That Sickening Sense of Entitlement

What is it with people who come at things with statements like "I deserve this?!" Where do people get off feeling they are entitled to anything anymore? Have they been living under a rock? Have they been on a media diet? Or are they simply without a clue or two?

What we do or don't deserve is irrelevant in this world that is all topsy turvy. Let me tell you who deserves better.

Think of that hard-working father of three, who has kept at a job that doesn't inspire him so he can build a solid home for his family and send his children to school and have them covered under his company's HMO. Then think of him in a 'town hall' meeting at work, hearing ugly words like 'downsize' and 'restructure.' Now think of his heavy walk into the house he has almost paid for, the painful conversation with the wife he loves, with whom plans for a happy retired life have been made. Think of his dwindled retirement fund, the mortgage he is almost done with but cannot keep up with. You have just conjured up a man who deserves more than that pink slip he was given. You have just conjured up a man this system and all its promise has thoroughly failed.

Here's the thing. Stop the whining, stop the pitchy tweets about your pathetic life. It isn't about you. It's about the choices you make. You don't deserve anything but the chance to work hard and do well. And that is a lot. There are people who don't even have access to these. You deserve whatever you have and wherever you find yourself right now. It's the result of choices you have made. Don't like what you see? Then it's your call, not mine so don't complain to me, or to the weary man trying to fix things for you. Life is tough and whiny people can't cut it.

I suppose I could say it isn't your fault, that society has sold you on this false sense of entitlement you so proudly wear. But I won't do that because unless you are under the age of fifteen, I hold you entirely responsible for yourself and your bloated sense of what you deserve. Unless you can get over that, then you'll never really get far in life. And the short distance you are destined to travel, you'll deserve that too. In fact, that might just be all you do deserve.