No Entry Into The Clubhouse

We are just getting so many messages from the media that have nothing to do with most people's reality, and the disconnect just seems to be getting bigger and more blatant. Ads for multi-million dollar houses that make it seem like everybody lives that lifestyle. Advice columns on how to negotiate raises, when an employer would just as soon replace you with someone who will work cheaper. Houses in movies and on TV that are palatial, when the people (and the actors who play them) on the screen live lives of leisure. Plot lines on TV and movies where people leave their jobs and are immediately recruited by multiple employers. Commercials for expensive medical procedures that show the family next door and suggest universal availability (and, conveniently, don't ever mention the price). Yes, there is an microscopically small part of the population that sees those things in the sphere of their existence. And that is part of the problem--that there is a "performer class" being created so the rest of us can be spectators to a lifestyle we are led to believe we would be part of, but for our negligence in getting into the clubhouse.