We're all in this together!

[DanaC]

An interesting documentary following the lives of four children living below the poverty line in modern Britain. As the voice over tells us, they speak for the 3.5 million children living in poverty here today.


One of the things that angers me is the disparity in cost of living on basic needs. It isn't just that the poor can only afford the worst of everything, and sometimes not even that. It's the fact that everything is less value for money. The damp in t he house that wrecks your clothes, and means you have to replace them sooner. The cost of electricity and gas for your home costs more if you are so poor that you pay through metering. You pay more, for less. You don't get any of the savings that come from being able to py regularly, upfront through direct debit. You don't get the savings that come from being able to invest, up front, the purchase cost for your television, your friedge or your washing machine. These things are only available on credit, and the only credit that will touch these people with a ten foot barge pole, is the high interest variety.

Everywhich way.

The rich have loopholes, the poor have potholes.

[Stormieweather]

I think the attitude of, "Fuck you, I don't care if you live or die, I got mine" borders on sociopathic.

It's not just greed and it's not jealousy.

It's the utter lack of empathy and appreciation for the community within which we live. It's the narrow minded view that the wealthy person got where they did without a lick of help from anyone, that they don't owe anyone anything, and that the less fortunate are not their problem. It's arrogance and snobbishness (amazingly, many of the poor have this same pathetic attitude).

I wrote the above, then found the below article, which says what I was trying to say, but better:

A fat, smug bastard friend of mine (that’s his chosen nickname, The FSB) pointed out to me some time ago that pretty much ALL conservative politics are selfish at their core. Take any conservative position on a social or economic issue and boil away all the rhetoric and what you are left with is “I got mine, screw you.”

I thought about that for a while. I suppose its simplicity struck me as being a little too easy, a little too sound bitey. So I sat down and made a list:

•No gay marriage – Homosexuality makes me uncomfortable (due to misguided religious influence or poor upbringing or both) so gay people should be punished because of my beliefs. Stoopid homos…
•No welfare, food stamps or Medicaid – I’m not poor enough to qualify for these programs so my tax dollars shouldn’t pay for it. Stoopid poor people and by poor I really mean black…
•No health care reform – Why should I help pay for other people who are sick when I’m not? Stoopid sick people…
•No environmental protection – Environmental laws makes things more expensive for me and that’s bad. I also don’t understand the concept of long term impact; I want cheap gas and gadgets now! Stoopid…ah, you get the idea…
•Don’t raise my taxes – EVER. The government can find its own money to pay for stuff.
•Medicare – Young conservatives: Why should I help pay for old people and the disabled? Older conservatives: Keep your government hands off my Medicare!
•Social Security – Young conservatives: Sacrifices need to be made, people should take care of themselves, not depend on handouts from people like me. Older conservatives: Sacrifices need to be made BUT DON’T YOU TOUCH MY SOCIAL SECURITY!
•No abortion – The government should tell women what to do with their bodies because I don’t like abortion.
•No prayer in school? – GOVERNMENT OVERREACH!! I like The Jesus™ so everyone should have to listen to my prayers. No Muslim prayers, though. That’s indoctrination.

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Dictionary.com defines a sociopath as: a person, as a psychopathic personality, whose behavior is antisocial and who lacks a sense of moral responsibility or social conscience.

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Ayn Rand’s specific worldview was that “The pursuit of his (man’s) own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.”[i] This is in direct opposition to a functional humane society where the whole must be cohesive in order to provide for its weakest and most vulnerable. You’ll notice my inclusion of the word “humane”. You can have a perfectly functional society without a shred of humanity in it.

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As wealth and power becomes ever more concentrated, the rest of us suffer. Any attempts to remedy the situation by imposing restrictions on the rich and powerful to keep them from fleecing the country is met with howls of class warfare, Socialism and government overreach. Any attempts to remove any of the sweetheart deals in place allowing those same anti-government rich and powerful to pay less taxes (or no taxes at all) or to reap billions in unnecessary subsidies are also met with howls of unfair treatment.

Now that’s what I call having your cake and eating it, too.

These people are sociopaths, pure and simple. As long as they get what they “deserve”, it doesn’t matter what happens to anyone else. Homeless families are not their problem. Malnourished children are not their problem. Uninsured sick people are not their problem. The elderly reduced to abject poverty (as they were before the advent of Social Security) are not their problem.

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Mahatma Ghandi said a society is judged by how it treats its most vulnerable.

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Based on that last sentence, our society is immoral and sociopathic. And becoming more so by the day.


Note: ~~ = sections of article removed for brevity.

Sciopathic society


Also, who decides what wealth is? I think that people who are truly rich know that they are wealthy.

Personally, I find it immeasurably insulting and enraging that the wealthy continue to stack the deck in their favor at the expense of those who are not wealthy. I'm all for doing the best you can, and living with what you've accomplished, just as long as we are all playing by the same fucking rules.