Does poverty lead to giving up freedoms for care?
ChuckyBob's 11mar16 comment on the subject of
voting privilege is astute, in my estimation. . Please
give it your consideration:::
When I was much younger I lived for several years in the barrios of Chicago amongst some very humble and economically challenged folks. I gained a good understanding of the draw of dictocratic communism. The lower you are on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, the more appealing it seems to have someone say "Surrender all your rights to me and I will supply all your needs." However, as you climb the ladder of the Hierarchy, you can see that dictocratic communism is very shortsighted and suboptimizes the human experience. So, it is to the benefit of the major parties, both Demoratans and Republicrats to have a substantial "lower" class to whom they can promise "Surrender all your rights to me and I will supply all your needs." because that lower class will vote to keep them in power.
-- j
voting privilege is astute, in my estimation. . Please
give it your consideration:::
When I was much younger I lived for several years in the barrios of Chicago amongst some very humble and economically challenged folks. I gained a good understanding of the draw of dictocratic communism. The lower you are on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, the more appealing it seems to have someone say "Surrender all your rights to me and I will supply all your needs." However, as you climb the ladder of the Hierarchy, you can see that dictocratic communism is very shortsighted and suboptimizes the human experience. So, it is to the benefit of the major parties, both Demoratans and Republicrats to have a substantial "lower" class to whom they can promise "Surrender all your rights to me and I will supply all your needs." because that lower class will vote to keep them in power.
-- j
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." H. L. Mencken
Now, with the incorporation of Cloward and Piven into political strategy, the seekers of power have the means of engineering society to their benefit and the "poor" be damned.
Jan, seeks a point for use of present subjunctive
freedoms ... it's a good thing that I wanted to go into the
military (usaf, that is) and y'all taxpayers helped me in
school, so Thanks-Thanks-Thanks! . I wanted to be
free from mom and dad in the worst way! -- j
p.s. I picked up a 4-year debt to the usaf in the process.
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I made the same choice, of course: traded 4 years of my life to the USAF in return for training in a profession. Win-win.
Jan
I love your insight and care with words, like the
pluperfects and subjunctives! -- j
p.s. I was trained in airplane maintenance, which
harmonizes quite well with real engineering --
the greasy, make-it-work kinda stuff!
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The Gulch is one of the few places that someone else would notice and appreciate such tidbits of grammar.
I find a terrible scarcity of people who both can and are willing to just 'make it work'.
Jan
my first father-in-law, a school-of-hard-knocks machinist,
taught me that "good enough is perfect." . he was the guy
who could remove a car tire from its wheel and install a
new one with a rubber-faced steel hammer. . we patched
things together and kept them going regardless of difficulty
around the "ranch" -- a hundred acres of pastures with
horses, cattle, goats, sheep, guineas, cats, dogs. . there is
something to the pioneer spirit, ingenuity and persistence! -- j
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Jan
To think this way is to deny the reality of true destitution and those that through their own efforts, struggles, and use of their minds climb out of the "lower class", and those that place more value on self reliance, individualism, and liberty than the 'comforts' of paternalism. It as well denies the facts of 'moocher' statists. Such individuals are only low on "Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs" by volition and living for today and to a large portion, mental defect.
It's not "dictocratic communism" that draws them nor a conspiracy by political parties to create them--it's immaturity, a total inability to grasp cause and effect, and a biological defect of failure of the anterior prefrontal cortex to fully develop that results in the lack of normal ability to grasp the benefits of delayed gratification. It's true enough that politics has learned how to influence such people, but they exist in the first place because we let them steal and beg from us. It may well be that we suffer from a larger mental defect of 'empathy' and politics has learned how to influence that defect to arrive at altruism.
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I don't think you got what I was trying to communicate. I did not grow up in the barrio. I grew up in a middle-class mostly white suburb. I spent a couple of years doing volunteer work in the barrio and also lived there. It was a unique experience.
I heard gun shots occasionally. I heard someone being murdered. My life was threatened a few times, mostly by drunks. But we got along ok with the gangs. They considered us to be neutral.
Many of the people I knew there were illegal. In those days there were not so many handouts for illegals. So it was either work or starve. That led me to come to the understanding that to some extent life is a lottery. I was born to a well educated middle-class family. Therefore, it was natural for me to become well educated and reap those benefits. The illegals I knew were born into uneducated poverty. Therefore, they set their sights lower.
However, since that time my thinking has evolved to understand that no matter what your situation, you need to make the best of it and continually strive to better yourself.
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Thank You! -- j
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Poverty is not exclusive to 'moochers', immigrants, or 'life's lottery' nor is it a permanent condition of life, like size or freckles. Going through your 6th birthday with 3 younger brothers and an expecting widowed mother soon to deliver your 4th brother, living in a 2 room cabin without insulation and with a shed added as the kitchen, water from a hand drawn well, an outhouse, and going on with life in the Ozark Mountains--no support from anyone except a milk cow and once a year calf and piglet to raise and butcher from an uncle and a 1/2 acre garden spot from a neighbor, income only what was earned from seamstress work by your mother, what you could earn from gathering wild foods and trapping, odd jobs from farmers, and a paper route--then eventually a MSEE degree and a year into a Phd Degree while moving into industry with work throughout the Western US up to Project Mgr of a $67 million (1980 $'s) project, then establishing and operating an Engineering & Construction Co. in gold, moly, and coal mining, paper & pulp, oil & gas, co-generation, printer manufacturing, and other related and similar industry.
All of that with 'volunteers', Churches, and do-gooders trying to split up the family, try to convince that being 'under privileged', 'lower class', 'economically challenged folks' like us had to accept our situation and let our 'betters' 'show us how' to be their mechanics, or carpenters, or even preachers and fit into society and better ourselves.
I don't say or reveal any of that for recognition, critique, or empathy nor is my story unique--only to attempt to illustrate to you and others that poverty, barrios, privilege, and lower class has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with giving up rights or accepting or searching for life as a 'moocher'. There are many poor people that have principles and refuse 'mooching' and at the same time, many wealthy, privileged people that 'mooch'. It's stupidity, immaturity, inability to understand cause and effect, laziness, and mental defect. The one thing I agree with you on is "either work or starve".
When a person has adversity they can either decide to be a victim, or a success. You obviously had an innate desire to succeed, or a good role model, or both and decided to succeed. I think that is great and you can, in turn, inspire others. There are, however, many who do not have your desire, or role model, and they elect to turn the smallest adversity into a life of victimhood.
I was just saying that whole Horatio Alger plot line would be a good thing to instill in many of these kids who don't have your vision and drive.
I could also go through my list of challenges and failures that would indicate that I never should have been able to get educated, or become financially independent, but suffice it to say, I had some good role models and opted top be a success rather than a victim.
where self-actualizing people go nuts over houses and
friends and food and clothing. . my wife and I are at
that level and wear scruffy clothes, old shoes, and
we eat freezer food with weird friends. . it's all skewed-up! -- j
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purt-near take care of things around here, at least
those which I want to take care of. . and a friend's son
helps too -- he's a self-sufficient mechanic and a
wonderful guy, so he fits right in around here! -- j
.
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everyone like I treated my best friend, I could be
considered a stupid character! -- j
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everyone like I treated my best friend, I could be
considered a stupid character! -- j
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I had Hope. Because of that, all the experience did was to bomb-proof me to being afraid of poverty. (Did you know that you can use fresh-cut walnut leaves as an environmental insecticide?)
So the message must include the sense, "You are doomed. There is nothing you can do to improve your lot."
Jan
to give them hope for the future -- even if it's "only" after death?
there is an entire thread in this thought string also, Jan!
when I was in high school, the "guidance counselor,"
a doughty standoffish prune of a person, told me that
I "had potential." . she didn't dare say that I had a high
IQ score, but those words puzzled me for decades
until I took a mensa test and thought to ask for the results
from that high school. . then, Mrs. N. H's comment
made sense. . she was just looking at numbers on a page.
but it gave me hope,,, in a sense. -- j
.
Jan
Jan
Another case of 'some things being more equal than others'. (And she was right in her observation.)
Jan
whatever sense you have. . horsepower without
traction is just noise! -- j
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Having been there, done that I know that when you're poor the appeal of being taken care of is as seductive as opium. I came very close to the seduction of my principles after having two kids whom I was crazy about but unable to give them everything I wanted to. The support of the Randian principals sustained me enough to get me past the "easy" way. It was a close one, though.
I think poor people are not street smart at all when they actually think that some overlord will just take care of them out of the goodness of his heart. Thats just NOT human nature.
to take in slaves whom they care for, in exchange
for their votes. . whatta deal that is! -- j
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they would be far better off -- they just can't see it,
with their recent experience and heavy negative
propaganda from the media. -- j
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Those on the welfare system are provided medical care
There is no requirement to vote one way or the other and at present, except for the lack of candidates other than those 'of the left' no way to stop anyone from voting as they wish to vote.
It would appear there is a gain not a loss as the rest of us in the working class have to pay and and pay and pay.
I have concluded its the idea that care must be provided to anyone by any ER that opens its doors, and the fact that a lot of them have no money. This starves the ERs of cash to operate, so they resort to having minimal staff and facilities . Its a very bad situation. There should be private ERs that take only people who can afford the care- maybe on some sort of membership basis.
When the patient comes in, a triage nurse quickly sorts the patients into ER level illness vs UC level of illness. There needs to be an immediately adjacent Urgent Care (ie attached to the anteroom of the triage section) – but it does not even need to be run by the same people as run the hospital. Shunt the less ill individuals off to the UC and keep them from filling up the ER.
This takes into account what no other system does: The fact that when you have something wrong you often do not ‘know’ how serious it is. Is that pain just gas? Too many oysters? Salmonella? Bleeding ulcer? Heart attack? Right now, we are forcing the decision to ‘go to the ER in case it is really bad’. This is a correct response to an unknown that could be life-threatening. We should validate that Darwinian perception and make it an advantage instead of a liability.
Jan
the urgent care section which Jan is describing. . if
they did, the ER would be handling fewer "patients." -- j
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Jan, had longer reply but it was wiped!
to me last friday, and it was a good one! -- j
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I use a laptop with a touchpad. This list is set to default to 'select and delete' when I accidentally contact the touchpad when typing. This would be OK if the Edit Undo worked, but it does not. Sigh. I try to discipline myself to pre-typing in a Word doc and then Pasting to this site...but sometimes the Muse takes me unaware and then it is chancy. (I occasionally respond to that by putting a post-it note over the touchpad.) It is frustrating when it happens.
Jan
The ER should be for that: emergencies.
What I am all in favor of is a plethora of minor emergency centers where the doctors there can call for an ambulance if they find something worthy of an emergency need.
I do think, however, that doctors should be compensated for the care they give. To expect them to provide services and not to get paid is nothing more than slavery, and I can not support any who believe they have a right to get something for nothing.
Of course one has less choices when one has less money. This is true whether it is healthcare or a car or shoes that one is seeking. Some choices are beyond one's financial means. But just as in the case of shoes a free market produces healthcare options at all price levels possible and without the overhead of armies of bureaucrats and enforcers of income collection.
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