There’s a blog I really like (but don’t read much because its posts tend to make me feel angry and upset) called Ramen Noodle Nation, written by a blogger who struggles every day with poverty and just trying to survive in a increasingly profit-oriented, empathy-deprived, narcissistic society that has no patience for “losers” and “leeches” who are too “stupid, “fat” or “lazy” to get a decent job or “better themselves.” (by attaining an education they cannot afford and that has become unaffordable).

This particular article hit home for me. It’s about the way employers look down their nose at applicants who are “different” in any way. Employment has become a process of weeding out qualified applicants rather than finding people with talent and potential. If you are the wrong size, wrong age, have the wrong body type or facial features, don’t smile enough, don’t wear the right clothes, have a disability of some kind, aren’t outgoing or perky enough, live in the wrong neighborhood, or drive the wrong car, be prepared to be shown the door, even if your talents and abilities would be a perfect fit. Nonconformists need not apply. If you have medical problems, you will be overlooked because with more companies now not even providing health insurance, you are too much of a liability. You’d better be thin, healthy, young, outgoing, always smiling, always fashionable, with perfect hair, perfect skin, and have never broken the law (even a traffic violation or that one pot charge back when you were 22 will haunt you for the rest of your life), and no health problems. In other words, you’d better be a Barbie (or Ken) doll. Your actual knowledge and talent don’t really matter. Image is all that matters. Things never used to be this way and should never be this way. But gaining a foothold in the world has been rendered needlessly difficult or even impossible if you lack “curb appeal”–or aren’t born wealthy.

Ever notice the way those well-heeled yuppies on the home-buying reality shows thumb their noses at perfectly functional bathrooms and kitchens because they lack granite countertops, garden tubs, and stainless steel appliances? “Rip it all out!” they moan. Well, people with good souls and minds but who lack curb appeal are held in no higher regard than the avocado tub and Formica countertop sitting in the Dumpster in the driveway.

Throwaway people used to be a rarity. There was always your family, if the chips were down, who would take you in and support you even when no one else would and you couldn’t take care of yourself. Many people still have that, but more and more people today do not, especially the adult children of those who were encouraged, even as parents, to put their own needs ahead of their kids and throw any child who stood in their way or demanded too much or was too “needy” or didn’t make them look good under the bus. Generation X (1961-1981) has become especially vulnerable to becoming “throwaway” adults, but the problem certainly isn’t confined to this generation. Adult children of narcissists are especially vulnerable to becoming throwaways if they don’t measure up to whatever impossible standard has been set for them by parents who care only about how their adult child reflects on them. And our compassionless, Ayn Rand-worshipping society says that’s perfectly okay! If you’re not a “winner” in life you don’t deserve to live. Pull yourself up by those bootstraps, loser! If you don’t have bootstraps, well too bad, it’s probably because you have a “victim mentality.” 🙄

Throwaway People
Ramen Noodle Nation, 6/10/13

We have too many in this society.

What does one do in a society where you are told YOU DO NOT BELONG and ARE NOT ALLOWED TO MAKE A LIVING for the most minute of differences? I faced this when I got sick, said illness denied me high paid enough, sustainable employment which made the health problems worse. I have seen so many talented people set aside via the bean counters. It’s a travesty. Right now we have a growing underclass of all kinds where they know they do not belong.

Read the rest of this article here.

Further Reading:
Everything’s a Competition in America

Forever a Bum to Your Own Family (EXTREMELY triggering because my family is EXACTLY like this!) Finally, someone GETS it.