Good evening,
Please give me your feedback on this controversial essay. Thank you very much for help as always.
" The U.S. Is becoming a nation of spectators - people who prefer to sit back and observe rather than a nation of doers. " Explain why you agree or disagree with the quotation above. Support your position with examples from your readings, observations, or experiences.
Recently I have come across numerous articles mentioning statements similar to the quotation "The U.S. Is becoming a nation of spectators - people who prefer to sit back and observe rather than a nation of doers." This quotation stirs up many controversial discussions among people. Some people agree that the U.S. is becoming a nation of spectators and that people spend a lot of time watching TVs, or playing video games and much less time involving in building and strengthening families, communities and the country. Others disagree with the quotation, and they feel that the U.S. is a nation of participants and that people involve more in community work and politics than people in other nations. At first I did not believe what I read from those articles, but after careful thought I actually agree with the quotation that we are becoming a nation of spectators especially when it come to the education of our children, our communities, and our politics. Most of us would rather spend time watching reality TV than get involved.
In education, very few of us participate in helping out in schools. It is easy for us to talk about deterioration of our children education. Many of us would rather talk on the phones or read our emails than help out with our children homework. For most of us, our daily planners only schedule going to work, paying our bills, meeting our obligations, and nothing about volunteering in our children classrooms or joining school PTAs. We claim that we don't have time to attend parent-teacher conferences, yet we spend hours watching TVs. We expect the school and the teachers to take care of our children education. It is easier for us to blame teachers, our children, curriculum, or the administration of schools for the education misadventure of our children than to blame our civic lethargy and social disengagement.
In community, we would rather watch a firestorm burning down houses in the news from our comfortable living rooms than volunteer to help out fire victims. We spend time reading our neighborhood crime stories in local newspapers and expressing our concern about community safety, but we don't join our neighborhood crime watches to help patrol the streets. We complain about the lack of maintenance on our public parks, but we don't help repair them. Too many of us lack confidence in our capacity to make basic civic judgments to join our neighbors to do work of community, to make a difference.
In politics, our favorite pass time is watching Jay Leno or David Letterman making fun of our current president or future presidential candidates instead of working on a campaign or running for office. we relegate our politics to experts and political insiders, and we become consumers of public life rather than productive, engaged citizens. This trend is especially troubling for young people. Research has found that young people in the ages group between 15 to 24 lack politically interest, trust and knowledge about American politics, politicians, and public life. Over the past decade, many of us have become passive and disengaged in our politics.
In short, I agree with the quotation that we are becoming the nation of spectators rather than doers when it come to issues dealing with our children education, our community, and our politics. We spend more time watching news and entertainment media and much less time getting involved in improving our children schools, building our communities and engaging in our politics.
