The American Paradox - Feb 2015

Keith Haring Exhibition - Dec 2014 - De Young Museum

Since I have been here, I have been very impressed by the sense of community Americans tend to cherish, which I found utterly positive. At the same time I have to admit I have been schocked, not to say appalled, by the seemingly callous way Americans handle their people's health care, which is to me not less than a community concern. This is what I call the American Sense of Community Paradox.

 

I recently fully experienced the best aspects of the American sense of community.
I discovered the city of San Francisco thanks to two websites.Those are great american initiatives which aim to foster local human links. 'SFcityguide.com' offers 60 different free guided tours of the city, run by savvy guides who have been selected and trained prior to their leading of a group.Those guides are mainly recently retired people who are interested in passing on their interest for the city without earning a penny. Thus I learned about the Gold rush in San Francisco,  the Earthquake of 1906, and the wonderful Victorian architecture that is so typical of the Californian city. If one day I retire in Paris I wish to emulate this wonderful organisation and set up free guided tours of the French capital, which would be awesome!
 

'Meetup.com' is also an American concept whose inception stems from the observation of a decline of community in the US, that has been rekindled after 9/11/2001. There was a sudden yearning for people to reconnect, to feel part of a local community. Though amazing the internet can be, the means to chat all over the world in front of one's computer has its intrinsic limits, for a web contact never surpasses a human contact. That is why Scott Heiferman created Meetup.com in 2002, to allow people to meet on the basis of common interests or hobbies on a local scale. Therefore, 12 years later, there are 125 000 groups that potentially allow14 million people to meet up in more than 200 countries all over the world.  That`s how I joined `Walking in San Francisco for Health and History` (but it could have been, `I love Californian wines` or `we are Bolywood friends`), and there I made some friends!
 

I also experienced this way of building a sense of solidarity in my English classes. It is very impressive to see how the American way of teaching is highly conducive to helping each other by fostering interaction between students. It is like creating a virtuous circle by getting everybody engaged in the success of all. I don't mean to fawn over the American spirit, ( my French teacher  friends will hate me!)  but all in all I find it utterly positive, and quite different from our way of doing in France...

"The last moments of John Brown" 1884 -  De Young Museum
This man was hanged convicted of inciting black slaves'insurrection.

On the other hand, with regard to this high sense of community and solidarity,  I am bewildered by the way health care is treated in the US (I am not talking about the new Obama care- nevertheless the principles remain).

In my opinion,  every citizen should have the unassailable right in a modern democracy to be taken care of in case of illness or health problem irrespective of their salary or previous health conditions. No one chooses to get cancer or to give birth to a deaf baby. A lot of those people are not covered by health insurance because the health insurance companies are private and profit driven, and thus have the ability to choose their customers, preferably the healthy ones. Were they to insure a seemingly healthy person who becomes ill, they will find all the legal reasons not to cover their medical expenses. As an example I met Jane who hiked with me in Zion Park, 59 years old, recovered from a bad cancer two years ago, she now has to pay 2000$ a month to be insured, her husband, 69 cannot retire to be able to pay the cost of his wife's health insurance - not everybody can afford that. I recommend you see "Sicko", a staggering documentary from the infamous Michael Moore. As a result a lot of patients are not treated. The evidence for this preposterous situation is given by the life expectancy of the United States which is 3 years less than Western Europe  and Canada. It is at Cuba, Costa Rica and Lybia's  level (I checked this figure for the 2014 year).

The nadir of this system lies in the governance practices of the nation. Political parties and their candidates  are largely sponsored by private companies. This is an insidioulsy deleterious system, for there is a blatant conflict of interest here. It results in condoning a legalised corrupt government. This issue was pinpointed by the French government almost 30 years ago. Thus, they passed laws regulating this financing, forbidding any company to take part in any political funding. Political parties in France are now financed by public funding according to the results of the last polls, and private funding is allowed by individuals to the extent of a 7500 euro maximum amount. I told you my American sycophantic speech was not going to last long!

No wonder it is so difficult to change the paradigm in the US, drug companies as well as health insurance companies are big supporters of politicians who wouldn't give up their crucial financial help, by taking the risk of creating laws that would hinder those companies from thriving.

Conversly our French public health care system  does not let anybody down and treats everybody (almost) equally. However some  know very well that our sense of solidarity might be tainted by selfishness. Our current system leads us to dig the grave of our children by increasing an already outrageous debt because our earnings don`t cover our expenses. This is how we will bestow an overweight debt burden to our future generations. Why: because we are unable to budge an inch when it is about giving up the slightest privileges we have acquired over time.

As you can see the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence...
Or one could also say that it is easier to see the mote in your neighbour's eye, rather than the beam in our's own!