Supreme Court Justice is Sick of the “Poor Me” Culture in America

In a speech at the Library of Congress on Thursday, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas let the audience know that he was no fan of the victimhood culture roiling today’s college campuses. In remarks that will no doubt anger those on the left who make their money by telling young minorities that they are being held down by THE WHITE MAN, Thomas said that there would soon come a day when the American public grew tired of these spoiled brats and their endless search for someone else to blame.

Thomas told the crowd that he’d recently visited a college campus in Kansas where a black student told him that she was more focused on completing her studies than embroiling herself in the political frenzy that so many campuses have played host to. This, to Thomas, was a good thing to hear.

“At some point,” he said, “we’re going to be fatigued with everybody being a victim.”

Noting that he did not grow up in the best of circumstances, he praised his family for making the most of what they had. “You always have to play the hand you’re dealt,” he said. “If you’re dealt a bad hand, you still have to play it.”

It’s a shame that more young people aren’t getting their life lessons from the same well that Thomas drew his from. This is a man who overcame extraordinary odds to become only the second African-American in our nation’s history to sit on the Supreme Court. And his is only one of many, many stories of people playing a bad hand like a Vegas poker champion. Just because you were born into poverty doesn’t mean you have to stay there. Just because you see “oppression” in society doesn’t mean you have to let it hold you down.

But even tales of wild success disguise the greater truth in what Thomas is saying, because the fact is that you don’t have to turn yourself into a world-beating hero of law, a touchdown-scoring champion of the gridiron, a rock star, or even a successful business owner to “make it” in this country. Play the hand you’re dealt, yes, but also recognize that your hand is only “bad” insofar as you give it that label. Satisfied, happy people didn’t get that way through some external accomplishment – 99.9% of the time they were that way the whole way up the ladder. Don’t put off your happiness. Don’t let your internal peace be dependent on worldly circumstances – EVER. If you can learn that trick, you won’t have to worry about attaining success, because you’ll already have it.