occasional earnings to create a financially stable life. It took a lot of years and effort to achieve that. We have also been extraordinarily lucky. Our parents are/were pretty healthy and had their own means of paying for their care. Bill’s daughters disowned him, and one only came back into his life after she was married. We have both been very healthy, and we don’t have children together. We also don’t have any ties to any specific place, so we can move wherever the work is.

My point is, we have a pretty secure lifestyle, at least for right now. That could change in a heartbeat. A stroke of misfortune could easily land us back in debt, no matter how much “personal responsibility” we exercise. Most Americans are, in fact, a missed paycheck away from poverty. You’d think that given the fact that so many people are a hair’s breadth away from the poorhouse, they’d have more compassion for people in the same boat. Unfortunately, it seems that people are more interested in pointing fingers at others and patting themselves on the back for their “commitment to personal responsibility”, than focusing on their own situations and making sure they can take care of their own business.

I made the mistake of reading a few of the comments on that post. I noticed this morning there were a lot more, but I didn’t read them. It’s Sunday, and I don’t want to be outraged today. At least not until later.

One of the comments came from a guy I’ve known since third grade. Like Bill, he’s a veteran. He enlisted in the Army when he was out of high school. I seem to remember his family was pretty poor when we were growing up, so he did what a lot of kids from poor families do. He made a career out of the military. Eventually, he became a warrant officer and retired. His wife was also in the military and, I’m guessing, also retired. They have a nice lifestyle, and raised two very successful daughters.

My classmate commented that the military was the one track in life in which a person could have nothing and carve out a good career. Other people were agreeing with him, including this one woman I don’t know personally, but have had run ins with on prior occasions. This woman is friends with a lot of my friends from my hometown. I have noticed that pretty much every time I see her comment on something, my blood pressure spikes. I find her completely insufferable. Such was the case yesterday.

This woman was blathering on about how her son had just finished dental school, courtesy of the Army. He would be reporting for duty on July 1, along with his engineer wife, who also “worked her ass off”. She bragged about how he has no student debt, because he joined the military. She’s so proud of him for being smart, and getting trained for a career that will serve him well in life. As a former Army wife, I hope her son’s wife is prepared for the potentially nomadic lifestyle she’s about to embark upon. She may have some trouble using that engineering degree. But maybe she won’t. Time will tell. I also hope her son stays out of danger and never develops a problem that makes practicing dentistry difficult or impossible for him.

Now… I don’t blame her for being proud of her son. Dental school isn’t easy. And I think it’s fabulous when people are willing to work for their education by serving their country in the military. I have no qualms whatsoever about that at all. That’s what Bill did, and I agree, it’s served him very well. He makes really good money, and we have a nice lifestyle.

What upset me about her comment was the rest of it… in which she pretty much took a shit all over anyone who chooses to go to college and get a degree in what she deems a “worthless” field of study. I admit, I didn’t read her comment very carefully, because I found it pretty offensive. I do remember she used a “sociology degree” at Elon University as an example. Apparently, she doesn’t think there’s any worth in studying sociology.

She probably has similar negative thoughts about people like me, who studied English in college… or anyone who studies one of the fine arts. This woman thinks that the only degrees worth having are the ones that will lead to high paychecks. And those of us who may not have a talent or interest in science, math, technology, business, mechanics, or healthcare are just shit out of luck… or should just become mediocre at jobs we’ll hate.

I had a visceral reaction to that woman’s post. It was so sudden that it even surprised me. I blurted out, “Oh my God, this is absolutely dreadful! I’ve got to block this bitch right now!”

Then Bill and I both laughed, because it was really a funny moment. I mean, I’ve never even met this woman in person, and she’s certainly entitled to her opinions. But every time I see something she’s posted, it makes me sick to my stomach. I can picture her, and her type, because she’s from the town where I grew up, and she’s one the “gang”.

My hometown is rife with people who have never been anywhere, but think they know a lot about how the world works. They’re the type of people who live in a small town their whole lives, become entrenched in the local group think about most issues, and never actually consider any other perspective other than what they’ve been taught by their forebears.

They are the type of people who will go to church on Sundays, listen to the white Protestant version of Christian doctrine, then go home and post racist and classist things on social media. They are the type of people who look down their noses at people who care about others, want to create beautiful things, don’t want to spend their whole lives being a wage slave for a corporation, or maybe don’t identify as male or female. I’ve found that most of them have very rigid, closed minded thinking, and no matter what, you can’t get them to think outside of that tiny box.

I want to make a couple of points related to my visceral reaction to that woman’s post. The first has to do with the false notion that a person can join the military with nothing and be a success. I’m actually surprised that my former classmate, who has years of military experience, would post that.

The truth is, not just anyone can join the military. It is true that a lot of people, if they are young enough, and healthy enough, can join and do fine. But not everyone is lucky enough to have adequate physical health, even when they’re young. Recruits have to have a basic level of intelligence and an aptitude for some kind of skills that the military can use. They have to have basic level of mental health and toughness in order to succeed.

My husband once commanded a basic training company. Sometimes, there were recruits who couldn’t hack it and had to drop out. It’s true that many of them simply needed a kick in the ass, but some just weren’t suitable for the military life and had to quit. They weren’t going to succeed, no matter what. Some of those folks might have made fine musicians, artists, or poets, though. Why shouldn’t they be able to go to an affordable school to learn how to employ their actual talents, while they also learn how to make a living?

The second point is that there is no such thing as a worthless course of study, nor is there such a thing as “unskilled labor”. Every job requires a skill of some sort. Not all jobs are created equally, but they all require something… whether it’s people skills, physical stamina, math, reading, or something else. My guess is the woman who inspired today’s post enjoys movies, music, television shows, books, and other modes of entertainment. Well, does she think that babies come out of the womb able to succeed in those fields?

I mean, yes… people are born with innate talents. Sometimes they can use those talents with no instruction whatsoever. But even someone with an innate talent will perform better with some training. I’ll give you an example. Take James Taylor. James Taylor is a man who clearly has natural talent for music and writing. He comes from a wealthy family, and had a mother who was very invested in nurturing her children’s innate artistic proclivities. Those factors were certainly helpful in Taylor’s very successful music career. But, what many people might not realize is that Taylor, who started playing cello when he was a boy, and later changed to guitar, never learned how to sing properly until he was an adult.

James had always done what came naturally, never having taken the time to learn vocal techniques that would help him keep his voice healthy for as long as possible. His long time former backup singer, Arnold McCuller, eventually convinced him to learn some methods of singing that would improve his voice and help it last. And, as you can see, James Taylor still has a career that endures, even at 76 years of age. Ditto to Jackson Browne, who also picked up some techniques from McCuller. Arnold McCuller learned those skills from someone, didn’t he?

As someone who has also studied voice, and learned some rather miraculous vocal techniques from a gifted teacher, I know of what Browne and Taylor have described. Many people think if you’re born with a good singing voice, you can simply do what comes naturally and maybe make some money. But professionals know that you can learn some techniques that will improve and enrich that natural gift. The idiot woman from my hometown probably really loves music by (ironically liberal ) musicians from the 70s. But she’d probably scoff at someone who studies music at college. To people like her, that’s a waste of time. She thinks everyone should study business or nursing or engineering. The rest of those fields of study are dismissed as “Mickey Mouse”.

I’ll bet she’s the kind of person who complains about newspapers that have articles behind paywalls. Because why should she have to pay for journalism? Anyone can write a news story, right? Anyone can paint a picture, or frame that picture… or make a baby blanket for whatever the supplies cost, with no labor costs included. In case you were wondering, I am being sarcastic. I’m actually kind of fuming, as I write this. My mom was a professional church organist for over 50 years, and she worked very hard to play music that inspired and uplifted people. She also ran a knitting and needlepoint business, and used her formidable talents and skills to make beautiful things. And she regularly had to deal with dipshits like the hometown woman who felt that her time wasn’t worth the money she charged for all she did.

There’s a place in the world for people who want to learn about women’s studies, anthropology, theater, dance, English literature, and yes, sociology. We can’t all be plumbers, undertakers, soldiers, business tycoons, or dentists. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want an untalented nurse taking care of me when I’m sick. I don’t want a warm body who happens to know how to start an IV putting one in me when I’m not well. I want someone who enjoys the work and does it well.

The United States is a country where that can and should be possible. It’s supposedly the richest and most powerful nation on Earth. But Republicans only value people who can make money… and they don’t have regard for the people who can’t. Then they complain when those who can’t find suitable work that pays enough end up homeless, and sleep on the sidewalks by their fancy boutiques or in public parks… which, by the way, belong to the homeless as much as they do the wealthy. Maybe if people like that hometown woman weren’t so selfish and entitled, people who are down on their luck could get the help they need to get back on their feet again.

People like hometown woman don’t mind that some folks have to resort to GoFundMe to pay their medical bills and burial costs. They can choose whether or not to contribute to that. But heaven forbid someone get welfare assistance. Because why should she have to help “THOSE PEOPLE”, who made such “poor choices” when they were 18 years old? It’s all I can do not to pull a Dorothy Zbornak.

Anyway… I probably better end this post before I get too riled up. But yes, I think it’s a good thing that I used the block button. Because, as I’ve repeatedly stated, courtesy of George Carlin, I “don’t want to have anything to do with an asshole like that…”