.We are Lemmings.

"The fact that fewer than 1% of the almost 60 million married couples in America consist of Black & White reflects that "freedom" to marry whomemever we choose is an illusion--that social factors influence and restrict our choices."
-David Knox 2005

We are all to a certain extent lemmings; lemmings to the media, lemmings to education, lemmings to authority, lemmings to this society. To rebel is to conform. Everyone falls into some sort of niche. You may be an artsy hipster who swims against the current and holds up a middle finger to the mainstream, but by no means are you the sole middle finger. The irony stems from the idea of the "inner" you, that little voice inside of you that tells you that you are different, isn't really you. You certainly had a part in its creation but the inner you is a product of society and its pressures. There is a huge argument to be made that the gender, race, and class you are born into basically decides your life. That statement is to be taken on a social level not personal, there are certainly outliers [Martin Luther King, Gandhi, W.E.B. DuBois], but generally this statement proves to be true. Class mobility is a huge myth within the U.S. employed majorly by the upper classes. This whole "American Dream" is basically crap, yes everyone has a certain chance to succeed, the starting points just differ incredibly. We may be the richest country in the world but we also have the highest income discrepancies. Our distribution of wealth also feeds this illusion. The chances of someone moving from the working/poor class to the upper middle class is highly unlikely borderline impossible. The lack of mobility can also be attested to a lack of class consciousness. Most Americans identify themselves as middle class, the average, when they really are in the working class. No one wants to be a part of the working class but are certainly not wealthy enough to pass as rich so they group themselves into the middle class.

Gender and race are huge implications of what you will encounter in your future. Once again this is generally speaking, if you are a white male born into an upper middle class family you will certainly enjoy far more privileges than a minority would or even an upper middle class white woman. Most of us are or appear to be familiar with racial discrimination so I will not divulge too greatly. When it comes to color there are definitely privileges that come with being on the lighter side of the spectrum, racial consciousness is the best of combatant to racial tensions. Gender discrimination is as prevalent if not more so than racial discrimination in this country. On average women make $ 20,000 less then men per year for doing the exact same job. For many women work does not end at five o'clock, many women come home and have to clean the house and make dinner because it is expected of her. This is when home and work become intermixed.

Back to my original statement that to some extent we are all lemmings. Well, we are. Society tells us what the acceptable parameters to our lives are. It tells us our position in society, which jobs we are allowed to inhabit, the amount of power we are able to attain, who we will marry, what toys to play with, what colors we are allowed to wear, even down to what car we will one day drive. So we are lemmings that are at the beck and call of society's norms. So, now what? We can change that, we can un-lemify ourselves. Up until this point I've personified society which many people do. Society, just like the economy, is not some existential being it is you and I and everyone around us. If we are the problem then we are also the solution. Today's deviance is tomorrow's norm. Good luck America.