The American Dream: A New Focus

“This will be the day when we bring into full realization the American dream — a dream yet unfulfilled. A dream of equality of opportunity, of privilege and property widely distributed; a dream of a land where men will not take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few.” —Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“The American dream that we were all raised on is a simple but powerful one—if you work hard and play by the rules you should be given a chance to go as far as your God-given ability will take you.” —President Bill Clinton, speech to Democratic Leadership Council, 1993

“It’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.” —George Carlin from Life is Worth Losing

Recently, as I was doing research on the concept of the American Dream, I came to a few major conclusions: first, the concept of the American Dream has become so intertwined with our identity that to question it in any way is a controversial act; second, the reality of the Dream is truly real to an extremely small amount of people; and third, that if not put into perspective, this dream interferes with our relationship with Christ. I think that as Christians we must have a realistic view of this concept that has formed our nation in order if we are to bring about a change that encourages Christian ideals in American life. First, let us look at a short history of the concept of the American Dream.

Interestingly, two of the most powerful forces underlying life in the United States at the turn of the twentieth century—capitalism and the concept of the American dream—had not been formally named or defined . Even though these concepts were not named, they had developed over the previous century with the rise of the Industrial Revolution and enabled the creation of a large docile work force that was made up of exploited immigrants and other groups of marginalized people. The main tenet of the dream encourages the population of the United States to continuously work as hard as possible. It maintains the illusion that through hard work and ingenuity, anyone is able to achieve success regardless of their current social status. The dream acts as the perfect vehicle to encourage large amounts of the population to work for extremely low wages rather than fight for fairer compensation.

James Truslow Adams was the first to officially coin the phrase “American Dream” in 1931 in The Epic of America, repeating the phrase over 30 times throughout his book. Adams stressed that no theme was more important to American citizens and that it was the “greatest contribution that Americans have given to the welfare of the world.” He argued that ultimately it would give every American a “richer and happier life for citizens of every rank.” In one sense his remarks are accurate in that this dream can be inspirational, helping disenfranchised groups continue to work towards rising out of their circumstances. On the other hand, the belief in it creates a dangerous contentment. This contentment encourages us to remain in our current circumstances instead of uniting for the creation of a fair system. Within the disguise of being a tremendous contribution, the Dream idealization becomes a powerful force that is difficult to question or criticize.

Now we must begin to ask ourselves: what is wrong with this, or why does this conflict with Christianity? We look first to the Bible’s call for justice and mercy for the less fortunate. Although I could choose hundreds, one of my favorite verses that states this clearly is Matthew 5:6-8: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” There is a clear call to “hunger and thirst” for righteousness and mercy that we cannot ignore. So, what does this mean in reference to the Dream? It is obvious when we realize that the most widespread misconception of the Dream is that there is equal access to achieving a good life for everyone.

The reality behind this false equality premise is truly disturbing. In the United States characteristics such as race, gender, class, sexuality, and other factors implicitly impair the ability to participate in this dream, even more than most other parts of the world, for example Tom Hertz from American University writes:
“The chances of living a rags-to-riches life in America are a lot lower than elsewhere in the world. The chances of a child born into a poor family will make it into the top five percent is less than one percent. By contrast, a child born into a wealthy family had a 22 percent chance of being as rich as the family they grew up in. On average, 47 percent of poor families remain poor. But within this, 32 percent of whites stay poor while the figure for blacks is 63 percent. It works the other way as well, with only 3 percent of blacks making it from the bottom quarter of the income ladder to the top quarter, versus 14 percent of whites.”

Hertz then argues, “Consider a rich and poor family in the United States and a similar pair of families in Denmark, and ask how much of the difference in the parents’ incomes would be transmitted, on average, to their grandchildren…In the United States this would be 22 percent; in Denmark it would be two percent.” Most of all, I find it interesting that the ideology of the American dream has much more supporting evidence in many other countries around the developed world, yet many Americans still believe that the rags-to-riches life is a reality for large amounts of the population and something that America has cornered the market on.

So, then I ask, why should people that make up the marginalized groups in our country believe as ardently as they do in a near-impossible ideal? This question brings others to mind, as well. For instance: in America, why is it that a black child is over fifty percent more likely to die in their first year of life then a white child? And why are black women half as likely to get breast cancer than white women, yet twice as likely to die from the disease? With this in mind, is it good for the black community to believe as ardently in the Dream as a Caucasian child? Not to mention the fact that entire black neighborhoods are blocked from getting bank loans regardless of credit history. How about other marginalized groups— for example, Asian Americans that experience many similar problems as African Americans ? Does the belief in this dream prevent these groups of people from revolting or fighting for equality, thereby transforming them into docile workers that inevitably support the inherent injustices in the system? Factors such as unequal access to healthcare, access to higher education, laws that increase the ability of the wealthy to maintain their wealth, and differences in individual ethics contribute to an environment where the benefits of the American Dream are only accessible to certain parts of the population. This directly conflicts with the Biblical call for justice, righteousness, and mercy. Therefore, as Christians, whether we benefit from the Dream ideology or are disenfranchised by it, we are called to work towards justice for all and place the emphasis on Christ rather than ourselves.

One of the frightening aspects of the dream is that its dominance of the narrative of economic success is so powerful that it is considered an unpatriotic act to even question its reality. As with “The Patriot Act,” to question the American Dream is to be anti-American.

Beyond all of this though, perhaps the part of American dream ideology that stands most at odds with Christianity is the extreme focus on individuality and materialism. Individuality as the dominant ideology perpetuates the inequalities inherent in the system and encourages the silent majority to remain voiceless restlessly working for their own benefit. This silent majority can often be seen in the low voter turn out in nearly every national election in the United States. In this way, the American Dream’s focus on the individual exists as a dominant vehicle for perpetuating the powerful survival-of-the-fittest narrative. This stands directly against the Biblical call to love one another (not stomp on them to get ahead), not to worship any false idols (money - try living one day of your life without thinking of money), and to help defend the defenseless (the five million people under the poverty line in the U.S., of which I am sure there are many orphans and widows).

The major vehicle for the survival-of-the-financially-fittest mentality is the humanistic ideals inherent in the American dream. The Dream does not call for the population to come together to produce a better society (or even Christians for that matter); instead, it resists collectivism, and promotes Social Darwinism or extreme self-interest. By definition the dream is a success story involving many individuals, not a united body of people. This brings about dangerous aspects of the dream, for instance, that even though individuality is the true foundation of the dream, there exists a false sense of collectivism inherent in it because of the belief that the entire society participates in this collective dream.

Of course, there are positive aspects of the American dream. For instance, the idea of the dream has driven people to overcome difficult circumstances, overcome oppression, and hold onto their sanity in harsh circumstances. In this way, the dominance of the Dream is reminiscent of the use of Christianity in slave narratives, where it would be used as weapon by slaveholders to continue oppression, but at the same time it became a tool that many slaves used to survive and even escape oppression. The problem becomes which version of the dream (as weapon or tool) dominates. The answer: the American Dream is much more frequently used as a weapon because it is not only used by those in power, but it is also internalized by many of the oppressed, such as the poor and immigrants. Because of this internalization, resistance becomes in many respects futile.

Ultimately, because of the domination of this ideology, the American dream still exists as the dominant vehicle of perpetuating individualism and materialism in contemporary American society. Many studies have shown that belief in the American dream has grown stronger despite the exponentially increasing difficulty at achieving its benefits. The wide spread faith in this ideology also increases exponentially with every major economic movement from the gold rush, to the invention of the automobile, to the internet bubble (perhaps one of the reasons that the belief in the American dream is so strong currently) and remains powerful even after the economy collapses. This concept seems even more deeply rooted in our culture today, forcing me to believe that it is of the utmost importance to continue investigating its impact on our country and our faith.

What should we do? There are no simple answers. We should begin every day by thinking, praying, and meditating on making sure that God is our primary focus and not nationalism, money, or self-interest. We need to remember that everything can be questioned except God’s sovereignty. Also, we need to live each day according to conforming to Christ, placing nothing above Him, and showing His love in all that we do.