http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/boortz.asp

Snopes notes that the piece was indeed written by Boortz, but never delivered at
a commencement. Below is my response to what Boortz claims. Please send this to
everybody you know.


Scott Andrew Hutchins
scottandrewh@...

Examine The Life of Timon of Athens at Cracks in the Fourth Wall
Theatre & Filmworks
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/scottandrewh

"But since in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and
stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and
thought, and have to choose, to be human at all...why then perhaps we *must*
stand fast a little--even at the risk of being heroes." --Sir Thomas More, _A
Man for All Seasons_, by Robert Bolt


----- Original Message -----
From: Scott Andrew Hutchins
To: boortzshow@...
Sent: Wednesday, July 23, 2003 10:01 AM
Subject: faux commencement address


I was reading your faux commencement address on snopes.com, where it said it's
been circulating by rumor as an address you actually gave. I found myself
agreeing with you a great deal until about halfway through. Then I encountered
material that failed to corroborate with the empirical evidence of my life.

I went to college and earned a degree with two majors. When I got out of school,
there was no work for me. I don't use alcohol or drugs, never even tried, my IQ
is approximately 140, career counselors have said that my resume is very strong,
a "power resume" in the words of one, and yet I almost never get interviews
despite my continuous distribution of it. Indeed, I would be homeless, and not
through my own choices, were I not living with my parents, including a
pathological liar of mother who wants to kick out both me and my father for
insisting that she do things we have never insisted of her.

My work in the field I am trained to work in has been sporadic at best, earning
me a rounded grand total of $1,500 in the past year, and no one will hire me to
do anything else, even though I am a hard worker and quick learner, and
recognized for doing well at almost everything I try. Within my city, there is a
low demand for people in what I have trained in, and there is no money to go
elsewhere. I finally got accepted to graduate school out of state and I am still
trying to determine how I can even make the move. Essentially, the only work I
can get is in retail, the job type fourth in demand in Indianapolis after all
the health care positions, and no one is willing to make any accommodations for
my health that they are required by law to make. The structure of my feet causes
me severe damage after about seven hours of standing or walking that takes weeks
to heal, and will not heal with continued work. I discovered this when I worked
bagging groceries in the first part of college. I developed foot pain faster
than anyone else, and when first assigned to work an eight hour shift, I had
astonishingly enormous blisters running the entire length of my foot. I left
that job for a job on campus open only to students. Were it not for my
acceptance, it would seem my only choice would be to return to that sort of
work, and had I not filed for bankruptcy and the death of my car's engine, all
of the money would be spent trying to make ends meet, and not toward moving to a
place where my skills could be appropriately utilized.

Your argument that our success in life is defined by our choices is a limited
and ignorant one. Certainly it is a major factor, but much of it is left to the
people in power. People in power have fired me for being involved in a
conversation with a woman in the next cubicle who said in the sixties she was
approched to do a walk-on in an adult film in the 1960s, on the grounds that as
part of the conversation, that I was as much guilty of sexual harassment as she
was. At another job, I was constantly berated by my supervisor, who works a gym
teacher during the school year, as were all the employees she supervised with
weight problems, as having low accuracy, when the team leader who actually saw
what I was doing repeatedly said I was by far the most accurate in the group. I
recently was made a leader at a similar job for another outfit where it was
entirely telecommuting based on my accuracy--something that was denied to me at
the previous employer because of my physical appearance (although I was always
neat and well-kempt) and for another health issue the law forbids them in
discriminating against me for. What can you do when you can't prove it? Nothing
but complain and badmouth them, which just makes you look bad, too. These people
in power are clearly not thinkers, but feelers. Thinkers are not the ones in
power, as you claim.

No, there is a great deal to be said about being fortunate, which you entirely
discount, when a true thinker would be able to recognize it as an important
factor. Experienced people know that being in the right place at the right time
is a major factor in success, and being in the right place at the right time is
determined as much by chance as it is by choice. I knew a homeless man who
recently died. He was not a substance abuser. He was a wealthy emigre from India
who came here as an engineer. He was not allowed to take his money with him, and
when he arrived, after selling a formula, he was not able to get a steady job,
and lived at a shelter, where poor health care led to his demise. True, we do
not have a right to health care, and true, one can blame the victim, but it is
only the reprehensible, morally corrupt who would blame the victim.

I know so many people in similar predicaments, faced with having taken training
in the area where they most excelled, and had the strongest inclination. It
seemed the wise choice. Better to work toward what you excel at than what is in
demand and end up mediocre. That's the wise choice, but it appears that,
especially in this economy, the wise, hard-working choice, is not the most
practical one. The practical one is the commonplace, cowardly, bandwagon choice
based on what those in power decide they need at the time, leaving all others in
the cold, to struggle at menial labor despite their talents and efforts. This is
the whole truth. Your faux commencement address was only a partial truth.

Scott Andrew Hutchins
scottandrewh@...

Examine The Life of Timon of Athens at Cracks in the Fourth Wall
Theatre & Filmworks
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/scottandrewh

"But since in fact we see that avarice, anger, envy, pride, sloth, lust and
stupidity commonly profit far beyond humility, chastity, fortitude, justice and
thought, and have to choose, to be human at all...why then perhaps we *must*
stand fast a little--even at the risk of being heroes." --Sir Thomas More, _A
Man for All Seasons_, by Robert Bolt

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