OT: Jibjab, Politics, the Big Bang and more!

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
What on earth are you talking about? I've never even read catholic dogma, so I have no idea where you got this particular notion.

Coincidence, then, that you parrot one of their notions. Bound to happen, alas, since they've influenced (infected?) much of Western civilization.

Is an employee who's job is outsourced responsible for this? Nope.

Yes and no. Speaking as someone whose job was outsourced, and am presently unemployed, I can state that I'm not living on the street, nor am I depending on the goodness of others for my support. Unlike many, I prepared for the possibility. IOW, I was practicing personal responsibility.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Cainehill:
When there are people, who are capable of working, who _refuse_ to work even when offered a job - let them starve.

I am unable to understand how people can feel this way.

Starvation isn't much of an issue in the USA, at least not in urban areas.

Which is why I didn't want to even bring it up in the first place. The social safety net in the U.S. is adequate in most ways.

Again - what world are you living in? The sewage in the river would hurt _everyone_.

As long as you have a nearby river your sewage only hurts people other than yourself. At the very least, universal medical coverage would help to keep people healthy and on the work force.

Who determines the bare minimum? The people who chose to live at the bare minimum?

The bare minimum is the point where a person has enough food to eat without being malnourished, shelter to prevent them from freezing to death, and medical care so that the simple preventable and treatable illnesses can be dealt with. The only one there that's hard to define is the medical care one.

[Cainehill]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:

quote:

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Originally posted by Cainehill:
Oh - so someone who works 60 hours a week, takes good care of his family, looks after his friends, and volunteers to help people in his neighborhood find jobs, become literate, etc, is "a social parasite" because they don't care about the billions of people they don't personally know?

Well, since this person clearly cares about people that he doesn't personally know, I'm not sure what your argument is. He obviously helps people he hasn't met before. Or would this person actually not care at all if a few billion people they haven't met yet suddenly died?

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He's not "caring about people he doesn't personally know" - he's helping people, in his neighborhood, whom he does get to know. Perhaps more importantly, he's helping people who are willing to help themselves.

He's _not_ sending money to Gloria Struthers to feed the starving kids in the Philipines, and he doesn't much care about the well being of the trailer park trash single mother with 8 kids.

You don't have to care about the faceless billions in order to not be a "social parasite". Arguably, anyone with a decent productive job (as opposed to CEOs, politicians, ambulance chasers and used car salesmen) is a productive member of society, paying taxes, providing for their family, and not a social parasite. Even if they don't do a damn thing for the homeless, jobless, spineless, etc.

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:

quote:

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Originally posted by Cainehill:
When there are people, who are capable of working, who _refuse_ to work even when offered a job - let them starve.

I am unable to understand how people can feel this way.

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Which one? The ones refusing to work, or those not caring if the lazy sods die?

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Arryn:
Coincidence, then, that you parrot one of their notions. Bound to happen, alas, since they've influenced (infected?) much of Western civilization.

Or perhaps it's because the notion happens to be correct.

IOW, I was practicing personal responsibility.

Yet you still are not completely responsible for everything that happens in your life. After all, it wasn't your decisions that led to outsourcing.

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
Or perhaps it's because the notion happens to be correct.

Nope. It's a value judgment you (and others) have made. It's not an immutable law of the universe.

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
Which you are doing by refusing to provide proper health care.

No. Perhaps I need that health care for myself. It's my money. Don't they have their own money? If they think it's really that bad, I can lend them some duct tape. Duct tape has worked for me when I couldn't afford to seek medical treatment. They can make it work for them.

Really? Somebody always has to be poor? I wasn't aware that the shortage of resources in the U.S. was so acute that there was not enough food for every person.

You seem to think that resources are unlimited and that everyone can be rich. That is not the case. If everyone were rich, we'd simply have inflation. Some people will always be of below average means. And there's plenty of food....provided you are not picky. Not everyone can afford wine and caviar, but rats are free. Hell, people will pay you to be rid of them.

You aren't nearly as self-supporting as you think you are.

That which I cannot take care of myself, I can pay someone to do it. The key here is that I pay for what I consume: I don't expect a handout. When I didn't have enough money for it, I learned to do without. If I become sick, I can pay a doctor. If I can't afford to pay a doctor, I'll learn to do without. What an amazing concept.

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
And it still would be. Providing a hard bottom that people cannot fall below that allows them to avoid starving and suffering from poor health does not mean that they are experiencing a life of luxury.

Being starving and suffering is a great motivation to succeed. I certainly wouldn't have been motivated to succeed in life if I thought living out of a jeep between jobs was all that. Some people, however, seem to want nothing more than that: For them, if this is provided FOR FREE, they have no incentive to do anything more than be a leech. Since they have no income, they won't be paying anything back. Why support this?

A hard bottom is a cardboard box in an alley and a tasty "you kill it, you grill it" rat-on-a-stick. The means to survive always exists. People have survived for millenia. They can do so again.

I never said that society owes you success. I said that society owes you protection from starving to death and abject poverty.

No, society owes you the opportunity to avoid starving to death and remaining in abject poverty. If you choose to simply be a leech, you deserve to starve and remain in poverty.

I can never understand why basic medical care isn't considered to be something that society should pay for. After all, people don't seem to have a problem with the sewer system being paid for by taxes, and that's the single most important part of your health care.

That's because without a sewer system, somebody, upstream, is dumping his crap into my drinking water. And I'd be dumping my crap into somebody downstream. I think it's worth paying up to avoid dealing with this.

After all, you as an individual wouldn't be hurt by dumping your own personal sewage into the river.

No, but if you don't support the sewer system, you're doing this dumping at somebody else's expense....and somebody else is dumping at yours.

You would pay for them because you want better than the bare minimum.

The minimum is a cardboard box in an alley. This costs you nothing. Somebody will surely have a cardboard box they'll let you have. If you're lucky, you might even be arrested for vagrancy and get to spend the night in a cell with Bubba.

Originally posted by LintMan:
Norfleet, are you a R.A. Heinlein fan by any chance? If you haven't read any of his SF, you might want to check him out.

I've read some of his work, and rather enjoyed it. My memory is slightly fuzzy about details at the moment, so don't ask me for specifics.

Originally posted by Cainehill:
Lots of people who have been homeless and jobless can tell you that it's not hard to avoid starvation in this country. Soup kitchens, church Groups giving out food - even scavenging behind restaurants.

Starvation isn't much of an issue in the USA, at least not in urban areas.

It's hard to starve in ANY urban area. Between particularly bad jobs, I often didn't have any cash on me. I couldn't afford to pay food, and even if I could, I certainly couldn't afford to be noticed. You know what? I learned to do without. Have I mentioned how tasty rats are?

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
If it actually encouraged people to become "leeches", as you've called them, then the majority of the industrialized world would be populated by these leeches. The reality of the situation is that the vast majority of people _want_ to make it by themselves, and would rather that other people don't support them too much.

No, that's the excuse that is used to justify the system. These people have family. Friends. Church Groups. Why can't they ask THESE people for help? These people surely care about them. Why can they not get help there?

A person can easily be in such a situation through no fault of their own. A person should be allowed to fail, but this failure shouldn't bring them down to the point where they can't maintain the most basic level of care for themselves.

A little bit of suffering and hardship builds character. It *IS* their fault, for not having anticipated this, and not being willing to DEAL.

quote:

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Why should I reward the poor decisions they made in their lives? Example: if someone decides to have 8 children, and cannot afford to feed/clothe/care for more than 1, why must I (in the form of taxes) pay for their stupidity/irresponsibility?

Why isn't compassion for them reason enough?

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Because compassion costs money. I have a finite amount of money. Therefore, I have a finite amount of compassion. My compassion is first reserved for those people who I think are genuinely deserving of my help. People who I think will someday perhaps be able to pay me BACK. Not people who are complete idiots and will spend my money on digging themselves a deeper hole.

Everyone else is already burdened by these people, so moving it into a more visible place would probably be a good thing.

There you have it. Let them suffer in public. Let them serve as an object lesson to others. When they die horribly in a pool of their own blood and vomit, I'll gladly pony up the tax money to hire someone to have their stinking carcass removed.

[Cainehill]

Oh, wait a second! I've been out of work for over four months (laid off, Marine and programmer always employed for 22 years straight), I should be supporting Graeme and the welfare state! Yes! Someone should subsidize me for life - after all, if I can't find another tech job, god forbid I should get a job as a rentacop, prison guard, short order cook, or anything else that would be beneath me - it'd be a waste of my talents!

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Cainehill:
He's not "caring about people he doesn't personally know" - he's helping people, in his neighborhood, whom he does get to know. Perhaps more importantly, he's helping people who are willing to help themselves.

Then good for him. This just means that he cares more for those people he knows than doesn't know. This is normal.

He's _not_ sending money to Gloria Struthers to feed the starving kids in the Philipines, and he doesn't much care about the well being of the trailer park trash single mother with 8 kids.

And he wouldn't be upset if they were murdered in their sleep? After all, Norfleet's argument would be that they deserved to be killed, since they must not have protected themselves well enough.

You don't have to care about the faceless billions in order to not be a "social parasite".

No, you don't need to care very much about them. Since Norfleet has demonstrated that his fictional characterization of himself is a parasite for many other reasons, this is simply another demonstration of that.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Arryn:
Nope. It's a value judgment you (and others) have made. It's not an immutable law of the universe.

It is not a value judgement at all. No person can be completely responsible for their life because no person can completely control all factors that influence their life. You might argue about the relative amounts of responsibility, but there are _always_ factors that cannot be controlled, even if their effects are not significant enough to be measured.