Performance reviews - how do you handle t hem?

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cubedemon: briefly - none of this has anything to do with nobility.

And nobody cares who you blame or don't blame.

In this country, as has always been true in this country, able people have opportunity, which means that they aren't shut out (much) by class or caste, family background, a long list of other things that define, in other countries, what work you may and may not do, how you may or may not live, what education you may or may not have.

"Able" simply means "can do [thing you want to do] in the current circumstances." There is no absolute definition. If you're going to succeed in this country you have to be energetic because it takes a great deal of energy to keep making an enterprise work day after day. Nobody else will come along and make it work for you. If you have the strength to do the thing you imagine, make that thing happen, and it's not actually illegal, then you'll find few barriers here. That's all "opportunity" means. And it's in contrast to how things work and have worked in many other places. In that sense, commodification is a good thing. If most endeavors are translatable to money, and there are no social rules saying who may and may not have money, then anyone whose natural talents allow them to get money can play.

I'll make that more tangible. I'm a writer. In this country most writers are poor unless their families are rich. You get no support from the state for being a writer, and there is no market for much writing. People don't want to buy it. This state of affairs upsets a lot of writers, who believe the government should support them with grants because of the cultural importance of what they do. I think this is insane. The very last thing a writer wants is a government grant, because once the government starts paying, the government starts caring about what you write and starts trying to control it. That's a terrible state of affairs, just ask Solzhenitsyn. So unless you enjoy writing propaganda for whoever's in office, you're much better off being poor and tired and working a day job and writing what you please, secure in the knowledge that nobody cares about what you're doing. .

It's a bad business when your society is ruled by ideas, rather than something as neutral as money. Because the ideas have to be someone's ideas, and they're likely to be quite, quite loony, with few contact points with reality. I have never seen things get nastier faster than in a group of powerful people fighting over whose ideas will run the show.

Speaking of loony ideas: Protestant theology likes to ascribe success to God's favor and virtue. That's because this country was founded by a load of cracked religious zealots. We're stuck with it, apparently. But that's the source of the moral values assigned to strength, helplessness, etc. That old creep Luther and his co-wackadoodles, all busy deciding what God likes and doesn't like.

I think the next two posters made great points.

I just wanted to comment on this particular one, because it speaks to me. Maybe one of those nature vs nurture things, but, I feel like I chose the internal locus of control because I grew up around people who seemed to turn over all of their power to external forces. The 'someone should fix this' or 'someone should take care of me' attitude I encountered never seemed to be good for anything except a reason to complain.
Most people aren't THAT black and white about it obviously, but, my situation certainly was. To me, blaming others for their lack of opportunities was illogical, when I saw there were changes that could be made to change the circumstances, thereby giving one different opportunities. And the more I made those choices myself, the more it reinforced my personal belief that taking responsibility for everything that touched me in life with pretty empowering, so I only believed it more strongly.

There are times in my life when I've taken it perhaps a bit too extremely... when something goes 'wrong' I pick apart and analyze any tiny thing that might have prevented it and not dealt harshly enough with those who have done me wrong because I was the one who chose to engage in a relationship with them and put up with their behavior for so long or was 'dumb enough' to not see an obvious betrayal or advantage coming.
But, for the most part, it has worked for me.

It's possible I would not have insisted upon such control in my life if I did not know the powerlessness that comes with being physically disabled... so, perhaps I need to be thankful for even that suffering.

There is still friction with some people from my old life who feel like I judged them because I'm not like them and take such personal pride in my choices... but, I tell them what my Grandma told me, "you wouldn't worry so much about what other people think of you, if you realized how seldom they did." (ie my views aren't about them, they're about me, even if they think otherwise)

Looking at existence as a whole, what is the extent of our control exactly? What are the constraints exactly? Can you tell me how you derive your answer?

Just got time for one: cd, you ask what happens to those who aren't able. In this country? Screwed. Read Dreiser if you want the tabloid version. You want better support for not-so-able, steer for Scandinavia. Better marry a Scandinavian first, though. They're not dumb, they know half of America would swim for it it we knew what kind of life we could have over there. They don't let too many in.

What openness? What opportunity? If America was an open society then why are there numerous social standards in which one is not allowed to deviate from whatsoever? IMHO, it is the opposite. We are a conformist culture.