"A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in."

                    --Greek Proverb

Many of the ills that have befallen our society and our world in the past and up to today, even those which we have worked to cure, could be attributed to those in positions of power who worked too often in their own self-interest. From the landed aristocracy of the old European order in the Dark Ages, to the Puritanical, oppressive, yet often hypocrisized ideals of the first American colonies that we catch a harsh glimpse of in reading The Scarlet Letter, slave owners and westward expansionists, to the pursuits of Big Business, fascist dictators, militant tyrants, and even American congressional members(!), when the goals of a society are so limited by the vision no less the definitively aspired gains of a select few, the many then suffer.

This is not to discount individualism and the overwhelming freedom and well-being it has brought to Americans and others of the western world, some would argue in contrast to the more often collectivist, what could be debated as almost “authoritarian,” cultures that are typical of the eastern hemisphere. Individualism has become synonymous with free-thought, free-speech, free-”dom” and no literary movement better took hold of America in the 19th century and spurred on the expansion of the frontier than Transcendentalism, in which Emerson and Thoreau advocated for an appreciation of nature, of one’s self worth and independence, against the corruptive effects that religion, politics, and society as a whole could have on an individual. However, our individualistic culture has come to more largely value personal achievement, no matter the expense to the larger group, over the ideas of Emerson or Thoreau, even the democratic tenets and individualism that Thomas Jefferson fought for in the Declaration of Independence. We live and die by competition, a product of the all-too wavering boom-and-bust capitalist economy that we, Americans, so cherish, despite the underlying hands of corporations, individuals with so much unnecessary wealth that they can decide our very elections like the Koch brothers, and, yes, even wasteful, often confused in its goals, bureaucratic government.

With the failure to plant literal trees at this point (more directly by cutting down on carbon emissions and investing in newer energy alternatives than coal and oil as we’ve, to the distaste of a whole half of America, slowly, but not heavily enough, begun), as well as the foresight and care for the state of our Earth, our resources, our opportunities, our liberties for future generations, this competition could actually mean our destruction. It is to the huge detriment of our society that our political system can be so whimsically influenced by the unfathomable amount of money that Exxon Mobil and other Fortune 500 companies, not-for-profit and, often not effectively spending their money, charitable organizations, hedge funds, the Koch brothers, those with no interest but their own in mind can donate during elections, forcing so many of our politicians in congress to the President to the heads of government agencies to be admittingly, and so unfortunately, limited in their decision-making by the ties that got them there. They buy a voice in a way that no amount of Americans ever could’ve, and thus the power to ensure that the trees that are planted will shade themselves, rather than more everyday Americans as well as our future ones, as much as possible.

Consequently, America today is a society riddled with distrust, exhaustion, and a growing apathy towards our future. As much patriotism as Americans still share, we have yet to reach a point in American society, perhaps closer but still with huge strides to make during the Progressive Era of the early 20th century and the New Deal under Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that the cultures, opportunities, and needs of our varied people have truly meshed to create a strong, compassionate, future-oriented America. This is what continued racial disputes, a stifled middle and working class, the hypothesized mass extinction of countless animal species in our world and the needed conservation effort, the looming effects of climate change, student debt to the state of our mental health system,  inequality of gender, race, sexual preference, income, etc. all across the world, and the terror, violence, and genocide that still pervade the Middle East and Africa all call for!

America, today, could be described as a rapidly puncturing rock face of deep divides and chasms on which countless everyday Americans feel they have slipped within the cracks and feel helpless to the issues of today’s world. However, those chasms are best filled with an urgent and undying approach to create the solution that does not solely rely on individual pleasures or beliefs but creates the safest, happiest world for the most possible, that the Earth may spring up again from those cracks, that the rock face might transform into a verdant countryside, and countless trees be planted for many generations to come.