“If you stay silent, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. That idea really stresses me, because I don’t know how to help other people. I can’t even help myself. How am I supposed to solve problems? I’m obviously a bad person, but I don’t know how to fix it. There are so many things wrong in this world, and I don’t do anything about any of them. I don’t really have the resources to do anything, but that’s not much of an excuse, is it?”
-Jill
Jill, by believing what you have been taught in school and reinforced by the media, you have become a quintessential example of an oppressed person. This entire suite of ideas based on the dictum that if you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem, has three purposes.
#1. By convincing most people that if they do not change the world, that if they do not help build a sand castle at high tide that will last, that they are bad people, the power elite and their mouthpieces guarantee that most folk will come to the same conclusion as you have, that you are a bad person because you cannot make an evil world good. This then leads to drug addiction, drug prescription, sports, porn or Halmark Channel Christmas in July self-distraction in order to render you into economic and moral chattel.
#2. By convincing some people to agitate for change, the ensuing chaos will enhance support for government power. Every riot strengthens the government, enhancing the militarization of the police force.
#1. By accomplishing items #1 and #2 the power elite will draw counter protestors and advocates for tradition out in open view where they may be identified and then either pressured into turning State agent or liquidated at some convenient time and place.
Jill, the world is out of your weight class. Leave it to its own devices as you find a way to chart a decency course through the moral maze.
Let the World Fend for Itself
Big Ron's Baltimore: A Working Man's View of Urban Blight
I'll add this to that good advice.
The "world" IS out of your weight class; but the little bit of it right in front of you, right at hand, can be made better by you.
Your family, your friends, even people you don't know that live or work right around you can be influenced for the better by you and your actions and what people see.
You don't have to go on some campaign or espouse a cause or carry signs or shout or respond to blogs; just be a good example of the way that you'd hope others would live, and someone will see that, and be influenced by it.
Be positive. Help someone that looks like they need it. If someone wants to get loud and aggressive, YOU be the one to de-escalate.
Let a physically and emotionally-scarred warhorse like James do the heavy lifting, and let him hammer the ones that need hammering. You just influence the things and the ones you can reach out and touch on an every day basis ....
have children