© AFP / Scott Olson
The sight of Antifa mobs smashing their way through the US' business districts strikes fear into property owners' hearts. But what do they expect when owning property is a near-impossible dream for an entire generation?
Video footage of a Kenosha, Wisconsin man trying to impart respect for private property to a group of young protesters has gone viral, mostly among conservatives who hold it up as proof the kids flooding the streets to smash windows and set things on fire are spoiled brats who've never worked a day in their lives. That self-serving reading is only half the story, however: while owning a home and business remains the American Dream even for young adults, many of them are finding that, just like any other dream, it vanishes when they wake up.
"What y'all don't f***ing understand is that people have their lives in these businesses," the exasperated man tells the younger protesters in the video, posted earlier this week to social media.
"
We pay for this!" one of the protesters, a young woman who looks barely out of high school, shouts back,
while the man vainly attempts to draw a distinction between private businesses and the police who paralyzed Jacob Blake, reigniting tensions over racism and police brutality that have polarized the nation since a white cop killed black Minneapolis resident George Floyd in May.
"Are furniture stores the police? Are car dealerships the police?" he insists, before he's finally chased off as the woman promises,
"We'll burn your stuff down, too!"Most who see the video sympathize with the man, who comes off as a defender of the quintessentially American value of private property. But when fewer Americans than ever can afford to own a home, can young people be expected to uphold a value that doesn't apply to them?
Like most cliches, the "
Antifa protester living in Mom's basement" trope contains a grain of truth.
More millennials live with their parents than with a romantic partner - the first generation in over 150 years to forsake 'leaving the nest' in favor of moving back in with Mom and Dad. The trend is only growing: the percentage of young adults living with their parents has
more than doubled since 2000. And the Covid-19 economic shutdown has forced even more newly unemployed young adults to retreat to the safety of their parents' basements.
But this isn't necessarily because they're too lazy to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Many work - or worked, pre-pandemic - multiple jobs, struggling under crippling student loan debt, often emerging from the college education they were told would open the door to professional success only to find all the good jobs have been taken and their law degree has merely prepped them for waiting tables at Applebee's. They don't qualify for a mortgage or even a rental apartment - landlords generally demand tenants make 40 times the monthly rent - and thus moving back in with their parents is their only option.
Even young adults who live on their own are
much more likely to rent than own. While some commentators have tried to spin this as young people not wanting to be tied down, it usually boils down to simple poverty
. Nearly three-quarters of millennials believe home ownership is a "top priority" - they just can't afford it. And a growing proportion have
become resigned to the fact that they'll "
always rent." Do those who condemn millennial living habits genuinely believe that, given the opportunity to
not turn over more than a third of their monthly salary to a parasitic landlord, they wouldn't take it?
© the authorAnti-rent graffiti as seen in Bushwick, Brooklyn the author
One need only look at the popularity of the Cancel Rent movement - support for which can be seen scrawled all over the walls and sidewalks of New York City and other large urban areas - to dismiss the notion that young people are renting because they like it. The vast majority of people, given a choice, would prefer shelter that can't be yanked out from under them for a few months' nonpayment - although, as the 2008 foreclosure crisis proved, even home ownership isn't a fail-safe against being unceremoniously thrown out on the street.
With no hope of property ownership in their future, and banks and landlords still circling like vultures eager to pick off whatever earnings they can, it's no surprise so many young people care little for protecting private property. When they know they'll never be able to afford a home, what's barging into a gated community? Who cares about torched cars at an auto dealership when one will never be able to afford a car?
Communism and kindred ideologies are calculated to appeal to the dispossessed, which is a description that - despite the US' increasingly unrealistic self-image as the Land of Opportunity - fits the country's younger inhabitants to a T.Especially after the ill-advised pandemic shutdowns put millions out of work who were already barely hanging on, young Americans are painfully aware they have no future in the system. So, why not smash it up?
Those property-owners (rightfully!) horrified by young Americans' utter disregard for private property and the other principles once thought to underpin the nation must admit that most of them turned a blind eye while entire generations were deprived of the American Dream they'd been promised.
No, the American Ripoff doesn't justify the wholesale arson and property destruction that have been unleashed in the wake of the George Floyd protests. But try telling that to someone who's tens of thousands of dollars in debt, with no opportunity to climb out of the hole, and now forbidden to work by nonsensical government diktats that are killing more people than the virus they're supposed to combat. The US must either dramatically reverse the 'trickle-up' economy that has given a handful of wealthy people control of more wealth than the bottom half of the population or come to terms with its imminent destruction. The financiers and corporate bigwigs who've hoarded the nation's wealth have forgotten the cardinal rule of the parasite: thou shalt not kill the host. The American gravy train is about to derail, and it'll be their own fault when it does.
Reader Comments
However that does not automatically equate to a desire to destroy other’s property. There is more going on: anger at the restrictions on their freedom would be high on the list.
‘What you finally reach an age where you don’t have to do what your parents want and then the Governments lock you down.’
The Dems are a great example: their sheer rage and hatred for Trump consumes them.
SARCASM According to a survey by the Federation of European Self-Storage Association in 2019, there are approximately 4,290 facilities across Europe providing over 9.9 million square meters of self-storage space. Green with envy supposedly originated in OTHELLO, from Shakespeare, green being referred to as an ill color by the greeks. common bookkeeping practice due to red ink standing out against black ink. losses were marked in red in the margins for quick future referencing. done everywhere book keeping is done, not just the U.S.
As for what Goethe says
just remember he was partially in control of the Weimar Republic. We should all know where that went.
Sitting Bull would have thought ANY non indigenous person has a fascination with private property....
But thanks for bringing up these points M8
People who like to "imagine no possessions" always are.
Do these people look like the hard-knock revolutionary dispossessed, dragged up on the bad side of town to you?...[Link]
This batch look like low-IQ university ideologues with a deadly penchant for crystal meth....[Link]
As do these... [Link]
They all seem to have this 'not-enough-animal-fats-to-keep-the-head-and-face-from-imploding', vegan look....[Link]
Cellphones, adderall, prozac, McDonald's happy meals, soy-in-everything, shit TV, films and music. You could go on forever.
One thing you could say about them though, is they're not poor, they're not underprivileged, they've never know hunger.
...Which is once in a blue moon.
We don't need more education because the education is the problem because it's not education. It's programming and it's programming designed to serve the CEO's and Billionaires.
RC
If you have to load up on adderall, prozac, fentanyl or god knows what else to be able to get out of bed in the morning, you ain't fit for school, you ain't fit for work, you ain't fit for anything.
And that's just lecturers, professors, etc.
“Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!”
“You can’t own property man!”
“Well I can, because I’m not a penniless hippie!”
if you haven't worked for your possessions and or don't have any (or got into severe debt that you don't want to pay), 99.9% of humans are lazy and will say "take my soul, and stuff from others, to give me things and forgive my debt."
if you have worked for your possessions you have, you don't want them taken away AND are not in debt for your possessions you are smart enough to realize those other people are lazy dumb asses that will soon be possessionless and in debt again even though they sold out themselves and their country.
I mean the list is endless. They are quite right say what does it matter because hell they can barely afford a pack of smokes which thanks to the criminals in the State Legislatures now cost an hour's wages or more. Screw the system, burn it down for all I care. Ya know the last new car I had was 30 years ago. It's my daily driver. I haven't owned a house since 1978. I don't own shit and what I do own they are trying to either steal, outlaw, or tax to death. I'm with em myself. I say burn baby burn.
damn good argument. are you talking about the current government,
or the shit system all the rioters and democrats are working on building.
because if you are talking about now, you ain't seen nothing yet.
And yes previous generations blindly trusted officials and media and it is now evident that we were all being led to this point.
But blame will not help at this stage. Only taking responsibility for the fact that this is where we are and only we can do anything about it - just by saying no. And by ‘we’ I mean those who are now awake and see the truth of the deception.
RC
Luke 12 is saying much more: it is about having faith in God’s goodness that He will always provide. Also that there are more important priorities than our food and clothes. Also that humans are much more important than the creatures. God loves all His creations but humans are the greatest of His creations. Some think I am being arrogant in saying that, but it is that we are capable of so much more than we can possibly imagine at this point.
should there be a law against selling your house to someone for an amount they are willing to pay,
instead forcing you to sell the property for less or no profit?
should people not be able to build equity in their homes and neighborhoods through investment?
should owning a home just be done away with.?
in most instances i do agree with yourself and baron....
definitely not when it comes to housing prices though.
I am open to listening to ideas on how to keep costs low, but still keep property worth investing in.
If the ordinary person does not feel like their home is an investment they should grow, then what is the incentive of owning, and if most people didn't own a home how would people rent anything?
At that point would everyone live in a government dormitory?
Seriously asking.. I just can't picture it... baron too, serious....
It seems to me that these industries all serve the super rich and they are supported by governments because the pollies are paid to. This I see as the biggest problem with the US Constitution: that there is no protection for the 99%.
If Central banking were demolished (either strictly controlled or state owned) that would be a step in the right direction. It is the banks that manipulate the market in mortgages and interest rates that have caused this problem, which I think can only be solved by government to restrict the market manipulation so that housing remains affordable for all. That should be the goal in my view.
A system which rewards us for making money on our home is the same system which makes the super rich more so.
RC
Socialism would never work unless you brought back ALL manufacturing jobs.
What is going to happen when your sources of cheap labor run out?
Everyone will be equally as dirt poor since all the money you can print wont buy you anything anymore.
Ain't near as bad as your cut finger (OUCH!) but it looks like one of these: :like:.) You know what I mean.
Hope all's well with you.
RC