Is Volunteerism Dying?

That was the question I asked myself yesterday after learning an astonishing fact about a local community theater audition.

Baltimore is blessed with a significant number of community theaters, i.e., small companies that mostly on ticket sales, small donations, and the all-volunteer efforts of people on stage and off.  For theater people, it is either a great way to start a professional career or a great alternative to having one.  The community, of course, benefits both from the works performed and the general enhancement of the quality of local living.  But none of these theaters could survive without volunteers, especially volunteer actors.  Fortunately, Baltimore has never had a shortage in this category.

Until, quite possibly, now.  I learned the other day by way of Facebook that no one--I repeat, literally no one--attended an audition for a new production by one of the city's oldest and best-know community theaters.

That gave me a lot of cause for pause.  I'd often heard of shows that were struggling to cast one particular role.  But I'd never heard of a show that couldn't find enough warm bodies for an entire cast.

It made me think, however, about my own experience as an actor, and the direction it has taken.  I became a union actor just over four years ago, which precluded me from any further performing in community theater.  I did so in part because I wanted to make a serious effort to get professional work, but also because, as a partner in a small law firm, I could no longer justify the long number of volunteer hours away from my firm at the expense of our clients' needs.  (I should add that, in making this decision, it didn't--and doesn't--hurt that my partner is also my wife).  I knew that, if I wanted to act, I had to find a way to justify doing so financially.  So I did--and I've never regretted it.

But yesterday's news made me wonder:  Is the economy so bad that no one can volunteer anymore?

And, if that's the case, where is the advertisement for charity supplanting government as the primary source of public services?  For that matter, where is the argument in refusing to raise the minimum wage, or extend unemployment benefits, or doing anything to help Americans financially, in both the short and long term?

In short, what is the conservative argument for making the lives of Americans better, other than hoping Obamacare will be so bad that it will automatically lead voters to give conservatives full control of the government again?

It obviously doesn't exist.  They don't care about making America better.  They care deeply about one thing, and one thing only.  Power.  For themselves.

And not you.

Which is why you should NOT give them your vote.  Otherwise, a lot more in this country than volunteerism will soon be dead.