Amidst listening to the radio, 94.3 was talking about a
video that went viral because of one young man’s good deed. I read more about
the story on here.
Joey Prusak, Dairy Queen manager in Minneapolis, was going about his work when
he saw a $20 bill fall from a blind customer. A woman eyed the bill and quietly
slipped it into her purse. Prusak witnessed everything and demanded the woman
to give the blind man his money back. She refused and Prusak gave $20 out of
his own pocket to restore the blind man’s lost bill. I was drawn back by this
19 year old’s immense kindness but also this woman’s pure selfishness.
This story
really opened my eyes to the “freedom” that we Americans have in everyday life.
Our duty is to use that freedom to promote what is right. We have the choice to
choose right from wrong. Prusak could have pretended not to see the woman take
the money, but he chose to speak up and gave his own earnings to the blind man.
The woman also had a choice to return the $20 back to the man, but she decided
to keep it for herself. What I found even more horrible was that she didn’t
give the money back to the man after Prusak called her out. Not only did she
make a morally wrong choice, but she didn’t feel embarrassed enough to return
the money.
One could
say that this woman was just a “bad person” but maybe she wasn’t taught wrong
from right. Maybe she just learned to take what she could in order to survive.
Is this just one of the few “bad people” in America, or is she simply morally uneducated?
What is America teaching its people? From whom are Americans learning morality?
How are Americans being influenced to do this or that?
I agree with you Audrey that this woman was wrong to do this and I wonder how many people would have taken the money and then not returned it. It is funny how these two Americans both (probably) grew up in the U.S., but have different values and moral codes. Everyone always thinks of the U.S. of a "melting pot" of different cultures but we seem to forget that this means a "melting pot" of different values too. While Prusak saw this incident as an act of dishonesty and injustice, the woman say it as an opportunity. I don't think we can label this woman as a "bad person" based on this incident because we don't know her background or what she was taught. That being said, I also don't think we can label Prusak as a "good person" for the same reasons. Many people have different values and moral standards in the U.S., but can we blame them for their actions and beliefs?
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