THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 24, 1995 TAG: 9512230020
SECTION: COMMENTARY PAGE: J5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: KEITH MONROE
LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
Lately more and more Americans seem to be feeling downbeat. Polls, interviews and chats with the man in the street all reveal signs of discontent with today and deep worry about the prospects for tomorrow.
People think the government doesn't work, the justice system is a joke and the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. Diseases that we licked are making a comeback and new horrors emerge from the jungles. We are divided by race, gender and generation.
Our lives seem to be turning into radio call-in shows where all the voices are angry and life is one big plot against us. Even entertainment has ceased to be entertaining. When sports aren't going on strike, greedy owners are jerking teams from one city to the next. Movies are filled with sleaze and violence. TV is a freakshow.
Clearly the country has problems. We're going through an uncharted transition from industrial society to something new. Some Cassandras think we're going through a transition from growth and affluence to stagnation and subsistence. There's no question that big, unpredictable changes are taking place.
But the history of America is the history of big, unpredictable changes. We all need to lighten up. Sometimes the grim statistics and awful anecdotes with which we're bombarded make things seem worse than they are.
This is perhaps an odd view coming from a denizen of the editorial page. After all, opinion pages generally traffic in tragedy and folly, malfeasance and maladministration. They are apt to dwell, often with ill-concealed relish, on what's gone wrong and who's messed up.
In fact, however, editorial pages are a bastion of optimism. They are dedicated to the implausible proposition that words on paper can move people to recognize problems and resolve to fix them. Pollyanna wasn't that upbeat.
Therefore, as a holiday service, here are a few things worth rejoicing about - some Christmas and Hanukkah candles in the dark.
Much of the country spent much of last year transfixed by a televised murder trial and by other grisly crimes that regularly made the news. But most Americans don't hack their spouses to pieces, drown their children or commit other vile crimes against the people they love. Most Americans love the people they love.
Despite a lot of moaning about the decline in family values, all of us belong to families and most of us live happily within them. The phone company gets rich on Mother's Day and the airlines and roads fill to capacity at the holidays as we hurry to reunite with our people. Our families may be extended, blended or upended but they are what we call home. Our relatives may drive us nuts, but we wouldn't want to live life without them. Most of us are more like Ozzie and Harriet than like Lyle and Eric.
The vast majority of parents aren't deadbeat dads or abusive moms. For most of us, our children are our dearest possessions, our constant concern, our pride and joy. And most of our children aren't the kind of feral delinquents portrayed in the news or lurid dramas. Most are admirable specimens coming of age in a precarious period. We may deplore their taste in clothes and music, their earrings and tattoos. But we don't deplore them.
Their teen years may be hard on them and on us, but relatively few run off the rails. Most don't drop out of school, but finish it. Most learn more than nothing. Many learn things we never dreamed of learning. A lot go on to college and excel. A majority get jobs, start families of their own, take care of us when we begin to dodder or freak out from believing all the bad news we hear.
At a time of widespread fury at government, it is worth recalling that most of the people who work for it aren't freeloaders, apparatchiks or politicians. They are our neighbors and friends who defend the country, deliver the mail, teach our children, police our streets, and haul away our garbage.
The economy is going through a painful transition, but most businesses aren't heartless and corrupt. Some are forced to lay off workers, but a lot more are eager to grow and hire. Entrepreneurs are endlessly innovative and willing to take risks to create new enterprises. We may be watching the past die, but we are also watching the future being born. And more than most places on earth, if you've got an idea for a better mousetrap (or mouse) you can build it here. Ask Bill Gates or the latest 24-year-old software king.
Compared with most other eras, ours is a golden age. But, as the poet Randall Jarrell once noted, in a golden age everyone goes around complaining how yellow everything looks. They don't know how good they're having it. We certainly don't seem to realize it, but at least we aren't complacent. It's okay to think the glass is half empty as long as you keep hunting for ways to fill it to overflowing.
Still, it's worth pausing to recall that we live longer than our grandparents. We're better fed and clothed and housed. Mothers rarely die in childbirth and infants rarely perish in infancy. We have more opportunities to get ahead and more diversions than most times and places could dream of.
If we make the effort, most of us have access to as much education as we can use. We are relatively unfettered and can pick up and go at whim. We are free to say what we think and pray to whatever God we choose. We aren't at war and have the wherewithal to defeat any enemy we can envision. We may be depressed, but we aren't oppressed.
Next week we can go back to complaining full time, but for one holiday weekend it's not unreasonable to count our blessings. If we do, we are likely to conclude we're having a wonderful life. MEMO: Mr. Monroe is editorial-page editor of The Virginian-Pilot. by CNB