A U.S. of modern A. where the State is not a team or a code, but a sort of sloppy intersection of desires and fears (Infinite Jest)

…but who can imagine this training serving its purpose in an experialist and waste-exporting nation that’s forgotten privation and hardship and the discipline which hardship teaches by requiring? A U.S. of modern A. where the State is not a team or a code, but a sort of sloppy intersection of desires and fears, where the only public consensus a boy must surrender to is the acknowledged primacy of straight-line pursuing this flat and short-sighted idea of personal happiness: ‘The happy pleasure of the person alone, yes?’

From: David Foster Wallace’s novel Infinite Jest.