OCCUPY STUDENT DEBT

I’d be amiss to recount my student debt story right away, though I will later. What I want to express now is my indignation at the status quo, in a place I once was willing to die for, these United States, that has entrenched itself through the obliterating power of a select few, a plutocracy, that has corrupted her leadership, killed her sons and daughters in unjustified conflicts abroad, not only in the gruesome and dire anguish of the battlefield, but in her denying of crucial, life-saving medical interventions, procedures and medicines at home for the elderly, for women and children, for a myriad reasons, but standing above them all, because of impoverishment. There is a place for weeping, wear sackcloth around our spirit and sit oneself in ashes sometimes. We should not feel entitled to absolute, unending happiness as long as we are witness to so much social and economic injustice. There is corruption, injustice, war, hunger, poverty and suffering out there; they are killing one another for parched land, for money, for power, all the while trampling over the fatherless, the elderly and the destitute; innocent people are being murdered and incarcerated without reason and people are being robbed out of their homes; young men and women are sent to die in unjustified wars, all the while the sons of the wealthy watch from the stands, and the wealthy become even richer with the blood of the brave— we cannot remain untouched by this, not all of the time. Though in truth, if you are in this site, odds are that you are already aware of these tragedies and the plight of many, for you yourself have withstood the burden of inequaltiy, believed that college would open up your life to the pursuit of liberty and happiness, but instead you find yourself enchained to poverty, or barely making ends meet, just like me, forgoing having a home and family of your own because doing otherwise would be impossible to sustain. When the banks were rescued and people like myself were forgotten and left to our own devices, (but what else is new?) I decided I would not pay my debt back, because financial obligations, the righteous morality of honoring one’s debts, is trampled upon by those who charge interest over interest, making a debt an eternal, unpayable burden, an obligation fit only for the foolish and the naive. At 37, i’m starting from zero, living with my parents with a worthless college degree that has taken me nowhere, being hired for meager paying jobs (one of which was quite fulfilling—social work has its own spiritual rewards perhaps—notwithstanding the insufficient hour salary with zero benefits, but one which had to lay off its employees because of losing a contract), and being ignored for all and every job I ever applied for, except for the latter one, mainly because the supervisor found a resemblance of her deceased brother in me. Although I was desperate to keep the job, I wondered if it was worthwhile to lose one’s tranquility of mind and well being, suffering sporadic, but latent humiliating treatment from my boss, being responsible of finding tired officers working twelve-hour shifts in a stressful high turn-over job due to the zero benefits, 7.25 per hour salary job position as security guards, having myself to stay at my shift risking not being paid overtime, just as it frequently happened to many of them, in a stressful environment that had it rewarded me at least psychologically, never mind financially, I would have have tried to remain employed there, but it was foremost my dignity and my psychological well being, both of which might be fungible, being a practical man as I am if I were rewarded fairly, but for 7.25 with zero benefits, not in a thosand years. I decided to start anew here in Mexico. I found a job a minute away from my dad’s home. Earning 190 dlls biweekly, a risible salary indeed, but better than where I was because here I have no debt, no gas expense, and moreover there’s a sense of freedom in spite of the endemic violence. I wish I could work in the U.S. again, after all im a U.S. citizen first by birth and by cultural assimilation second, but for years I looked for a job in a long span of time and have found none, except the two aforementioned. And I’m tired of searching and being looked over, perhaps because of my student loan default, anyother explanation would be far fetched. So I choose to disavow my student debt loan completely and try to begin anew here. But I will tell you this. If we all disavowed this unfair burden, if we all together did the same, our leadership would be forced to hear us out and reach a fair solution to this tragic, student loan debacle.