Posted by
Rural Anorak on Friday, July 18, 2008 8:58:33 AM
What is wrong with people these days? They appear to wait for someone, anyone, to take care of them. This spring/summer, when the Midwest was being flooded, I saw a gentleman on the news stating that he was waiting to see what the government was going to do to fix his problems. Why? Why couldn't he start to rebuild himself? What has happened to the "can do" spirit of previous generations?
A few years ago, Tom Brokaw wrote about "the Greatest Generation" and what they went through with the Great Depression and the second World War. They did what needed to be done. Go back to the 19th Century as the pioneers expanded into the West; go back to the 18th Century to the Revolution; go back to the 17th Century and the founding of the Colonies. Go back to all these eras and you will see that difficult choices were made, they had to be made.
For all that the difficult choices had to be made, there were still the individuals who wanted to be taken care of. Everyone wants to be taken care of at some level, the key is that we recogize when we have to make the tough decisions and get the job done. Lets take a look at Jamestown. We all know that Jamestown was the first permanent English colony in the New World. Why? Why did it succeed when twenty-two years prior the Roanoke Island colony failed. Jamestown wasn't in a better location, it was established in a swamp surrounded by mosquito infested, brackish water. Why did it succeed? The early colonists had members who were treasure hunters, they wanted the gold, they were willing to wait for the ships to bring supplies from England. It took someone to make a stand before the colony began to survive. That someone was Captain John Smith. What did he do? He instituted several practices that put the colony first, he began to barter with the Powhatans, the said "he that will not worke, shall not eate." This idea worked from 1607 to 1609 when Smith left the colony. After his departure, the treasure seeking element came to the fore and the collection of provisions declined. The summer of 1609 was very hot, a drought to be exact, but the colonists were content to wait for supplies. Summer turned to winter and the winter of 1610 was brutal. The supplies hadn't arrived. This period of 1609-10 is known as the Starving Time and almost ended the colony of Virginia. By the time the supply ship arrived (it had been delayed by storms and other weather conditions) there were only sixty-five survivors. Had they made the difficult choices of putting aside their greed and working toward building the colony, there may have been more survivors.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, it shows us where the mistakes were. The problem is we don't understand how something so obvious could have been overlooked. Its a difficult choice for that reason. The gentleman I mentioned earlier was going to wait until FEMA came through to give hime money to rebuild his home, because he didn't have insurance. The difficult that he faced, before the flood, was does he sped money on insurance every month that he may or may not need, or does he spend money on something more "fun." Whatever the reasons he had, he choose not to purchase the insurance and is now waiting to be taken care of. So why isn't this man taking a lead in his own rebuilding? So he didn't have insurance, that doesn't mean he cannot take an active role in putting his life back together after the flood. Waiting puts a drain on the resources available to the extent that when people are finally assisted they only get the barest minimum. By making the difficult choice of working to meet the goals, then the final outcome will be much more than the minimum.