Who Wants This?

I'm not even going to pretend to have come up with this. I stole this story to use here, because it is important that we lay this groundwork here, as we are going to visit the moral of this story over, and over again. You can find versions of it all over the internet. 

It starts out with a well known speaker beginning his seminar by holding up a twenty dollar bill. In front of hundreds of people, he asks. "Who would like this twenty dollars?"

Of course, hands start going up instantly. 

The speaker continues saying, "I am going to give this twenty to someone here, but before I do..."

The speaker crumples the twenty dollars up.

Does anyone still want it? 

Of course hands remain in the air.

"Well," he went on, "what if I do... this?" 
He drops the bill  on the floor and steps on it. He lifts his foot and looks at the audience and then steps on the bill again, and begins to grind it into the floor beneath his shoe. After a few seconds, he picks up the crumpled, dirty twenty dollars and asks again, "Anyone still want it?"

The hands were still in the air.
The speaker smiled. "Friends, you have all learned a very valuable lesson today. No matter what I did to this money, you all still wanted it because nothing I did changed it's value. Twenty bucks is still twenty bucks, right?"

Life. It drops us in the dirt, kicks us around, and leaves us crumpled and worn. Sometimes we may feel worthless, but no matter what life hands us, no matter what decisions we make, we never lose out value.

Those around us are the same. Think about that twenty dollars the next time you see a panhandler, drug addict, drunk or prostitute. Think about that twenty dollars the next time you have a conversation with someone you don't agree with. Think about that twenty dollars when you see an "at risk" kid, or someone who is mentally or physically challenged.

Twenty bucks is... Twenty bucks.
If we can't start to see the value in each and every human being...

We are still savages.