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Old 09-12-2007, 05:27 PM   #33
DanaC
We have to go back, Kate!
 
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: Yorkshire
Posts: 25,964
Quote:
So if I do that, and you take care of those you can help around you, and bruce helps those around him, and UT... see where I'm going here?
Unfortunately not everybody is willing to help the person next to them. Not every person is surrounded by people who will help them. The world is full of people who will exploit and people who will be exploited. It's full of people who are resolutely blind to the suffering of people living mere metres from them and it's full of people who suffer poverty and fear on the doorsteps of people who do not see them.

We used to have a society in Britain, where help was something individuals offered and individuals sought. Not enough individuals offered and far too many had to seek. The protections our society has were hard fought for by people who had been cut out of the big cake and left eating scraps.

Poverty, unemployment, health inequalities, social exclusion. These things are too big to be left to the vagaries of individuals' good will. The reason so many people in my country fought to achieve those safety nets is that the system of gentle benevolence was really a tacit acceptance of inequality and brutal exploitation.
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