The American Dream - Redux

(This post is in reference to an earlier post concerning the true nature of the American Dream.)

 I still maintain all of what I said before concerning the American Dream. I feel that I gave a broad enough definition to fit any one's American dream. I also correctly noted that it is very difficult and unlikely to live out any one's American Dream but that their efforts toward it are still beneficial, such as those efforts of the immigrants that greatly boosted America's industry.

One main idea that I would like to add to my previous blog is the benefit provided by those living their American Dreams. I cannot generalize with this, because there will always be greedy people and criminals making more than they deserve. However, many of the tycoons of the Gilded Age serve as a good example of how those living their American Dreams can benefit the whole. While they do create the terrible wealth gaps, these magnates drive the economy and serve the masses. To say that the poor and middle class workers toiling for something more are the only good people is wrong. These super rich individuals usually provide more good than the poor or middle class individual, through good business and philanthropy. As to the greedy, there are bad poor and middle class people as well, although it is of more note when someone of influence gets bad marks. 

Furthermore, in my previous post I neglected the influence of the American Dream. Learning about immigration, especially when it came in waves, taught me just how pervasive this idea is. It reached the furthest corners of the earth, sinking in as a fact and infecting peoples' minds. Even after many immigrants came to America and didn't experience their full American Dream, the global concept thrived, and in a way fed off of more victims. However, these 'victims' wouldn't have always felt tricked. This range and persuasiveness of the American Dream gives tribute to how the country conducts itself, namely being a democracy. Poor immigrants with no more or less money than they left their homelands with may still have felt better knowing that they would be safe. Money is definitely not everything, something which the countless tired, poor, and humbled masses knew well seeking the American Dream from far off lands.

After having learnt about the crucial topics of immigration, the Gilded Age, and the wealth gap, new light has been shed on my original American Dream post. Although in my old post I unwittingly covered a lot of what we covered, there was still more to add. In this update, I have attempted to put the American Dream in a broader light and not just through the eyes of the average American born middle class individual. America is a melting pot, and even though it isn't often represented by the wealthy or the immigrant population, they cannot be overlooked as an indispensable part of the American system.