How much do Americans
really take for granted? In my class we
watched a movie called “Wasteland”, which depicts an artist who goes to Brazil
to film a documentary/art project to try to help the trash pickers. These trash pickers are Brazil’s form of
recycling because the country does not have recycling. The dump trucks would come to this dump yard
and dump the trash, and then hundreds to thousands of people would walk through
picking out all the recyclable material.
These “pickers” are happy because they are not having to live a life of prostitution
or drug dealing and can make a living in a respectable way. The workers only make $25 a day and they are
happy with that pay.
Again how much do
Americans take for granted? These people
in Brazil are happy to dig through trash and filth for $25 dollars a day
working god knows how many hours and Americans only have to work 8 hours a day
making at the minimum $58. I would love
to see a business man, a doctor, even a garbage truck driver, to go over to Brazil
and work just one week in these conditions.
What do you think would happen?
They would whine and complain about the work and when they got paid they
would flip out on how much they got paid for it.
Americans need to start
to realize we have it good over here.
Even though our economy is in the dumps right now, we still have it a
million times better than a lot of these other countries. I believe that Americans have a much skewed
sense of reality and are so spoiled we don’t even appreciate the good things in
life. To be able to have a minimum wage,
to be able to not have to work more than 40 hours a week unless you want to, to
have government assistance (such as food stamps and unemployment), and to have
the freedom to go out and achieve anything we want. Now granted it is much more difficult than
some to get by in America, but even the poorest communities still have it
better than third world countries.
Americans need to open their eyes and see what a beautiful and blessed
country we have and to realize that even when times are hard you still have it
better than most. If we as a country
could all think this way, a more peaceful happy society will emerge.
Here is the trailer to the movie so you can get a better understanding
Agreed!
ReplyDeleteSo true!!!
ReplyDelete