WHEN TRUST IS BROKEN

   I recently experienced two of my young family members taking a bottle of soda  out of my truck without asking me if they could. When asked if they were the guilty party , it was of course denied. After a couple of days my brother was able to coax a confession from them. They apologized to me and I would let my brother decide any punishment for them. I did however resolve to explain to them exactly what their actions cost them, it cost them my trust, and that the road to rebuilding ones trust is long, difficult, and not guaranteed of success.

   As I contemplated on how I could best get my message across to them, I became more and more aware of just how important trusting was for the human race, that it touched every aspect of our lives, and if we were suddenly without it, we would not be able to function.

   When we are children we trust our parents to care for us and keep us from harm. We send our children to school trusting they get a good education. We trust when our light turns green that the lights on the other signal turn red. It goes on and on and on, virtually everything we encounter requires a certain amount of trust.

   I believe that a large part of the blame for the enormous amount of apathy that the people of America are experiencing are the direct result of trust being broken.

   Look at our police departments, when I was growing up we were told that the police were our friends and if we needed any help, then just call them and you will be rescued. Well, the age of cell phones that record video has proven that those galant knights in blue seem to not only regularly exceed their authority, but are complicit in breaking more laws than anyone else. And now with illegal traffic stops for ID checks, they are part of an ongoing enterprise that flaunts their disregard of Constitutional laws.

   We trust that when we go to the market to purchase our groceries that the products we are offered are wholesome and safe, only to find that 90% of that food has been genetically modified, and the meats and dairy come from animals filled with growth hormones and antibiotics.

   Millions of people save money for decades to insure they can retire with dignity, they trust bankers to watch over their retirement funds and keep them safe, then those bankers invent complicated schemes with which to manipulate those funds into generating huge bonuses for the bankers and brokers, and then the bubble bursts, millions of people lose their life savings, pension funds get bankrupted, millions lose their homes, and the bankers say, "Oh, we're sorry, but there's nothing we can do for you", all the while these fat cats are tucking away millions in bonuses in their off shore accounts.

   We elect representatives to send to Washington D.C., we trust them to speak and act on behalf of  those people that sent them, we trust that their actions will be motivated solely by the desire to fulfill the solemn oath they took to "protect, preserve, and defend our Constitution", and instead we get lawmakers who are so deep in the pockets of big banks and corporations that daylight can't enter. They blatantly lie to us while filling their greedy pockets courtesy of their crony co-conspirators.

   When everything you thought you could trust turns out to be just groups abusing that trust to enrich themselves, I suppose apathy is the only thing you can do to keep from giving up all hope, so it should come as no surprise that some people take for granted that their leaders are not to be believed or trusted, and after all, who can blame them.


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