“Joker” Illustrates Emptiness of ‘Opportunity’
Politicians and others love referring to the U.S. as ‘the land of opportunity’. Opportunity is great, but if as a society that’s all you’ve got, it is a society without humanity.
When opportunity is all there is, everyone is either ‘a somebody’ or ‘a nobody’. In this nation these days anyone can be a heartbeat away from being a somebody. A friend of mind calls it the “lottery culture.” ‘Somebodies’ flourish; societally, ‘nobodies’ might as well be ghosts.
That is an essential difference between this nation and nations like Denmark. People there actually do have opportunity. They also have a culture of caring for all members of the nation. People can be happy, feeling that they are living fulfilling lives without being anything special. When the opportunity to be a somebody is all a nation offers, people can easily feel that it is that or being a total nothing.
Note: When I went to publish this, the ‘tag’ Medium provided was “entrepreneurship.”