lucullus
What people want in life often comes from what they experienced themselves previously. You mentioned charity. I’ve put 13 years of my life into being a scouts group leader, organizimg weekly meetups, many events and multiple scout camps a year. I’m very passionate about this, since I’ve got so much out of being a scout since I was 7, growing up with a community, that was meaningful and not harsh and punishing as school. I wanted tp give these experience back to the next scout generation. And during my time as scout group leader I could grew even more, making my own life better through helping others. Soon I will shift my focus away from the scouts (currently its too much together with work; also I want kids soon).
I’m not saying, that you need to do this. I just wanted to explain where my motivation comes from. I get a sense of fulfilment and I’m proud of what I’ve done and I’m proud of the kids, that I saw growing up and now being group leaders themselves.
Finding something, that you are passionate about is very important. It doesn’t need to include external responsibilities. Taking responsibility for your own self, like putting in hard work to learn a new skill, can be as fulfilling as the above.
Alcohol consumption. I don’t drink alcohol - ever. Never have and probably never will. And it can be really hard being with people, who find it cool and funny to drink excessive amounts. I volunteer as a scout leader in my country. It is astonisihing, what some of the troop leaders think of ok, when working with youth groups. And often enough even the regulations for underage drinking are broken (which are already relatively low, comparing to the US). They all just don’t care as long as they get to drink as they like. You can probably hear how frustrated I am, though I’m over with fighting it. Won’t change ever and it is not good for my psychological state to go against society here apart from my own personal decisions.
How would one describe “how stupid” these 99% are? Sure, you can take the distribution of IQ, though that doesn’t mean much.
A good idiom to think about: 99% of people believe, that 99% of people are idiots.
Where I live in germany there is a saying: “Anderswo is auch scheiße”. Literally translates to “Other places are also shit”. So I’m currently not considering moving into another country. Though I often ask myself, what I would do if germany goes the nazi route again. The AfD is real scum.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYCRwcz2aV8 is really crazy, that americans seem to think, that you need to be able to get out of everything by yourself. In the line of: If something bad happens to you and you are not able to get out by yourself, then it is your own fault and nobody should help you. Though this is already often talked about.
Another scary thing is how little you like your government (being it of the State or federal). It seems Americans don’t want the government to do much, not seeing at as a tool to handle modern problems. Back when I was at Reddit I read a thread about why americans opposed state run free healthcare for all. One user wrote something like “Don’t see, why we should solve the price issue by letting the state (so taypayer) pay”. The user just ignored the immense power, that a government of a big and wealthy nation has. It can easily press pharma companies to set prices low enough, without stiffling research and innovation. But that would be against freedom, I guess? Really difficult to understand.
Though changing the american system is a big task. Months ago I’ve seen a good video on youtube on that topic by TypeAston. I think its this one Would Universal Healthcare Really Work in the U.S.?