Grrr

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— Waylon & Elephant Journal (@elephantjournal.bsky.social) April 10, 2025 at 2:05 PM

“You let one ant stand up to us, then they all might stand up! Those puny little ants outnumber us a hundred to one and if they ever figure that out, there goes our way of life! It’s not about food, it’s about keeping those ants in line. That’s why we’re going back!” ~ Hopper, “A Bug’s Life”
~

“A Bug’s Life” looks like a children’s movie. It’s really a rallying cry.

In the movie, the ant community is forced to work day and night only to give up most of their harvest to the grasshoppers who bully and exploit them. But once the ants realize that it is they, not the grasshoppers, who hold true power, they tip the hierarchy once and for all.

Many children’s stories share similar inspiring messages of community coming together for a common cause, people closing ranks to defend their most vulnerable, or individuals setting aside personal gain for the good of all humanity.

But those are not the stories we live out day to day.

Instead, America in 2025 feels more aligned with a show like “Yellowstone,” where the theme is us versus the encroaching world. In this worldview, any action in the name of self-preservation is a just action. Morality and loyalty are merely bargaining chips. And the cowboy stands—proud, invincible, self-sufficient—in the center of the story.

While children are told stories like “A Bug’s Life,” “Yellowstone” better exemplifies our modern world: It’s a dog-eat-dog world. Only the strong survive. It’s us versus them.

Us versus them. This false worldview, which many Americans hold, keeps us wary, suspicious of others, ready to believe any awful conspiracy theory about a group of thems, like the cruel comments about Haitians in Ohio. Nothing in life comes for free, we’re taught, and the things you want—money, a good job, opportunity, love, joy, toilet paper—are limited resources we must fight one another for.

It’s a zero-sum world, and not everyone can win.

Meanwhile, it’s getting harder and harder to get by. I have two daughters in their mid-20s—smart, ambitious, good jobs. And still, they scrape the bottom each month. They’re not alone. People everywhere are struggling to keep their heads above water. The us/them dichotomy thrives on our struggles to survive, preventing us from coming together to raise the quality of life for everyone.

Instead of unifying, we’re doing exactly what the grasshoppers in “A Bug’s Life” would want us ants to do: becoming demoralized, cynical, suspicious, protective, and myopic. While we’re coaching each other on self-reliance and making vision boards to create our own reality, they’re slashing essential programs and lining their pockets.

American individualism was never a mantra meant to set us free. It was a plot designed to keep us quiet, small, and unobtrusive. As long as we bow down to the god of individualism, we remain incapable of being true agents of change. Instead of being someone who can be a part of the process of tackling all the inequalities, we become passive bystanders, not engaged citizens.

The myth of separation isn’t just a lie to keep our heads down and our hearts closed—it’s a grift. And it’s working. The billionaires are happily enriching themselves off our cowboy-like “independence,” our stubborn stoicism, and our prideful independence.

We have become so steeped in individualism and all its cousins that we’ve rendered ourselves ineffectual when it comes to exacting real, collective change.

We can do it all alone? Myth. We need each other.

We are solely responsible for the outcomes in our lives? Illusion. We are intertwined; not everything is within our control.

It’s us against the world? Lie. To quote a 1980s supergroup ballad, we are the world.

Fellow ants, we need each other now more than ever. Remember the perennial truth that lives in all the world’s greatest spiritual traditions: We are all one.

We cannot sit in fear in our individual silos anymore.

We have to reach out, connect, and support one another. We must practice empathy, compassion, and be part of the tide that can lift all boats. Even if we haven’t personally fallen through the cracks doesn’t mean we won’t.

Billionaires preach hard work, personal responsibility, and “self-made” myths because they know: if we consolidated our power, the game would be over.

Now, it is time for us to remember, link arms, and take our power back. Together.

There are, after all, a lot more of us than there are of them.

~